handsful

Me and my kids, on the night we arrived home.

We’ve been home 3 days as of tonight. All in all, Dylan is doing great. He adores his siblings to pieces, goes to both Randy and me equally, gives kisses, makes eye contact, and has given me 1 unsolicted hug so far :) But, like all adoptions, there are areas of struggle and since I feel it’s important to give other adoptive families a true picture of this journey, I plan on “keeping it real” here.

We completely expected Dylan to react to food like Lainey did…eat voraciously, never seem full, want to eat all the time. Boy, were we wrong. Dylan eats very little, and usually only with encouragement. He will chew a mouthful of food FOREVER and when we try to give him another bite, he opens his mouth wide to say “still chewing, mama”. I’ll try and give him a sip of drink to help him swallow. It works sometimes. There are times that he refuses to swallow and he gets upset. He usually refuses bites of food that he’s not familiar with. I’m planning on calling our agency’s support line to check on this…definitely not how we thought he’d react to eating.

Then, there are times when he sort of spaces out. It happens after we do something that shakes him – maybe told him no, or asked him to eat another bite of food, etc. He freezes, his forehead crinkles and his eyes look anxious and fearful. He won’t respond to our words, won’t take anything we try to hand him, nothing. It’s hard to see him do this, but we realize that his world has been totally rocked and turned upside down. His little 3 year old brain just can’t handle it all sometimes and this is his response…his way to shut it all down. We’re praying that this happens less and less as we show him our love is real and forever.

His other struggle is bedtime. He slept in his crib at the hotel the 1st night – we laid him down, he stayed completely still, and fell asleep. That was the last time he was in the crib, because the next night he screamed in fear when we tried to put him down. He’s been sleeping with us. Our routine is kind of the same as in the hotel. We get him in his PJ’s and brush his teeth (which causes him to start to cry because he knows what’s coming), then sit up with him in our bed with the TV on. He cries – a sort of over and over humming cry – as we rub his back and tell him it’s okay. About 5-10 minutes into it, he begins to nod off. We lie him down, and he’s usually out in about 2 minutes. He always wakes up happy.

Oh, and did I mention he hates the dog?

It’s been a rough few days, with all of us trying to find our new places in the family…

Lainey isn’t the baby anymore and is definitely feeling some jealousy and wanting tons of mama/dada time. We expected her to react this way, but she’s also showing signs of being a fantastic big sister. Whenever we include her in taking care of Dylan, she jumps right in with big sister authority. Dylan accepts her most of the time :)

I’m learning to be a mother to six children. If you would have told me this would be my life even 10 years ago, I would have laughed. Me? 6 kids? Yea, right. It feels daunting at times, especially in these early days (and jet lag still working on me!), but I know that God will equip me to be the mom He knows I can be. What a privilege. I’m extremely thankful for my family and can’t imagine my life any other way.

First breakfast at home.

So, that’s where we are right now. I’m confident that we’ll all find our place and new rhythm. I know that Dylan will settle in and feel comfortable and safe with us. I know he’ll eventually drive the dog crazy with attention. For now, I’m trusting God to walk us through this time. That’s what faith is, right…even when you’re not feeling it, you believe it’s there. I believe.

What a wonderful word! We pulled in last night at 12:30 after a very long “day” of traveling. Dylan did very well on all the flights, only fussed about having his seat belt fastened. I assumed that would mean he’d dislike his car seat, but he did fine (could be he was too tired to complain!)

After meeting and playing with the kids (he’s already charmed their socks off), we finally got him settled and asleep in our bed by 3am. He does NOT like bedtime…cries whenever he’s put on any bed and cried when he saw his bed/room. I’d love some advice on how to best deal with this. We’re going to take it slow, and let him sleep with us for now. He still cries for a while, even though we’re both there beside him.

We’re estatic to be home, and I’ve been busy today cleaning, unpacking, and re-claiming my house :) I figure keeping busy will help me bust through jet lag, right??

We hope to get all unpacked today, and maybe even shop for a Christmas tree. We’ll see how we do!

Well, the last 2 days have gone by fairly quickly and I’ve not had time to post. As of 8:30 tonight, we are totally packed and ready to leave in the morning. We leave for the airport at 10:45. Fly to Seoul, Korea – then Atlanta – and then finally, Charlotte. We should arrive home around 11:30pm 12/11. Weird, since our total transit time is around 24hrs!

