Such a wonderful day!

I realized that we spent more than ten hours traveling yesterday, just for four hours of fellowship. And you know what? It was completely worth it! I'll write all about it, probably tomorrow, but now I need to get myself moving to make a blueberry cake for Jaan's second birthday celebration tonight (his second celebration of his second birthday ).

Jaan, David B., Caleb B., Harvey/Volodya K., Adriel K., Irvin K., Rachel B. and Raia
Originally uploaded by fylliska.

I wasn't going to post any photos today, but this one is just too good to hold back. This is all eight of the Kershner/Beaird/Hunsucker children. The oldest is six years old (Rachel), and the youngest is our Raia. In between those two girls, it's all little boys! Beaird Child #4 is supposedly going to help start balancing that out, though. We'll see in a few weeks.

Today is the anniversary of a very sad day for America, but it's also the day that we arrived in Russia four years ago. I know this is mostly about the kids, but I thought I'd just say that I've been thinking about this anniversary, and really seeing that I've just recently made another big jump forward. I'm certainly not speaking Russian better, but I'm understanding the language and the rest of life in Russia better these days. I've just made it through my first whole Pushkin poem, and not only did I understand the whole thing without the dictionary, I loved it! Before I've always said that I feel like I fit in, except when I have a newborn. It might help that Raia is getting older, but even her newborn time wasn't so hard. I don't know where I'm going with this ramble, except to say that I really do love this country!