Royal Zoo and the Imperial Mansion Marriott

Today was our first full day in Beijing.  We slept wonderfully on soft beds at the Imperial Mansion Mariott.  It is set up like an apartment which is great for family style travel.  We went and saw the pool but haven't ventured in it yet.  In our experience the pools are usually cold and I haven't gotten up the courage.  We need Gege here, he is usually Jaden's swim buddy.

We went down to breakfast at the hotel buffet.  It was a great mix of Western food and Chinese food.  Jay ate like he was starving and we had to remind him that we would come back tomorrow so he wouldn't continue to eat!  Noodles and fried duck breast seemed to be J's favorite while Tim did his typical Chinese breakfast of Fried noodles, fried rice and pork and beans.  Lots of options!  Jaden was thrilled with the dragon fruit.  (It is this bizarre looking prickly thing that has white with black polka dotted fruit.)  He kept saying, "This is the best dragon fruit ever!  I dream of this dragon fruit!"  As usual for everywhere in China--the coffee is what my dad would have said is "Gooood coffee!"  A "compliment" usually reserved for cruise coffee and old hospital coffee.

After that we made it through surprisingly mild traffic to the zoo.  It was very pretty but small.  The difference between our zoo at home and this one was interesting.  The area for humans was beautiful with running streams and gorgeous garden areas but the areas for the animals were spartan.  The animals could have been touched through the fences if you didn't care much about keeping your fingers.  Very different from home where there is always a big barrier between the animals and the people.  Katie, as expected loved the zebras.  We had to pull Katie back because she wanted to touch the Mama and Daddy Zebras.  Since they were biting each other,  I assumed she might look equally tasty.  I thought Katie would be glad later that we made her keep her remaining fingers intact.  ;)
Jaden ran around saying "Take a picture!" as he pointed at everything.   We watched the Lemurs for quite a while.  They were running around like, well, wild animals.  They had several babies riding on their mamas' backs.  Jaden thought it hilarious when one of the babies bit his mama on the butt.  He was trying to tell random people about the funny baby.  For future zoo goers...bring an umbrella.  In   places there were so many birds in the trees above that you needed it!  Yuck.

As always, Tim and the kids visited every bathroom in a 5 mile radius!

We went shopping after that to an indoor mall with hundreds of little stalls.  Jade, pearls, silks, toys--lots of bargaining to do.  Unfortunately, if you don't bargain you will pays several times what you should but there are a couple where it is inappropriate to bargain???  Our guide reinforced several times that we should bargain but then at one place he waved us off and said you can't bargain here.  I'm not sure how to know the difference.  (Any seasoned China shoppers, feel free to chime in!))
At each adoption, we have gotten jade crosses and Tim wanted to get one here also and so we bargained.  Who knows if we got a bargain but they seemed fine to us.  :)
As an aside, you may notice fewer pics of Jaden than normal; he has decided making weird faces is cool.  Jaden LOVES our guide, David Wang.

After that we went to one of the oldest noodle shops in Beijing.  It was very good.  Laura was sister supreme and practiced her left handed chopstick noodle feeding techniques.  She rocked it!  The kids are going to gain a million pounds.  (I may lose a few if I keep trying to eat with the chopsticks.)

Labor begin...

So much of pregnancy and paper pregnancy runs on parallel paths...everytime (for us) it has been about 9 months, for the most part I loved being pregnant, both came with moments of doubt and great fear, and both give you an incredible gift at the end.  Neither are guaranteed to be easy, neither I suppose, are even supposed to be easy, but God lets you forget the hardparts and eventually both are so worth it.

I remember being pregnant and calling on family and friends at the end and later looking back and seeing how much less fun it would have been without my "village".  Adoption is very much like that.  It is so awesome to see and feel the support at the end of this "pregnancy" too.  Friends to hold down the fort at the office so that we feel ok about leaving, friends to run over at the last minute with Chinese money so that you don't reach China completely without funds, friends to cry with about delays, family doing laundry and oh, the prayers.  Tim and I have felt the prayers and truly do take comfort that God hears those prayers.  The hard part is He doesn't always say yes when we want hiim to but then I don't always say yes to my kiddos even know that they are old enough to know the things they feel that they need.  Sometimes God must feel a little like we do with Katie lately.  Her new thing that is adorable, but probaby shouldn't be, is  her urgent "But I NEED it!"  Sometimes it makes me smile, sometimes it makes me sigh but all of the time I know that most of the things she "needs" are not really needs at all.  (I mean does anyone other than Katie and Laura really believe that we NEED sweets 5 times a day?)  Evertime she says that to me, I'm going to try to use it as a reminder that the times I think "But I NEED it!" toward God are probably equally non-urgent.

Ha, pregnancy brain hits paper pregnant moms too!  I just realized how much I am sort of rambling.  (Of course it could just be jet lag.)  :)

I am going to try to blog daily.  It probably won't happen, but I am going to try.

