Beijing Tourist

Today we had a great day! We are having a GREAT time so far! We got up early to have breakfast and then we met our guide at 8 am to start our day. There are 3 other families here in Beijing with GWCA and we finally met them this morning too. They are all so wonderful and we had a great day getting to know them all and learning about all of their kiddos! It turned out to be such a fun group of people.
This morning we toured the Tien An Men Square and the Forbidden City. It was so fun to learn all about the Chinese history and get to know more about Tai's culture. Our guide Grace was great and really taught us some interesting things. After that it was off to a silk factory, which was also very cool to see. We of course started our shopping off there with a bang! We got some neat outfits for Tai, a purse for me, and some gifts. In fact we spent so much we got a free gift! Can you believe it - just like the United States - I am a now a frequent shopper of the silk market! After the shopping excursion it was off to lunch and the Great Wall. What an amazing site. We hiked quite a ways, and yes it was very steep. But so worth it! We would have given up sooner but the 6 yo in our group inspired us to keep on hiking! After our long day out sightseeing, the group went out for Thai food. It was really good and we had such a lovely time with everyone.
Our guide was hilarious today. Everywhere we went the people stared at us, they were so curious. We felt like the paparazzi! Everyone wanted to take pictures with us, Esp Jason he was a hit with the ladies, of course. Our guide Grace told us it was b/c we all had such big noses. No wonder Fenton got so much attention!!!!
Sorry there are no pics today. We took a ton plus some! We love love love our new camera! But we are much too tired right now to mess with downloading. We promise to do it later. But I know that no one really cares too much about our sightseeing pics, all you really care about are Tai pics. But you will have to wait one more day for that! We have an early morning. We are meeting our guide at 5:45 am to catch our flight to Nanchang. We will get Tai at 3 pm. So very excited and a bit overwelmed right now. Oh we so hope that tommorrow goes smooth. We promise to update as soon as we get a chance. For now we are off to bed. Sweet dreams of Tai tonight!
P.S. we can read the little notes and we love them all! We also love all the wonderful emails. You all are the best. It is so fun to hear from all of you. We are so lucky!!

We Made It!

Hello from China! Well we made it safe and sound to Beijing! We are both exhausted after our 28 hour travel day, in fact we were both nausous on our last flight which is very unusual for both of us. I think just lack of sleep and nerves. Anyway, our guide, Grace, met us at the airport as promised and got us all tucked into our hotel. We arrived at the hotel at 11:15 pm China time. We have an early morning, we meet for breakfast at 7am then off to tour. So we are tucking in for the night. Our 5 star hotel is nice except the beds are hard as rocks, seriously!!!!!! But the pillow seems soft. Oh and no hair dryer as was advertised. For those of you that know me, you know this a little problem....... I knew I should have brought a baseball hat. Wonder if dear ole hubby will loan me his, it is Valentines day after all.
Oh I almost forgot the best news! We found out today that we get Tai on Sunday at 3 pm and not Monday like we thought!!!!!!!! Wooooooo Hoooooooo. Hang on baby we are coming!
We will post more tommorrow, but for now we are dipping into our "travel pharmacy" and off to bed.

