Hoppy Beerfday to Juu!

Saturday, September 20, 2008 - Artem's 15th birthday! Seems like it was just a year ago when we first saw and met our son! :-)

Today we picked up the boys and gave Artem his choice of where he would like to go eat for his birthday celebration. And to our great surprise he said, "McDonald's!" I don't think I'll eat at another McDonald's back in the States for a long, long time. It was packed as usual and took about 30 minutes or more for everyone to order and get their food. I've never seen a McDonald's busier than this one. Artem ordered a coupe of items including fries but Sasha ordered a Big 'n Tasty, Chicken Wrap, 9 piece McNuggets, Fries and a large Sprite. Of course, he had to chase all of that with a Sundae.

We brought the boys and Austin back to our apartment with Natalie and the boys had fun playing on the computers. Arri had brought Artem's gift from the States which was a Nintendo DS Light. He and Sasha both seemed to enjoy it quite a bit.

After, Arri and Lucinda made a Top Ramen soup and added some other vegetables including peas and we were amazed that none of the boys liked the peas. They all made faces and pulled them out of the soup. Then Arri placed matches on Artem's cake (couldn't find candles) and he blew them out very quickly.

Natalie asked Artem if he had a nice birthday and he said, "Yeah. It was a lot better than my 5th and 6th birthdays."

When she asked him why, he said that everyone in his family was drunk on those birthdays. He didn't really laugh and it gave us a little more insight into what he can remember. It will be really good when he learns english and we can talk to him and Sasha better.

The weather warmed up today and all in all another good day. We've learned that we cannot leave Sumy until early Tuesday morning about 3:00am. We'll drive to Kiev to get their medical work done and if all goes well, we'll get to the embassy to get their Passport work started. If we can't get there by 12:00 noon on Tuesday, we will have to postpone our Thursday flights. Keep us in your prayers that we can all get done on Tuesday.