Yesterday, we went to the Guangzhou Safari Zoo. There were 4 families total, along with our guide…we had a blast. An open air train took us all through the safari where we saw elephants, tigers, lions, hippos, giraffes, camels, deer, etc. Some came very close to us! It was very well done, and looked like authentic wild lands. Dylan loved it! After the train, we spent a couple of hours on the walking trails seeing other animals and an elephant show.

Our favorites were the pandas! We even saw the famous Ming Ming who is 33 years old. :) They had around 12 pandas there, some of which had been brought in because of the Asian Games in Guangzhou and all the tourists that brought in.

We manage to time it right to see feeding time. They were literally throwing bamboo stalks to them and they were peeling them with their teeth and crunching away.

Kristin and I found a buddy to pose with. Dylan wanted NO part of it. Just like our other kids, does not like dressed up people!

Randy paid for a couple of branches to feed the giraffe…we think Dylan liked it, but he was holding on tight to baba! After they were done, there were two women and little child picking up pieces to feed him so Randy quickly bought a branch and gave it to them. They looked totally floored that we did that, and were very grateful. It’s fun to do little surprises like that for others.

This shot sums up how much he liked the zoo!

A few nighttime shots…

Inside of our hotel, taken from the open balcony on the 3rd floor.

The river comes alive with lights at night. The boats are decorated with lights and just beautiful.

Self-portrait :)

Jumping to today, 12/10…breakfast, playtime in playroom, and some last minute shopping to finish. We called Ann back and she met us at 2pm – we remembered a few extra things we wanted to check out and she can get us SUCH good prices!

I’ll explain this next picture…

Ann took us to several markets today, this one was a small “store” that sold mostly jade figures. When we came in, there was a gentleman with a young boy. He started talking to Dylan (like EVERYONE does) and he realized that they spoke the same dialect – he is from a neighboring city of Luoyang. He helped us realize that something Dylan has been saying over and over means “father”. Sweet. Dylan saw a basket of wooden pipes and the man gave him one to see. Dylan called it a “pipe” and said that people shouldn’t smoke. Really? I couldn’t believe he said that! The man ended up letting him keep it. Hence, the shot of Dylan with a pipe. Now, the other man is the 97 year old father of the man that was talking to Dylan. We asked if we could take a picture with him, and he initially said no…that pictures of older people were a sign that you were expecting them to die soon. Yikes. We said it was okay, but he said his father would pose with us – I think he was very smitten with Dylan and felt a connection to him. It’s encounters like these that we will forever treasure and remember most about our time in China.

So many people, SO many markets. There are countless store fronts, and hundreds and hundreds of stores devoted completely to jewelry, beads, and other things to find. Ann said that they all make money, because other store owners come to buy in bulk and re-sell. She said, because we were with her, we were able to buy only a few items and not large quantities.

I guess you would eventually get used to the crowds. And, the smells. It’s like being at the fair, where smells change on a dime…they’re just sometimes not GOOD smells.

Randy was honestly loving every minute. The bargaining is just plain fun to him…he got very good at showing little interest in something if the initial price was high and successful in bringing them WAY down.

Going through the pet market again, Dylan wouldn’t touch the puppies or turtles, but got up the courage to poke at these little kittens.

Back to the medicine market…dried snake skins anyone?

The jars on the right side of the wall, with the brown discs hold “swallow spit” – basically the spit of a swallow bird. ?? Ann said it’s extremely expensive and mostly foreigners buy it. I must not be foreign enough.

Men gathered around a table, I believe they were playing some type of Chinese chess. A very common sight, men playing board games at all hours of the day.

Well, that’s about it. I’ve got to get some sleep so I’m rested before our marathon travel day! We are very grateful for the prayers that have been said for us during this trip…we have felt very blessed by them! Other than the cold I had early in the trip, and Randy having stomach issues for a few days (he thinks he ate undercooked eggs), we have been healthy and Dylan has been perfect. Praise God! We are very excited to be coming home to begin our new lives of being parents of SIX children.

See you in the states!! Hugs to AMPEL, we’ll be home soon :)

He likes looking at his photo album…we’re teaching him his brothers and sisters names. :)

Today, we took a trip down to the US Consulate. Our guides had already taken our Visa application for Dylan to them this morning, and our paperwork was approved…he’s cleared to leave the country with his new parents :) There was a room full of us, all raising our right hand and promising that the information in our paperwork was correct. Regardless of the drab meaning, we all felt a sigh of relief that we’d all passed through the LAST step to call our children ours. Whoop!!

