We know how to party

I know I'm going out of order, but here are some pictures from mid-March. First up is Miss G in her snowsuit, and hat, and 47 other layers. Trust me when I say there is a baby in there! Which you can see from the second photo where, like an onion, we peel back the layers.

The All Blacks photo is a nice family portrait from another event we went to - everyone is representing their Kiwi heritage, except for the photographer, who is a Kiwi-in-spirit only.
The rest of the series is from a birthday party for our friend's 2 year old. We had the girls all dressed up. Miss G was wearing the blue dress that S wore when she met Nana Mayhew 2 years ago. I don't have a great photo of it here, since she decided to take a nap in the middle of the party and the dress is covered. Don't worry, though, we went to a SECOND birthday party that day (for our cousin) and there are some dress pics there. What you can't see in this photo is that the crib is right next to a playroom with 20 kids in it. It always amazes me how kids can sleep through anything...

We have such an active social life, you have no idea. It's one Cars-jungle-Dora-themed party after another. The circuit is grueling, you know, as evidenced by the photo below. But we soldier through life, one cupcake at a time.

Swim Fishies!

As promised, here are photos of our Saturday morning outings to "Nemo" which is located in the local polyclinic around the corner- here's the pool, which is a maximum of 4 ft deep. The man who runs it is very nice, and even offered to take photos of S and I swimming, but since my new, stylish suit hadn't arrived, I thought I would spare you all. These aren't really "classes" since the theory here is that you can't teach kids per se until they are 4. However, the instructor provides individual suggestions, and it seems to work pretty well (especially for $6 an hour versus the swanky "classes" that are $30/hour and you aren't even allowed in the pool area with your child if you're not a "member" of the elite hotel pool organization.) We go with our friends, who have a 3 and a 2 year old. We practice bubbles and chase down toys, and do it all in a mix of Russian and English. There is a baby there who is 3 months old, so little G should be starting soon. However, we are delayed in that since neither Aaron nor the baby have their "spravki." This is a requirement of all pools I've ever been to in the former Soviet Union. It is a medical certificate that states that you don't have some terrible communicable disease that you could spread through pool water - like leprosy? I don't know. My only issue with the process is that you do it once - what if you catch some funky disease 6 months later? No protection for the rest of us in the pool. Oh, and swim caps are necessary - choice of cat or fish - we went with red cat, which I think is quite striking.

And here is our fearless swimmer, ready to tackle the pool - swim cap? Check. Strawberry swimsuit? Check. Uncle Ellis and Paul-provided shoes, since the floor has hot-water pipes underneath and is about 1,000 degrees? Check. Interest in going out in the pool beyond the steps? Not as much... There's always next time!

Krakow Scenes

We obviously saw a lot of beautiful architecture, judging by how long it's taking to upload everything here! To tell you the truth, we had ambitious plans to do everything that Aaron did on his "honeymoon" here in 2006 with his friend Mark, but the salt mine, for example, involves walking down 35 flights of steps... before the tour starts. I didn't think the toddler/infant combo was going to do that.

But it was nice to go to the mall, get M a haircut, just walk around the city. We don't do it much in Kyiv, since we're not really in the best walking district. And S loved all of the attention. So we went to a foreign country to do a lot of things we could do here, except that there was in the EU, so it was a little bit cleaner, a little more orderly and a little newer - and possibly a little less corrupt!















It was Victory Day (maybe not for the Poles, who then entered decades of Soviet rule) on May 9, May 8 in Poland, and being the 65th anniversary of the end of WWII it was a big deal in Ukraine. A little bit of a deal in Krakow, hence the banners.

Walking in Krakow

Krakow! Holy Cow!

We took a weekend jaunt across the border to Krakow, thanks to low-cost airline WizzAir. Buying tickets was a bit of a drama, as a bank request from Ukraine (land of cyber crime) triggers your credit card's fraud department. And when I called to unblock the cards, it turned out that someone had actually hacked one of our Visa cards! Now what kind of stupid criminal steals a card number to sign up for Chemistry.com? Where you have to enter personal information. I mean, really.

Anyway, we can fly to Kratowice airport, which is about an hour and a half by car from Krakow proper. We rented an apartment in the Jewish district - a really nice location and once again it proved that VRBO.com is a great website. For $100 a night - the same as a hotel - we got a kitchen and the care of the apartment owner's parents! You can see the apartment in the photos - the big comfy beds. And they had internet, so a certain teenager was pleased.

