medical update

We went to the ENT today and it looks Nicholas will have tubes put in on 9/13/06. His cleft palate will wait until next summer. Today he is real out of it and very sleepy and clingy to Mom. We think the jet lag is hitting him.

Ready for school to begin..

Living with all three kids day in and day out can be stressful. I am so ready for Collin and Sarah to start school. Tonight is back to school night and they start next Tuesday. I think Nicholas will be quite upset when they are not here during the day as he loves to be with them. Anytime them go outside he starts to cry. The house is a total mess but hey that is what kids are for, right??

Nicholas is doing great. He has developed a fake cry to get my attention which is driving me nuts. After a few times this Mommy caught on to what he is doing and now I am ignoring it. He is terrified of our dog Blacky so now we have to get creative sectioning off the livingroom so Nick can play and Blacky does to not have to be locked in the basement. Hopefully he will get comfortable with Blacky but at this point, it looks like that might not happen. Oh well, this is part of all the adjustments he has had to make. He is doing great and has been a real trooper. We still can't believe he is our precious son.

Our First Family Photo with Nick

Life as a Mother of three

Its 6am on Saturday morning and I (Stacy) can't sleep. Today I take Sarah to visit her friend Hannah, who was in the orphanage with her for a GIRLIE DAY. We are going to the Mall of America to Club Libby Lu for makeovers and have lunch. Our sweet Sarah is having a hard time not being the baby anymore and sharing her Mommy with the new boy. At time she is very excited about him and likes to play with him and other times she seems withdrawn and sad. I keep assuring her that I love her and she is my girl and no one can take the place of that. I think once school starts up again, she will be so busy she will not have time to worry. Today will be my first time leaving Nicholas so of course I am anxious. I am sure he will be just fine with his papa and "brat (Russian word for brother). Nick follows Collin around like a puppy dog and you can just see the hero worship in his eyes. These two boys were meant to be brothers.

Nick is doing pretty good. He has been our son now 2 weeks. He is such an active boy, full of energy. He is also trying to talk like crazy. All day long he is hitting me on the leg and trying to show me something or say something. I think once we get the tubes in his ears, he will make up for long lost time. The orphanage said he never talks on his own and will only repeat words if you ask him. Within 2 weeks he is making all kinds of sounds and is trying to say 2-3 word sentences. We can't get him to be quiet! ha! ha! Its amazing what love and attention does to a little soul. Eating is ok. Some days he eats everything we give him and some days he won't eat a thing. He loves apple juice, bananas and muffins. He also likes scrambled eggs, pasta and cream of wheat. He also loves tootsie pops. I keep a couple in my purse in case we need a diversion. We had his first picture taken yesterday at Wal-mart and he made us work to get him to smile. Anytime the photographer would do something silly to make him smile, he would repeat it. It took a long time but he did ok. I put one of his new outfits on and he looked so handsome. Can you believe it, he is 2T clothing, not 3T. I have no 2t clothes for him so Grandma came through with 3 outfits. I did get him some 2T jeans and a couple of short sleeve shorts.

Tonight Doug's family is throwing a 10th anniversary party for us at Pizza Ranch. We are looking forward to it. Collin insisted that he and his brother wear matching shirts so we got matching polos. I asked Sarah is she wanted to match and she rolled her eyes and said no way! That's my girl! I fianlly have added a picture of Nick in Red Square. Enjoy!

Life now as a family of 5

Hi! Its 5am and sleep is nowhere to be found. Being home 48 hours with our new son has been awesome yet hectic. Sarah and Collin are being awesome siblings, especially Collin as he is now known at "the protector". We started Nick on medical appointments yesterday. It was not fun as he got 5 shots, blood drawn and a tb test. Collin was very involved as he was asking what they were doing to "his brother" and why they were hurting him. Nick goes to an ENT specialist next week to review his cleft palette and see about getting tubes put in. We know now why he is not talking as the pediatrician was shocked as how much fluid is built up in his ears. He can't hear very well. Our family and friends have been stopping by which is great as we were missing everyone so much. Don't be afraid to give us call as we would love to hear from you! The Daubs

Finally home

Hey All....Just to let everyone we know that we made it home with our new son and our family is reunited. It was a long journey home full of long lines, heightened security measures at airports, lost luggage (yes again.....we know), heat, cancellation of flights and an unexpected overnight stay in Chicago. To make matters worse, Stacy got a bad case of food poisoning the last night in Moscow which left her vomiting throughout the night. On the morning of our flight home, we summoned the hotel doctor to our room to help Stacy. Doug refers her to the "witch doctor". She made Stacy vomit more to "cleanse the system". Between our bad Russian and her bad English, we knew just enough to thoroughly confuse each other. The main point is that we made it home. The kids are thrilled with their new brother and Collin has taken the role of his protector immediately. We will update this when we have had more rest. Tomorrow we will take Nick to his first Dr. appointment as a family and get groceries. Take care.