No cameras allowed at the consulate, so no pictures. It’s probably better, since Dylan decided that today was the perfect day to start doing a little “testing”. And, at the consulate no less. Dylan will learn that his daddy is JUST as stubborn as he can be. It’s tricky beginning discipline with an adopted child…he’s likely NEVER heard the word “no” (he giggles when we say it) and has been given no sense of boundaries in his young life. He has to learn that giving him limits means we DO love him and that we want to keep him safe. Today, we began laying that foundation.

We started our day at breakfast (no, I’m NOT sick of french toast yet…), and then went back to the room and got word that Dylan’s Visa app was approved. After that, Randy attended a quick meeting in our guides room, while I dressed Dylan is his traditional clothes for the Red Couch pictures.

For those who don’t know, the White Swan hotel hosts a TON of adoptive families and years ago a tradition began of taking the kids pictures on the red couches in the White Swan.

First, each family had their photo taken – then we piled ALL of the kids on the couch and attempted to get a decent shot. Now, we completely expected some to cry, some to scream, some to crawl away, and most to not look. But, it’s something you HAVE to do. You just do.

15 kids – missing one. They had gone to the bathroom. We attempted a re-do, but it wasn’t pretty.

After that pandemonium, the whole entire group had our photo taken in front of the enormous Christmas tree.

All 16 accounted for here.

All in all, Dylan did well. No crying! We did over-estimate his size with his traditional clothes…hope he grows into it a bit more before Chinese New Year!

The inside of our hotel, standing on the 2nd floor. Gorgeous, huh??

Knowing we only had a short time for lunch before heading to the consulate, we had lunch at Lucy’s. This was our 2nd, and undoubtedly not our last, meal at Lucy’s. They serve deliciously familiar foods for us Americans – which we’re all missing right about now! I had a grilled cheese sandwich :)

Making my way back to the subject at the beginning of this post, our consulate appointment was next. Since Dylan had such a “fun” time at the consulate, we gave him some down time in the hotel playroom when we returned…thankfully, he dropped his grudge (finally) and played good and hard! Have we mentioned he’s ALL boy?

The rest of the day was pretty laid back, we picked up dinner at the deli and ate in the room, D-man had his bath, and he’s about to hit the hay. Tomorrow, we’re going to a Safari Zoo. We’ve heard it’s really amazing, so we’re looking forward to it. Only 4 families are going…our group is dwindling since some families left tonight and more leave for home tomorrow. We’re trying to contain our jealousy.

We have 3 more nights here. Missing home like crazy…soft bed, drinks with ice, showers without the worry of splashing water in my mouth. Oh, and my KIDS! And, Christmas! I realize it’s also Christmas here…there are decorations everywhere…but none of us feel it at all. Soon, soon, it’ll hit me like a brick and I’ll be pushing through jet lag to enjoy it :)

Here is who we’re missing so badly…our other kids! We’re having great Skype time with them, but it sure doesn’t replace actually being there. Can’t wait to catch up with them, and find out all we’ve missed while being here. We love you, AMPEL!!

I missed posting yesterday, it was such a busy day and I konked out early! Dylan had his TB test checked yesterday morning…the nurse took one look and said “nothing!” – great news, no need for a chest x-ray, and we were free to go. We had a quick lunch, and then met up with our friends Thomas, Kristin, and Mei Li for some serious shopping. I say serious because we hired a personal shopper/bargainer to go with us. Her name is Ann, and she offers this service (as well as care package service to those waiting) at her website www.redthreadchina.com. She met us at our hotel, and we walked to the markets.

Walking over the bridge, from the island to the main part of Guangzhou. It was in the 80’s yesterday, hot enough that we were sweating…hard to believe we were freezing in Beijing just days ago!

We first walked through the medicine market. This is the back of Ann…something we saw a lot of! We worked hard all day to keep up, she walks fast! The sights in this section were quite interesting.

Bag of dried frogs. Yep. Did I mention this was a TRADITIONAL medicine market?

Left to right – Ann, Kristin, me, confused Chinese man. We get a lot of looks around here, even though there are many of us here adopting Chinese children.

6 story mall, full of nothing but jewelry. The giddiness set in quickly. Ann took us to a jade and pearl shop and got us CRAZY good deals.