The city looked a lot like our trip to Lviv - which was only about 100 miles west, but a world away. As M said - this is a real country, they have more than one chain restaurant. So yes, mom, we did eat at KFC and even bought Subway sandwiches for the flight home on Monday night. Things you wouldn't think twice about at home are a real treat abroad.

Krakow is centered around the Stare Misto - the old city. We stayed just outside, but to walk end to end takes about 45 minutes, so we saw quite a lot. I'll talk about the trip to Auschwitz separately, but we spent a lot of time on the main square by the Cloth Hall. We saw Wawel Castle - where the Polish President who was killed in the tragic plane crash last month was just buried. Due to an oversight by our tour guide (me) the Royal Tombs were closed when we went on Monday. But we saw the main building, and it was sunny and warm.

The photos to the left at the Main Square.

In fact, we missed a lot on the trip, I was tired and it's hard to travel with 3 kids, especially when they don't have set schedules. I was very grumpy when I had to nurse while actually walking the streets of a strange city. And it did rain on and off most of the time, but I was actually smart enough to bring raincoats for everyone and an umbrella, and we bought another when we were there - as I was buying it an older Polish man came up and said something we didn't understand, but I did get the words girl and healthy, so I think he approved of us protecting the kids from the evil cold-inducing rain.

Girls will be girls

Despite my best endeavors, we have begun the Princess phase. OK, I am partly to blame, but only because I have had to explain who the Princesses were on the gifts from friends and relatives. But she has no idea of the story of Cinderella, and doesn't really seem to have a lot of context for royalty in general. Every time she sees a bride - and that happens a lot here on weekends - she points out the princess, so I think, as it should be in all things, that it's...

all about the dress

And here is her little sister, looking on in either admiration or disbelief at big sis' fantastic full-on Cinderella styling. Don't you worry, little one, they're called hand-me-downs!

What do you do with kids in Kyiv?

I'm glad you asked me that question. This place has a booming social life for the wee set. (Not so much for the teens. As you saw from recent posts, M chose to stay home and play video games rather than come to Odesa. We figure he's old enough,and there isn't anything for him to do in terms of getting in trouble. Our biggest fear was that he'd starve to death, but since we were only gone two days....)

Anyway, back to the toddler scene. Here is one example - the culinary stylings of our neighbor's birthday party for the 2 year old - "Circus and Cocktails" theme. The mom is 7 months pregnant (another girl, just like us) and somehow she managed to do all of this. I reassure my ego with the fact that she doesn't work. (You'll see the little girl in the bouncy castle down below.) To this day, S asks me if I'll make her a tiger cupcake. Good luck with that, kid. Maybe I should be devious and tell her that Aunty Lisa will make her tiger cupcakes - after all, she's the crafty one. (Sorry, Lisa!)

We went to lunch with some other families, and the restaurant had a full-blown play area out back. Pirate ship, sheep and horses, and while we were eating they set up a bouncy castle. S loved it! We have video of her laughing so hard she can barely breathe.

On an interesting side note, we left that party to have dinner with a friend of Aaron's who works for the Finnish Embassy. We all (including S) had our first taste of reindeer, and we all loved it. Who knew the little one would enjoy reindeer and ligonberry sauce. Thank heavens she's not old enough to make the connection to Santa's helpers...

Belhorod-Dnistrovsky Castle

One of the more "famous" sights near Odesa is the Belhorod-Dnistrovsky castle complex. With ruins that date back to at least the 9th century, it is a true architectural monument. In true local fashion, however, nothing is cordoned off and you can climb all over it. (In fairness much of it was renovated in the 80s and 90s so you're not actually climbing on the oldest portions. And the photo above is of the excavated 9th century ruins, which are still under active investigation. We climbed on the stuff inside the castle.) And so here we are, climbing all over it. Aaron got a lot of funny looks - first they don't use the Baby Bjorn method a lot and second, he's scaling the walls with a newborn. But we're used to being the topic of discussion. An unfortunate side effect of this trip was that for two weeks S would repeat "Someone pee-peed on the castle." This was true - she was poking around in the dungeon areas, yelling "Hello! I'm S!" and we told her not to touch a wall where someone had, well, not made it to the toilet.

