Just another day in Uralsk..

For two of our last three visits, Madden was determined to be too sick for a visit, which gave us lots of time with Jackson. We're aren't really sure what determines if they are too sick to visit, but they haven't seemed to be too ill- just a mild cold it seems. The doctors at the babyhouse believe that babies have to be kept very warm!! The room where we visit them is almost 80 degrees, but since they've been sick we keep getting instruction to bring warmer clothes. They are wearing tights, pants, slippers, 1-2 undershirts, and then a thick shirt. Sometimes you can actually see sweat on them! We're hoping this will be sufficient because we just arent' sure what else we can add other than full snowsuits.

Also, for those of you who asked about clothing sizes, our translater was able to get us the most recent measurements from the babyhouse doctor. The only catch is, I don't know when they were taken, other than that it was some time in November. So, these could possible already be a month old, and almost two months old by the time we get back. But this is the best information we have. Jackson: 18.2 pounds; 26.8 inches and Madden: 18 pounds; 27.6 inches.


This shirt (below) pretty much summed him up today. It was all we could do to keep him contained! We are supposed to keep them only on the blanket we bring, but this is almost impossible with him. All he wants to do is crawl and walk along the chairs. When he makes up his mind he wants to get somewhere, it is almost impossible to stop him. We could actually see him looking for an opening. He doesn't really get upset when he is blocked, but he just tries to force his way through. He gets this very determined look and makes this kind of grunting "ughhhh" sound. The last picture is him actually climbing over Kevin and is a pretty good shot of his determined face. He has also started this charming little thing where he sticks his tongue between his lips and blows spit everywhere- kind of like a motorboat noise. We have no idea where he picked that up, but he seems to think it is great fun.

We didn't get any individual shots of Madden, but for the one visit we had, she was in very good spirits and didn't seem ill. She was making lots of noise today, mostly just "yah, yah, yah", but she seems to really be discovering her own voice. When she gets really excited she does this odd thing where she sticks out her tongue and pants while she laughs. I'm assuming she will grow out of this, but it's just a bit odd to see her doing this.

The two of them really don't interact a lot. They mostly just look at each other, but when they get close Jackson most often will take her toy. She doesn't put up any fight and just kind of stares at him like, "huh?". I'm sure she'll learn to stand up for herself and then the fight will be on!

We haven't really had too much exciting to post. The only thing we did today other then the visits was go shopping to buy lemons as directed by the babyhouse director. Why lemons you ask? Well, for the babies' tea of course! The days all seem to run together now, but we are going on a tour of the city tomorrow, so we should have lots of pictures to post.

They are also having the presidential election here on Sunday. I'm not sure if that even gets a mention on the news back home. There is no question that the current president will be re-elected for a third term, which would cover years 15-21 with him as their leader. They are considered a democracy, but doesn't sound like it is fully functioning. We heard that an order was issued for all government workers to vote for him and also that college students are basically required to attend rallies in support. We heard there are 5 candidates on the ballot, but we've only seen one sign for another candidate. From what we can tell though, in general the people do like him and are mainly satisfied with their system. However, we are told there is a small chance there could be some protests the day after the election. No one should worry about us though. If this does happen they will probably just keep us in the apartments. I mention this only because that would be the kind of thing that would show up on the US news, and we don't want anyone to think we're stuck in some major uprising.

So, that's about all for now. We will post as many pictures of the city as we can tomorrow after our tour.