Today marked the completion of our mandatory 14-day visitation period. Our facilitators submitted the paperwork today and we should have pre-court on Monday. Pre-court is the same as court, but without the prosecutor. The dry run should help ease nerves for the big day which will hopefully be on Wednesday.

Also yesterday evening the babyhouse had a power and water outage. This seems to be quite common in Kazakhstan. We were asked to bring extra diapers this morning for the other kids in the orphanage, so we all brought extra bags in this morning. Supposedly the state doesn't help subsidize diapers so there is always a shortage. I think that might be why kids in TJ's group are "toilet timed." They only wear diapers during naps and overnight. Besides that, they put them on the toilet after meals and snacks.

A photographer also came to the babyhouse today to take TJ's passport photo. TJ did a pretty good job standing still and looking at mama while she did a dance behind the photographer.

This morning we played on the playground (again), another family had left this sand rake behind and TJ loved it. I think he's ready for the beach!



We also bought him this Russian police car, but quickly learned our lesson about needing durable toys for a 2 year old - within minutes he smashed off the roof lights and busted a wheel. Oh well - I'm sure it won't be the first beat up toy.



The days are going by much more quickly now which is good. We also look forward to reading all the comments people post. We feel like there is a big TJ fan base out there!