What Day Is It Again?

Yesterday and today have been relaxing. After our crazy adventure Friday night, Bean and I both slept in yesterday. She didn't get up until after 10:00am!

Shortly after Bean and I dragged ourselves out of bed, Jeremy went out to get dumplings and potstickers for lunch. Our diet the past few days is making me a happy girl. How can you not love these veggie-filled spheres of dough-y yumminess? Plus they cost $1, for all of them.

After lunch we spent some time being silly in our room. Bean is coming out of her shell more and more. We still haven't heard her talk at all, but she's giggling, laughing, and using some sign language. Here are a few of my attempts at catching her smiling.

Bean and Jeremy squeezed in a nap before our dinner date with our friends. I read while they slept. At one point I looked over, and they were sleeping like this. Be still, my heart.

After nap time, we met our friends on the island for dinner. We had a really fun time, and Jeremy was not complaining about more sweet tea and other cheeseburger.

This morning (Monday), we had our appointment at the U.S. Consulate to apply for Bean's visa. We got Bean all dressed up in red, white, and blue. After grabbing a quick breakfast at our hotel, we hopped in the van for our ride to the Consulate. Monday morning traffic in Ch*na is not fun. In the middle of the bouncing and stopping and honking and swerving, Bean puked all over the van. Ugh.

Here she is in her super cute outfit with an I-just-puked look on her face. Poor girl.

Our interview at the Consulate was short and painless. And it was our very last appointment in Ch*na! Tomorrow afternoon our guide will pick up Bean's visa, and then we can head to Hong Kong. We'll spend one night there before we fly home Wednesday morning. (For those of you who have asked about Bean's size, she was officially 10.5kg/23lbs at her medical for the Consulate. Her cute little red, white, and blue dress is size 18-24 months, and it would not stay on both her shoulders.)

We got really brave for lunch today. We just headed out by ourselves in an attempt to find a restaurant with a picture menu. On our way to lunch, we stopped to check out the pet market near our hotel. You can buy kittens, puppies, birds, rabbits, guinea pigs, lots of fish, and turtles. Check out the turtle selection!

They also had blue crawdads for sale.

And these creepy-looking creatures. I'm thinking they are salamanders...or baby Loch Ness monsters.

We decided to eat here (mainly because their menu was displayed on their front wall in gigantic pictures).

Everything was going well until Jeremy looked a little too closely at his soup.

Any guesses on what this is?

So there's a chance that we might have been a little too brave in our dining selection. 

After lunch, Bean and Jeremy took another nap. The sun finally came out today (it's been pouring since we got here), so we decided to try to pool this afternoon. We were pretty sure Bean was going to hate it. She screams bloody murder anytime we get her near the bathtub, so we didn't think the idea of a giant bathtub was going to go over well.

But she surprised us. She loved it! She splashed and splashed and giggled like crazy. Instead of just sitting on the edge with me, she let Jeremy take her in. (I have the cutest video of her in the pool, but our internet is C-R-A-W-L-I-N-G and it would probably take about 57 years to upload.)

After swimming, we went back to the island for another cheeseburger. (I guess I can't blame Jer after the soup he had for lunch.) Now Bean is sound asleep, and Jeremy is reading. We are looking forward to seeing our friends one more time tomorrow morning and then heading to Hong Kong tomorrow afternoon. Two more days and we will be home!

Days 8 & 9: Bean's First All-Nighter

We are still having internet issues, so I'm way behind on posting. I'm going to quickly share about the last 24 hours (because they've been super eventful and involved way too little sleep), and then I'll do my best to catch up on the rest of the week when I can.

Yesterday was our last day in Bean's city. We got up early to meet some amazing ladies for breakfast. Our adoption agency's Ch*na team is in Ch*na visiting partner orphanages right now. They happened to be visiting Bean's orphanage yesterday and were able to meet us for breakfast. These are some incredible ladies who work so, so hard for little ones in Ch*na. I really feel like they are my friends, and it made my day to meet them in real life.

Here Bean and I are with Stefani, our agency's waiting child advocate. This is the awesome lady who sent Li'l Man and Li'l Dude's files to us and who works tirelessly to find families for waiting children every. single. day. She's pretty much an adoption superhero. (Check out Bean's grouchy face; she had a major diaper explosion while Stefani and I were talking, so that might explain her look of displeasure.)

We knew we'd be up late for our flight to Guangzhou last night, so we headed back to our room for quiet time (and diaper explosion clean-up) after breakfast. How sweet is my little thumb sucker?

We were able to check out of our room and grab a late lunch at McDonalds before heading the airport for our 6:30pm flight. Here we are in the airport, saying goodbye to our wonderful guide. (The couple on the left are our new adoption buddies.  Their daughter is in the peach headband.)

