Ambushed!

Ok, it wasn't that bad but I was on edge.  We called S today... decided that Dennis is in a really good mood so it was ok.  Oddly, the surgery isn't even on his mind.  She was washing clothes which she tries to do nearly every day.  As expected, the shoes we sent her were too big but we sent money with a family adopting a friend of her's right now... so hopefully we can take care of her that way.

Suddenly the phone went dead and 30seconds later we were in a 3-way call with Dennis' gma.  Last week we finally got the aunt's phone number and weren't setup to call on our own so we weren't planning to until next week.  I thought about just hanging up but I watched Dennis' face closely and listened to the words I could pick up... figured if we are trying to make nice, hanging up is a bad first impression if I don't have to.  His Ukraine gma has a VERY forceful voice... old school soviet, many of you know what I mean.  It all seemed good but we'll get the conversation translated.  Dennis' did his typical "good", "no", etc type of answers.  Snezhana interjected once in a while in her distinctly softer and quieter voice... she confirmed with us that was gma and said it was all good.

Then the silence repeated and a different woman was on the phone.  A much more gentle voice... from what I heard about biomom I figured it wasn't her so it must be aunt.  At one point she asked Dennis who his brothers and sisters in America were and he named them off twice... she didn't understand the names but that's ok.  A little while later a little girl... probably 3yrs old got on the phone in a sweet little voice and talked to Dennis.  I assume a cousin.

Then that was over with more silence... Snezhana came on for a little bit and confirmed it was aunt.  Then she said something to me quick and the connection ended.  I think it was that the battery was dead as we tried to call back and got the out of service message.

So all-in-all I think it was ok... we still want to do a call directly once a month or so with one of S' friends in America "monitoring" for us.  As long things are ok and they don't try to guilt or manipulate him at least.  Of course now that I type this, I guess we should have the kids call their America grandparents monthly at least too :)