A Quiet, But Good, Day

Hallie, trying out her hat for the first time

Yesterday was a quiet day for us. Lucy (our guide here in Guiyang) met us at our hotel after breakfast, and she took us for a brief walk around this part of the city. It turns out that she's actually not even from this province; she just comes over here when there's a family—like us—who travels here to adopt a child. We feel a little bad that she has to spend this week in a hotel, away from her home, but she doesn't seem to mind. She's not that close to 5' tall, but you'd never know it from the way she carries herself. She definitely sees it as her mission to take care of us this week. She can be a little bossy at times, but in an endearing way that clearly demonstrates how much she cares about us and our little ones. She's been guiding adoptive families for thirty years, so she certainly knows what she's doing.

On our walk yesterday morning, she took us to a supermarket, which is a perfect distance from our hotel (about a fifteen-minute walk). We picked up a few things, and in the process discovered how pushy sales people here in China can be. Kristie was looking for some baby cereal so that we can continue mixing that into Hallie's bottle (right now, that's the ONLY way that we can get any real nutrition into her), and the lady at the market tried very hard to get us to buy another kind of cereal, the most expensive one in the store. The container she was insistent that we use was about 400¥ ($65)!!!! As politely as she could, Kristie told her, "No, thanks" and put a far more reasonably-priced container in our cart. On a side note, the markets here in China tend to be located in shopping malls. Weird, but someow it seems appropriate.

After our excursion, we went back to our hotel room, and Lucy came up to talk to us about the next couple of says. Unfortunately, we didn't get Isabelle yesterday like we had hoped; we'll get her this afternoon (Monday). This turned out to be a good thing, I think, because it gave Hallie another day to get comfortable here. In fact, yesterday was the best day we've ever seen her have. When we arrived here, we expected that Isabelle & Hallie would follow the typical pattern for adopted children (based on others' experiences and what Kristie has seen with her own brothers and sisters) and bond with me first, and then her. It wasn't that way with Mikaela, who bonded just like a biological child because she was only 11 months old when we brought her home, and developmentally more like a 3-6 month-old. Well, since Hallie seems to be in the level of a 12-month-old, she has bonded with Kristie first. She is most definitely a Mommy's girl. She sticks to her at pretty much every turn, and while she likes me, I don't get the same kind of clingy hugs that Kristie often gets. She clearly likes me, but I'm not quite on the same level as Kristie in her mind. She's usually very agreeable when I hold her, so long as I don't try to kiss her cheeks very much. Our kids back home often tell me that I'm too scratchy, and in our running dialogue voice for Hallie, I've become "Scratchy Face Man" more often than Daddy. But, yesterday she showed more affection towards me than she has—giving me some clingy hugs nearly worthy of Mikaela's—even after I did the unforgivable and gave her a bath and washed her hair. All in all, she continues to open up and explore her surroundings more and more. Now, we can't wait to meet Isabelle, see where she is, and watch her open up. It's such an amazing thing to watch kids open up who have never received anything like enough attention of stimulation before.

~Greg

Goodbye, Jinan. Hello, Guiyang!

This afternoon, we left our hotel in Jinan. While we're both excited to go get Isabelle, we're a bit sad at leaving Jinan behind. We have thoroughly enjoyed ourselves this week, and that makes it hard to say goodbye. But, I'm sure that we'll explore Guiyang some in the week ahead, and I want to make sure that I appreciate our time in Guiyang, because this will almost certainly be the only time that we'll ever get to be in Isabelle's birth province.

We ran into a few snags in getting to our flight this afternoon. First, we almost left Hallie's bottle at the hotel, which would have been an unmitigated disaster since that's the only way that we can get her to consume anything. It's the bottle that her nannie from the orphanage dropped off with her, and I don't know what we would have done if we had forgotten it. Thankfully, Kristie remembered that it was still in the refrigerator in our room as we were loading our luggage into the van. Then, at the airport, we were delayed in obtaining our boarding passes because Hallie's birthday had been incorrectly entered as being in 2008, and it took a while to sort that out. Then, we had to pay a fee of 490¥ because our bags were 20 kg over the weight limit. By the time we got in line at security, I was stressed because I thought that our plane was supposed to leave in about fifteen minutes. So, when we were held up again (I'm not even sure why this time), I really began to worry. We got through the check-point with ease, and then I hustles down to our gate. At that point, I realized at our flight was to depart at 16:45, not 16:00 as I had been thinking. And all this time, it was printed on our boarding passes! At least we got to our gate in time, but we again were delayed when we tried to get on the plane. There was some problem with Hallie's boarding pass, and while we're not exactly sure what the trouble was, we think that her seat might simply have been double-booked because they assigned us to a different row. But, we made it safely onto the plane.

