Saturday and Sunday... Happy 1st Mother's Day to me!

Mother's Day Angel

I loved waking up and snuggling with my little boy this morning. My first Mother's Day as a mother! My little guy wakes up happy and snuggles until we are ready to change him. Then he's ready to do whatever we do.

Last night we had our suspicions about whether or not Little G would feed himself. So at breakfast this morning, I cut up his pancake, gave him some scrambled egg and sausage and sat back to see what he'd do. He lightly touched a piece of the pancake. I took his hand and put the pancake in his mouth. He lightly touched a second piece and looked at me as if asking permission. Well, he ate the rest of his breakfast on his own!

This morning we went to an arts museum which is housed in what was the Chen Clan house and school. They are restoring the color on the ornate carvings along the roof line. I think our guide said that this was just turned into a museum not too long ago.

After the museum we went to a tea house. Since neither Guillermo nor I are tea drinkers it wasn't the most exciting thing, but it is a cultural thing so we were onlookers. Little G, on the other hand, is a true China man! The lady who was doing the demonstration gave each person a tiny little teacup and samples of several types of tea. Little G was ready to try each one. He actually did a pretty good job of drinking out of that tiny teacup. His bib was soaked, but he got quite a bit into himself too. For you tea drinkers, what we learned today is that if you brew your tea more than 20 seconds it gets more bitter and increases the amount of caffeine in the tea.

After teatime we came back to the hotel and had a McDonald's lunch. Little G ate half of a hamburger. Then took a good nap. After he woke up we played with stacking cups and keys, then to supper. We came to StarYucks for a muffin for dessert--or so we can use the internet.

Well, my little angel is reaching for me, so I'm going to wrap this post up and get my boy from his daddy.

ornate carvings on roofline and outer wall

G & G

more carvings on the outer wall

the door gods--guarding the entryway

inner courtyard

the fingerpainter -- beautiful paintings all done with his fingers

restoration

guard dog

teapots

tea

tea demo and samples

tea demonstration

Sippin' tea


Big tea pot

Saturday, May 09, 2009

Medical exam

This morning we woke Little G up to go to breakfast so he would have time to eat before today’s outing.  He’s a good eater and eats just about anything we offer him.  We have to chop things up but are finding that we don’t have to chop them as minutely as the orphanage workers made it sound like we needed to.  For breakfast he’s been eating scrambled egg, a little bit of chopped up sausage, part of a pancake, veggies from the dumplings and some congee mixed with fruit or vegetable juice.  We generally fill a bottle with apple juice for him to drink during the day. 

After breakfast today we headed out for the medical examination.  Before going to the clinic we went into this little office near the clinic to have pictures taken for Little G’s (and the other kids’) visas.  All he had to do was sit on a chair for one picture, but as soon as I set him in that chair you would have thought someone was torturing him.  He cried, screamed, threw his head back.  He certainly didn’t want me to let go of him or to take his thumb out of his mouth.  We managed to get a fairly good picture of him, despite the tears.  There were three parts to the medical exam;  height & weight, head circumference & body check, and checked out by an ENT.  While giving him a bath the other day we noticed that he does have Mongolian spots on his bottom, so that needed to be noted in the medical notes.  We also took pictures to go in his medical file in the US and for the social worker.  It’s important that they realize these spots are common among Chinese children and are not bruises. 

We left the clinic and went back to the grocery store.  The families who adopted from other provinces arrived in Guangzhou yesterday and needed some supplies.  We bought a few things to try and a little toy for Guille.  Guillermo carried Little G around in the snuggly with him facing out.  He reached for several different things in the grocery store.  We were very happy with this since he hasn’t seemed to reach out for much of anything…except us.  When we got back to the hotel room, we decided to try some of the things we bought for lunch.  When I opened these little yogurt dipped pretzel sticks, Guille grabbed for one.  This was the first food he actually reached for, so we let him have it to see what he’d do.  It went straight for his mouth and he bit off bits and obviously knew what he was doing!!  He ate a good lunch and then went down for a nap. 

While Guille napped, I went down to our guide’s room for a “paper party”.  There were several forms that need to be filled out before going to the US Consulate so one parent from each family met in the guide’s room for about an hour and a half filling out paperwork.  When I came back to the room Guille was just waking up from his nap, so I got the snuggles!   (Have I mentioned that I’m happy that he’s a snuggler??)