On the downhill stretch

Hey All....First of all, thanks for all the emails! We so enjoy reading them. We can't respond as our time is limited in the internet room besides we have a helper who wants to touch all the keys. Just to let you know that we are leaving today for Moscow. We will be at the Embassy tomorrow and go home Saturday! Yeaa!!!! Hopefully Nicholas will enjoy his first plane ride. We will update this next when we are home (and there is no place like home)!
Love, the Daub family

a brief update

Hey All....Things are still going well. Nicholas ate well yesterday for us but not much this morning. We have been having fun meeting the new children of the other adopting couples here at the hotel. All the children are so beautiful. Today Doug has to some errands with the WACAP staff while Stacy has to go buy Nicholas another pair of shoes. Last night when we went out for supper, somehow he stepped in oil and it is everywhere including on his coat and pants. The shoes also stink. Shoes run anywhere from $6 to $40 here so hopefully we will find some inexpensive ones. Otherwise we are busy playing with Nicholas and starting to get packed as we leave for Moscow tomorrow. Saturday can't come fast enough as we miss Collin and Sarah so much. We literally ache for them. Doug reminded Stacy that as soon as we get home , they will all be fighting so enjoy the peace and quiet while it lasts. Take care all.
Only 5 days to go!
Love the Daubs!

Life with our new son...

Its Tuesday morning here and its very chilly and the sky is very dark yet the sun shines bright in room 510. We are so enjoying the process of getting to know our little Nicholas. For the most part he is a happy, loving little boy and he likes his Mama. No matter where Stacy goes, he has to be with her. He enjoys playing with cars , doing puzzles and watching teletubbies on the portable dvd player (thanks Grandma Lange for lending it to us). Eating has been a challenge as he has a hard time eating and is very picky. Last night we ordered soup to our room and he did eat that and some Del Monte pears that Stacy found in the grocery store. Today at breakfast he made up for what he did not eat the last 2 days. He ate 2 pieces of egg bake and 2 bowls of porridge. We were relieved. For morning snack, he ate 1/2 of a large pastry. Hopefully he will keep it up. Other wise he is doing ok. We had to put him in time out this morning for the first time and boy did he cry. It broke Stacy's heart but it needed to be done.

The time is going so slow here and we are anxious to get home. On Sunday Oksana took us to the zoo. It was very cool and Nick loved it. He went on his first kiddie ride which made him smile from ear to ear. Today we walked to the department store and we got him a balloon. He giggled so hard he about fell over. We take this stuff for granted but its a whole new world for him. We had to buy him suspenders...yes that is right....suspenders. All of his pants fall off of him and they do not make belts small enough. He is so malnourished. His Grandpa Lange would be so proud that he wears suspenders just like Grandpa. Stacy did take in 2 pairs of knit pants.
We have met so many great people here. John & Isabel and Ned & Ann went to court yesterday and they pick up their kids today. We are so excited for them. They have been so supportive to us and kind to our new son.

Well its lunch time. Take care all and email us or put comments if you can. We are so homesick!
Love, the Daubs!

The First 24 hours with Nicholas

Hello All!
Well we picked up Nicholas yesterday morning. Again, we were prepared for many tears and for him to be somewhat scared out of his mind but he proved us wrong. We were taken to a caregiver's room where we could change him. They brought him in and he had a big smile on his face. We changed his clothes. Stacy brought 2 pairs of elastic was it 3t pants. The first pair fell off of him. He literally is nothing but skin and bones. The second pair worked ok but we rolled the waist bad. He loved his denim hat with the monster truck that Sarah picked out for him. The caretaker told him to go with us to the car and be a good boy for his Mama and Papa. Doug and I held our breath as we took his hand and led him outside. We were waiting for tears. They said goodbye to him and he ran to the car with no looking back. He was ready to go! We laughed and got pictures of him running to the car. It was so darn cute with him in his baggy pants and carrying the teddy bear that Grandma Lange had gotten him. The car drive went well. Stacy thought his neck would break turning and looking at everything. He loves trucks!
When we arrived back in the city, we stopped at a supermarket (much like the ones at home) and again he just stared at everything. We took him for lunch which he did not eat a lot of. Then we played and took a nap.
In the afternoon Stacy took him to a department store to return a backpack that we had bought the day before (zipper broke). Again, Nicholas just stared at everything with his mouth open. It is a whole new world for him. Stacy had him choose a backpack and he picked one with a tiger and race care on it. She also bought his a toy matchbox truck. . Hopefully today he will eat for us. Stacy gave him his first bath. As soon as he saw the bathtoys in the water, he could not get his clothes off fast enough. He loved it and giggled so hard. Of course he had to splash his new mama. After that we played and read books to him. At 10pm, he started yawning and we told him good nigh, put him in his crib and went right to sleep. He woke Stacy at 5:30am to go the bathroom but then he marched back to the crib and wanted to go back to bed.

