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Brewing equipment in Murmansk. Food was fabulous as well!!!!
Katie Aunna and Mama in the Old Arbat Hotel garden. It was Divine!!!
Katie Aunna exploring flowers;-). I love the "firsts" with newly adopted children.
Katie Aunna the "MOVIE STAR"
What a show off. My I do adore her so much!!!!

I just wanted to take a little time to catch you up on my post in Murmansk where I said there was something going on that I could not talk about. It was horrifying for both Duane and I as our facilitator decided to give out our information about what hotel we were staying at with Katie Aunna. Much to our shock and dismay on the 10th day of the waiting period we were contacted by an ex-family member!!!! I want to say that the other couple adopting a precious little girl at the same time kept us calm. They were wonderfully supportive and I will always love them as our special friends.

Anyway, it was a horrible extra stressor for us to endure during our adoption process. When we left Murmansk this person was waiting for us at the Murmansk Airport!!! This really made me mad as I did not want Katie exposed to her again. I was also highly shocked when we returned to the USA and we received a phone call from this ex-family member. What I could not understand is that this person had not seen Katie Aunna in several years and relinquished any/all rights to her long before we began the adoption process. Needless to say, we have changed and unlisted our phone number.

Okay....Now to more pleasant business. We debated, due to the expense, of staying at an apartment, but, Duane decided he wanted the experience of a nice hotel. It was certainly nice. We stayed in the Courtyard Marriott which was as nice as the Marriott Grand or the Trveskaya Marriott. It was snuggled more into a little side street, but, was only a few blocks from Trveskaya Street so we were able to get our vodka to bring home;-).

While in Moscow we met up with another couple who had adopted an adorable little baby boy in Murmansk. By the way, during our long...long.....long stay in Murmansk we had dinner with this couple. This nice couple took us to a cool restaurant right after Duane's own heart...his hobby...beer brewing. The picture of the huge steel tanks are brewing beer. It was delicious beer if I do say so myself!!!! The couple was running a few days behind our process with their adoption. So they did not arrive in Moscow until shortly after us.

They stayed at the Arbat Hotel in Moscow and there I took some beautiful pictures of Katie Aunna. We had such a wonderful day with them and their new little boy. He showed off like a true movie star and was a joy to be around. We walked around old Arbat Street which was a treat for us as on our previous adoption trips we had not seen Arbat Street. Our dinner was wonderful at the Hard Rock Cafe;-). Katie loved the loud rock music and so did we!!! I hope you enjoy these photos from "Russia With Love". I have a few more pictures to show you of Russia and so will make another post to include them as only five pictures at one time can be placed into each post.