Saturday Morning

Ben had a great first night. He slept 9 straight hours and woke up at 6:00 AM. We took him out of his crib and for the next hour or so he just wanted to be cuddled. Boy did mom and dad like that! He is a cuddly boy.

It seems the paperwork stuff went well yesterday. We really were't that involved with it. We were probably only out for about 1-2 hours and really only needed to be there to sign our name. The good news is with that being done, we are trying to get home a day earlier than planned. I talked to our travel agent this morning, and he's trying to get us on a flight to Moscow this Sunday. If that works, then we'll try to leave for home on the 27th.

Benjamin managed to fall asleep in the car for a good half hour or more. It's too bad he didn't tell us that meant he planned on skipping his regularly scheduled afternoon nap. Linda and I were both exhausted from the previous night. That night was just a bad combinatoin of us being ill and Benjamin being with us. Though he slept, we really couln't help but watch his every move, so the result was very little sleep for us.

So when we got back to the hotel, we went back and forth with him a little as we tried to get him down for a nap. When that didn't work, I took him down to the lobby for an hour or so while Linda rested and then we switched off- I rested while she entertained Ben. He sure seemed tired, but there was no way he was napping.

We decided we would go out for dinner at a little cafe type place in the local department store. It seemed like kind of a risky decision at the time, but at that point we wanted to make sure he would stay awake until bedtime. We got him suited up and then hiked over there and ordered some food.

Right next to this cafe is a kiddie pay-and-play spot. It's kind of like what they have out at IKEA except it's not free. Benjamin loved it. Then our food came and he screamed at the top of his lungs all the way to his high-chair because he didn't want to leave the play area. We stuck a spoonful of borscht in his mouth and all was right in his world again. He ate practically everything we put in front of him and still didn't seem completely satisfied. We decided to order some ice cream. Much to our surprise he didn't go for it. He made really ugly faces when we put that cold stuff in his mouth.

Last night he was a little more resistant to go to sleep, but once we finally succeeded, he slept until 6:00 again. He is squirmy in his sleep. At one point he was sideways with his legs sticking out of the crib. Thankfully he didn't wake up when we moved him.

So far so good today. Ed and Ben are here playing. (I took over typing.) Ben seems tired. He is getting cuddly again. We are trying to keep him on the schedule he had at the baby home and that puts nap time another 2 1/2 hours away, after lunch. We'll see how it goes. I didn't bring that camera down, so we'll post some pictures later.