For supper we went with most of the other families in our group and our guide to a Japanese restaurant that is here in the hotel complex.  There is kind of like a mall on the first floor of the hotel with several different shops, Starbucks, a couple of restaurants, etc.  As soon as we put Guille in the high chair, he reached for the chop sticks, took them out of the paper cover that was around them and started trying to pull them apart.  Again, he obviously knew what he was doing!  We had fed him some rice cereal before going to the restaurant because we weren’t sure what he’d eat there.  He ate a LOT!  Some of our fried rice with seafood, a bowl of boiled egg soup with mushrooms, shrimp, & crab meat that the waitress brought out for him (even though we didn’t order it).  He was kind of comical popping up for more food, mouth wide open waiting for the next bite.  He reached for the food tonight too, so tomorrow for breakfast we are going to put the food in front of him and see what he’ll do with it.  It sure would be nice if he’d feed himself, though it has been a nice bonding time.  Our guide said tonight that she can see that he’s really trusting us and likes us a lot.  We’re so happy for that!!

 We had him walk part of the way back to the room to walk off that big meal!  I’m not sure how much he’s had the opportunity to walk, since he does the penguin walk and doesn’t like to walk long distances.  But, we’ll get him home and let him play in the big back yard and I’m sure those little legs will take him many places…probably faster than I can catch up to him. 

 He’s down for the night and Guillermo is watching a James Bond movie, dubbed into Japanese with Chinese subtitles.  I think I’ll wrap up this entry, shrink a few pictures to add to the blog whenever I get a chance to post again, then hit the hay.  It’s been quite a day.  Our little fella is starting to show his personality and I like what I see.  He’s such a good boy and we love him so much.  Good night.  

Ready for the medical exam

Examination room for adopted children

Waiting for the doctor

Not a happy camper!

Little G's medical form

Munchin' on pretzels

Paperwork party

"Hey, I know what these are for!"

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday... and now it's Friday

Friday, May 8, 2009

Ok, Ok... I know it has been a while since you've gotten an update. It's hard to find a time to come to StarYucks to get online. We thought about getting internet in the room, but it's around $100 for 1 week of internet service. So, we'll stick with this method for a few more days. OK... and now the updates. I'll post the events of the week. Starting with this morning.

We walked to a nearby park and watched the people doing their meditation exercises. If you didn't know that it was a meditation thing, it really did look quite graceful. The park is huge and there were a lot of people there.


Thursday, May 07, 2009

A trip to the zoo

This morning started with an early breakfast. Little G woke up a happy boy. He played with his keys and stacking cups while we finished getting ready for breakfast. We headed down to the restaurant around 6:30 since it takes Little G quite a while to eat. At about 7:45 we came back up to the room and packed up for our trip to the zoo. We could tell that Little G knew we were going somewhere. I’m glad today’s outing was a nice, relaxing one for him. There weren’t any animals in particular that he liked or didn’t like, so I’ll just share some of the pictures that we took while we were there. Enjoy our trip! :)

My 2 Gs

Checking out the elephant

playing with bubbles

Self explanatory...(read the sign)

Watching the monkeys

Cutest thing in the zoo!

Red Panda (looked like a raccoon to me... well, almost)

Family picture with the "panda"

Miniature deer (no, that's not the correct name, but it gets the point across

Flamingos

Froggy

Once we got back to the room, Little G quickly downed some apple juice. We had been hoping that we wouldn’t have to use a suppository…but we did. The apple and prune juices just didn’t do the job. But, the job is done now and we are praying that his little body will work properly and he won’t have to endure that again. After the deed was done, he ate most of a bottle of congee with prune & apple juice before going down for his nap. He’s sleeping now. He doesn’t like to lay down when he gets put in his crib. Today he finally just flopped forward. He’ll be waking up soon and we’ll see what he wants to play with this afternoon.


We decided to postpone our trip to the orphanage. I think at this point it would be pretty hard on the little fella. I'd hate to lose the ground we've gained. We will probably go on Monday.

Wednesday, May 06, 2009 (For the sake of time here at my favorite coffee shop, I'm just going to post the pictures at the end of the narrative.)

A trip to the Police Station

Little G had slept about 11 hours last night when we woke him up to get ready for the day. We did take time, of course, for morning snuggles. He’s a great snuggler! He had a slight fever so we gave him some baby Tylenol before heading down to breakfast. Yesterday we wondered if he was teething but we’ve only caught him grinding his teeth once. Please pray that he’ll have a normal temperature. He’s been VERY snuggly and clingy all day long. I don’t mind that, really I don’t, but I can tell that he just doesn’t feel too good. This evening another lady in our group suggested that it might still be from his shot on Monday.

