Introducing...

Mayana Catherine John

Nickname: Maya

Born: November 26, 2004

&

Tristan Ilya John

Born: November 12, 2005

We are so excited to share our happy news with all of you! Thanks to you all for being so patient!
Now, let me tell you about when we first met. We got to the orphanage about 5pm on Tuesday. They took us into a large room that they use for special occasions. It had a terribly out-of-tune piano, lots of tiny chairs, plants all along one wall and toys all along another wall.


We made sure that they knew we wanted to go over the children's medicals before we met the children. So, our agency rep got their medical records and started to translate while I took notes. We got about halfway through and all of a sudden one of the caregivers appears in the doorway with our handsome little boy. His Russian name was Ilya, but they called him Ilyush as a nickname. We decided to keep his given name as a middle name to honor his birth country heritage. Anyways, Tristan Ilya does not even hesitate in the doorway, he lets go of his caregiver's hand and beelines for his new Daddy. Then he gives Jeff the tightest hug ever and does not let go. He does not say anything or smile the entire first day, but he got very excited about the toys we brought to play with and as soon as we pulled out a few little baby treats we brought, he jumped up from what he was doing and gobbled them up. His favorite things to do were play with cars and trucks, do a shape sorter and the all-time favorite was to play with the crayon box, dumping it out and putting all the crayons back in.


They brought Maya in just a few minutes later. (Her Russian name was Yana and they called her Yanichka. Mayana is pronounced "my Yana.") She looks at the three of us in the room and walks right over to me, hugs me and kisses me right on the mouth. She was also excited about the toys and treats. Her favorite activities were coloring in the coloring books we brought, dancing to the music from a little toy piano we brought, playing catch with a rubber ball and most of all, playing with dolls. We sang "3 little monkeys jumping on the bed" with them. They both were fascinated, and Maya started doing the actions. We also did Ring-Around-the-Rosie, but neither of them would fall down. :) Tomorrow we are going to try Play-Doh with them.


Okay, so now it is 1 in the morning. We are so off-schedule here! We went to dinner to celebrate at a nice restaurant called Vremya Yest that someone had recommended. When we headed off to find the restaurant, we realized it was already 9pm! The food was delicious, filet mignon and stuffed salmon! We also ordered Homemade Lemonade to drink and were surprised to find that it had the taste of fresh mint in it. It was surprisingly good.