Wednesday . . .

Wednesday… where has the time gone? We waited a year and now life seems so normal with Emma here. She was once a dream and then a hope and now a reality. Our day is full of two Chinese girls. How odd the twists & turns that God puts in our path through the years! I never would have guessed what my life would hold.

Today we were free until 2:40. That was when went to the US Consulate for our final paperwork and the swearing in ceremony. All types of families were formed today. The most were first time parents and there were a number of us who were adopting our second or third child. Just a few were adopting for the first time but had other children. There was one set of twins adopted today. Another family was adopting two special needs kids at the same time although the kids were not related. Most adopted kids were babies as you would expect. I could not help but tear up as I saw all the children get forever families. How wonderful their little lives will be with a mom and dad of their own.

Emma has given me hugs all day. She hugs me as I walk holding her hand. She comes and lays with me. Today she sat in my lap and put her arms around my neck and I sang “Rock a bye Baby” to her about a dozen times. She just giggled. Has she been held since she was a baby?

This morning Alison did homework and Emma watched movies. Tonight we ate at Pizza Hut. The pizza was really good. Alison and Emma had chicken wings and fries. We all enjoyed our dinner. The weather was quite nice this evening. There was a nice breeze and the humidity was down. I hope that lasts through tomorrow and Friday.

One WACAP family left today. Another leaves tomorrow and the rest of us are out on Friday. The couple that was on our flight coming over is going back on the same flight. They live in North Carolina. We are exchanging email addresses to keep in touch. That is the fun part of adoption in that you become part of a club almost.

We will sure be glad to be home. I can’t wait to see Emma’s reaction to home. She will be glad that Nikki is not home. She told us she does not like dogs. We told her that Nikki licks a LOT. Emma says she wants to sleep in the bottom bunk. We will see. She will probably sleep everywhere like Alison did.

So no earth shattering news. We are on the home stretch and boy are we ready to be home. We are ready for school and work and structured, normal days.

Homework & TV

Today was a free day. We slept in until 9AM & then went down to breakfast. We ran into Sarah on our way back to our room. The girls had a fit because she had glasses on. They both thought it was awful for her to wear glasses. I just thought it was interesting to see the reaction from each of them. I knew Alison would have a fit because she says she hates glasses but then Emma did too.

We ride the escalator up to the third floor everyday as we come back to our room. I don't think Emma had ever rode an escalator before and we have used a number of them in our various shopping trips & the hotel in/out. She spotted it the first day & wants to take it up everyday. The up/down are side by side. Two days ago the hotel switched which one went up. She looked so confused with the stairs going the wrong way. She tried to walk up the down escalator. She didn't get too far.

We did homework most of the morning. With Alison being sick for a few days & a couple of longer travel days plus jet lag (mostly mine) she is behind in getting everything done. The rest of the week and the flight home will be homework focused.

We ate at McDonalds for lunch. The boiled chicken was not good when I got it the first time. The hamburgers are good but different so I went with the fried chicken sandwich. Well, that was good but very spicy. Emma ordered a cheese burger but didn't like it so Lynn went back and got her the same sandwich as mine. I told her it was hot so she took the chicken out of the bun & ate the bun w/ lettace & mayo all by itself ... every bite. Then she ate the chicken. Too funny.

We walked down the street window shopping. Alison wanted to go into an office supply store to get pencils. The whole store was about twice the size of our walk in closet. They had some cute pencils & pens. Emma bought a pen that when you push the open/close the nose or the top of the head has a peg that comes out like you are sticking out your tongue or blowing your top. Ok, stupid but that is what kids like. Our shopping was cut short because Alison had to go to the bathroom. Emma & I walked at leisure while Lynn & Alison hurried to the McDonalds. When we got there, we went to the courtyard beside the McDonalds entrance. The restroom was actually in a small shopping mall beside the McDonalds. Emma & I cooled off from our walk by sitting on a fountain stone wall. The fountain was not running & was almost dry. We sat there for a long time & then a guard came by telling us “no sit”. He also made another person get off of the wall. Ok, I know we all looked like vagrants and I am sure he thought we were setting up squatters rights for a nights rest! I finally decided to go look for Lynn since they had been ahead of us and we had waiting for some time. It seems Alison was stuck in the bathroom without paper. When I went in, I was greeting with “WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? WHAT TOOK SO LONG?” I just can’t win.