Getting there has half the fun, as we often like to tease the GPS by trying tofind things near major tourist sights, largely since the damn thing doesn't actually have the site itself programmed in. (Don't get me started!) So we took this little spit of Soviet-constructed land across a giant harbor, through crumbling infrastucture intermixed with nouveau-riche mansions stlye homes, across an old railroad bridge, and into the thriving metropolis of Belhorod-Dnistrovsky. After teaching the kids some new swear words, we navigated the bomb-like potholes and asked some people at a bus station for directions to their castle. (I assumed they only had one.) So, marital crisis averted, we got to the castle, bought a painting, got to see the costumes and "armory" - for around $2 they let you shoot a crossbow or shoot the cannon. Aaron wanted to shoot the cannon until we realized that it was somehow electric and didn't really shoot a cannonball. Oh, well, I'm sure there's someplace here that let's you shoot off live rounds, we just have to keep looking!

So, getting home was the other half of the fun, since the old railroad bridge that we crossed on the way there was raised for a barge on the way back. The line of cars erupted into an impromptu dance party when the drunken folks 4 cars ahead got out and turned up the radio. I just enjoyed the chance to feed the baby, change diapers and run the kids out some more. You have to look on the bright side, right?

Odesa pt 2 - Easter!

Our weekend in Odesa was actually both Orthodox and "Western" Easter, which occur on the same day every few years. So Sunday, although we didn't go to church, we did have an obligatory egg hunt. I put about 5 jellybeans into around 6 eggs, and the rest were empty. Hid them in our little two room apartment and had S search for them. The look on her face when she shook one and realized there were "lollies??" inside was priceless. She had the same look of excitement and surprise all day whenever she shook one, which she did a lot since she was shaking herself from all of the sugar! I tried to get a good photo of the whole group but the basket was in the way. Suffice it to say that I tried - I put G in a bonnet, all the girls wore dresses or skirts, and we went out to brunch.

Little G - not so into the plastic egg hunt concept.

S looks very mature here ordering brunch at the outdoor cafe. This is Deribasovskaya Street, the main walking street. As you can see, at 10 AM on Easter morning, not so many folks. Oh, and it was the night that the time changed, so for many it probably felt like 9 AM on a Sunday, so that's why the rest of Odesa wasn't out - too hungover.

Vegetarians beware! Here are Aaron and S in front of the steak sculpture. I guess you can choose your own cut of beef, or identify its orgins? Despite being a vegetarian myself at one point, it was never out of pity for the cow, so I didn't mind when we ate at "Steakhouse" that night - the beef was exceptional!

Trip to Odessa for Easter- pt. 1

So we set out on an epic car trip - it is 490 km to Odesa, around 300 miles. We chose this trip as the highway is one of the best, if not the best, in the whole country. So we were able to drive at the unheard of speed of aroun 90 miles an hour, and make it there in about 5 hours. Even though this was a "short" trip, we gave S a special treat. She was allowed to watch her DVD player on the way. With little G sleeping and S zoned out, it was almost like we had no kids in the car!We stayed in a nice apartment about 3 blocks from the main walking street. When we arrived, mid-afternoon, we walked down to the center of the city. Behind us is the Odesa Opera house - beautiful, isn't it? And in the foreground, the object of much curiousity by Ukrainians, the "foreigners double-stroller." Thankfully there were lots of tourists, so we didn't stand out too much more than anyone else. And below Dady and his girls in the city park, enjoying the realtively warm weather. S is standing on the "Potemkin Steps" which, for Russophiles, are well-known from Eisenstein's silent movie "The Balltelship Potemkin" in which a baby carriage rolls down them in horrifying slow motion. They were built to create an optical illusion of being grander than they are, and are much wider at the bottom than at the top. They were renamed in 1955 to commemorate the 50th aniversary of the Battleship Potemkin crew's uprising agains the Czar. You can see S is contemplating all of this as she walks up the 192 stairs...OK, so having a little girl you don't notice the gradual change from baby to full-blown diva. Here she is at an outdoor restaurant on Deribasovskaya Street, where one is "seen." Purple star wand in hand, Cinderalla rose-colored glasses, and being fed by her assistant. She's going to be trouble, this one is...

Home with the Children

She has the sweetest temperament I have ever seen in a baby, and that includes her sister. Laughing, smiling, sleeping well, happy to play with you. What a cutie!!

Having 3 kids is a little bit like having 400 kids sometimes. There is an exponential increase in the amount of time it takes to get everyone ready, and there's never time for a breath. Once I get the baby down, the toddler needs love, and the teenager needs to be reminded to a) shower b) do homework or c) clean up after himself. So we are homebound in the evenings, but we do manage to keep busy, and sometimes we get out. Here we are about to head up to the Marine House for G's inaugural visit - S is very happy (complete with cheesy grin) to wear her NEW John Deere pink cowboy boots. I think they are pretty darn style-y!