Those are ALL pearls. Ann knows her stuff, and showed us the good quality vs. the bad.

Back outside, to visit some other markets. We walked a TON and loved it all.

We wanted to go to the toy and silk markets, so Ann said we needed to flag down a van or 2 taxis. After several attempts (while we all stood on the side of a very busy road!), she found one. The driver and Thomas in front, Kristin and me with the kids in the middle, and Randy hopped in the open back – no seat! Traffic was bumper to bumper and the Chinese completely ignore lane lines. It was better to not watch.

Silk. I had this goofy grin all day. Randy also enjoyed shopping…He laughs and says he doesn’t enjoy shopping, he enjoys buying. heh heh.

The kids did well, though both had their moments of being done with the whole shopping experience. Here are they warily checking each other out.

Ann and Randy, in his newly acquired shirt.

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Shopping done, we posed for pictures and then flagged another van to take us back to the hotel. We shopped for 4 hours – dropped our items off at the hotel and then went to Lucy’s for an American dinner of a burger, grilled cheese, and grilled chicken. It was a FUN day.

Today was a free day – absolutely nothing scheduled for us. We slept in a bit, Skyped the kids, and had a late breakfast at the buffet. We then took Dylan to the White Swan playroom for some down time.

He found a baby walker and pushed, hopped, pushed, hopped, etc.

Nothing holds this guy back – if he wants to go somewhere, he does.

Even when his baba is throwing balls at him while he climbs.

We did some exploring around the hotel. There is an outdoor pool beside the river – there were kids actually swimming today. And, the weather was cloudy, windy, and only up to around 65. We had our jackets on again today!

Dylan wasn’t too sure about the wind in his hair! Randy didn’t seem to mind.

Side view of our hotel…it’s right on the river, we have breakfast right outside those far windows facing the river.

The rest of our day was low key…a little more browsing shops, a snack at Starbucks, and the beginning of packing to come home. We now look to our next day in Guangzhou which is full. Our guides take our paperwork to the consulate tomorrow, to apply for Dylan’s visa to leave the country. We’ll know by mid morning if our papers “passed” and then we’ll have our consulate appointment (where we take the oath) in the afternoon. In between, we’ll take the customary Red Couch pictures – we bought Dylan a traditional outfit to wear for the occasion.

More tomorrow!

2nd day in Guangzhou, and all is going very well. Dylan continues to be the entertainer, charming anyone and everyone he comes in contact with. There are 16 children in our group – 11 boys and 5 girls. I love seeing all the little boys adopted…when we told others that we were adopting a boy from China, we got many confused looks. Don’t they only have girls for adoption in China?!?

There are so, so many precious boys with special needs, waiting for families! Our group has children with heart issues, cleft lip/palate, limb differences, albinism, dwarfism, and seizure disorder. Some needs require more intervention than others, but all are “doable”. Dylan is the oldest child in our group, but we’ve seen boys as old as 13 being adopted here in Guangzhou. These kids deserve a life with a real family.

So, today was spent touring the Six Banyan Trees Buddhist Temple, the Old Chen house, and the Guangzhou Provincial Arts and Crafts market. But first, we had our buffet breakfast at our hotel, the White Swan. It’s known, at least by other adoptive families, for it’s amazing french toast. It’s really good. Randy doesn’t usually order french toast anywhere, it’s not his favorite. But, he’s loving it here. Not to mention the other items at the buffet…too many to list. Lots of Chinese foods, which I tend to ignore. I’m going for the fresh fruit, pastries, and – french toast.

See how BIG these buddahs are?!? The temple was very crowded today, with people bringing offerings of fruit and bottled water (not sure I get that last one). They buy big bundles of incense and burn them. They go in the temples for blessings that are given every so often during the day. We skipped the blessing – I’m pretty certain the big bellied guy has no pull with my God.

The original temple was built around 527AD, but there was a fire that burned down the whole property around the year 1000AD. They rebuilt it, and the temple that stands today is more than 1000 years old.

Next, we went to the Chen House. It was very beautiful and is now owned by the government and used as an arts and crafts exhibition center. There were ivory and jade carvings, furniture, and embroidery. We enjoyed walking around the gardens, with all the very interesting sculptures. We were especially amazed by the embroidery.

An example of the embroidery…they looked like actual photographs, the stitches were so tiny and colors so true.