We decided to go to the Trust Mart (more like the old (and I mean old) 5 & Dime and not a K-Mart knock off. Anyway, we went looking for movies. We bought a number of Chinese movies when we were here last time. Some still work & some don’t. We only brought one back with us. They are so cheap. Anyway, we got more of the girl / fairy / magic / preteen stories. We bought a box set. Alison understands them & it promotes the language skills. We also bought Ice Age 3 in Chinese. Emma wanted a Disney learn English book / CD. I also picked up a math CD set in Chinese. I thought it was a workbook but seems to be all DVDs. We picked up a couple of story books w/ CDs in Chinese / pinyin pronunciation. We got in line behind a lady with one cart. Then as they started working on that cart she backed up & pulled another cart in behind her. She was buying in bulk (maybe this is a very small Sam’s Club). Then as we finished our check out, I noticed the person in front of us taking her cart to a station & sacking her groceries. Now I know, we are in Aldies (I don’t know how to spell it since I don’t shop there)! Well, do we have a bag? Of course not. Can you buy a bag? … of course, but not at check out. So, we took Alison’s hooded jacket & wrapped our purchases up in that.

It is overcast and late afternoon. There is a breeze most of the time but we are walking and the humidity is about 90% & low 80’s. I am drenched each time I go out for a stroll. As we were coming back in, Alison says “you are hot”. Lynn says “of course she is hot”. Alison says “not hot like that Dad”. Then the whole discussion of not hot, HOT! She told Lynn the Jonas brothers were hot so when he sees a cute guy he asks her if he is hot. The same goes for a really cute girl. Don't get her started... Mom and Dad are NOT HOT!

When we got back to the hotel, I took a nap to cool off. Emma & Alison have watched about 4 of the pre-teen shows. Alison is eating her way through a bag of sunflower seeds. Emma ate left over chicken from lunch. I gave her cookies. Lynn & I ate a candy bar and that is our dinner. Oh, there were Pringles for Emma & Lynn… I ate a few but they were the original tasting Pringles & not the new & improved Pringles we have at home.

Oh, I forgot to tell you all about our dinner last night. I wanted to go back to the same restaurant that I had to leave early from because of Alison not feeling well (that was Sunday night). It is a large restaurant around the corner and up a million stairs (ok, maybe just two flights). Sunday night we had a curried chicken w/ potato that was GREAT. We also had broccoli w/ garlic & oil that was OUT OF THIS WORLD. I wanted both. They have a huge book of menu items with pictures! They have another two sided picture menu. Could I find either of these items on the menu…. NO! Did our waiter speak any English? NO. Maybe I did tell you all about this. I guess you can tell, it still bothers me. So I ordered a kind of chicken w/ something and what did we get? Shrimp w/ shells in the curry sauce. Chinese don’t eat with their fingers. They slurp, scoop, lick and have noodles hanging while they eat them but they don’t eat with their fingers. So how do you peel a shrimp? It was really good but impossible to eat and we had three napkins between us. I tried to appeal to a waiter that we had the wrong food but he insisted we had what was ordered for us. Oh well, we ate. Alison didn’t eat a bite. Emma ate the broccoli and the rice. That curried chicken / potato was so good. I guess I will have to see if I can find a recipe. Ok, I will stop complaining about our lack of restaurant ordering skills. And the shrimp was as good as the chicken but I had sauce up to my elbows!

