Honk Kong to U.S.A.

Well friends, this is the last China post. We are up and getting ready to head to the airport. We are so thankful. We arrive at the Birmingham Airport at 9:25 pm Friday. For those that want to meet us there, we had posted a blog saying that you could come up to Hope and lightly touch her and talk to her. We need to revise that. Please DO NOT touch her. She is very afraid of strangers and this traveling will make it worse. You can talk to her but please try not to touch her. Keep praying for safe and easy travels. She is a good traveller but 14 hours on a plane makes me crazy, imagine being her. We are going to attempt to catch an earlier flight out of Chicago if by some miracle one has been added. If our flight changes we will post it on FB and here on the blog.

We can’t thank everyone enough for following our journey with prayers and encouragement. We have really needed all the love you have all shared. We will keep the blog open for a little while as we enter into surgery season, but will close it probably around December so it will only be for our sweet Hope to re-read some day. Blessings to all who have loved us through this entire process both friends and strangers. It has been an honor to share in God’s plan with you. Blessings dear ones!

Goodbye Guangzhou!

We’ve had a couple good lazy days recently. On Tuesday we went to the famed Shaimen Island to do some shopping and touristy stuff. We took a taxi and it was thrilling needless to say. When he crossed the bridge to the island he literally stopped the car on the bridge and said, “Shaimen, you go.” So we had to wander down half the island to find the “touristy spots.” We got some heritage stuff for the girls and Noah. We found a popular sculpture that people tend to take pictures next to. Noah had just bought a bamboo sword and here is our picture of the curtsey girl…

No one move or the curtsey girl gets it!! Hope was a little more apt to stay with me today and she was quite good on the shopping tour. I finally got some snuggle time on the way home in the death defying taxi ride…strange place for snuggles but I’ll take ‘em where I can get ‘em.

Could you just kiss all over that sweet smile!!!!

Snuggle time!!

Then that evening we went on the evening river ride and saw all the lights on the river. We had a good time and later there was a magician. He played with the Chinese kids most of the show but then finally I scooted Noah closer to the front and the magician spied Noah and came straight for him for the final trick. He had a fist full of white paper and then came to Noah and pretended to take a hair off Noah’s head then he added it to the paper, hit it and it became a fist full of Chinese Yuan (money)! I told Noah we were gonna shave his head later if it turns paper into money!

Wednesday we had our consulate appointment and baby girl became a U.S. Citizen (well the moment we touch down in Chicago she will be). It was quick and easy. Then we lazed around and went to the pool and went out to eat with Melissa and Craig to Mexican. We had to say goodbye to a sweet Mama and her two girls but we hope to catch up with them when we get back home. Vicky and her girls live in Montgomery. Then there is today…we packed up and swam and ran to the Trustmart (Walmart) for more formula. We said goodbye to another precious family today as well, Amber and Brian and their girls. They were such a blessing to us while we were here. I will really miss them. We also said goodbye to Suzanne and her daughters another sweet family. We will all try to keep in touch and follow each other children. I know I won’t forget these amazing families we met here in China. We are now one hour away from our 3 hour van ride to Hong Kong. We are riding with Melissa and Craig and their sweet son. It will be good to have friends on the trip. We will check in to our hotel around 8  p.m. I would guess. Then we fly out of Hong Kong at 11:10 am tomorrow. I have no idea when we will have to leave the hotel but it is likely around 8 am. We can’t wait to get home. Noah is really home sick today and I think we all are truth be told. Don’t know if I’ll get to blog from Hong Kong. If not, see you on the other side! Blessings dear ones!

Noah’s favorite place…one of the several Koi ponds in the hotel.

Me and my girl.

I got all my bracelets on! (That would be 7 total)

Jane Martin THIS Post Is For YOU!

So today was zoo day and it was GREAT! Hope and Noah both loved it. We took a golf cart around the zoo first and it was cool and nice. Hope loves riding. We stopped at the Panda’s and Big Cats to get out to film then when we finished the golf cart tour we had an hour to burn so we went to see the monkeys…big shock there huh? It was a good day, here are some of our favorite shots. The Big Cats were amazing in that a female lion started to roar and then a big male chimed in and then another couple females joined. It was amazing and loud! I have it on video but I won’t bore you with it.

