Day 2

What a fun day!
I woke up and posted earlier around 5am, but I had a headache which progressively got worse. I realized I was still tired and went back to sleep. I woke up an hour later with a terrible migraine (not unusual- I've had one every day for about the last month, but it was pretty bad). Woke hubs, he gave me meds, back to sleep. The next time we woke up, it was 1:30 in the afternoon! ha! The last time that happened was... um... never. Ever.

We were in no rush to be anywhere (ahhhh....). We piddled around in the apartment on the computer, watched Parenthood re-runs, made some sandwiches, and eventually decided to get dressed and go for a walk. By that time it was nearly 5 o'clock and already dark outside!

Obviously, the pics don't do it justice AT ALL. Love all the colors!

We walked and walked and never left Independence Square :) There was plenty to do and see, including two Spongebobs, Bart Simpson, multiple Santas and ponies! AND it was snowing! Not just spitting snow, like for REAL snow. Nathan was in heaven. I don't know why the cold at home can sometimes be annoying... being here, it just felt so refreshing! It was perfect. Walking around a beautiful city (in Eastern friggin Europe), arm-in-arm, in the snow. I had this major awestruck moment (I've had a few the last few days). Is this really our life?!

 I never would have imagined 13 years ago when Nathan and I were lovedrunk teenagers that we would be here, much less be here to bring home our daughter! I'm just all kinds of in love.

We walked around (spent most of our time in a toy shop where we found some great souvenir ideas for our littles ;) until the streets were getting so icy, I could barely walk.
Mom- my new boots are super cute with all my little European-inspired outfits, but we probably should have paid attention to the fact that they are smooth as stones on the bottom providing absolutely ZERO traction on the snow and ice.

We went into a pub just a few doors down from our apartment- that was interesting! Our first real experience of trying to talk to someone who speaks a different language. I've actually worked really hard on learning some key Russian words, but now that we're here, I'm too intimidated to try! I don't know why. We managed to let the dude know that we speak English, and he actually brought us an English menu :)
I had a caesar salad with chicken and Nathan had "pancakes with chicken and mushrooms"- both were great! We stayed a LONG time. We were just really having a good time, talking and laughing, listening to the life music, people watching. A real date :)

We just got home a bit ago (around 1am) here. We're thinking of watching a movie before going to sleep. Some of our friends got here today (yay!) and a couple were already here, so we will probably meet up with at least some of the others tomorrow at some point. We can't wait to meet everyone in person and see the city in the daylight :)

Paka paka (Goodbye)!