Poor Hallie had a very hard time when she first boarded the plane. She didn't like the fact that the flight attendant made us put her in her seat and buckle her in (nor did we, for that matter), and she didn't like the pressure change during take-off. The poor thing cried pretty much the whole time, and she only settled down once Kristie was able to get her out of her seat and hold her. Then, she quickly fell asleep. She was really tired and probably a bit hungry, though she was so worked up that we couldn't coax her to take any of her bottle.

John had told us before we left Jinan that Lucy was running late and wouldn't be able to meet us at the airport, so the driver would take us to our hotel. Once we arrived in Guiyang, we gathered our bags and met the driver at the airport exit. She then ushered us up to the upper outside level, which meant taking a couple of trips up the escalator because the baggage cart wouldn't fit. Then, she asked us—through a series of hand gestures, since she doesn't speak any English—to wait there while she went and got the car. A few minutes later, she came back, looking frantically for her keys. Thankfully, she found them among our bags. She must have dropped them while helping us to get our bags to the upper level. I'm sure glad she found them! Then, she drove us over to our hotel, which is easily the most luxurious hotel at we've ever stayed in. It's almost like living in an Eastern-style European apartment. I don't think that we'd have ever booked a room in a place like this, but this is where our contact put us for this week, so we're going to enjoy it.

Native Music & Food

This morning, John picked us up at 9:00 to go get Hallie's passport. Thankfully, it was done and ready for us, and we were finished with our errand before 10:00. So, he took us to the tea shop that he and a couple of his friends own.

It was closed when we arrived, so he unlocked the door—and believe me, it was very well secured—and took us inside. He treated us to several different kinds of tea: red tea, a locally-grown green tea, a green tea from southern China, and an oolong tea. We also spied one of the traditional musical instruments (a guqin) that he makes lying on a table in the other room. It turns out that this was a factory-made model, not one of his handmade creations, but he treated us to a couple of traditional songs. The video that I got is of a traditional song from right here in Jinan. Amazing stuff.

Then, just as we thought that our time there was just about over, he asked if we wanted to have some roast lamb for lunch. We'd been kind of sad that we hadn't really had any local food this week, so we eagerly said yes, and boy, are we ever glad that we did! He ordered it from a street vendor just a couple of shops over, and about fifteen or twenty minutes later, the vendor came over with a plethora of lamb skewers, along with some deliciously-seasoned bread that had also been toasted. This is without a doubt the best food that we've had since we left home, and it's also the best food that we've had in recent memory. And, he wouldn't let us pay him for this, either.

After stuffing ourselves with lamb, bread, and some more tea, we sat and talked for quite a while. We can't say how much we've enjoyed his company this week, and we wish that we had more time to spend with him. He has made our time here in Jinan wonderful, and I don't know what we would have done without him. If he ever comes to the States, he had better look us up.

This is our last night here in Jinan. Tomorrow, we'll check out of our hotel at 2:00 pm and then head straight to the airport to catch our flight down to Guiyang. We suspect that it will be about a three-hour flight, so as much as we'd love to see Isabelle right away, in some ways it would be better if they would wait until Sunday to bring her to us, if they're going to bring her to us early at all. Hallie would probably do better with a night to get used to a new environment. Several times today she started to melt down, but Kristie was able to calm her down each time. She really relies on us and our hotel room for stability, and we're hoping that one night in the hotel in Guiyang will be enough for her to regain that sense of stability in a new place before her sister joins her. But, of course, if they do meet us at the hotel with Isabelle, we will be delighted to see her. I can't believe that we're already done here in Jinan. We're going to miss this place, but we are more than ready to meet our other little girl and start bonding with her, too.

Hallie, smiling at breakfast when I tickled her

John's tea shop

John, serving us some tea

Best food of the trip!