I must say the black leopard was one of my favorities, followed by the chimpanzees. The Asian elephant was much bigger than I thought it would be and I have never seen a 2-humper camel before. So it was a wild kingdom sort of day. Now we are in naptime and swim time. We will likely ring up some friends for dinner, I’d like to try Italian tonight…we shall see. Tomorrow we have the day off and we go to a night time dinner cruise on the river that is supposed to be wonderful. Then Wednesday is our consulate appointment and shopping on Shaiman Island. Thursday we pack up and leave at 4:30 pm via van with another family and head for Hong Kong. Friday at 11:00 am we fly home!!!!!!!! I’ll keep you posted. Hope is doing great today. Her lip is much better with the coconut oil we believe and things are good. Keep praying please! Blessings dear ones!

A Word About Sweet Eden

Okay…I don’t like being gone this long from my precious Eden Marie. To say that it is killing me is almost and understatement. Praise the Lord for Skype and my Dad sending us photo’s from Camp Grandparents. She is having the time of her life. She apparently doesn’t remember to miss us much, she doesn’t get weepy or call for us. She is delighted to see us on Skype but only for a few minutes and then she is off and busy doing something more fun. I am so thankful for this. I am so blessed with parents who are willing to take care of a 2 1/2 year old for 18 days!! And they don’t just take care of her…they spoil her rotten…which I am conflicted about…hee hee. (The re-training takes so long.) I’m so blessed to know that while I am here, Eden is safe, sound, and happy as a lark, there. Here are some of the photos we have received from Dad…I love this gorgeous girl. Keep her in your prayers too please!

 

This last one is my favorite one…Hollywood eat your heart out!

Thanks Mom and Dad…we could not have done this trip without you. We love you so very much.

Shopping Day in Guangzhou

Okay, so most women would be excited about this day…I, however, was not. There are only a few things I do want and they are on Shaiman Island, we go there Wednesday. But we went to this big shopping mall like thing. We went to get some dresses for Hope and Eden. I think I bought them too small. Hope was barely in hers and I doubt Eden will fit in hers. I even bought some bigger sizes (so I thought) for when they are older, but they seem small too…the neck hole is the problem. Then we tired to get some shoes, but her feet were too small for anything they had. So we headed to the Pizza Hut early. We saw two more adoptive families I have been emailing and facebooking with and that was cool, but we eat in shifts around here so Eric had to entertain Hope while Noah and I ate. Then I grabbed Hope so Eric could eat and we were off in search of pearls. Apparently it is another Chinese tradition to give pearls to your daughters for when they wed. Since I don’t know if the girls will even like pearls let alone want to wear them on their wedding day I got them each a modest pearl bracelet that I’ll likely give them when they turn 16 or something. they made both bracelets out of one strand of pearls. It is amazing to watch how fast they can individually tie each pearl on the string. Noah got a necklace himself…gold colored pearls that look and are shaped like a strand of corn kernels. They match the second Kung Fu outfit we got him…a gold one with black dragons. I thought the necklace was unattractive but with the outfit it looks man-ly and awesome. Who knew the kid had fashion sense. The longer I watched these ladies make the girls bracelets I wanted a strand for myself. So Eric let me get a necklace for myself. So now I own a real pearl necklace and it was so inexpensive here! Here is Noah’s new outfit (minus the necklace).

Later we went down to the pool with another family with 2 teenage girls. They were so sweet and they played tag and Marco Polo with Noah. He was so thrilled to have other children to play with. It was such a gift to him and to me. It was great to see him playing and having some fun. This family is such a blessing to us in many ways. Another way is that Amber (mom) offered to share some Coconut oil to help out Hope’s scabbed over lip. It look awful. She said she uses it on her other adopted children and it works wonders. We are hopeful that it will help our sweet girl. So we bartered coconut oil for Pedialyte. God bless them Pedialyte and Gatorade is all their new daughter will drink and they were running out. We had a full box of it and Hope won’t drink it so we were glad to give it to Amber and Brian. It really is an instant community here in the adoption world. It’s pretty cool.

Then at 5:30 we had a group picture taken where we were supposed to dress our kids in their Chinese clothes if we bought them any. Check out our China Girl!

Look how happy and cute I am!!

Then we went and ate Subway with the precious couple that is standing right next to us. That is Melissa and Craig from Birmingham. We love them.

Hope is doing well. She definitely favors Daddy right now. She was not letting me hold her much at all this day until the Subway run when Eric just gave her to me to handle. She started to arch and freak out at the Subway when I sat down to hold her in my lap while we ate. Her and I had about a 30 second tussle and the she quieted down and was fine. Since that time she is much better with me. We think she is just mistrustful of women right now…which is understandable she had been abandoned by them 3 different times in her life now. She took some time to go to sleep and wouldn’t let me leave the room but once asleep she only woke up once during the night and slept till 8 am. So all in all she is doing really well.  