One Day Til Take Off

Since I have nothing going on in my life, I can't imagine why I am not sleeping! Ha! We had a wonderful evening. The weather was gorgeous last night, so we sat on the patio and had some cocktails with our good friends Dee Dee and Aaron. Which turned out to be exactly what I needed! When my head hit the pillow I was out last night - too bad it was so short. Here it is 3 am and I am wide awake! We leave in just about 24 hours for our big adventure. I can not even believe it. It seems so surreal to me. We have waited and planned for this day for so long! It has been such a long journey to parenthood for us and can't even believe that it is actually going to happen. Our lives are about to change FOREVER, but in such a good way. I was lying in bed just now thinking about all of the wonderful friends and family that I have. I can not even begin to express how lucky I feel and just how blessed I am to have all of these wonderful people in my life! I was thinking about all of my baby showers and thought I should get up and tell the world about them - so here goes..........
My last day at work before "maternity leave" was Monday. My oh so wonderful co-workers threw me my second shower! Yes, that's right I had 2 work showers! How wonderful is that? I work with such an amazing group of nurses!!!!!! I also had 2 other showers while waiting for Tai. Yes that is 4 showers total! My first was with my dear Kansas City girls. So fun! Dee Dee and Michaela thew a great party complete with a lil chinese buffet! And my friend Shelley made the most beautiful cake! All of my great KC friends were there plus my mom and Jason's mom. It was truly a great and very special day. Jason and I came home and immediatley started playing with all of Tai's new toys! So fun! My second shower was a complete surprise! And boy was I surprised!!!! I flew to Austin to attend a travel seminar put on by my adoption agency and to visit my dear sorority sister Amy, whom I hadn't seen in a few years. I was having so much fun with her and her 4 kids (what a great mom she is BTW)when Amy decided to take me to this adorable little mexican restaurant. I am sure the entire restaurant heard me scream when I turned the corner and to my surprise there sits Mandy and Amy E.! They flew to Texas from Arizona and Oklahoma just to celebrate Tai with me! It turned into the most amazing girls weekend - one that I will never forget!
Besides lying in bed thinking of how lucky I am to have so many great friends, many other things are racing through my mind. Like how am I going to fit all of my stuff into these 2 small bags? Is weather.com really accurrate? Do I have the right clothes? What should I bring for Tai, he has too many cute outfits to choose? How big is he? Can't forget the passport. What if this huge wod of cash gets stolen? Can't forget to check in for the flight and upgrade our seats at 9:05 on the dot. Do I have time to get my eyebrows waxed today? Is Lucy going to be OK? So many random thoughts! Feels good to write them down, now I have a list! hee hee
But mostly I lay in bed and I think about Tai. What is he doing right now? Does he have any idea what is about to happen to him, that his life is about to change forever too? Does he know just how much we love him? We know that he is going to have some rough times in the beginning. We know that he must grieve his loss of the only family he has ever known. We know that this is a huge adjustment for him. But we just pray that god has prepared his heart for us. We pray the he sleeps at night with peace in his heart and that he knows that we will love him unconditionally and that we will be there for him every second of every minute of every day. Oh, our little Roo Roo is finally coming home! We are so blessed!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well this is my last post from the good ole USA! I will write again when we get to China. Please help us pray for a safe flight, a good pilot, and for no flock of birds! For those of you that know my hubby, lets pray he can survive this flight without too much trauma and that the crew remembers to pack the wine!!!! Please also pray for our little Roo Roo and for a smooth transition for us all!

Tai's Closet

Some of you wanted to see "the closet" so here you go........... Think he has enough clothes?

Final Itinerary

We received our final itinerary last week. So exciting!!! Can't believe we leave in 4 more days! Woo Hoo!
Feb. 12 - leave house at 6 am for our 9 am flight - we fly to minneapolis to Tokyo to Beijing - a VERY long day.....
Feb. 13th - arrive in Beijing at 9:45 pm
Feb. 14th - sight see - Great Wall, Forbidden City, and Tian An Men Square
Feb. 15th - fly out at 7:30 AM for Tai's province - Nanchang, Jiangxi
Feb. 16th - GOTCHA DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Feb. 17th - Shopping for Tai and orphanage visit
Feb. 18th - sightseeing at XiangHu Park
Feb. 19th - sightseeing Teng Wang Ge (we have no idea what this entails.....)
Feb. 20th - Pick up Tai's passport
Feb. 21st- fly to Guangzhou our last stop
Feb. 22nd - Sightseeing at Chen Family Temple
Feb. 23rd - Tai's medical check-up and visa picture
Feb. 24th - Free Day
Feb. 25th - American Consulate Interview - this is where we promise to love Tai forever and ever and to never abandon him - he becomes a US citizen when we hit US soil in Detroit
Feb. 26th - leave for home sweet home! We fly from Guangzhou to Tokyo to Detroit to Kansas City

Jason and I are having so much fun preparing for Tai! Today we finished all the babyproofing and started some packing. The next Sunday morning we spend in this house we will have our lil guy with us. Can't even wait for that!!!! Our hearts are filled with so much joy right now, we can't even believe how lucky we are to be going on this journey. We are so blessed!

Tai care package #2

Here is a picture of the second care package that we sent to Tai. This one had a little photo album with our pictures and a toy phone with our voices recorded on it and an adorable puppy dog snuggly (thanks Lao Lao)! And Lucy is just wondering what is going on in her house these days!!!! Poor puppy, her world is about to be rocked!

One Week Til Take Off

With one week to spare we have finally finished Tai's room! Sure hope he likes trains. We have been very busy preparing for the lil guys big arrival. I think most of the errands are finally done and it is time to start focusing on the packing. Of all things, this has me the most stressed right now. Just can't figure out how we can get these massive piles of stuff that we have collected into 40 lbs each! Yikes!
Happy Chinese New Year Everyone! I promise to be a better blogger while in China.