Anyway, after a late breakfast we rode the escalator a couple of times for entertainment. Guille doesn’t mind the escalators but sure lets us know that elevators are not his thing! He’s getting better, but still doesn’t like them. After riding the escalators we went up to the 4th floor of the hotel and walked around the outdoor swimming pool. Since we didn’t have suits on and Little G doesn’t even like a bath, we didn’t swim. He did put his hands in the water beside the pool and thought about it…but decided to cuddle instead of playing in the water. Then, back to the room. We thought he would play with some of his toys but he started falling asleep. I gave him a bit to drink and then he was off for his nap. While he slept I tried to organize things a little better, since we’ll be in this hotel for almost another week. I washed socks and a few other things then got the rest of the laundry ready to send to the laundry guy.

At 3:00 we loaded the bus and headed to the police station. No, nothing bad happened! That’s where we had to go to apply for Little G’s passport so he can go home! We were some of the first people there, but by the time we left there were many families with little ones who were there for the same reason. While we were sitting there waiting our turn the reality of all of this sunk in one more layer! I nearly cried as it hit me (again) that this really is our child. He’s really going to go home with us. He’s OURS! The process of applying for his passport was very easy, on our part. Our guide brought all the paperwork, presented it to the official, told us to sit there and smile. So we did. The official looked over the paperwork, asked the lady beside him some questions, got out a little web-camera, took a picture of Guille (hopefully he wasn’t crying too hard in the picture), gave us back our passports and our OFFICIAL ADOPTION Certificate. That was it. All done!

After the police station visit we went to Pizza Hut for supper. We had seafood pizza with crab meat, shrimp, octopus and veggies on it. We also ordered a side of spicy chicken and pineapple kabobs. It was a nice change from McDonalds and granola bars. Good thing the breakfast is good and plentiful!

Back in the room LittleG just wanted to sleep again. He slept from 5:30 til around 6:30 when I decided I better wake him up and get him to do something, otherwise he’d be awake at 4:00 in the morning… and I’m not up for that! We walked in the hall for quite a while. Started out holding hands, then he got adventurous and walked a few steps ahead of me. He’d turn around every now and then to make sure I was coming. Then, he’d turn around and come at me with arms open wide. I love it!! We came back to the room and he ate some congee with apple juice and prune juice mixed into it. We made that mixture up at breakfast time and brought it back for later use. It looks like he needs more prune juice! Pray that his little body will adjust to the new schedule and food intake and that he will poop soon. I don’t mind not having to change dirty diapers, but I know it’s not good for him, so I’m praying for a poopy diaper in the morning!  (Imagine that!) After the congee mixture we sat on the bed and read a couple of books. He was really interested in the books and knew about turning the page, we were so excited about that! One of the books has some flip-up windows on a couple of the pages. He really liked looking under those. After the books he got ready for bed…without a fuss. When I put him in his crib he laid there quietly for a little while before falling asleep. Maybe the sound of his daddy snoring helped get him to sleep?!

I remember… I was going to tell you about Little G’s walk. It’s so cute! He kinda has a penguin walk,-- Legs apart and rocking back and forth as he goes. I think he’s getting a little better each day. I did take a video of him walking. Tonight as we were walking, his new pants are a bit too big in the waist and a bit too long in the leg. So I rolled up the pantlegs and put him back down for more walking. With the waist being so loose, the crotch was down below his knees and with his spread apart feet, it looked like he was a middle school or high school kid trying to keep their pants up because they won’t wear a belt. At least Little G was happy to get his pants pulled up!! :)

Tomorrow is a trip to the zoo in the morning then MAYBE a trip to the orphanage in the afternoon. We haven’t decided yet how Little G would react to going back there at this point in time. Yesterday when our guide asked us how he was doing we thought he would be fine with it. But today with being so clingy and quiet and not being sure if he’s just not feeling well or if it’s part of his grieving process we told the guide that we’d like to decide tomorrow. She said that if we don’t go tomorrow there is a possibility that we can go early next week. I really would like to go see where he lived for his whole life up til now and where he was abandoned. But, his wellbeing is more important, and if going back there would be hard on him, I will forego my wants for his sake.

Well, that’s all for now. SOMEDAY I’ll get these posted and you all can read about what’s happening here. Meanwhile, thanks for your continued prayers.