She's Opening Up!

Well, today was a big day for Hallie. We took things very easy today, venturing out for a walk by ourselves (we gave John the day off, even though he seemed a little bit disappointed at not seeing us again today) down by the city moat, and trying to find the Western style cafes that he told us were just down the street from our hotel. We'd only been out for about half an hour when Hallie started crying, so we turned around and went back to our room. She calmed down pretty quickly once we got back there. She's taking a little bit more from her bottle than she did at the beginning of the week, and she's definitely staying awake for increasingly longer stretches of time. In fact, she didn't sleep at all this afternoon, which was a shock to us (especially given that both of us fell asleep for parts of the afternoon!). And, completely out of the blue, she gave Kristie her first smile AND her first giggle! We didn't think that we'd see her laugh until we got to Guangzhou, at the earliest, but sure enough, she was giggling while Kristie was tickling her this afternoon. So cute, and we're so excited about this! She's really opening up with us, and it's a great feeling to see her real personality starting to shine.

Then, when we went to dinner tonight (at a rather over-priced but still enjoyable restaurant here in the hotel), she had a meltdown while we were finishing up our desserts. Again, we'd been gone from the room for just over half an hour, and this time I think that she was mostly just tired. But, we think that she just wanted to be back in the room with us. Already it seems like hearing a lot of Chinese is upsetting to her; she seems to have a strong preference for hearing Kristie and me talk (definitely NOT in Chinese), and this is a good bonding sign. She's bonding more like a typical infant—very much like the way in which Mikaela bonded with us—and that fits with our impression of her as being much more like a 12-month old instead of a nearly-four-year-old. She really is our baby. Well, at least for a few more days until we get Isabelle. Then she might have some competition. :-)

It's Official!

I'm a little late in posting this, but on Monday morning, our little girl became Hallie Elizabeth Godwin for good! Her adoption is complete, and that happened a day earlier than we expected because they brought her to us Sunday afternoon instead of Monday morning, which meant that the mandatory 24-hour (i.e., overnight) probationary period ended on Monday instead of beginning then. It was really good for us to have her just four hours after arriving in Jinan, and I think that it's going to make her transition easier. She was very placid and complacent Sunday. In fact, she slept for about twelve hours that night. On Monday morning, we had to go to Civil Affairs, the police station, and then the notary's office. At the first two stops, both of the caretakers from her orphanage came with us, and the one who seemed more attached to her spent most of the time holding Hallie and taking care of her. It seemed like she needed the time to say goodbye even more than did Hallie. At the notary's office, only the other caretaker came in with us; I don't know where the other girl was. She didn't hold Hallie at all in the office, but that wasn't so strange because she hadn't held her much at all at any of the times that we've seen her. (We learned later that she was only there to take care of the papers from the orphanage. She wasn't actually Hallie's caretaker, at least not to the extent that the other girl was.)

Hallie was really hungry by the time we finished up there (about 11:30), and thankfully we were able to get some clarification on her eating habits. They'd told us Sunday, through John (our coordinator here in Jinan this week), that Hallie liked to eat cheese. We asked him to ask the taller girl what kind of cheese to get, but it turns out that cheese is an inaccurate translation. The only kind of solid food that she eats is crackers/cookies mixed with milk. They left some of that with us when they brought her to the hotel on Sunday, and so Kristie mixed some up in a bowl and fed it to her for her lunch once we got back to the room. For the first time, Hallie really fought back. Even though she liked the taste of the food, she didn't want to do it on our terms. The realization that she is now in our care, not that of her usual caretakers, seemed finally to dawn on her. So, Kristie spent the better part of 20-30 minutes holding her still while feeding her one spoonful at a time. She finally did eat most of the bowl, and then after crying some more, she settled down for a good afternoon nap.

We ventured out that night to find some Western restaurants done Chinese-style. The Pizza Hut that we found looked almost like a half-Pizza Hut, half-bistro restaurant, and let me tell you, it's a good deal nicer than the Pizza Hut/Taco Bell combos that we have back at the States. Dinner there was really good, and we got back to the room exhausted, but very grateful for the fact that Hallie is now officially ours. What a great way to end our first full day in Jinan!

Hallie being held by her caretaker, along with the other worker from the orphanage.

