(Maureen's Post)
Our adjustment to the time change is getting better day by day. Again, when the sun doesn't rise until 9:30AM we still get a little thrown off. Since I was feeling so ill yesterday I went back to bed after we returned from our visit with James and just slept off and on all night. I awoke this morning feeling almost back to normal. So glad we brought the powdered Gatorade with us.

Oleg returned this morning with someone to repair the water heater. There was still another part missing, and Inna told us later that Oleg drove all over Kokshetau to find the part since some of the stores that may carry it were closed because it was Sunday. I'm telling you everyone here has really gone out of their way to take care of us! The repair guy was still working on it when we left to go to the hospital to visit James. Another good visit day! We went back to our regular visiting room, but there was no baby! I think it's because we showed up at 1:30PM today, and they may not have been expecting us until 2PM. So one of the nurses brought James to us. He started playing with us right away. Actually, he laughed so much he started hiccupping. Inna got a bottle of water from one of the nurses for him (heated, of course) to see if that would help. It didn't at first, so we played some more, but he was clearly uncomfortable. So we tried the water again later and it finally worked. The nurse came in during our visit and brought his bottle, which he only ate part of, surprisingly. He did nap for a little bit during our visit but awoke and started playing again. We also started softly playing the Baby Einstein music on the iPod again today while he was napping. It was still playing when he awoke, and he was fine with it. When our visit was over the nurse came in and took him from us, probably to feed him the rest of his bottle.

After our visit we dropped off Darryl and Jenny at their hotel and then went with Inna to the Rainbow Cafe. The food was great! All three of us had a salad, but the salads here usually don't consist of lettuce, and have either oil or mayo in it (usually mayo). Inna and I had a salad of cucumber, tomato, and grated cheese tossed in a soy sauce/oil dressing, while Sean had a different salad. I was very hungry (probably from not eating much yesterday) and also had lagman, which is a beef broth noodle soup, then we all had a dish of beef topped with potato and cheese then baked together, which was excellent. We all toasted with vodka, of course, and Sean also tried a piva (beer) called Siberian Crown. We were later joined by Bob and Jodi Mechem and their interpreter, Rada. While we were at the Rainbow Cafe Oleg had made some phone calls and made arrangements for someone to come to the apartment tonight and fix our shower door so Sean would not have to try to duct tape the shower curtain up. We were dropped off at the apartment and were able to do one small load of laundry and hung it up to dry on the outside balcony before Oleg arrived with a group of people (one of them was a lady who I think is the owner of the apartment) to fix the shower door and fix our bed, which apparently was missing some slats beneath the mattress (Sean said the bed felt a tad less lumpy afterwards). Sean was even able to contribute as his Leatherman came in very handy when they were needing a Phillips head screwdriver. Even though Oleg's English is limited and Sean speaks even less Russian, they were still able to communicate pretty well. We are so grateful to Oleg for coming through for us and helping us out. After everyone left about an hour an a half later we were able to do another small load of laundry and hung it up in our entryway on clothesline we brought from home. Then we called it a night and turned in.

That completes today's post! Love to all!