I continue to get hugs today from Emma. She woke me up from my nap by coming in and lying in bed beside me... just for a snuggle and then she was off again. She has giggled and laughed out loud w/ the movies. I love to hear her laugh. I remember Alison laughing as she watched movies when we first got her. The girls feed off of each other and are such company for each other. Today at the store, Emma was blowing on Alison’s hair and Alison jerked around and yelled at her in Chinese. Emma just laughed & shrugged her shoulders at me. Like what is she upset about? Oh the days ahead.

Zoo & Shopping Can it get better?

Today was a fun day & not tooo terribly hot. We boarded a bus at 9:30 & headed to Shamian Island so the other half of our group could go to the clinic to have their TB tests read. We looked around the White Swan & then headed to the zoo. It was an overcast day & still probably in the 80s but there was a nice breeze most of the day. Who doesn't love a zoo. We heard the lion roar again but didn't actually see the lion. We saw just about everything else. The panda was zonked & not moving around but we can say we saw one.

There is a very amateur circus that was pretty weak but even the kids enjoyed that. I probably wouldn't go see it again but where can you see a monkey and a bear riding a two wheeler (don't get me wrong it wasn't at the same time or even the same bike... not that spectacular)?

We got back to the hotel at 1:30 & a few of us were going to the Pearl market at 3:30. I took Emma with us to shop. She must have been bored out of her mind because we went right to a few shops & we all spent all we wanted to spend. We were gone almost three hours and probably didn't go in but maybe 3-5 stores.

Emma has been real chipper today and very affectionate to me. She is finally starting to acknowledge Lynn a bit now. We looked at our family album again tonight. I told her again who everyone is and she repeated their names after me. A very good day for her.

Alison is feeling better but has no appetite. She ate breakfast but no lunch or dinner. She says she is just tired but she also didn't like our choice of food for dinner.

Tomorrow is a free day. At least I don't have to beg, plead, yell to get the girls up, fed & on the bus by 9;30. That shouldn't be that hard but they really sleep in and yet they aren't up late. We normally are in bed by 9:00 and then up at 8:00. Maybe it is the heat and they are just wiped out at the end of the day. I don't know what it is... maybe it was just hard to keep Alison moving cause she hasn't felt well.

Four more days and we head home. Alison is talking a lot in Chinese now. She talks to our guides Sara & Jennifer and quite a bit to Emma. They don't just chat but she tells her what she needs to tell her. At dinner tonight, the waiter couldn't understand what I wanted & he turned to Alison to tell him what I wanted. Alison had to say that he didn't understand me. Well, even I knew that!

Pictures on Flickr

If you haven't noticed, I added a link in the left panel to some random pictures from our trip on Flickr.

Ear Aches...

We had an interesting night last night. We were watching TV & the girls were in the bedroom. Alison came running into the living room screaming “my ear, my ear”. I think she burst her ear drum. We didn’t even know she was having ear problems. She settled down after awhile & I gave her a Tylenol Sinus pill to help with the congestion and she finally fell asleep.

Today she has complained all day w/ periods of seeming to be fine. Breakfast was normal & then we took a bus to a Lantern festival / park. The flowers were very beautiful. I have pictures of the girls sitting on cow statues… you don’t see that every day. There was a lion dance that was very good. The park was gorgeous but a lot of people and so hot. We got the girls ice cream which helps and bought some bubbles to keep them quiet.

Next we went to a Buddhist temple. There were three very large bronze Buddhas in a building. There also pagoda which was 17 stories inside and was called the 9 Banyan tower. Lots of people celebrating today & offering prayers. We could have had the girls blessed by a monk but chose not to. Everyone complained of the smoke from the incense but it really was quite colorful and festive although so empty of true meaning in my faith.