What we have learned about our new son, he likes cars and trucks, baths, juice, chicken and sausage, puzzles and elevators. What he he does not like, lots of different foods (especially rice), and being told no. When we tell him not to do something, it works better if we use a soft voice. If we use a firm voice, he just laughs at us. Reminds us of another little boy named Collin! These two boys are two of kind and are similar in so many ways.

Today, we are going to the zoo. It should be fun. We are going with Oksana our interpter and now our good friend. The rest of the day will be low key. Take care and keep those emails coming as we are home sick!

Love, the Daubs

p.s. The Luggage Came Friday night!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's Official......We have a new son!!

Hello Folks!

Well it is official. Nicholas Donald Daub is our son and the 10 day waiting period is waived. We pick him up tomorrow to start our new life with him. As Doug says, the kids now out-number us so we need to be on our toes!

Court was at 10am and lasted about 55 minutes. Doug did an awesome job with his speech that he wrote at 2am this morning. The questions were tough but WACAP did an awesome job preparing us. We both were so happy that we can now call Nicholas our son.

As for the luggage update......well last night at 9pm they called to say that it was not found and they had no record of the luggage. Stacy pretty much lost at it at that point. We was on the phone with various people until 1am local time. Ranier travel was able to find it and it was in Moscow and should travel to Novosibirsk over night tonight. We will have to pick it up at 8am in the morning. Somehow it arrived on Lufthansa airlines and the baggage got new numbers. We will be so relieved to have it in our possession.

We moved rooms and we are now in room 510 at Hotel Sibir. It is very nice and much bigger. We are having small celebration tonight with another couple and our interpreter in our suite to celebrate our new son.

We will keep you posted!
Love the Daubs!

Reunited with Our Little Boy!

Hello Friends and Family!
We are here in Siberia but without our luggage. They seem to not know where it is or when it will arrive. Please pray that it gets here soon. Tomorrow is court at 10am and of course our court clothes are in the luggage. Stacy went shopping and found Doug a dress white shirt to go with his khakies. John and Isabel (another couple that are adopting) went with Stacy which was nice company. Stacy also found some shoes for Nicholas.

Ok...now for the good stuff. We were reunited with Nicholas yesterday at a summer camp which was one hour drive from the hotel. We were nervous as we did not know how he would react to seeing us or if he would remember. They brought him in and he just stared at us almost in disbelief. Within a few moment he came over and shook our hands. After while they encouraged him to give us a hug which he did. We played with him and kept telling him what a good boy he was in Russian and how much we loved him. At one point he was across the room and he looked at Stacy. All of sudden he comes running into her arms and hugs her for dear life. HE kept pressing his cheek to hers while Stacy cried with joy. We did not expect that kind of reaction from him for some time. They brought in his snack ( bread pastry) which was about the size of his head. We kept saying that there was no way he could eat it. HE nested into Stacy's arms and ate his snack. At one point he layed his head back and just was smiling. The caretaker asked if he was happy and he said yes. We told him goodbye and he looked scared. We reassured him that we are coming back the next day.

Today we saw him in the morning. Right away he smiled and hugged us. We showed him a photo album which he loved to look at. He especially enjoyed the pictures of his sister and brother. We played and had fun tickling him and throwing him in the air. He also like doing back flips off Stacy's lap. It was so good to hear him laugh. His speech is very limited but today he was making all kinds of noises and sounds which was good. The caretaker said he is blossoming now that he has a mama and papa. Hopefully by Saturday we will get him. They said tomorrow will be too busy to pick him up which is disappointing. Hopefully we will be rested up for this active boy.

Wish us luck at Court!
Love,
Stacy and Doug

Less than a week to go.....

Ok......Stacy is concerned that there is not enough hours in a day to get everything done that needs to be done before the trip. Stacy did treat herself to a manicure and pedicure today which was very relaxing. Also many calls to Stacy's mom is also helping. God bless Moms! Tomorrow is Stacy's dad birthday which will be celebrated on the way to the airport next week. We are looking forward to seeing our friends John and Isabel next week as they will be in Novo adopting their girls. They are first time parents so this time must be so exciting for them. Hopefully we will all have safe travels.