What to Bring and what not to bring ?

Congratulations! ! ! If you repost this under the Russian Forum, I'm sure you'll get some responses. There is also a fairly recent thread with info about traveling and some good links -- find it by searching the archive if you can't find it through scrolling. Best wishes!

please take a coat and long pants, gloves for every one even the baby. get the baby a one piece suit made out of fleese or maybe down ....some thing warm we adopted our son in april and it was 3 foot of snow on the grown. they have long cold winters. i had a double lined hat fro my son and lot on winter long out fits and long onies. lots of diapers. feel free to email me at maggymae @sbcglobal.net i will be glad to talk to you about international travel. youneed a converder box fro your blow dryer and bring several bottles of water and a small hot pot for coffee this will not give me enough space to write every thing. can goods for eating. some food is not good. culture shock big time i took ham in a can tuna,foumula baby cereal. tea bags. tiolet paper for sure. baby wipes some places you may eat may only have a whole in the floor to pee. and try holding an infant, and peeing over a whole at the same time. it any easy. they you must pay a rubble , to use the whole. and no stalls at all. all can see.

In addition: - advil/tylenol - pepto-bismol - wet-wipes - plastic shopping bags (for dirty clothes and trash) - hand sanitizer Best of luck to you, mriya-adoption.org

Hi, Don't forget a small basic first aid kit, a thermometer, nasal aspirator etc..immodium in case of diarrhea, some snack foods like crackers...I had to live in Peru almost seven months for our son's adoption, and was glad I had brought alot of canned food with me, esp since you could not eat the seafood or salad at the time. Sounds like it is going to be an exiting trip..don't forget to write everything down in a journal for your little one to read later.. have a great trip and congrats! Cathy

My husband and I ate mostly at McDonald's and this pizza place with GREAT fresh vegetables on the pie, but the advice here is wonderful with respect to taking our son on our next trip. A jar of peanut butter can go far! What a wonderful idea. Beyond the American cuisine, we ate a lot of beef jerky and these little apple streudel bars. They were lifesavers. Some of the food just doesn't make it, but there is much that is pretty American in nature. Pre-sweetened Kool-Aid was also a great asset. Polar fleece is God's answer to a Russian winter. We took a polar fleece blanket and a thermal blanket and our son was sweating at times he was so warm - the temp was about 15 degrees. Also a snowsuit. The softer the better, with the sleeves that fold up over the hands. We brought diapers, but could have gotten them there. Best of luck and God's blessings on your journey.

Depending on the age of the child, one of those inexpensive umbrella strollers can be indispensible when navigating airport terminals.

We made our first trip to Irkutsk Siberia to meet our little boy in Novermber and it was already freezing cold. For our second trip we're not bringing too much clothing for him. We're even going to buy his coat and stuff there. Everything is so reasonably priced, and it will give us more space to back orphanage donations. We will bring some outfits but purchase some items of clothing for him there, that way he'll have a few little souveniers for his "memory box'. EVERY kind of food you could possibly want was available in the stores. We brought all kinds of snacks and drinks, etc. and didn't need them. They're cheaper there. Same with diapers and baby food. for the baby. It was readily available and very inexpensive in the stores. We purchased a backpack/storller on Ebay. Great for the snowy surfaces where you can't push a stroller. Good luck!