Back to the hotel… Sarah arranged for us to go to a doctor this afternoon. He couldn’t really find anything in Alison’s ears but he gave us Penicillin anyway. I made her come back to the room and nap this afternoon. At 5:30 we met in the lobby for a group picture then on to a local Chinese restaurant as a group. The food was good. There was a chicken / potato soup in a dark yellow sauce that was excellent. The chicken was very good and I don’t normally like the chicken in most dishes… bones & all usually but not this time. Anyway, Alison complained and cried the first half hour until I finally left & we walked back by ourselves. We made a stop at Starbucks for hot chocolate for her and a latte for me. I gave her Tylenol when we got back. She laid on the couch for sometime but is now lying on her bed playing Uno with Dad and seems to be better.

Emma is still not made up with Lynn. She waved goodbye to me at the restaurant as she was not done eating but still didn’t want to walk back with Dad. She does hold a grudge.

We are hoping the antibiotic w/ Tylenol for pain will get Alison feeling better. She is crabby when tired but she is a nightmare when she is in pain. I am so ready to be home. We may need to stay in tomorrow and that may be worse… I don’t know. So not a bad day but a stressful day with a whining, sick kid.

Xrays / Itchy arm & SHOPPING

The other families from WACAP are now here. One family is adopting now a 5 year old & will be back this summer to adopt another son from Madison. They say the special needs kids are easy to get "waives". Met a family today that waited 6 months for an 11 month old w/ a birthmark that disappeared when she was 2 months old (the fear is that another might come back). She is gorgeous. So many children and so many stories.

At 9:30 we met to go back to the clinic. As I suspected, Emma is positive so she had to have an x-ray. They looked at it for a long time & called others to look at it & then finally said it was clean. They suspect her heart problem was showing some distortion on the x-ray. Anyway, we have clearance to come home & we can take care of anything there.

We were then free to shop Shamian Island. Yeah! I went to Starbucks for a latte (so good) then on to as many stores as I could fit in. Jennifer's has moved next to the new Subway which is by the Victory Annex. We had lunch at Lucy's. Emma got her feelings hurt when Dad had to tell her "no" very sternly & boy did she let us know she wasn't happy. She pouted w/ her head down almost all through lunch. Finally the corn on the cob won her over plus her soda didn't hurt. We took the french fries with us & headed to the White Swan. We got one picture on the red couch but only w/ Alison & I. Boy did we add to the economy on Shamian Island. It is our American duty.

It is in the 80s today. We were pretty hot but most shops are air conditioned so we got relief. It is so awesome to talk to the other parents. Not many older kids being adopted. I have only seen maybe 4 this week out of the maybe 20 plus kids we have seen. Don't get me wrong, I love to see families being formed. I just wish more kids were finding families.

We took our laundry to Sarah's room. The girls are chattering in Chinese to each other. Alison is talking more to Emma today. Alison asked me today if I was glad that we adopted her and Emma. She also told everyone that she had a great day yesterday. Her face sure didn't show it! Alison talked to the baby on the bus ride back. Alison must have told the dad a dozen times that his baby was adorable. Now Alison is saying... when we adopt again. We aren't even home yet & she is talking like we are coming back to get another child.

The girls have eaten more of their hot fries snack that Alison bought yesterday. They each have had soy milk (who knew) and a fruit snack. Now they are going through the things we just bought. They each have a yo-yo and the grins are never ending.

I find it interesting that most of the cartoons here are in English. Isn't that odd? Tom & Jerry mostly on one station. Oh Cartoon Network is almost all English. I just heard the commercial for what we are watching.

We have one English phrase "oh no". More to come.

Trip to Zhu Hai

For those families who are waiting for pictures of their children, we loaded a bunch to the Yahoo Group Picture album. The boys look healthy. We went to their room and they were each carried to us and we were told who they were. They were never put down on the floor. We went to the room with about five adults and maybe 15 kids in our parade through the halls. There were either 2 or 3 caregivers in the room. Most of the kids were in cribs, one or two were running free and a couple were being fed in seats. We totally interrupted the routine. There was only one child to a small crib and the cribs were head to toe w/ aisles between maybe three rows. Most of the awake babies stood in their cribs when we came into the room. Several older girls were with us and they felt quite at home going to a crib and picking up a baby. We were told not to take pictures of the other children but that was after I had taken a few. There were three rooms to the nursery with glass windows separating each one so you could see from one to the next. The first room was the feeding (and probably changing room). The next two were filled with beds. There were so many people milling around I couldn’t take it all in. I couldn’t take pictures & hold one of the boys so I opted to take pictures.