Pizza pals

Nap time buddies

More juice please

Good to the last drop

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

It’s official! The adoption is final!

We left the hotel this morning at 8:30 to go back to the civil affairs office to meet with the civil affairs officer and the notary. In China the notary is more like a judge, according to our guide in Beijing. So meeting with the notary is a very official act. Before meeting with the officials we had our “family portrait” taken. This picture will be used on the certificate of adoption. Then we had “interviews” with both officials who asked basically the same questions. They asked why we wanted to adopt, do we like the child after having him for a night, will we ever abandon or abuse him, will we provide him a good education, are all our answers true…. That was it. We signed our names and Little G was officially ours.

The Gonzalez Family! :) 

After leaving the civil affairs office we went to the “grocery store”. It was more like a multilevel high end shopping center with groceries shoved back in a corner of the 4th floor! We also went on up to the 7th floor to buy more bottles for Little G. His cleft is a bit bigger than we expected so drinking from a bottle with a BIG hole cut in the nipple works better than a cup, sippy cup or spoon. I did spoon feed him some apple juice and orange juice this morning at breakfast since the only bottle we brought with us had milk in it. We also bought him a couple of outfits. He fits size 12 month for weight but for height he needs 18 month. I thought I had brought a couple pair of long pants for him, but couldn’t find them this morning. Maybe they got donated to the orphanage with the other clothes I brought for them. Oh well.




We came back to the hotel and Little G fell fast asleep after eating a bit of oatmeal and drinking some milk and fruit juice. He slept about 3 hours and Big G and I slept between 1-2 hours. Naps are good!! :)




In the afternoon we walked in the hotel, walked outside, played with some toys, tried to find a restaurant for supper that didn’t cost $30USD/person and yet we could tell what we were eating. We ended up at McDonalds…yippee (note the sarcasm!) After supper we went to the StarYucks that is in the hotel. Actually, there is a whole MALL in the hotel! This place is HUGE! Anyway, we bought a muffin so we could use the internet to post about “Gotcha day”. Once we finished that post, Little G and I came back to the room where he got a bath (in the sink…with water…which he really didn’t like!) After his bath we cuddled a while and I rubbed lotion on him. His skin is so rough. Poor little guy! He liked getting the lotion rubbed on him. No fussing there! I suppose it felt like getting lotion rubbed into your hands in the winter when they are so dry and cracked. Guillermo came back to the room and cuddled with him until he fell asleep. (Last night he slept from 7:00pm -7:00am without a peep from him.) Hopefully he’ll sleep as well tonight.

After bath

Mmmmmmmm!! Ice Cream!! 

He likes to cuddle and be held. He likes to know where we are. Most of the day he just wanted to be held. We set him on the floor and we both got down and played with him for quite a while. He’s starting to make some noises that aren’t crying noises, so I think he’s beginning to trust us. I hope so. I hope he knows how much we love him. He’s such a sweetheart and I can’t wait for you all to meet him.

Morning snuggles

I’ll try to post Tuesday’s and Wednesday’s happenings tomorrow (Wednesday). Sorry for the delay in posting GOTCHA info and pics. Things have been a bit busy for all of us. OK, the snoring in the room is making me quite tired, so I’ll sign off for now. Good night!

GOTCHA!!

(I wasn't able to post this on Gotcha Day, so it's a day late. So is the posting for today... the day after Gotcha Day. Hopefully I can catch up soon. I'm not going to post much of today's happenings right now since we are all tired of sitting at StarYucks. Read on to find out why we're here. Little G is doing MUCH better today. He doesn't like lying down to get his diaper changed. I think that he must have gotten changed at bedtime and naptime. And he doesn't like elevators. But, he seems content and is playing with some of his toys. He's a quiet boy!! We love him lots!

OK, Now... back to yesterday...

Gotcha Day!

As I sit here typing this, OUR SON is sleeping peacefully in the crib beside me.  He has had quite a day!  I guess we all have. 

We got up around 5:00am and left the hotel in Beijing at 6:00 to go to the airport for our flight to Guangzhou.  Our flight out of Beijing was delayed about 15 minutes and during the flight it was so hot and uncomfortable.  I guess it was just preparing us for the hot & humid weather here in Guangzhou.  Actually, it felt better out of the plane than on the plane.  Anyway, enough about that! 

Our guide met us at the airport and we came to the hotel to get settled in a bit and prepare paperwork, waiting for our guide to process some of our paperwork there were children arriving with their nannies and orphanage directors.  I spotted little G right off!  And, I cried!  And, HE cried.  (That’s even before we were supposed to meet!)   