So...for today, we got up very, very early and the plan was to throw the kids into the car and let them go back to sleep for the hour trip to the airport.  They were all too excited to go back to sleep (well Laura may have if the littles hadn't wanted to talk her ear off!)  On the way we passed the casino and Jay said, "I can't believe God made a house of lights just so it would be beautiful!"  As signs and red lights, and building lights would come it to view, he would say with awe, "just beautiful!!"  Oh, to have the joy of a child.  We made it to the airport, flights were all smooth and the kids slept a little on the loong flights.

Our guide David was at the airport when we got there and got us to our hotel, (I have to admit that I enjoyed watching Laura's face in the Beijing traffic, hehe), we got checked in without problem and then went with our guide for a dinner at a local restaurant.  Very authentic.  It was very smooth and suprising easy the entire day.  No major meltdowns were to be seen (and the kids did great too).  So nice boring early labor as this final part of the journey gets ramped up.  Yea!

Tomorrow is supposed to be the Royal Zoo in BJ and the following day is supposed to be the Great Wall.  Hopefully I will have some more exciting pics to add down the road.

Jaden is such a character; we are trying to remember some of the Jadenisms as they happen but one of my favorite for today...After eating a ton a lunch just before the landing on the long flight today, he um, gave us back, the entire meal.  Even as I was wiping his chin, he said "This is the best day ever!  This is my favorite part!"  (I assume he meant the landing that the pilot had just announced.)  Sometimes his exuberance can be exhausting but oh, he does joy well, doesn't he?

So specific prayers for today...continued health.  Laura is still not over the exhaustion induced illness from her marathon ER rotation and forgot and brushed her teeth with tap water.  Oops, hopefully no repercussions from that.  Katie isn't thrilled with all the stares we are getting here, I'd love for her to be comfortable with or blind to the attention our big blended family is going to receive over the next 2-3 weeks.  Mitch is midway through his medical missions trip in Mexico and will join us afterward.  Prayers for my big kid as he navigates the long flights and the China subway system on his own to find us in a few days.  As always, prayers and good thoughts on Ian's transition.  I would love to be spared what I know some of the other parents of the older children's adoption have been through lately.  Adoption, like pregnancy, is hard.  Kids don't join our families without pain and tears and shouting.  I'm old enough to really understand that the hard parts really do eventually pass and leave behind great joy; I would just hope that as God metaphorically wipes my chin that I can remember that sooner or later, I'll be able to say "This is the best day ever!  This is my favorite part!"
Blessings, y'all.

TA and Leaving!!

Wow, it has been a crazy, busy few days!  We got TA (Travel Approval from China) on 5/21 and we are leaving at 5 in the morning tomorrow!!!  A 6 day turn around is nearly unheard of (and probably complicated things a little) but in order for Laura to be able to go and to have time to recover for her next rotation, we really needed the timing to be perfect.  God showed up in a big way and everything has worked out.  Tim has been an absolute rock.  He has kept us organized and kept us all on track with packing and getting ready. 

ONLY ONE THING LEFT!!!

While this is an incredibly exciting time, it is also potentially a very emotional, traumatic time.  Ian has had so much more time in the orphanage than the other two that he will have much more to grieve right now.  Later it may be a comfort to him to have memories of his time in China but for now it will make this much, much more difficult.  Ian's orphanage seems to be more invested in their children.  Most of the children have been given baby books of sort to take to their new homes, they really do seem to want the best for the kids.  Having had more attention and care probably makes it even harder to leave.  We know that it is ultimately the best thing for him; children are meant to have parents.  He may not see it that way at first.  Some of the others have kicked, screamed, shut down completely, tried to run off, refused food, or been defiant.  All of which is normal in an older child adoption.

I would love to know that I have a community praying us home safely.  Specific things to pray for would be for Ian to feel the love that we want to give him, for Ian and the littles to feel safe and protected, for the littles not to be jealous of their new brother, for us not to have forgotten anything important :), and for us all to have the patience and peace that will be needed. 

Stay tuned as the adventures unfold...

Jie Jie answers FAQ :)

 

Hey everybody. It's Laura. Jie jie. Big sister. Wawa. Walrus. I have lots of names these days. Anyway. I'm writing a blog post for three reasons:
1. I'm supposed to be finishing up my personal statement for my residency application and I am the queen of procrastination.
2. It's been awhile since mom posted anything. It's like she has 5 kids to keep up with or something. Whatever.
3. I get asked the same questions over and over when people find out about my family. Maybe some of you have the same questions. Maybe not. Either way, here's a little FAQ session for you all!

 

Q: Did your parents ask you before they started adopting?
A: I've been asked this so many times, for each adoption. And the answer is yes. Absolutely yes. This was a family decision from the start. It's one I'm glad we made, and I'm especially glad we made it together as a team.

