Robin here. Well, today was the eleventh day of bonding – and the fifth day since I’ve been able to wash my hair! In preparation for the upcoming freeze, the city has been readying the hot water pipes that carry heat to all of Kazakhstan. Unfortunately for us, the two big holes in the streets around our neighborhood apparently feed the hot water to our apartment. It’s not unusual to turn on the faucet and find cold water where hot should be. But, we don’t even have water. Turn on the hot water faucet and we get nothing.

Each day for the past five days I have been telling myself that surely “tomorrow” I will have hot water with which to shampoo my hair – and each day my hopes are dashed. So, since tomorrow is Sunday and we are not going to the orphanage, I will spend an hour heating up water on the stove in order to mix it with cold water and try to shampoo and rinse my hair with a coffee cup.

You will notice that I am missing from all but one of today’s pictures. As if my hair wasn’t already a disaster, Kristina decided to create a new do for me today! So, I will swallow my pride and allow one picture to be posted with my youngest daughter.

Today’s visit was a good one, with lots of ball tossing, trampoline jumping and hide and seek playing. We were also introduced today to a yellow, stuffed rabbit that matched Kristina’s yellow dress. It would sing a short little song when its stomach was squeezed and Kristina knew the lyrics so well that she would accompany the rabbit in song. She was just cute as a button singing in her high pitched little voice as she would bob her head to the rhythm of the music. She was so cute today that it took our combined wills to not kiss and hug her endlessly!

Kristina is slowly beginning to accept physical affection and we dare not overdo it, even though most of the time we would love to just eat her up. And, not to be forgotten -- at one point today an alarmed Kristina called to her Papa to come and stomp on a spider she had spotted on the floor by the window. This, I believe was Greg’s first Papa in Shining Armor moment.

We stopped at a Pizza place with Igor on our way home from the orphanage today and then stopped by a store where Greg was able to buy four colorful nub-tipped balls that are identical to the balls we play with at the orphanage. I also bought a darling blue and white soft, soft bathrobe for Kristina for when she is finally with us – hopefully, right after court. This was the first of what will be many clothing purchases for our little girl. Ownership is not something an orphan experiences as a rule and I can still remember how in awe Julia was when she understood that all of the clothes we bought were for her and her alone.

Tomorrow (Sunday) will be a day of rest for us. We’ll try to sleep late and just hang out, as we did last week. Igor, our interpreter/driver told us today that Yuri, the orphanage director told him to hire a driver on our court day so he would be able to partake in the lunch and toasts that he (Yuri) plans for us after court. I think it is tradition to eat and drink at the orphanage with total abandon on adoption day and even if it kills us, we plan on savoring every minute of the celebration!

You will notice in today’s pictures that there is a bottle of Mr. Proper aka Mr. Clean. The English word ‘clean’ apparently translates to ‘proper’ in the Russian language. It’s nice to know that I am using a respectable product to clean the floors.