My Girls are Home

My girls are home! Natasha and Petra finally made it home on Sunday night. (It's Tuesday, now)...

Basically, whatever could go wrong did just about go wrong with the flight to Ukraine and the flight home.

Snow delays, lost luggage, lost stroller - twice, leaking ceiling, no "free, spare" seat for Petra to sit on (so she had to sit on Natasha's lap the whole time - but I think we saved like $500 that way, at least), and some crazy people sitting next to Natasha. *She didn't tell me everything, but I think she said she was sitting next to a crazy, terrorist looking guy...

It was just a coincidence that a huge snow storm hit Europe while Natasha and Petra were visiting. I think it was so bad that Frankfurt Airport cancelled all flights on Saturday - the day they were supposed to fly home.

One of the worst things is that Natasha's family lives like 1 1/2 hours from the Kiev Airport - and everytime they travel there they need to hire a taxi. Well, it gets old real quick when you have to keep paying to go to the Airport, and then back home after you wait for 3 hours just to find-out your flight is cancelled. Then, you have to keep calling the Airport to find-out if the next possible flight is actually going to happen. Then, you have to keep your fingers-crossed as you drive to the Airport, that the conditions don't change - which would mean you'd have to turn-around and drive back home. (Not, to mention when her parents are trying to pick us up from the Airport, and they're not sure if we made it on the flight that we were supposed to be on)...

Overall, though, Natasha did have a good visit with everyone. Everyone really enjoyed seeing her and Petra! Natasha said it was sad to visit with her Grandpa, who's getting older...

Natasha was frustrated with how bad things have become in Ukraine. Prices for things have increased so much. Another problem is that people work for months and months, and their bosses don't pay them. There's a fine line between being patient, and keeping faith that as long as you keep going to work - then, hopefully your employer will decide to pay you... This past trip, Natasha's found-out that her uncle finally quit his job (which I think he had for a while) - after his employer did not pay him for four months of work...

O.k., I'll go ahead and post this. I'll try to choose some pictures from the trip.

Also, I wanted to share how Petra reacted when she saw me. She was sort of surprised that she hadn't seen me for such a long time - and it was like she was remembering that I did exist... And, then when we brought her home it was so neat how she saw all of her different toys and her books, and she got so excited as she remembered - "Oh, these are all mine! I knew I had alot of cool stuff!!!"

Later,

Kevin