Court

We have court this morning and should be done at 12:30.  We had our court prep session last night and learned more about Valentina's background (and more about her brother).  We also met with the orphanage doctor and with her head care giver.  They discussed her medical diagnosis (nothing surprising or that we did not already know), went over her routines and wanted to know how we were planning on handling these as we will be asked that in court.  We had two nice visits with Valentina, she and Chase were bouncing off the walls.  It has been really cold here and we have not been able to take the kids outside together.  It is hard for them to be confined to one room as they are still both pretty excited and get wound up quickly (a favorite game right now is a version of tag where one of them runs with a stuffed doggy and the other chases them).  They are like a pair of monkeys.  We are hoping that after court we will be allowed to take V out of the orphanage and to a childrens play area at one of the restaurants.  It would be nice to give the kids a place to play.  We have not told V about court yet, but are planning on talking to her about it after court.  We have been talking to her about the summer, what she remembers and yesterday was the first time she actively wanted to talk about it with us and our translator (she takes awhile to warm up to unknown adults and did not know the translator).  I think she is getting to the point where she will be able to sit and talk about it with us.  It has been a bit hard on Chase, he wants her with us now, can't understand why there are all those rules at the orphanage, etc.

Keep your fingers crossed that all goes well at court today.  Thanks :)