Right after this picture is when the adventure really started. Our guide casually mentioned that our flight was delayed about 15 minutes or so. No big deal, right? We found our gate easily and settled in to wait for our flight. We quickly noticed that the computer screen at our gate listed 4-5 flights, several of which were already supposed to have taken off. Not a good sign.

We were doing our best to keep up with the flight announcements that kept crackling over the PA system. (Trying to catch your flight number in heavily accented English on bad speakers in a loud airport is challenging. Understanding what is actually being said is pretty close to impossible.) After we'd been waiting a little while, we managed to decipher an announcement saying that our flight was delayed until 7:30pm. Shortly after that, our gate was changed. We found ourselves in the "basement" of the airport, waiting on a bus to take us to a plane at some unspecified location.

Time slowly ticked by. 7:30pm came and went, but all the screens still showed our flight was scheduled for 19:30. We were on the same flight as 7-8 other adoptive families, and the little ones were starting to get tired and restless. 8:30pm came and went...then 9:30pm. At one point, a huge rush of Ch*nese people left our gate, and we were sure our flight was canceled. Thankfully, it turned out to be another flight scheduled for the same gate.

The one bright spot in our super long evening was that Bean was in a super silly mood. She apparently thought the airport basement was the most interesting place ever. She smiled and smiled as she watched all the craziness. At one point, she was sitting on my lap and she started throwing herself backward. I played along and tipped her backward and then back up. She broke out into giggles. It was the first time we'd heard her laugh. She wanted to do it over and over, and she laughed and laughed. It was so fun to see her opening up, and her sweet little giggle is pretty much the cutest ever.

Finally our departure time changed from 19:30 to 00:20. Ugh. Shortly after midnight, we loaded up on a bus and rode out to a plane in the middle of the tarmac. We were exhausted, but at least we were finally headed to Guangzhou. 

The flight was really full, and the some of the little guys were pretty much losing it at this point. We taxied out to the runways and stopped. Apparently Air Traffic Control had not released our flight. So we sat in our crowded plane full of crying babies in the middle of the runway...until 2:00am.

We finally arrived in Guangzhou a little after 4:00am. Amazingly, Bean slept through 95% of the airplane ordeal. As soon as we loaded the van with our guide, she fell back to sleep. We got to our hotel around 5:30am and took a nap from 6:00 - 8:00am. At 8:00, we had to drag ourselves back out of bed for Bean's medical. (This is an appointment required for her U.S. visa.)

The medical went well, and we enjoyed our morning with our guide and our friends. We are staying in a really fun area that our guide calls "authentic Guangzhou". She helped us buy a delicious lunch a couple blocks from our hotel, and it ended up costing $2 for all three of us!

We had a leisurely afternoon (which involved a very long nap for Bean) and then spent the evening walking around. We visited "the island", the area where we stayed when we were in Guangzhou for the boys' adoptions, and ate dinner at Jeremy's favorite restaurant in China. (They serve double cheeseburgers and sweet tea in Mason jars; he's a big fan.)

Bean was a big fan, too.

(When you're the fourth child, you get to do really crazy things like drinking sweet tea before your second birthday.)

Tomorrow we have a day off. We are going to sleep forever and then just enjoy a relaxing day together. The only thing on our schedule is meeting friends for dinner. This sleepy girl is excited. 

Alright, I need to sleep. I'll leave you with one more picture of Bean from our walk tonight.

Days 4 & 5: She's Ours!

We were having internet issues yesterday and the day before, so I'm behind on blogging. I'm going to squish Monday and Tuesday into one post, and then hopefully I can get caught up tonight and tomorrow.

Bean slept well Sunday night (horizontally and in the middle of our bed, of course). Monday morning we gave her a quick bath and got her all dressed up for a long day of appointments. (Here she is before I learned about the whole white-flowers-for-funerals thing.)

Our first appointment Monday morning was back at the Civil Affairs Office where we met Bean. We had to fill out some paperwork and complete a short interview. Then we signed documents making our adoption final. (WOOHOO!) Here's Bean adding her footprint to make things really official. 

Naturally, we had to take an Adoption Day selfie.

We had a delicious lunch with our amazing guide, Sherry, and then headed out for another appointment. Our afternoon stop was at the police station where we applied for Bean's passport. Her passport takes all week to process, so the rest of the week is pretty open until we get her passport on Friday. Friday afternoon we head to southern Ch*na to complete the U.S. part of our adoption paperwork.

Monday afternoon we all crashed. We woke up at 8:00pm (oops!) and realized we'd better get out for a little while to at least try to conquer our jet lag. Bean's city is so fun at night. It's lit up, and there are vendors and people everywhere. We stopped for Bean's first Starbucks (decaf, of course), and then walked through a local market. There were lots of little booths, selling everything from shoes to kites to kabobs.

