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Well it’s hard to believe that it’s already been 1 year. That’s right, one year ago today was the day we picked up Sasha from the orphanage in Cheboksary, RU. If you’ve frequently this site for long you’ve probably already read of some of the other events of that day. But even with all of the adventure and drama that fills our memories of that day we have to look back on it now and admit that we had no idea how our lives would be changed. All our lives. He’s a little goofy (as his ad-lib pose in the picture here demonstrates) but he rarely ceases to make us smile. I’m convinced that God has special plans for Sasha and we are truly blessed to be a part of that.

Bloomington Reunion (Sasha sings) from Randy Bradshaw on Vimeo.
This is another short video taken during day 1 of our Bloomington trip. It starts out with Sasha singing one of his favorite songs from the Disney Channel to Luba. Of course, it’s all in English but she seems to enjoy it anyway. The remainder of the video is a compilation of shots taken by Hannah and even Sasha himself.

Bloomington Reunion from Randy Bradshaw on Vimeo.
In August we took a long weekend and traveled to Bloomington, IL. Sasha’s orphanage director (Luba) had made the trip from Russia so she could see him again. We were there for about 4 days and this short video is day 1. The trip went very well, thanks in no small part to the Cavanaghs who welcomed Luba into their home and put up with us for the duration of our stay in Bloomington.

Reagan’s 6th grade choir program. They called it “Like a Child” and, once again, Ms. Gray and the rest of the kids have set the bar a little higher. The video is about 30 minutes long. Sorry about that but I wanted to make sure that we captured it all.

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It seems that we’ve had more than our fair share of beautiful days in Texas this year. Of course, that typically means we’re in for a BLAZING summer. At any rate, we took full advantage of the day.

This was a short performance that Hannah’s choir class gave for some of the visiting parents. The songs sounded pretty familiar but somehow they managed to add their own personal touch to it.

Sasha finally determined that he was just too big to be riding his “hog” around on 4 wheels. So he finally convinced me to remove the training wheels and, as you can see, it looks like the time was right. Oh, and I thought the boots added a nice touch. After all, he is a Texan now!

The Harrison Intermedia School choir performed at this year’s “Celebrate the Arts” held at the high school.

Since I had to work all week Stacy decided to take the kids to the aquarium. The girls had been there a couple of time but this was Sasha’s first visit. He seemed to be pretty impressed!….

Most of the posts I’ve made made over the past few months have been about Sasha (for obvious reasons). But we also have 2 AMAZING daughters that we’re more proud of than you can imagine. Here’s a short video that I took recently of Reagan (our oldest) at one of her 6th grade choir performances. They’ve all worked so hard and it shows! This is only a sample of what they’re capable of. I’ll e posting more in the coming months. Way to go guys!!

Since we had President’s day off we decided to load up the family and head to The Main Event. We weren’t sure what to expect from Sasha at a bowling alley but, as we soon learned, apparently he had done this before too…. We’re really beginning to wonder if he was ever really a Russian orphan at all….
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Sasha’s only been with us for about 2 months but he’s been begging to start school and has pretty much exhausted the materials we have at home for him. So this past Friday he started his first day (noon - 3PM anyway) in Pre-K. It was pretty exciting for us all.

…As read by Sasha Lee Bradshaw - January 24, 2008.

There’s just something about the freedom of being on two wheels…toolin’ down the sidewalk without a care in the world…. (except for when one of your training wheels malfunctions).

As you can imagine Christmas was a little different this year. But not too much. Sasha was finally with us and was able to enjoy his first Texas Christmas. We toned things down a little this year so as not to completely overwhelm him. The girls were completely amazed that he actually slept in for the first time since he’s been with us. And ON CHRISTMAS MORNING!!!!!???? I’m sure next year will be a different story though. He got a new bike (which he loves!) and a few other small gifts like hot wheels and a remote control car (he really has a thing for cars). We spent the first few hours relaxing and sitting around the house opening gifts and just enjoying our time together. Then we loaded up and headed to Stacy’s folks in OK. We had a great visit there too but I think Sasha was more than a little surprised (and scared for the first little while) by the reception he received when we arrived. But after a few minutes he didn’t feel quite so overwhelmed and ended up getting to know some of his new cousins. And they, in turn, learned a few Russian phrases. So, all in all, I’d say it was a win-win for all involved.

