"Arrived Abroad"

That's right, our dossier is in Ukraine! Even better, it has cleared customs. I'm hoping that means it will be delivered today; if not, hopefully tomorrow.

Of course, last night I got word that we may need to redo our employment letter...no joke. But hey, what is an international adoption if not the opportunity to drive other people crazy with our bizarre requests and kill lots of trees in the process?? :) :)

Mark has been steadily working on the new house. He has almost completed all of the drywall and has taped and mudded a good portion of it. We're getting really close to being able to move--except we still don't have a toilet. Actually, that's not true. We do have a toilet. It's just sitting in one of the bedrooms. It is a requirement of mine that we have a toilet installed before we move in (I think the city might require that too). ;) As soon as the drywall behind the toilets is up, taped, mudded, and painted, we can reinstall the toilet and hopefully be ready to move in.

Oh, and some updates from our "problem" list a few weeks ago:
--we have our bolt back and Mark fixed the pocket doors
--the plumbing is almost complete, we think**
--all of the radiators (minus the 4 that need to be replaced) are working; the 4 that need replacement won't be replaced until later this year (so HVAC is complete right now)
--the electricity is back on and nearly complete; there's some finish work to be done but the drywall needs to be finished first
--the fences are finished except for the gates that Mark will be building tomorrow
--our first gas bill was not nearly as astronomical as I thought it might be :) :)

**The reason we think the plumbing is almost complete is because we don't have anything hooked up to be able to check it. The water lines in the kitchen do have water coming to them, and they seem to have good water pressure. We also water to an outside spigot. Other than that, there are a couple of things that need to be fixed before the plumbing is complete, but we're getting close.