Tuesday was a free day. Bean and I went shopping with our travel buddies in the morning, while Jeremy got some introvert recharge time at the hotel. Bean was really sleepy and pretty blue. Tuesday night we were supposed to go to a show with music and dumplings. We ended up deciding to have a more low-key evening as a family. We got our own dumplings at a little shop down the street and walked back to the street market.

Bean eats everything. She may be tiny and tired, but she can eat. American food, Ch*nese food, she devours everything we put in front of her. Already this week we've introduced her to McDonalds, Dairy Queen, and Starbucks, and she's loved them all.

The market was lit up for the night and full of people again. We stopped for a mango and a few little souvenirs. (If anyone out there is dying for something specific from Ch*na, tell me now.)

Two of the well-known historic sites near our hotel are the Bell Tower and the Drum Tower. They are lit up at night and look absolutely gorgeous.

Alright, I better post this while the internet is still working. I'll try to get caught up on Wednesday and today soon. Thank you so much for all your notes of encouragement and prayers. We really appreciate it!

Day 3: Best Mother's Day Ever

I really, really intended to post last night, but all three of us crashed just after 8:00pm. Today has been busy with appointments (and a long nap). Bean is asleep, so I have a few quiet minutes to write a quick update (if I can keep my eyes open).

Yesterday morning was about seven years long. As soon as I opened my eyes, I was thinking about meeting Bean. Our appointment wasn't until 2:00pm, and I'm pretty sure all the clocks in Ch*na stopped moving yesterday morning. Jeremy wanted to sneak in a few last minutes of uninterrupted reading. I tried reading with him, but I'm not sure I got through three pages all morning. I was just way. too. excited.

We are staying in the same hotel as two other adoptive families from the States. It has been so much fun sharing meals and having them at our appointments. One of the families is using the same agency, so we share a guide and a driver. At 12:30, all three families headed next door to the bank to exchange money for some of the legal fees. What we thought was going to be a quick five-minute errand turned out to be an adventure/cultural experience. 

It started pouring rain just as we headed out. We hadn't grabbed umbrellas, so we looked like a bunch of crazy white people running down the sidewalk to the bank. (Nobody wanted frizzy hair for Gotcha Day pictures.) At the first bank, they wanted our SSNs to exchange money. I have never been asked for my SSN in China, so we decided to try another bank. At the second bank, we told the security guard what we wanted. He called a man over who chatted with our guide for a while in Ch*nese. Then he left.

We were getting a little confused at this point, but the guide assured us that the man worked at the bank and he had gone out to get our money. Hhhhmmmm...it seemed a little odd that the bank manager had to leave the bank to get us money. A few minutes later he came back with a brown satchel full of money. It was the most interesting currency exchange I've ever experienced, but so far everyone has taken our brown-satchel Ch*nese money.

Finally it was time to head to the Civil Affairs Office to meet Bean. The other two families left at the same time. We ended up arriving early, ahead of the kids and the orphanage staff. They ushered us into an office where we sat around a big table. We were all nervously chatting and laughing when we heard voices coming down the hall. It was such a crazy feeling to know that our daughter was about to walk into the room. Here's our eek-we're-about-to-meet-our-daughter selfie.

Nannies started coming into the room holding little ones. Bean was the third baby to come in, and I recognized her right away. She just has these big eyes that are impossible to miss. When the nanny handed her to me, she cried for a few seconds but stopped as soon as I handed her a sippy cup.

We were able to sit with one of Bean's nannies and a translator to ask questions. I may or may not have brought a slightly-OCD list of about 87 questions that the nanny patiently answered. It sounds like Bean's orphanage is doing some things very well. We were told that she was cared for primarily by one nanny who was responsible for four babies. Older children in her orphanage live in foster-type settings with one married couple caring for 4-6 children. The nannies had prepared a very sweet photo book with lots and lots of notes (which are unfortunately all in Ch*nese). They also returned the lovie and mini photo album we sent in February.

I wasn't sure what Bean would think of Jeremy. (Plus, I didn't really want to let her go.) Little ones in orphanages don't see adult men very often (and pretty much never see scruffy white guys who are 6'2"). Surprisingly, once he managed to pry her out of my arms she went to him right away with no tears.

After we got back to the hotel, we had a little family time in our room. Bean has been very quiet. I'm sure she is scared and sad. Yesterday she was pretty shut down, but she was willing to perk up for her cup and food. The nanny said she is not picky, and that is true! Last night we ate dinner in the hotel restaurant. Bean devoured my beef fried rice and then Daddy's uneaten tomatoes and pickles.

After dinner, we were all ready for bed. I gave Bean a quick bath (which she hated) and got her pjs on. Bean is tinier than we expected. When I put my hands around her to pick her up, she feels so dainty and fragile. I brought mostly 24-month and 2T clothes, and they are pretty big on her - especially the bottoms. Here she is in her whale jammies.

