Gotcha Da

We have arrived in Jinan City!

We made it toJinan City in Shandong Province.  It is much cooler here, what a nice break after the blistering heat that we had in Nanjing.  It was overcast and humid but definitely not cold.  We had a bit of a flight delay but arrived about an hour and a half after we were scheduled.  Addisyn was pretty excited about her first airplane ride.

 

Jinan is green and lush, almost tropical looking.  A very modern city compared to Nanjing or Beijing as far as buildings and roadways.  Still pretty crazy in the downtown area with the bikes, scooters, cars, buses and pedestrians all fending for themselves.  It is pretty nerve wracking being responsible for kids getting across the street intact. Last night we had a very close call in a taxi.  He made an illegal turn across traffic into our hotel driveway at night with pedestrians, bikes, scooters and cars in his path.  

 

Our last night in Nanjing, we had a kid friendly, traditional Chinese meal.  We had noodles, rice, dumplings, chicken and fruit.  It was very yummy!  We were a little worried about the choice of establishments when we walked into this dirty hallway and took a very old rickety elevator up three floors.  It was very nice though.

 

Addisyn is still doing great.  Definitely testing the limits a bit more and more.  Today at the airport, she wandered off a bit and I gestured to her to come back and she refused.  I ended up having to go get her and she purposely made an issue of the whole by squatting down and refusing to walk with me.  I finally got her over to where we were sitting and put her in a little time out which she immediately got up from and got into her backpack in search of Jelly Bellies.  Well then I had to get really firm with her.  She got really quiet and pouty.  When I finally went and sat with her, she started crying.  She knew she had pushed it too far.

 

We get Sam in the morning!  So, so excited.  They are bringing him to the hotel at 8:30 in the morning.  I hope we are ready.  Hard to believe we are finally getting him too!

 

We will update tomorrow!

8/12/2010 Thursday

Today was a pretty quiet day.  The temperature is 116 degrees with the heat index.  I was feeling the heat today!  I was a bit worried about keeping the kids out in the heat very long today,lots of people in the hospital here with heat stroke.  We stayed around the hotel in the morning and early afternoon until heading out for a bit. 

 

We had quite a bit of laundry piled up so we headed with our facilitator, LiLi to a local laundry shop where we met Mr. Love.  Hopefully we can get the picture posted.  Many of you know that traditionally Chinese have young childdren in pants split from front to back for early potty training, when and where ever they need to go.  We met Mr. Love at the laundry shop.  Twenty-two months today with a little outfit that said LOVE across the bum, actually it said LO  VE!

 

We ventured to the outskirts of Nanjing to the Purple Mountains and visited Ming's Tomb.  It was guarded by stone carved animals that lined the main walkway.  Each of the six types of animals had a guarding pair and a resting pair so that the Tomb was guarded day and night.  During the Ming Dynasty when the area was created there were 10,000 plum trees planted in the area and 1,000 deer lived on the grounds.

 

Had a bit of a voltage issue today.  I plugged my flat iron into the wall and very quickly smelled something burning.  I had accidentally set it on the case and it had burned it, so I asked Baylee to grab me a washcloth to wipe the burnt black plastic.  It wouldn't wipe off and the smell got worse and then it started smoking.  Then I realized it was melting in my hands.  I guess universal outlets aren't completely fool proof.  My flat iron is history, thankfully I didn't take down the entire Holiday Inn with it.

 

Tomorrow we get Addisyn's passport then Saturday we are off to JiNan to get Sam.

 

 

August 11, 2010

Ni Hao!

 

Today was a great day.  It was 96 degrees in Nanjing today.  With the heat index, it was 110.  We don't talk much about the heat index over in our parts.  We occassionally talk about the wind chill when we do get some cold weather in the winter but it is basically the same thing, our perceived temperature based on actual air temperature and humidity.  It was hot!  When we went back out to go to dinner, it was still 96.  Tomorrow is supposed to be even hotter.

 

We have this hot/cold debate in our family.  I am sort of one sided on the discussion but it goes something like this...would you rather be TOO hot or TOO cold??  Well hands down, I would much rather be too hot.  I really dislike being cold.  Well the rest of our family definitely gravitates towards Tom's discomfort in being too hot so would rather be too cold.  For some reason we seem to revisit this subject a lot in our household.  Everybody understands how much Mom dislikes being cold.  Well I had no idea it was as hot as it was today, and didn't really know how hot it was factoring in the heat index.  All three girls were sort of uncomfortable and talking about how hot it was.  Baylee had beads of sweat across her forehead, Hayden was flushed and Addisyn kept squatting down because she was so tired.  In the afternoon we had walked over to the Confuscious Temple marketplace, a great big open market.  We were having a great time, OK, well I was having a great time because I wasn't really THAT hot! I kept dragging them around looking at stuff.  I did feel pretty bad whenwe got back and I looked at weather underground and found out how hot it was.  I had to carry Addisyn home, she was so tired.  I know Hayden would have loved a piggyback ride if Baylee would have been willing.

