It's fixed!

Digest version of the last few weeks:

--After many, many hours our laptop is back in business. Hooray!

--We are in the process of working towards closing on the new house. All offers/counteroffers have been accepted and we're waiting on financing paperwork. We're anticipating closing this month but we still don't know when we'll move in. There are a few things (like new plumbing!) that have to happen before we can take occupancy, although we'll have possession at closing.

--We have a Christmas tree! It's got lights on it but no ornaments. The boys love it and think it's quite amazing. I think it's quite amazing that we managed to find one that fit in our house. ;) We went to Eckerts and cut a tree down. The boys even helped with the saw when Mark was cutting it down. Unfortunately, the camera stayed at home.

--We're still gathering paperwork for the adoption. As always with Ukraine, it seems like absolute never-ending paperwork. The nice thing is that it's familiar. I already know where to send off for everything and how to get all of the documents notarized and apostilled, so that's definitely a plus.

--We had our last band concert on Sunday. It was a great concert. The boys were there with Aley (our babysitter) and did really well. They got a little restless by the end, but that's to be expected. Don't worry, we still made them sit through the choir concert afterwards. Nothing like training them to sit for long periods of time. LOL

--Zhenya is going through a rude phase which is hopefully in the process of getting squashed. He has become very demanding and just downright rude. Not a good character trait. I'm not sure if it's happening at school but we're certainly seeing it at home.

--Dima's having a really hard time right now. I'm guessing it's some of that "one-year-home" emotional turmoil that other adoptive parents have seen. He's having a lot of emotional outbursts, which in some ways is really good. When we first got home he would just shut down. It's encouraging now that he is comfortable enough to be able to share his feelings. We just need to work on sharing them appropriately. ;) I've been keeping an eye out to see if any of this is related to Christmas, but it really doesn't seem to be. It seems to be just more of him wrestling with his emotions. We're tightening his reins a bit to give him a little more security and help with consistency for him. Please be in prayer for comfort for him, and strength to deal with the inner turmoil he's got. He's only 6, but he's gone through emotional changes that most people don't deal with until college or later and he just doesn't know how to process all of this.