This is her mad face when I took her sippy cup away to snap another picture.

Bean slept in our bed. Somehow her tiny body took up more space than Jeremy and me combined! Thankfully, she slept really well. She's a thumb sucker. I was dying to take a picture of her, all curled up and sucking her thumb, but I didn't want to wake her.

I am very thankful that we are seeing Dr. S right after we get home. Bean's heart is definitely working hard. Her fingers and toes are very blue, and she has to put extra effort into breathing. She's also pretty tired. She fell asleep in my arms three times today. (Some of that could be the stress of everything that is happening to her right now, as well.)

All of her symptoms are normal for a little one with unprepared TOF, but seeing her little heart struggle makes me so thankful for the people who worked so hard to get us here fast. I'm also very grateful to know that she'll be seeing Dr. S less than 24 hours after we get home. I emailed him this morning, and he said to go ahead and start her on the beta blocker he prescribed. This should help her some with the blueness.

One of my most poignant memories from yesterday happened on the van ride back to the hotel after meeting Bean. The other family riding with us adopted a sweet 13-year-old girl. (Actually, both of the other families with us adopted 13 year olds.) On the way back to the hotel, their little lady could not stop talking. She was so excited.

Our guide translated for her as she peppered her new mama and baba with questions. She asked things like, "Did you bring me pajamas?" and "What day is Christmas?" She was just bubbling over with happiness.

One of the questions she asked was, "My friend _____ is still at the orphanage. Can you help her find a mom and dad like you helped me?" This little girl knew the joy of finding her family just in time, and she wanted her friend to have that too. (Orphans in Ch*na "age out" at 14 and can no longer be adopted.) Hearing her ask that question was incredibly sweet and heartbreaking at the same time.

Today was filled with meetings, and I'll try to post about those later. I do have to tell you that in one of those meetings, our adoption became official. Li'l Bean is ours forever. 

I'll leave you with a picture from this morning (because I know the pictures are why you're here, anyway). This was before the guide very directly informed me that white flowers are only for funerals. Oops.

Days 1 & 2: Beijing

We had a whirlwind 24 hours to see Beijing. Our flight arrived around 2:30 Friday afternoon, and we caught the bullet train to Bean's city at 2:00pm today. It ended up being a fun overnight adventure.

Last night we took a long walk (mainly in an attempt to keep our jet-lagged selves awake later than 5:30pm). I'm kicking myself for not bringing my camera because we ended up at a super interesting food market. There was one stand selling kabobs unlike any I've ever seen. They had centipedes, snakes, bees, and tarantulas. Seriously. (No, I wasn't brave enough to try one.)

This morning we started off with a very authentic breakfast.

Try not to be jealous of our ability to adapt to a new culture so quickly. ;)

After breakfast, we took a walk to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. It was fun adventuring on our own. Of course, we had to take some selfies. Here we are outside the Forbidden City...

...and hanging out with a lion statue...

...and, um, just being our special selves.

On our way back to the hotel, we walked through several hutongs. These are traditional Chinese neighborhoods made up of alleys that connect courtyard residences. Some of them have been around for hundreds of years.

I love the hutongs. I think they are filled with personality and really unique architecture. The crazy thing about Beijing is the fact that a street like this...

...is literally just a minute's walk away from a street like this, where you can shop at stores like Tumi and Apple.

After our very American breakfast, we got brave and walked into a little Ch*nese restaurant for lunch. We managed to order lunch on our own, even though none of the employees spoke English. Best of all, everything we got was super yummy and our whole meal cost less than $10.

Our guide picked us up at noon to head to the railway station. We chose to take the bullet train to Bean's city instead of flying. It's less expensive, and we were excited about the opportunity to see rural Ch*na. Plus, the bullet train is pretty much the coolest method of transportation ever. Here we are in the train station.

The ride took about four-and-a-half hours, and we got to see lots of countryside and small villages. I tried to take a picture for you, but we were going a little too fast.

We arrived in Bean's city around 6:30pm. There's another adoptive family here this week who is working with our agency, so we get to travel together and share a guide. They are super sweet, and our guide is wonderful!

Our hotel is very nice, and it's located close to the center of the city. We can walk to lots of shops and restaurants (including DQ), as well as some interesting historical landmarks. Bean's city was the capital of Ch*na before Beijing, and they've worked hard to preserve the history of the city.

Here's the best part of our hotel room.

They had this sweet little crib ready for Bean..who we get to meet at 2:00 tomorrow afternoon!!! (For those of you at home, that's 2:00am Sunday morning.) We are so excited hold our baby girl! 

Alright...time for bed. I'll have pictures of Bean in my next post!