Reagan is taller than I thought and her shoes were bigger than I expected. They were bigger than mine but they wear shoes too big & the style of tennis shoe would make anyone’s feet look big. She is so very pretty. She was at school when we first got there and we went back to the office/meeting room from our baby visit she was coming in the front door. Our guide was wonderful and translated everything. A room full of us went into the meeting room, I gave Reagan her gift. Another caregiver helped her open it & they went through the bag very quickly. When I could get back to Reagan, I asked for her bag and we went through every item. I showed her each picture & told her who each person was. The guide was beside me and told her in Chinese. We got out the shirt & explained what Indiana is (but what do you tell a Chinese what a Hoosier is?... we said it was a nickname for our state). We looked at the bracelet. When she pulled out the disposable cameras, she said she had two of them already. She has a sweet smile & our guide said she was very happy. She has a deep voice for a child… kind of like Emma’s. I told her that you would probably come in June to get her & the guide translated that too. There were some rowdy, pushy kids there but Reagan was sweet & yet not shy.

Now that I have told the new parents about their kids, I will back up & tell you about our trip. We had a new guide for today, Jennifer. Sarah has other WACAP families coming in from other provinces today (yesterday) & has to go to the notary for us all. They rented a van for us. We put the girls in the middle seats & I gave Alison a nausea pill right away. They both slept the almost two hours to Zhu Hai. The fog/smog is very bad as we go. We cannot see more than a mile. You cross many rivers / bridges & we could tell there were some large boats in the water but that was it. The air cleared by the end of the day & on the drive back we could see farther / better.

We arrived at Zhu Hai at about 11:30. They don’t have a large courtyard entrance. There is the road, trees, the gate, the entrance and a parking lot to the left of the entrance. It was difficult to get a real good picture of the front. The lobby had a programmable sign that read “welcome parents of Zhu Mei Xin and Zhu Ai Zhen to Zhu Hai”. We were told to go into a meeting room to the left of the lobby. There was a leather couch and several chairs around the room. They brought us water. They brought the girls soy milk (which Alison loves & Emma hates) and packaged cookies. Several directors came in to meet us. Several women and men that we have seen in pictures with the girls. They told us that Reagan (sorry, it is 6:00 AM & the girls are asleep & I can’t see my purse to look up Reagan’s Chinese name) was in school & would be here shortly. Adults & kids kept coming in to see Mei Xin & Ai Zhen. Emma started to cry & cried off/on for about an hour. Alison never tear-ed up but had a stern look on her face & would barely talk. She didn’t come to me for comfort but clung to the director (I have to look up her name… I will edit this later).

Everything was still a little wet from the morning cleaning and the dampness of the humidity. The walls, floors, ceilings are all white. We took an elevator to the third floor and then walked the hallways to the room. I was surprised to be taken to the nursery instead of them bringing the boys to us. It was a mad house as our troop descended on that room. They brought the boys to us right away and told us who was who. The babies in the next room began to cry and stand up in their cribs and since I was at the door, I walked in & talked to a few of them. I got some big smiles and some giggles. These babies are pretty happy in their surroundings. The one little boy on the loose, held up his arms for me to hold him and I did. Several adults and teens picked up babies. That is heart warming to see babies being held & talked to.

We walked a ways around the corridors to Emma’s room. More tears. Her room was rather large with only two twin beds in it. There was a closet unit as you come in. The night bedding was neatly rolled / folded at the top of each bed. No decorations, no curtains to the large windows. There were a few small stickers on the wall beside her bed. One was of a group of girls that are in a combo power rangers and Barbie adventure group. I recognize the blond because Emma bought that DVD the day before and we watched the movie. The rooms are arranged kind of like dorm rooms with adjoining baths to other rooms so she didn’t have far to walk to the restroom. I asked who Emma shared a room with & they answered but didn’t say… here she is and it wasn’t a name I remembered. Emma was too upset to want a picture with anyone in particular. She didn’t gravitate toward anyone friend in particular.