Bubbles!!!

Medical Exam Day

Okay, I’m not gonna lie when I say I was dreading this…I believe I mentioned that in the last post. With Hope’s “no touchy-touchy” policy, I didn’t think the medical exam would be anything short of disaster. We met our group downstairs at 10 am to all travel to the medical center together. It was at this time that I was asked for Hope’s shot records. Shot records…hmmmm…nope, don’t remember getting those. Luckily our guides only wanted them because they were going to translate them for us. We got on the bus with 4 other families. One family is a precious couple that actually live in Birmingham about 15 minutes from us. Love this couple.Their little one has had his lip repaired and some of his palate. He will still need work on that but he is super cute. We found out we will be on the same flight back to the U.S. Woot! Woot! We also are going to split the cost for a van to get to Hong Kong instead of taking the train. Way less drama and stress that way. Anyway, we arrive at the clinic and the first thing we do is take a picture for the VISA. Hope wasn’t having any of this. They tried to sit her in a little white chair by herself…bwah ha ha ha! As if! Then Eric tried to hold her as she thrashed around. We then stepped out of line since we were holding it up big time. The couldn’t get a picture with both her ears visible in the photo. I was like why does it matter?! I thought it was a China thing but they said that OUR country insists that both ears show…WHAT?! I’m writing a congressman. What if my child didn’t have both ears! Finally after watching 3 other children getting their photo’s taken and Eric passing her off to me, we got a photo (I saw it later and it is amazingly cute, especially considering she had been screaming at the top of her lungs just moments before.)

Then we had to wait around for our guides to assemble all our forms for us to fill out. Then it was time to go to all 4 stations…there is no order you just get in the shortest line. The stations are: Nurses (weight, height, temperature) ENT, General Exam, and TB shot. Praise the Lord Hope didn’t have to get a TB shot because she is under 2 years old. The shots they give here are not the simple little three pronged shots they are a huge needle stuck way in the child’s arm. It’s fairly horrible. We went to nurses station first. And as we already guessed the stats we got on her before we left for China were indeed inflated. She weighs only 21 pounds. Her height is about right though…about 1/2 inch off. Next was ENT…bwah ha ha ha. So the guy squeaked a toy on one side of her head and she turned screaming then he had another one on the other side of her head and she turned…still screaming. He then looked at her eyes with his eyes for like 1 second and barely pulled her cheeks apart to reveal that her bilateral cleft lip was complete. Then he scribbled through the entire form and signed it. I could have done that. Then the general medical exam…she screamed some more, he measured her head, had us take off her shoes and socks, and listened to her lungs and heart…how I don’t really know through the screaming. Then we took her to a little table where he put her on her back and lifted her shirt to glance over her front and back and he opened up one side of her diaper and check her front and back…total time less than 15 seconds. Then he declared we were done with our exam. I was supposed to tell them she was on antibiotics but he didn’t seem to care when I tried to tell him. All things considered it went WAAAAYYY better than I had imagined, God is faithful and I have little faith...clearly. (just kidding) But she recovered so quickly and let us even comfort her some. I was very happy about how the visit went. Of course Eric makes it look so easy to restrain her because he is so much stronger than I am. But even he agrees she snapped out of it pretty quick. However, for the rest of the day she only wanted Daddy. No Mama.

We got back in the bus and she chilled out on Daddy’s lap for the ride home. We ate lunch and then she took a nap. I went to a VISA paperwork meeting and the Eric and the kids went exploring a little when Hope woke up.  When I returned from the meeting we waited out a small thundershower and then all decided to go to the pool. Noah sure needed the exercise and fun. He had been having a pretty blue day. It totally perked him up.  After the pool, another couple, the one we met in Chicago, phoned us and we all went out to a Mexican restaurant called Tequila for dinner. We had a delightful time. I’m so sad we don’t live closer to this awesome couple. We hit the 7/11 on the way home, that’s right I said it…7/11, for water and snacks. Upon arriving at the hotel we did some “trading” with  Ashley and Mark, their medium diapers for our Gerber Puffs, some cough drops and Oragel sticks. Good times. Now Hope is sleep fighting and awake in her crib. Noah is about to hit the sack and I am too! Tomorrow and pretty much from here on out is relaxing and sightseeing until our consulate appointment. I’m finally caught up on this blog to present time! Yay! Blessings dear ones!