A Fun Day

So we went to the babyhouse this morning to visit with Angelica (that's her full name and what we're calling her for now) and got to have a nice long visit (1 1/2 hours!). When we got there they had the children in her group playing outside. They were all in their underwear and with kerchief things on their heads for girls and baseball caps for boys. We got some great pictures of her dressed like this, with her underwear on backwards, actually! We stayed outside the whole visit because it seemed like the toys were a little bit of a distraction in the little playroom. So we walked and I held her and Greg held her and we sang and had lots of fun. We looked at the book again and played peek-a-boo, which she learned how to say already. We think she'll pick up English pretty fast after she's immersed in it.
After that, we went for lunch at the Doner cafe, a place that had been recommended to us by another adopting family. We ate really good Turkish food (Nicholas had french fries) and then Nicholas played in the playplace that they have there. We liked it and want to go back.
After lunch we went around town with the other Americans we met yesterday. We saw the Orthodox Church and the Mosque. It was very fun and they have a playground on the grounds of the Orthodox church that we played on for a while. Then they (the Jones family) came over for spaghetti at our apartment. They are living in a hotel right now, so it was a chance for them to get some non-restaurant food. And we all enjoyed talking to other Americans for a while. All in all, we had a really fun day!
Tomorrow we are not allowed to visit either one of the girls, but we plan to go down to the river for the "demonstrations" that are supposed to be taking place for the Protection of Children Holiday. There will be demonstrations by children from schools and from orphanages, and I'm sure it will be interesting. We'll take lots of pictures.
I'm going to post a few pics of the last few days, including one of me wearing a crazy green cape, which is what I had to wear to go into the mosque. The little boy in that picture with me and Nicholas is Des, the Jones' son. Also included for those less traveled, a picture of a "squatty-potty."
It's storming right now and it's supposed to cool off tonight, which is great since it's been in the 90's the past few days. Paka! (informal bye in Russian) Love you all!