The roof is decorated in painted porcelain, which Guangzhou is known for. Despite being in the elements for 100 years, it still remains bright.

Being Sunday, the Chen house courtyards were full of people. There were children all over, with sketch pads and pencils or ink, practicing their skills.

The courtyards are surrounded by stone walls with intricate designs carved in them. We got a photo of Lainey peeking through one of them back in 2008…had to do a repeat with Dylan!

Apartments, directly behind the Chen house. From historical wealth to this in just a few feet.

Now, for some silliness…

View from our room using the zoom lens…someone painting on the roof.

Touring over, we returned to the hotel room. Randy walked down to Susan’s Place to pick up our clean clothes (yippee…this is the first time we’d had clothes washed. We worked hard to NOT wash in Zhengzhou, knowing how $$ it is there. We spent $150 RMB here – roughly $25). Then, we had in-room lunch with cup-of-soup type things and rested a while. Paperwork for Dylan’s visa was at 4pm in our guides room – Randy watched Dylan take a late nap while I handled that.

Then, it was back in the stroller for more walking and shopping.

This area is very busy, with lots of model photo shoots and brides having their wedding shots taken. Shamian Island is the perfect backdrop, the architecture and landscaping makes you feel like you’re on a movie set.

Not the clearest shot, but I love the faces I captured in it :)

We ended our night with this delivery…we ordered too much. Cold pizza anyone? It was yummy.

Tomorrow, Dylan has his TB test read at 11am, and then we’ve arranged for a guided shopping tour in the markets in Guangzhou at 1pm – outside the adoption shops of the island. We’re going with our friends we’ve met here, Thomas and Kristin and their little girl Mei Li. Ann is a local and offers this service to traveling families…she can show us where to find really nice things and then bargain with the shop owners for us. Sweet!!

6 more night-nights here, as our Lainey would say. We miss our other children dearly!! Goodnight from Guangzhou.

We arrived in Guangzhou last night, around 8:30. 16 families with new-to-us Chinese babies/toddlers on one airplane. The businessman behind us must have thought he landed in some alter-universe. heh heh…

After the long process of baggage claim, boarding the buses, and driving to the hotel, we landed in our room around 11ish and were finally in our (hard!) bed after midnight. The last leg of our journey.

Today’s first order of business was taking pictures for the kids Visas (yes, the photographer had to tell Dylan to put his peace signs down!) – then our big group headed to the clinic for examinations.

The waiting room. It’s loud, crowded, chaotic. The children have to go through 3 stations – ENT, medical evaluation, and height/weight. Those children over age 2 also must have their TB test.

As usual, Dylan was wide-open playful and playing to the crowd :)

I look very annoyed. I wasn’t. Dylan cooperated very well, letting them do what they needed to.

Dylan had to strip down to his birthday suit for his exam…this is Randy’s upside shot of him enjoying the freedom.

However, the fun soon ended when this mean lady in white stuck a needle under his skin and squeezed. Not a happy boy! He goes back to the clinic on Monday to have the TB test evaluated. Assuming it’s negative (which it should be…he had an initial TB test done about a month ago which was clear), we’re good to go. If it did show up positive, he’d have a chest x-ray.

After clinic, we picked up lunch at the deli and ate in the room. This is one of our views – 15th floor.

He approves.

Here in Guangzhou on the island, there are tons of shops that cater to adoptive families. There are LOTS of traveling families here right now, we almost outnumber the locals it seems! An online friend of mine, Amy (who runs the Henan charity on my sidebar by the way) recommended we stop by Susan’s Place to shop and have tea. As soon as we entered, Dong invited us to sit and have traditional tea with him. It was fascinating to watch him make it and explain the “rules” (only 1 kind of tea per pot – otherwise the flavors mix) and his english is good enough that we were able to have a wonderful conversation with him…we discussed religion, politics, children, US and China economies, etc. It was fantastic. And, the black tea was my favorite. He used a brick of tea that was 5 years old…the older the tea, the better the flavor. It had a very earthy taste – he said Chinese NEVER sugar their tea. I had to laugh at that since I certainly DO sugar my tea at home.

We shopped a bit, then rested in our room until it was time to meet the group for dinner at a local Thai restaurant. It was a lovely night that ended with a little more shopping with friends and now we’re in for the night.

We’ll be up early tomorrow for touring – so I’m going to bed! Goodnight from Guangzhou.