 

Today really was a great day though.  We got an early start and were heading out by 9 am.  We got to visit Addisyn's orphanage today.  It is in this fairly large campus that also has the Nanjing Children's Hospital and a children's rehabilitation center.  Addisyn's orphanage is one of the orphanages in China that is supported by Half The Sky, a US foundation that provides programs, education, and staff.  It also emphasizes a lot of its focus on educating the staff that care for the children, so they are developmentally, physically and emotionally meeting the needs of the children.  It really is an amazing program.  You can find them at www.halfthesky.org.  Addisyn is one fortunate little girl to have been raised thus far at this orphanage and I really think we are too. 

 

We met Addisyn's nanny that she was very attached too.  We also met this man who's family volunteered their time to be a sort of weekend foster family to Addisyn.  They took her out and about and did things with her and often had her stay with them.  They have an eleven year old girl.  You could tell that Addisyn liked him a great deal and he cared for her a lot.  The orphanage itself was very clean and decorated with very kid friendly decor.  There were lots of pictures on the walls of the kids on outings and doing different activities.  We saw Addisyn's little bed and her classroom.  We did find out that they kept her back in the preschool classroom because she was being adopted so that she didn't have to go away to a different school during the day.  We brought treats for the children that Addisyn very proudly handed out to the children in her classroom.  The kids were so very cute.  One little girl just wanted me to hold her and another one kept sharing her half eaten Jelly Bellies with me.  It was so cute!  Addisyn was pretty quiet while we were there, I was a bit worried about how she was feeling.  As soon as we headed to the car though, she was all smiles.  I guess she was happy to be staying with us.  I am overwhelmed at the transition these kids have to go through and do, for the most part, so well.  I try to imagine myself or one of my other kids in a similar situation and it is unimaginable.

 

We also saw the baby room!  (Tom you can stop reading now if you like!)  There were over twenty babies, all under a year, no walkers or even crawlers.  There were probably eight nannies feeding and holding the babies. They started bringing some of the babies to the window, it was like an old fashion nursery in the hospital.  We were told that only two were healthy newborns, the rest were considered special needs.  China's definition of special needs is much different than our though.  It can just be a limb deformity or cleft lip/palate or moles like Xia.  So many babies just needing families to call their own.  Two little ones reaIlly stuck with me.  One was this chubby little boy that I was getting to smile and giggle at me through the window and the other one was this tiny little girl with a severe bilateral cleft lip and palate.  No surgery yet, so they were having to feed her with a special bottle.  At least they have the bottles though.  So many children die around the world as infants due to a correctable facial deformity.   

 

All in all, it was a pretty wonderful day.  Hug your kids!

Introducing Addisyn MeiLing Smith

We are now official! 

Yan Ling Long is now officially Addisyn MeiLing Smith.

Today was the adoption registration day.  We went back to the civil affairs building and I was interviewed by the Provincial Officer and then signed and notarized the adoption decree.  Now we just wait for her passport.  We should get that on Friday and then we leave for JiNan on Saturday. 

Addisyn is doing really well.  She is very independent and confident and has just a little sass about her.  There was no crying or sadness today, she has been very engaged with all of us.  We are getting a better understanding of her hearing loss and her hearing aids, etc.  I was very surprised that she got to keep her hearing aids.  I was always under the impression that they weren't hers, they belonged to the orphanage.  Someone must have donated them to her though.  They seem to fit her fairly well, but it will be interesting to get her hearing evaluated back at home.  When she doesn't have the hearing aids in, I don't think she hears much.  She is also very loud like she doesn't have any concept of how loud she is, kind of like when someone talks when they have their earphones in.  When she has hear hearing aids in though, she responds to people and can imitate words.  In that sense she seems to have more language than most deaf people or just clearer language.  I am hardly the expert though.  I also have no experience with hearing aids, so that is something we are going to have to understand a bit more about.  Addisyn has changed the batteries twice in her left hearing aid and once in her right in the 24 plus hours that we have had her.  That doesn't  seem right.  A lot of times you can hear this high pitch ringing coming from the hearing aids.  That would drive me crazy and seems like it would cause hearing  loss.

Once again, I have to say it just feels right.  We have been blessed with another beautiful daughter.  I have heard many times before, aren't you afraid you are pushing your luck.  I suppose meaning, that we have been so fortunate with the children we have adopted into our family.  I truly believe it is the opposite.  We have faith that God wants these children in our family and he is the one making everything just right.  As one of my favorite songs says...

That's what Faith can do.... ~ Kutless

I am disappointed that my pictures aren't posting, hopefully we can get that figured out by me emailing Tom the pictures and he can post them by editing my posts.  I would just love to share this beautiful girl with all of you.  Plus we are getting pretty anxious to get Sam in our arms as well!

I am exhausted though so I better get to bed, we have to be ready by 9 am tomorrow.  I think I sort of drive our guide crazy with my "not early" approach to everything.  You tell me to be ready at 9:00,  I'll be ready at 9:00 but not 8:55.  Today, LiLi was calling all over the hotel 15 minutes before we were supposed to meet her because we weren't in our room.  We were finishing breakfast and were going to just go from breakfast to the hotel lobby.  She had called our room several times, the restaurant and the fitness room.  She told me she was afraid we had gone swimming.  Like we would go swimming when we were supposed to be signing adoption papers! 

Until tomorrow.....