Here in Moscow

We made it to Moscow!  Here's a recap of today (with pictures):

We woke up early this morning with Zac happy as ever (see Exhibit A)

Actually, that's not true at all.  But I really wanted to post that picture, so I thought I'd make up a story that fit.  OK - here's what really happened:

Our flight was leaving Novo at 7:40am so we had a wake up call set for 5:30am.  Unfortunately, little Zac woke up with a bad phlemy cough around 3:00am.  (Side note:  We've discovered Zac has 2 notable delays.  One of them is walking up and down stairs.  The other one is blowing his nose.  No matter what we tell him or what actions or charades we use, Zac cannot blow his nose.  As a result, the poor kid kept sniffing and sniffing last night which lead to coughing and coughing.  (See Exhibit B)

Needless to say, we started our early morning a little earlier than expected.  We made it to the airport and hopped on the S7 (Siberian Airlines) plane.  Unfortunately, we had one of the "old planes" this time.  Although for the record, the plane we took on our first trip was WAY worse than this one.  Therefore, today's old plane still didn't seem that bad.  

Things were going great for the first 90 minutes or so.  Zac was tired enough that he fell asleep right after take-off.  (See Exhibit C)

I should add that he did wimper a bit during take off and broke out into a sweat.  I'm thinking that he must get motion sick just like his dad.  Anyway, as I said, we were about 90 minutes into our 4 1/2 hour flight and Katie and I looked at each other and said, "This is going great!"  Of course, this led to the turning point in the flight.  Zac woke up and we began feeding him.  For the first time in our knowing Zac, he didn't really want to eat.  This should have been a tip off, but hindsight is usually fairly accurate.  At the time, we didn't have a clue.

We were trying to force a stale siberian bread roll into his mouth when suddenly.... up it all came!  In reaction to this sudden event, my daddy instincts kicked in and I shoved the only thing I could find under his chin to catch the puke:  my hands.  So I let him heave it all out into my cupped hands.  I'm not sure what was worse, having all that puke in my hands - or realizing that the puke was mostly all the mucus from the night before.  MMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!

I could go on and on about the smell and my clothes and his clothes, but I can tell that this post is already getting too long.

Here's the short story.  Within 15 minutes, he was feeling better and we had gotten cleaned up. (Sort of).  I popped in the Baby Einstein and our little kiddo watched a DVD for 2 hours!  Happy as a clam.  (See Exhibit D)

We had obviously had a long day, but really we had only just begun.  We had to deal with the airport, the driving, the passport pictures - but here's the cool part:  Most of the day, Zac hungout with me (dad) on the carrier sling thing that Katie bought for the trip.  Several times, he fell asleep with me just holding him up against me.  (See Exhibit E & F)

In conclusion, it was a long day and our little guy was the ultimate trooper.  On a day were we skipped entire meals and naps - he did little more than throw a few minor tantrums.  For the most part, he clung onto us (showing excellent attachment) and demonstrated tremendous resiliance.  

Tomorrow is a free day here in Moscow.  We'll see how Zac is feeling before we push him anymore.