The Opera house.
Leo, Vasya and Alex
Making cereal necklace
Sasha and one of the many Vica's watching Harry Potter
Look at the size of this car!

Matthew's Director and us

This lady was one of Matthew's caregivers, I have pictures of her from last time. These

women were sooooo excited to see him, not many come back for a visit.

The outside of his orphanage
Matthew and Pasha-will someone please adopt him and his siblings before I have to come back for them!

Wednesday, October 15 -Day 51

Today we visited Matthew's orphanage. Julia sent a taxi to pick us up at nine, then we picked her up and headed to No. 3 Baby House. It took a while to get there and Matthew slept the entire way. We were able to tell the taxi driver how to get there-we still remembered after almost three years. They remodeled the office, it is really nice. When the secretary told the Director Olga (whose last name I can't spell or pronounce) she came out and Matthew walked up to her and gave her the box of chocolates we bought for her. She remembered him well, she said he has grown. Julia translated for us and told Olga the story of why we are here this time. She explained about Vasya and Sasha and we showed her pictures. She was trying hard not to cry, she was very happy for all of us. She told all sorts of people who were nearby, and several of Matthew's caregivers came in to see him. They said he looks like me and seems very attached to us. We had Matthew's Ukrainian passport with us to show them what he looked like when he left no.3. We also gave the Director a small gift and a picture of Matthew from this summer. We have sent several packages of clothes and toys with pictures of Matthew through http://www.life2orphans.org/ and she thanked us for them. Then one of the ladies brought in a large remote control car for Matthew. He was in awe, not only is it big and remote controled but it also plays music and bumps up and down to the music and the top opens and all sorts of lights flash.

He said "I know Cabub and Ben will be cited when they see this!" Translation "I know Caleb and Ben (my nephews) will be excited when they see this car!" Matthew's group --the kids who were in his group are now the oldest at the baby house,they were at the beach so we didn't see them. After this year they will move to no.9 where Sasha is. We told Olga that we had recognized some of the kids at no.9 from when we adopted Matthew. She said that most of the ones who graduated no.3 and moved to no.9 are HIV positive. I knew that is where HIV kids went to because the care is so good, plus no. 9 is in the government's experiment to treat the entire child-mind, body and soul- so they get good care. We did see a few 2 year olds-some of them were wearing the clothes I had sent over.

After we left no.3 we walked to the McDonald's near the orphanage. We spent lots of time there when we were adopting Matthew, so we had lunch there with Julia. She is a wonderful translator and she and her husband have great hearts for the orphans of Ukraine-especially the teenagers and handicapped. They could use lots of help if any of you want to donate.

www.youthofukraine.blogspot.com
They work with a family in Omaha, NE.

We had good visits at both boys today. Vasya has a cold but he played with Matthew and even made a cereal necklace for us to take to Sasha. His group was making necklaces out of fruit loops. Sasha was excited to get it. We had Sasha call Vasya and talk to him. I think they are excited to see each other- hopefully on friday all three boys will be together for the first time. The two older ones haven't seen each other for quite a while either.

Tomorrow night we are going to the opera house to see "The Sleeping Beauty ballet." I'm not much for ballet but the Opera house was being redone when we were here last and I am told that is the most beautiful in all of Europe. Cindy Wolff has agreed to be tortured tomorrow and watch Matthew so Jeff, Michelle and I and maybe David (her husband)can go.