We also decided to try little G out in an old Exersaucer I bought from someone for about $10. She is still little so can only stand for a minute or two, but apparently it's long enough to be tormented by big sister. I like the big wide eyes as S tells her there is a phone call for her. And here is perhaps not my best look, but I wanted to show that my big girl is now happy to wear barettes, and get dressed up. She finally has enough hair and patience! She doesn't like posing for photos, but she is a ham when the camera is turned off. We've also started doing Saturday swim lessons, but I don't have enough hands to take photos. I'll try to get Aaron to, since babies as young as 3 months can come along, but first both he and the baby need to get their "spravki" - certificates that state they don't have some communicable flesh-eating disease... I'll save that for another post, though.

Lyuda comes to America - Caveat Emptor

Shopping. That is the word I would use to summarize my nanny's visit to the U.S. You name it, she bought it. Even if it already exists in Ukraine for a decent price and at decent quality. Socks? 25 pairs. Sweaters? 15. Dora dolls? 1. And a big thanks to my darling sister for taking her out - the language of shopping apparently trumps any need for a common spoken language.



We went to Quogue for the weekend. She shopped in West Hampton (pricey!) and bought lots of good tchotchke. More importantly, she saw an ocean for the first time in her life. I was glad we could do that for her - it was a beautiful freezing cold misty strong-ocean kind of day - and you really got a sense of power and majesty. I hope she enjoyed it, I know I liked seeing the ocean through the eyes of someone who never has before. And S and G liked playing ball on the deck, since it was too windy and cold for them to stand much of the beach itself.

But as I kept saying to myself, imagine you lived under a Communist system and were given 2 weeks to shop for anything and everything you could ever want. Wouldn't you go a little crazy too?

Valentine's Day

Thank you to my wonderful husband for sending me beautiful and unexpected roses for Valentine's Day (and astrolomeria for my birthday, but no photo here.) He's the best hudband EVER! And I say that even after 5 years of marriage and 3 kids, long distance separation, stressful jobs, tight finance and all of the difficulties that come along with life.

What fun we have had, though, vacations and cuddles and 3 kids... Love you, DLN.

The Rogers Five - Pt 2

What? My cousins are coming? I'm so excited...

We actually got 5 of the 6 grandkids in a photo. I won't say it's a frameable photo, as you can imagine that it wasn't the most receptive audience for posing. You can see above the best I got, and then below the rapid deterioration of cooperation!

The Rogers Five - Pt 1.

As you can imagine, 2 grandparents, 3 kids, 2 spouses, 1 nanny and 5 kids under five proved for an exhilirating, diaper-tear-laughter-bruise-chaos-exasperation-fun filled weekend. I like this photo (of the early birthday party) since you can see all of the kids doing their own thing, and you can see the Transformer cake as well. Poor Lyuda, a bit overwhelmed by our big American family, I think...Cole is such a monkey (and my godson, so he gets a special photo here...)

The babies sussed each other out (one of these kids is bigger than the other!) and you would think Miss G would be intimidated, but Cora is so absolutely darling and even-keeled in her temperament, that there was no conflict. Does she even cry? Miss S liked to play hostess.

The only down side? The cold that passed on to both of my kids, but even that had a silver lining, since the Lufthansa airline strike forced us to push our tickets back a week, so we didn't have to fly with a 2 year old with a high fever and a coughing baby!

Visits with extended family

Cousin Mary Marr and her son Stewart came for literallly and in and out visit to see the kids. They were on their way back to Baltimore. Mary is famous for telling my mother that I have a cousin (Cameron) in Kyiv and putting us together. Cameron had a healthy baby boy on February 3, so what a strange set of coincidences it's all turned out to be!

I'm too tired to be creative

Rather a random smattering of photos from the U.S. and back here. The little G is getting so big already! Here she is on the sheepskin from New Zealand that A bought for our first little girl. Look how tall she is - she's under the chart for weight-to-length, in essence very long and lean. Not for lack of eating, though, she's a little hoover!

And here she is with her Aunty Voo, who attended to us during my period of confinement :-) I'm sure it was an eye-opener into the treasures and travails of early childrearing. How will it affect Aunty Voo's decision to have kids...? Let's not rush it folks!