Anna, Rina (as Pavlo calls her), and Pavlo are doing wonderfully! Ira and Pavlo, now five, act like twins. They are both in kindergarten, and our refrigerator is papered with their drawings and finger paintings. They are nearly inseparable, although this sometimes results in their causing disasters around the house if we're not super-careful! Anna and Chava are both in ballet, and Anna has asked to start martial arts as well. Anna is in 2nd grade and her teachers love her. Rina inherited Chava's massive Beanie Baby collection and is very happy about that. She is more introverted than the other two children, but she is beginning to open up. She is in preschool. We are teaching all of the children Hebrew, and all five of our children go to synagogue weekly.
Katya, of course, did not take well to the sudden change in surroundings and does not get along optimally with our other cats. She lives with Anna and Chava upstairs, where they share a room.
Anna and Rina's parents have written letters and sent a few small gifts; since they gave up their girls for adoption, they have had a baby boy, Mikhail. We have pictures for the girls, and we plan to travel to Russia to visit their biological parents later in the year, probably over the summer. Thank you so much for adding these children to our lives!