Tuesday: Bonding

My hot wife posted about our trip better than I ever could. Here is an excerpt from our second day with our sons. I was tearing up reading it....

The next morning we left the hotel at 7am for the orphanage. We were able to spend 6hrs there! It was wonderful!! When they brought "S" in , he only cried for 5 minutes and "M" was so excited to see his Papa! I brought snacks that time so we were able to create a sort of bond with Chris and "S" with the food. By the end of the afternoon, "S" was sitting in Chris' lap with "M" and I took some great pictures. I was also able to bond more with "M". We played with the cars we brought him and I gave him lots of hugs and kisses. He hugged me back and it felt amazing! He loved the snacks we brought so I taught him the sign for more and within 2 seconds he was signing and saying "more"! I know I'm biased but he is so smart. He learns so quickly and loves to take things apart and put them back together again. I was able to trace both of the boys hands and feet and find out what sizes they currently wear. I found out that "S" is ticklish on his feet. So of course I tickled him to hear his cute little laugh and see his sweet smile. He's a very shy and quiet little guy so to bring him out of that was kind of a relief.
Soon it was time to leave. The nanny came to get "S" and he was ready to go, it was his nap time and he was very tired. It was very comforting to see that he loved his nanny. Both of the boys, it gave us so much peace when we had to leave. When the nannies came to get "M" it was a very sad sight. He cried and grabbed onto Chris and said "niet, niet Papa!" It was heartbreaking . Our sweet little boy didn't want to leave his Papa. We were crying, the nannies were crying, it was not pretty. I really didn't expect that he would bond with us so quickly. I kissed him and told him in broken Russian that we'd be back soon and that we loved him very much. His nannies were able to talk him into going with them and he looked back at us with a tear-stained face, smiled and said "paca" (bye). I cry when I think about it.
We left the orphanage and went to have lunch. Then we went to a souvenir shop and a chocolate store. The next morning we left the hotel at 4:30am to catch our 7am flight to Moscow. We had a little bit of a layover in Moscow so we ate there. Our flight was filled with families coming home with their adopted children and also with families returning home from their first trip, like us. It was so cool to see the new families and think that in a few months it would be us returning with our sons.
It was so surreal being there after waiting so long. I kept thinking that is wasn't real, that we weren't really in Russia. I couldn't wrap my brain around how far we were from home. Now that we're home, it's almost like we were never really there. If I didn't have pictures and videos to prove it, I probably wouldn't believe we were ever there.