First I will start by saying the train was great. What a wonderful experience. We have never been on a train so we were like a few 5 year olds and got very excited. Though it was an 11 hour ride it went pretty quickly. We of course tried to sleep but only managed to get about 4 hours.

Anyhow. We are here in the region of Myckolayv - it is known as the ship building city of Ukraine. During Soviet times this was where all of the Military ships were built. It is not as busy as Kiev (thankfully) but it is beautiful. There are of course some very poor areas, which really is a reality check of how people here have to live.

Oh and by the way....We met Olena!!!! I know that is what all of you were waiting for. Funny story though....we met a different Olena first. We were taken into a room where we were introduced to this girl who was NOT happy to see us. She started screaming and did not want anything to do with us. I was very nervous and felt very bad. But something was not right. Her eyes were blue and she was very big. I told my translator that she was much bigger than I was expecting?? Then all of a sudden everyone realized that this was not the right girl!! Boy was she probably happy. So off we went to the other side of the orphange where we walked into a room with 20 tiny children sitting at the table eating their lunch...with spoons that we would use for serving. The director pointed to her and said "there Olena!!" I start to bawl my eyes out. She was ABSOLUTELY perfect. I looked back and Jason and Gene were crying too. We were invited to come in and sit down where we watched all of them finish their lunch. It was very hard to see them all sitting there. I wanted to bring them all home. So sweet and innocent...just looking for a mommy and daddy. All the while Olena kept staring at the 3 of us. She knew we were there for her. After everyone ate they cleaned her up and told her to go see her momma and pappa. Surprisingly she came right to me and put her arms up for me to pick her up. All we could do was stare at each other!! She warmed up a little and we started to play on the floor with her. She is still a little nervous about Jason but that is expected. They do not interact with many men if any at all. But we were tickling her and she was laughing away. She is such a happy baby and boy is she tiny. She is VERY ticklish and loves to laugh. She even hugged and kissed me and let me rock her while she put her head on my shoulder. We of course couldn't stop crying. Thankfully Gene was thinking because he was snapping pictures like crazy using his camera phone. We only got to stay with her for about 30 minutes because we could not disrupt her schedule and it was nap time. We will be allowed to visit her again this afternoon after 3:30.

The orphange is very nice and very clean! The staff also seems very sweet. No pictures yet and we still do not know if we will post any because it may not be possible, but we will see what we can do.

We will try to post again soon. Love everyone and please welcome Olena Victoria Warchol to the family!!!

Love and miss you all.