When we were in the hallway starting toward Emma’s room, Mrs. Zhong showed up. She came in on her day off to see us. Her hair is different and at first I wasn’t sure it was her. She said we hadn’t changed at all. She hugged Alison and talked to her as we walked the halls to Emma’s room. She was with us maybe 15 minutes. Most of the time was talking to Alison. Again, Alison was just so withdrawn and overwhelmed. She reverts to becoming very introverted with stressed. Mrs. Zhong looks good. She said good bye to the girls as we greeting Reagan.

We were ushered back to the meeting room. A mad frenzy of Chinese adults & kids talking and wanting to see what Reagan’s parents had sent her. A Chinese adult lady the kids call something Ping helped her open the bag and look at the contents. We had brought a bag of candy (M&M’s and small Snickers) and I gave that to a director and she began passing it out. That helped clear the chaos so I could talk to Reagan and show her what her Mamma has packed for her. Our translator told her every picture in Chinese and I said what it was in English. Everyone who was looking at the pictures knew the word “cow”. Her eyes are so beautiful and she just soaked it all in as I told her she lived on a farm not far away from Mei Xin. With each picture, she saw her family with four siblings and they said she was #5.

Our time with the kids was shorten as the director wanted to take us to lunch. So four male directors and Mrs Yuan (I don’t know how to spell her name but I will) went to lunch with us. The men drove in their van and we went in ours w/ Mrs. Yuan. Lunch was a feast. We were in a gold decorated private dining room with the large round table. There must have been 15 or so dishes of food (mostly meat). The rice always comes last in a Chinese feast! We had duck, beef, chicken, toufou, small oysters, fried fish and we could have had snake! Lunch was awesome. I don’t like duck, toufou or oysters but I tried many of the dishes. They asked us if we needed a fork when the meal began. We told them no and then I was put to the test right away and I passed. Good to practice chop sticks.

The men had to leave us and go to a meeting but it was almost 2PM! Mrs Yuan went with us and we went to the old orphanage. The gate was locked but the guard let us go in and look around. Nothing of the old place exists but the buildings. We took a picture by a tree w/ the ceramic tile around the base. We went to the store on the corner and Mrs Yuan bought Alison some snacks that she likes. Mrs. Yuan is concerned that Alison did not eat enough at lunch… it is just emotions.

Then we go to Alison’s school. The gatekeeper there also let us in so we walked up to the buildings. The kids were out playing. Three girls were watching us closely and Alison said she knew them that they were in her class but that they were mean to her and kicked her so she didn’t want to go talk to them. Emma saw one of her teachers as we came in and we got a picture of them together. The school is very nice and they say has about a thousand students.

Next we went to the school which is across the street from the new orphanage. Again the gatekeeper let us in when Mrs Yuan explained why we wanted in. Emma’s said her classroom was on the fourth floor and in.

Finally it was time to say goodbye to Mrs. Yuan. Alison said it was so sad to say goodbye to friends.

We had a terrible drive back to Guangzhou with the interstate closed for some reason. It took us three hours to get back & only two to get there. Guangzhou is a city of 10 million and Zhu Hai is a city of 1 million.

Dinner was snacks for the girls. Alison can really pick out an assortment. Lynn and I had McDonalds. The hamburger w/ cheese was good but tastes NOTHING like home. The fries tasted good this time. The grease must have been old the other day.

The girls had a pillow fight last night. They are starting to act like sisters and not just people who knew each other. Well, I better go. I have to get laundry ready, breakfast and be ready to go back to the doctor by 9:30. Emma keeps rubbing her TB test and it is a little red. GREAT!