Chinese knot given to us by the woman at Civil Affairs. This knot means "good fortune."

The picture below is of her in the van, as we drove from Civil Affairs, where her adoption became final. Apparently, adoption is tiring not just for the parents, but for the kid, too. :-)

At Pizza Hut

China Trip: Day 1

We are finally on our way to China! We dropped our kids off at my parents' house Thursday evening, and they seem to be settling in very well. My parents have all kinds of fun activities planned for them, and I think they are going to have a great time. We went back home to a very empty house, packed up the rest of our stuff and then attempted to get some good sleep. I fell asleep immediately and slept very deeply at first, but was wide awake by 4:45, and never got back to sleep at all. We finally got up about 6:30, and had plenty of time to get ready before our pastor arrived at 12:00. He took us to CVG, and we made it through security so quickly, that we ended up with two and a half hours to kill before our plane boarded. The plane was packed, and they asked for a few volunteers to check their carry-on baggage to their final destination at no extra cost. Greg and I both agreed, because we thought it would be nice not to have the extra pull-behinds and strollers as we navigated the LA airport. The flight from CVG to LAX was uneventful, and we arrived here with no problem. We grabbed some dinner, and then went to check in at the counter to print our last couple of boarding passes. That's where we ran into our first major snag. It turns out that the carry-on luggage CAN'T be checked all the way to our final destination, because we didn't pay the extra fees, so they need to pull those items off and have us carry them on. That wouldn't be any problem, except they can't seem to find our bags at all. They have been looking for them for an hour now. They told us to come back at 9:00, and we really hope they have found them by then, because the plane boards at 10:00. We are both so tired already, and we know that the hard part of this journey is still ahead of us. We just keep trying to focus on Hallie, and knowing that we will meet her for the first time in about 48 hours. (We are obviously focused on Isabelle too, but since we don't get to meet her for another week still, it is more helpful to focus on Hallie right now). We are so thankful to be at this point in our adoption, and so grateful to God for everything He provided to make this possible for us. Right now we are just really tired. And we miss our kids. Three weeks is a very long time to be away from all of them. The internet connection at LAX is pitiful, so probably by the time I actually get this posted, we will have resolved the situation with our bags and everything. But please pray for us anyway. Pray for us as we fly that God will keep reminding us why we are doing this and that we will rely on Him to sustain us. Thanks!

Kristie

Travel plans

I just realized that I have been updating everyone on my travel plans by means of Facebook, but haven't posted anything here for those of you who are not Facebook friends. We got our TA, we got our consulate appointment, and everything is completely set for us to leave. We have booked plane tickets, made hotel reservations, and have our whole schedule set.

We leave Cincinnati at 4:00 on Friday afternoon, and fly to L.A. From there, we will fly to Guangzhou, and then on to Jinan. Our plane is set to land in Jinan at 10:15 Sunday morning, which will be 10:15 Saturday night here in Cincinnati. We should get custody of Hallie on Monday morning, and sign the papers to complete her adoption on Tuesday. Then we have a few days of peace and quite while our contact, John works on getting Hallie's birth certificate and passport. We should have those by Friday evening, so on Saturday the 17th, we will fly down to Guiyang. Then we should get Isabelle on Monday the 19th. Our last week will be in Guangzhou, working with the U.S. Consulate. We fly out of Guangzhou on Friday Aug. 30, and land home in the afternoon of Saturday the 31st.

We are so excited to be just over a week away from meeting Hallie for the first time, but we are also feeling nervous about being away from our other children for three weeks. We expect this to be particularly hard on Mikaela and Matthias.

Today was a big day for Mikaela, since it was her fourth birthday. She has been looking forward to this for weeks, and has insisted that she wanted cupcakes instead of cake. By yesterday afternoon, she was so excited about the cupcakes, that whenever anyone asked her a question about her birthday, she yelled, "CUPCAKES" without bothering to listen to the actual question. "Mikaela, how old will you be tomorrow?" "CUPCAKES!" Silly girl. :-) Most of the time, I don't even think about the fact that she is adopted, but on days like her birthday, I always stop and think about what our life would be like without her. She is such a blessing and a treasure, and I can't imagine how empty life would be if she weren't a part of our family. I am so thankful that she is!