Another Milestone

Besides the fact that I am posting only two weeks after the last post, Today is another wonderful day to remember for our family. It was one year ago today that we got to see(face to face) and hold our little boy. It was a fairly smooth morning and we got to get our referral and get to the orphanage before lunch. When I first got to see him, one of his caregivers carried him in to a room of about 12 adults, most of whom he probably never saw. He was so unsure of what was going on and once they handed him to me, he began to cry. I only held him for a minute or two in that first meeting, and then they wisked him out of the room. We did get to see him later that day, after his nap. He was still unsure but no crying. He was cautious but was too excited to play with the toys we brought to let that hold him back.

Here he is that first day:

By the end of the day we knew that he would be our little boy.

It is so wonderful this time of year to start the many anniversaries of our adoption. What is so amazing is to see how things have changed since then.

Here he is today telling me how much he loves me:

He is so sure of himself now and so a part of our family. I was thinking as I tucked him in tonight to bed and he looked up at me and smiled and we did our bedtime routine, one year ago tonight, someone else was putting him to bed, he had no real routine except they put him in bed. He had no hugs, no kisses, no family to love him. It breaks my heart to think that he had to go through that. But we came to get him and now there will be no more nights like that, he can always wake up to a mommy and daddy.

Another great event this weekend was that 5 families who adopted from Astrakhan in the last year all gathered at our house for the weekend. It was such a great time to see each other, to see how the kids have grown and remember and share our journeys. I will write more about that later but you can check The Beadle's blog for her update(she always is so great at posting).

Here are a few pictures from the weekend:

 At the zoo with all those adopted from Russia( one from Kaliningrad, the rest from Astrakhan) minus one.

Later in the weekend minus three( just love how Micah and Grace are trying to hold hands.)

Where oh Where...

have the Canestraro's been? Well, everywhere - almost!  It has been so busy since I last posted that by the time I get the kids down to bed, I am too tired to post. So here is what has been up.

We have had two more birthdays to celebrate

Happy Birthday Olivia! Oh, what a beautiful young lady she is.

And Happy Birthday Dominic! How handsome are they!

We also had the end of school, many doctor appointments, a vacation to the beach and finally a mini trip to WV to visit family for the 4th.

I am still amazed that after 9 month, I still can see so much changes in Micah(OK, I am tired of using initials so I am finally going to start using their names). Mainly in his speech, he just continues to amaze me in what he is learning. It will be interesting to see how much more he will learn once he is in preschool. And speaking of preschool, our summer project is potty training. Kind of hard when you are on the go all the time, but for the effort we have put forth - He is really doing very well - Candy is a good motivator.

The highlight of the past few months has been our vacation to the beach. I knew that Micah would love it, because he loves water, but I was not sure how he would handle the waves.

Here he is evaluating the situation:

Here he is after the waves knocked him down a few times:

I think he likes it! Here is his first attempt at surfing!

I am sure with his energy, he will be great at it someday. There is not much that scares this guy, but we did find something on vacation - a macaw. THere is a bird in a gift shop that we go to that talks to you. I thought he would like it - Oh no. I don't think he has ever clung to me as tightly as he did once the macaw started talking. I would even turn around so that he could see that it would be ok and he would just turn his head. He also did not like the loud noises from family setting off fireworks so I think that it has a lot to do with the loudness of things.

After the episode with the fireworks at our families house, I was not sure how he would handle the big fireworks, especially since we happened to be so close to them( family lives right next to where they are set off). But with a special set of ear plugs, he was just fine.

He daily talks about the "Boom,Boom,Boom!"

The biggest event for us(Russ and myself) was that on June 27th 2009, it was 1 year since we saw our first picture of our little boy. Here is the first glimpse of him:

And here he is today(playing in the sand this time):

It's like he is not the same child! The change still amazes me. These kids are so resilient, if just given a chance.

One other anniversary that has passed, was the one year of our first trip to Russia in May. If you go back and check our blog from June 2008, you will see that we had basically had to turn down a referral of two wonderful children that we wanted so much to adopt. Their grandparents, even though they had turned down once to adopt them, did not want them leaving the country and we were told the courts would never grant us rights to be their parents. We were also told that the grandparents were going to adopt them now. So at the time, we were at peace with the whole thing. However, as time passed, and I continually checked the Russian database, they were both still on it. Month after Month, I was so upset that they were still in an orphange, but finally in May, I checked and they were not there any more. I am not sure if they are with their grandparents or another Russian couple adopted them, but they are with a family and that is what is wonderful. The other good news is the little girl we turned down because of FAS is not on the database any more, so she is hopefully in a loving family also.

So as busy bees we continue to pack as much fun as we can in before school starts back. I hope it will be sooner before the next post. Until then, I leave you all with a picture that describes Micah better than any words.