Gotcha Day

What an amazing day!

J. and M. are both asleep. I better join them soon. We've got a big morning ahead of us: M.'s first breakfast out in public, a trip to the Civil Affair's office for the registration of the adoption and a family picture. We will have two interviews, hand in a lot of money, and hand in a lot of paperwork. The adoption will be irrevocable from the Chinese side of things after tomorrow. WOW!

I have so much to write about this day, but I am starting to feel wiped. We are so blessed. Blessed to have such a beautiful girl, but also blessed to have an amazing support network of family and friends. We can't believe the comments and emails we've received, the excitement shared by so many. We are humbled to be a part of your lives and so glad and grateful that you're a part of ours.

Thank you.

The adventure continues tomorrow. I'd love to tell you more about "Gotcha Day." It was amazing. Here's one parting picture of J and I in the hotel lobby within half an hour of meeting M. We are loaded up with a camera, video recorder, three gifts for the orphanage director and nannies, a bag filled with treats, drinks, pull-ups, blanket, notebook for questions, outfit to give in exchange for what M. is wearing, etc. etc. etc. J. and I had a great time of prayer together in our room, then went down to meet our guide and other family. We were excited and nervous all at once.

Amazing. Simply amazing. Such amazing joy.
We'll write more in the morning and hopefully even have some video.

One Hour Away

We meet our group in the lobby in 45 minutes and will get the the civil affairs office in about an hour. J. is worshipping via her i-pod; I'm (obviously) posting after changing some money over to RMB in the hotel lobby. Now I'll pray for a bit to ready myself for this new beginning.

I had not yet until today felt that "excited catch" in my heart that I often get when traveling or doing something exciting. I think I'm finally getting rested enough to "feel" things. I've definitely got that excited feeling right now.

I wonder if any of ya'll will even read this post. ha. When you wake up there will be more posts above this that will be far more interesting to you.

Crib

So we walk into the room and (after we stumble back in the dark to put the key-card in its holder to turn the lights back on) we see it: a crib!

Now, we are as of yet undecided as to whether or not we'll use the crib or have her sleep with one of us to promote bonding, (yeah. one of us. Joelle's right--these beds are a hair bigger than a twin. Just a hair. It's like Lucy and Ricky, but we're too tired to push the beds together.) but it was a jolt to see the crib, to realize we'll be here with HER!

--R

Here We Go!

This will be the last post until.....probably China.

We put the boys to bed and said good bye. Soooooooooo hard. That's the worst (only bad?) part about this whole thing: leaving our boys for 18 days. yikes. Hate it. Gut wrenching, in fact. I've been away from them for 14days---that was HARD. They've been without both of us for a max six days in one stretch. Hopefully business at school (for them) will keep them distracted. We really hope the Skyping helps.

Talk to you from Beijing!

--R

TOMORROW!

Ni hau.

We leave tomorrow. Amazing. Absolutely incredible! All the dreaming, praying, hoping and planning is finally coming to a climax. And we're actually pretty ready.

As of last night we are (I'd say) 98% packed. This has to be some kind of record for us. We're much more likely to be in the "packing til the last possible moment" crowd. But we were determined to have it basically done so we could do a little house cleaning and spend a bunch of time with the boys today. Only a few details left to tackle today and we're ready to go.

--R

Zhou Shang Hou (good morning)

We leave the day after tomorrow. (wow)

We are pretty well packed, but there are still plenty of odds and ends to take care of before we can go. We hope to wrap most of those up during the day today so we can devote tonight and tomorrow to the boys. (were really going to miss them and they us) I've been apart from them for 14 days (when I went to Kenya and I believe another time when they were visiting grandparents.) J has not been away from them this long, and of course they've not been apart from BOTH of us for this length of time. It will be hard for all of us--but we all know why we're doing it.

I did a test "skype" with my oldest son last night. I set the laptop up in my office and he used the home computer. Something's wrong with my sound. We'll have to work that bug out today.
--R

Hard Time Sleeping

For a good week after we got our travel dates, we just couldn't put together a good night of sleep.
One night, I woke up at 1:30am and couldn't fall back to sleep for a good two hours.

Another night, it was J's turn to wake us both up. All the other nights were filled with fitful dreams of travel and adoption.

You've perhaps heard of weird "pregnancy dreams?" These were like that. Really bizarre.
Thankfully, we've finally put a night or two together of decent sleep again.

I described my own feeling to J and others like this: It's like a wild mix between the excitement of a kid on Christmas Eve and the horror of one who has a final exam at 8:00am for which he's never studied.

Let Me Hear You Say VISA!

We have VISAS! After prayers from all over the United States, we finally have a visa for both of us. We are so excited that we're filled with butterflies! We're actually going! Thank you, prayer warriors!

Today we received another update about our precious peanut. It says she LOVES to listen to music. (How happy do you think J is?) It also says she LOVES snacks. (Watch out, boys!)

Olympics: Surreal

For most of this adoption journey, we've assumed we'd fly into Hong Kong. For the whole first week of the Olympics in fact, Beijing was a place far north of where we'd travel. It was still amazing to see. Our daughter lives in THAT country! Every little girl at the opening ceremonies provided a jolt: WE have a little girl hundreds of miles south of there!

On Tuesday, Beijing became a stop on our journey. Lord willing, we'll actually land in Beijing exactly one month after those opening ceremonies. Amazing! As we watched the closing ceremonies tonight, it was hard not to marvel--"we'll be THERE!"