Well, we made it. It took us about 23 hours but we arrived safely in Dallas last night. Sasha didn’t sleep the entire trip except for the final hour of the final flight from Atlanta to Dallas. That made for a VERY long day… Nothing like chasing a hyperactive 5 year old around a 767 for 12 hours. All in all he did great though. We made it through passport control and immigration so he’s now an official US Citizen!! The only real issue other than exhaustion and major sleep deprivation (for both of us) was that our luggage didn’t make it on the same flight we did. But it was here when we woke up this morning so no harm done. One of my concerns was how Stacy would do with him on her own since she doesn’t speak much Russian and she hasn’t been with him for a few weeks. But none of that seems to be a problem as they’re doing great. The girls made it off to school and we’ve been spending time getting him used to his new surroundings this morning. I know that we have a lot of long days and nights ahead of us but he’s doing remarkably well so far.

After weeks of proclaiming “I don’t like meat and I won’t eat it.” Sasha finally showed his true colors yesterday. We were at the flea market (see previous post) and he had his first taste of meat on a stick! We all had shish-ka-bobs and he didn’t ate more than I had seen him eat since I’ve been here. The place we were eating at is actually just a room above the flea market (no heating or other frivelous luxuries). You order and pay for you food (choice of pork, chicken, or fish) on a stick and they cook it for you right there over the flame (see pictures on the right). Then you take it all upstairs and eat it out of the wind. Notice I didn’t say out of the cold because that would be misleading. There actually is no place “out of the cold” here besides Marina’s apartment. There are only about 12 small tables so, as you can tell from the pictures, you have to resort to some creative seating arrangments if you have more than 4 in your party. But at any rate, I was with some great new friends which really took the chill out of it and in spite of the “ukranian” vodka that they insisted we needed to sample to warm up. By the way, as near as I could tell, the stuff really is nothing but rubbing alcohol with a little bit of honey in it. Seriously. But then again I’m not much of a drinker.

But the short of it is that we now know that Sasha is a meat-eater after all. I can’t wait to get some real Texas beef in front of him. Tomorrow is our last full day here and we get on a plane from Moscow to Atlanta on Tuesday afternoon at 1PM. The flight to Atlanta is 11h 55m and I’m not looking forward to that but, hey, every hour is another hour closer to home.

A very rare thing happened here today. The sun actually came out. This picture was taken at the flea market in Moscow. We were eating lunch in a place that, well, it’s hard to put it into words. Let’s just say that it was not as cold as the outdoors. We made the most of the cold day and did some shopping. Of course, doing anythign in moscow means spending 85% of the time sitting in traffic inhaling exhaust fumes and holding your breath as you come within milimeters of all the other cars on the road. Somehow, though they manage to make it work and we all survived. Again. 3 more days and WE’RE COMING HOME!!!!!….

Today was our interview at the US Embassy (Sasha and I). It was a pretty painless process. Basically they just asked me to raise my hand and swear that I am in agreement with all of the adoption documents that I have submitted (we did that yesterday). Once that’s done they gave me some information about what to expect as we enter the US together. Then they process and granted an entry visa for Sasha. Now I have to wait 2 more business days to register with the russian consulate and then we can COME HOME!!!! That puts us home on Tuesday right on schedule. However, I was reviewing our itinerary and noticed that the returning flight to Atlanta is 11 hour and 55 minutes. The flight from Atlanta to Moscow was only 10 hours and 08 minutes. Oh, well. What’s another 2 hours or so when I’ve been gone this long? I am starting to get anxious as I realize that the end is in sight. Now I just need prayers for Sasha to do well on the trip. That’s a LONG time for him to have to sit.

Sasha absolutely loves taking a bath. In fact it takes quite a bit of negotiating to get him out of the tub. We now have an agreement that once he’s all clean he gets 5 minutes to play before I pull the stopper. That seems to work. He gets a big kick out of how his hands and fee prune up after he’s been in the water for a while. We are communicating very well now. We’ve also adopted a pretty structured schedule:

7:30 wake up/breakfast
10:00 english lessons (30 minutes)
12:00 lunch
3:00 english lessons (30 minutes)
6:00 dinner
9:00 bedtime

We spend the time in between playing, wrestling and watching a few english cartoons. He sleeps very well. We have a regular routine where I read the “Monkey Book” (5 Little Monkey’s Jumping on the Bed) twice and then it’s lights out. He hasn’t been a problem at all to get to sleep.

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