And Finally: Gotcha Day!

It's 1 am and I should be sleeping, but I am not! Don't worry, Diego and Mark are sleeping, I am the only crazy one!

The final day, the day every PAP waits so anxiously finally came ... and went really fast!! We were at Podolsk at 11:50, Diego had already his lunch and was in the play room "hanging out"... For the first time we were invited to go to the room, meet him there and take pics of Diego with some of the games there... We were pretty impressed with the play room, it has a lot of platform-type areas, with gates and a padded floor with different type of toys...

Suddenly, one of the caregivers started talking to us in Russian and kind of pushing us to a little room with a changing table! Ah, they wanted us to dress him up with the clothes we brought! Then Violet grabbed me to sign some papers, so Mark was left with the duties of dressing up our boy! When I returned, Diego was almost ready, so we don't have pictures of the "magical" moment when you undress you baby and dress him up with the cool stuff you brought for him! We were afraid the clothes we brought would be too big, but the jeans were kind of tight in the belly!!! He has a little gut!

Few seconds later, the Espositos came, dressed up their kiddo, Violet game them some documents, then they left, and Violet said "Let's go!". We gave the presents to the care givers, put Diego in this snowsuit (which was the right size, we bought it during Trip 1 and were not sure if he would fit there) and said our final good-byes... Now, I kind of imagined that a caregiver would cry or that Diego would cry or that I would cry... the "favorite" caregiver was not there, and the two caregivers in duty gave him bunch of kisses, but nobody cried! So we left Podolsk baby home quietly, looked around the snow-free playing area one last time, and then jumped into Vlad's car (which this time was equipped with a car seat!).

The ride to the apartment was quiet again, Diego played a little with two toys and then fell asleep. It was around the time his usual afternoon nap, so we thought he would be down for couple of hours, but no, as the van stopped in front of our apartment building, he opened his eyes and didn't close them again until 8 pm!

The afternoon went kind of slow at the beginning with changing his clothes (he got really hot in the car with the snowsuit) playing on the floor, looking at the street lights through the window, but faster trying to feed him (he didn't like pretty much anything we bought for him - that's going to be the battle for the week), and giving him formula... At 7:30 pm we gave him a bath in the sink and right after that he got in his PJs for his bed time (he looks like an angel when he sleeps!).

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Was this a magical day? Yes! But now, the real work begins! From now I can tell that transitioning to new food will take some time... Also, I think he is growing out of having two naps and he may want just one nap per day... and then us, Diego will need some time to get used to us (and us to him!)... As cute as he looked when we put him to sleep, as it was heartbreaking when he woke up an hour later (about 9:30 pm ish) crying and screaming when he didn't recognize where was... At the beginning, we thought that his hernia was hurting him and were closed to call Violet for medical help! But after hugging him and rocking him for a while he felt asleep again... And then he woke up again at 1:30 am, just cried a little, but this time I was quicker and was able to get him to sleep without the screaming... Today I have understand that Gotcha Day is not only about the parent's dream come true, but also about the little kid's life changing, and how to respect and work toward the changes and make them as smooth as we can...

For now on, sleep our sweet Diego, we are right here, next to you if you need anything!