Guille with his nanny when they first came into the room

Soon it was time to meet the children.  Another family in our group is adopting an 8 year old boy.  Wow, does HE have energy!  We took a picture of them being introduced and then they called out “Wen Lian…San Wen Lian”.  That was OUR cue!  We met the nanny and director and the nanny handed me our son.  The poor little guy was so overwhelmed he just yowled. 

First getting Little G! What a joy! (for us! He wasn't so happy!)

The nanny told me that he had just gotten a shot today in his left arm, so he has even more to be fussy about.  He would calm down a bit, then look for his nanny.  I guess that’s a good sign of attachment, but it was sure hard to listen to him cry so hard when he couldn’t find her. 

Little G & his nanny with the truck we gave him

We made our orphanage donation and gave our gifts to the director and nanny, signed some papers, said our “thank yous”, then the nanny and director made a B-line for the door.  They thought it would be better for Little G if they weren’t there.  I would have liked to talk to them more, and find out more about him, but they had a long drive ahead of them and rush hour was approaching.  They said that if he has adjusted well to being with us, maybe we will be able to go to the orphanage in 3 or 4 days.  We’ll have to see how he’s doing. 

Our first family picture as a family of 3!

I think he’ll probably take to us pretty quickly.  I can tell that he is a shy boy and a bit scared of strangers.  That’s what they told us, and we can see that.  Back at the hotel, after feeding him some watery oatmeal and getting some water into the little guy he was starting to relax with us.  Then our guide came to our room to get ready for the “paperwork party”.  The dads from the other two families came to our room and all the dads went through paperwork that we need for tomorrow’s appointments.  When Little G saw the other people, he yowled again.  I took him out for a walk in the hall.  I could tell he was a bit uncomfortable, and when we reached the end of the hallway he clung to me and cried.  I wonder if it reminded him of the doctors’ office where they gave him his shot earlier in the day. 

Big G & Little G -- together at last!

Little G was out like a light by 7:00.   He was exhausted!  Big G was out by 7:30!  He’s exhausted too! 

We are so thankful to finally have our Little One!  It still seems surreal!  We both said it feels like we’re babysitting for someone else’s child.  But… He’s OURS!  He really is OURS!! 

Thank you for all your prayers and we ask that you continue to pray for us as Little G becomes part of our family.  Everything considered, I think the little guy did really well today.  I pray that he’ll get a good night’s sleep and tomorrow will be a great day for us all. 

Now I guess I’ll head downstairs to Starbucks Yucky shoppe and use their internet.  I hope we don’t have to buy anything.  It is inside the hotel, so…we’ll go see what happens.  

Church and The Great Wall

This morning started off with breakfast here in the hotel. We met at 9:15 in the lobby to head off for Beijing International Christian Fellowship for church. It is held in a theater and seats around 700 people. Chinese nationals are not allowed into the service, but the place was full. The service reminded us a lot of our church in Ames.

After church we went to the government jade store. They showed us the signs of good quality jade, how to check it by holding it up to the light. The more translucent the higher the value. There is soft jade and hard jade, the color varies a lot. The sales people were quite aggressive with their sales pitches. The phrase, "We're just looking" didn't back them off at all.

And now... Guillermo's rendition of lunch and the Great Wall......

For lunch, we had a grand buffet at a restaurant adjacent to a popular store called the Friendship store. The buffet included duck and about 10 other dishes. We couldn't finish all of it. After lunch, we had just under an hour to shop in the store. We bought postcards and an enameled copper vase made locally. The store is very large, and it offers a huge assortment of small affordable items that make decent gifts.

Lunch leftovers...we did a good number on it!!

The big event of the day was our visit to the Great Wall. It's about an hour's drive from city, about where the mountains begin rising from the plains. Joan and I walked up together some distance. I continued on to one of the towers, while Joan and Ruth (another lady in our group) turned around when the steps started to become very steep. Being there, one can get the full impact of the enormity of the construction. (And VERY tired legs!! Comment by Joan!)

A view of the Great Wall

It's hard to believe, but we will be with our son in less than 24 hours!

Busy Day (and they weren't kidding!)

Our guide wasn't kidding when she said today would be jammed packed full of activities. We left the hotel at 8:30 and ... let me back up.

Neither of us slept extremely well last night. That jet lag is something else! We got up around 5:00am, went down for breakfast at 6:30, met a few other families that are in our group, came back to the room to get water for the day.

Now... 8:30am (again) We left the hotel and went to Tienanmen Square. Since May 1st is a holiday EVERYBODY was out! It was soooo packed. We had a group picture taken in the square before heading into the Forbidden City (where the emperors used to live). To get to the "gate" to the Forbidden City we went under a busy road. On the other side, security was making people keep moving. The crowd was being "herded" from probably 20-25 people across to 10 people across--in a space that SHOULD have been for 5 people across. I seriously felt like pigs or cattle being herded into a truck heading for slaughter! People were pushing and shoving, some almost in a frantic state. And what for???? Sightseeing!!!

Here's Guillermo in Tienanmen Square.

Here we are in front of one of the buildings in the Forbidden City.

Forbidden City

This picture doesn't even show how crowded it was!

The Forbidden City sets on somewhere around 500 acres and has around 10,000 buildings on the grounds. We didn't visit all 10,000. In fact, we weren't allowed to go into any of the buildings. The outside architecture was interesting. I'll post pictures tomorrow, or at least I HOPE to post pictures tomorrow.

Around 11:30 we exited the Forbidden City and headed to a lunch buffet. I'm not sure anyone was too impressed with the food, and drinks were limited to one small glass of juice or water per person. Mind you, none of us left hungry though. It was good to sit down, rest and visit with the other families. And it was good that we had taken extra water to drink.

After lunch we walked to a government pearl store. They opened a fresh water clam for us, to show us the pearls inside. Do YOU know how many pearls a 5 year old fresh water clam has in it? 1? 2? 4? 7? 15? 20? 26? 35????? My guess was 4. I didn't guess right. There were 26 little pearls in that clam. The guy who guessed 27 got one pearl and the kids in the group (we don't have our adoptees yet) got one. Then we shopped there for a little while before moving on.

Inside of the clam, showing all the pearls.

We then went to the Summer Palace. It's not actually a palace, though there are buildings there. Basically it is a HUGE park where the emperor had the prettiest places in China re-created in that park, since so long ago it was impossible to travel so extensively. Again, there were SOOOOOO many people there that we only walked to MarcoPolo bridge and took some pictures there. A lot of people were in row boats and some in "dragon boats" (that's what I called them) on tours of the man-made lake in the middle of the park.

The lake at the Summer Palace and Marco Polo Bridge

After the Summer Palace we went to a silk museum/store. They showed us how a silk worm goes from eggs to larvae to caterpillar to cacoon to moth. They had lots of cacoons there and showed us how they make silk thread for making cloth. They also showed us how they can soak the cacoons and then pull the threads off in a bunch, stretch it and use it for making comforters, pillows, etc. Then we shopped there for a little while.

Life cycle of a silk worm.

Guillermo and some others in our group stretching silk to make a quilt

THEN, we came back to the hotel for a 30 minute break. During that time Guillermo managed to get in a short nap and I managed to blow a fuse! Then it was time to go to supper.

Supper was at a nice restaurant where we sat at large round tables with a large lazy-susan in the middle, where the waitress put all the dishes and we ate family style.

Supper--food was served on a big lazy susan

After supper we went to see the Chinese Acrobats. Those kids are so flexible, it's amazing. No pictures of that.

It's now 9:44 and we are both exhausted. So, good night. (Well... to those reading the blog... have a good day!) (Again, I HOPE to get pictures posted tomorrow, but for now....... ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

We're here!

Beijing welcomed us with nice weather and not too busy of an airport.  I thought it might be really crazy since Beijing is such a big city.  But, no problem!  Before we got off the plane we had to fill out a "health information card" stating that we hadn't been exposed to the swine flu, in contact with any pigs, or have any flu symptoms.  Then we passed through immigration, picked up our luggage, sailed through customs, and quickly found our adoption agency's guide.  

We brought a couple of suitcases for my Chinese teacher, who will be moving back to China in a few weeks.  She had one of her friends meet us at the airport to pick up those bags.  It was nice meeting someone she will be working with.  I know she will be greatly missed on the college campus!

Here you can see our flight path. We went right over the North Pole! We didn't have window seats and most people had their shades down since it was daylight for the whole trip! We did find a window on the doors where we were able to look out and see the Arctic ice. That was very cool!



OK, well, we're going to go have breakfast/supper, then walk to a store to get some water, then back here to SLEEP! Tomorrow sounds like a VERY busy day.