 

Q: What's it like having siblings so much younger than you? Do you get confused for their mom a lot?
A: It's obviously a big gap, but I like to think it helped mom and dad to have older kids helping take care of the little ones. Yes, people think I'm Jaden and Katie's mom sometimes. Probably more often than I realize. But I guess I should be honored that they think I could raise such beautiful and well-mannered children. And to be fair, sometimes Jaden does accidentally call me Mama. So it's an honest mistake. Really it's only a problem when people call Mom "Grandma." (Seriously. Don't do it.)

 

Q: Your parents sure are brave/faithful/big-hearted/loving/generous to adopt so many kids, aren't they?
A: They are some of the most brave, faithful, big-hearted, and loving people I know. But I don't like the use of the word "generous." Yes, it's true, they are incredibly generous. They lavish us all with attention. But adoption isn't about being generous. Adoption isn't charity work. If your biological child was stuck in a different country all alone, would it be considered generous to bring them home? Of course not. It is understood that you would do anything you could to get your child, BECAUSE IT IS YOUR CHILD. Why should it matter where (or to whom) they were born? Sorry. I'll get off my soap box now. My parents are wonderful people who do everything they can for their children. Let's leave it at that.  :)

 

Q: Are you going to get to go with them to get Ian?
A: It looks like the answer is YES! It just so happens that the adoption is going to fall during my vacation month. As far as Mitch, he may get to go with us. He may have to join us after Gotcha Day because he has already committed to a mission trip during the time we're likely going to leave.

 

Q: How do you stand the cuteness every single day???
A: I don't know. I like to think of it as my superpower. But really I nap a lot, so maybe that's an adaptive mechanism to avoid constant exposure to the little balls of adorableness that are my bebbe siblings.
 

That's all I have. Hopefully mom or dad can add some cute pictures (because, really, we know that's why you read the blog). And hopefully you'll be hearing more from us soon!

800 approval and GUZ assigned!

This has been such a crazy journey.  The LOA being approved and then not printed was just a hiccup in the scheme of things and thankfully, it is behind us.  We received approval on our I800 a week ago and today (finally) got assigned our GUZ number.  That means that the National Visa Center has cabled our visa paperwork to Guangzhou.  We are now waiting on access to another online visa application that we have to do before our next step can start.  When the next step (the Article 5) is dropped off, our agency will pick it up for us in 10 work days.  Unfortunately, Chinese Labor day will fall during this time for us and delay it just a little but once it is picked up, we will be waiting on TRAVEL APPROVAL!  We are getting so close now. 

In the ongoing theme of learning patience, our DS 260 is taking longer than normal to be accessible.  I'm trying not to let it worry me yet.  If it doesn't clear soon, I may get a little crazy.  For now, we are going to distract ourselves with a trip to the zoo tomorrow.  :)

LOA and the Emotional Rollercoaster

It has been about a month since I last posted and boy, have we been up and down.  On 3/11 I emailed our agency to see if there was any news on our dossier.  It was in the phase that tends to be the longest (and hardest) wait.  It is like waiting in line at Wal-mart, it purely depends on high quick your "cashier" is at their job.  Apparently we had someone who was fairly quick at translation because we were only on day 39 and were already translated and on the way to review!  Usually, review to LOA is about a 5-7 day wait; we were thrilled!  That meant that we would probably be getting Ian in May, whoot!  (Airfare goes up by at least 50% in June...there are 7 Sanfords traveling home from China.  Not a happy math equation.)

Our agency told us that we should have LOA by "early next week."  That became a phrase that made me sick in the next 3 weeks...Unfortunately, every time we checked, we kept hearing, "soon" and "early next week."  Yesterday, when she said again that it wasn't in but she hoped it soon would be, I checked with DHL.  (They are the carrier that China uses to send the LOAs and TAs to the US.)  They said that there was NO PACKAGE on its way to BAAS from China.  After much deliberation, I contacted my agency again and asked that they recheck about our LOA.  I don't think that Xiaoqing was particularly thrilled to do it but after gently reminding me that she had just checked 2 days ago and been told it was on the way, she did check.  What I knew was confirmed.  There had been a "computer on-line error"  (perhaps it was not plugged in to the printer???) and the LOA had been issued but never printed.  Sigh.  About 20 days just completely wasted.  The only sensation that I can relate it to is, perhaps, false labor.  Anyone who has been pregnant and  thought they were in labor and then were sent home from the hospital empty-handed can sort of relate.  I knew that didn't mean it wouldn't happen but I certainly felt like the rug had been pulled out from under me.  I know, too, that 20 days more in this wait of about 9 months doesn't seem like much.  Imagine though, if your child was moving away forever or dying; what wouldn't you give to have 20 more days?

Those closest to me know that right now I am struggling anyway.  Grieving for my sister, stressing over J's school stuff and whether to have him repeat Kindergarten, struggling with finding time to worship and feeling so disconnected from my church family (due to Katie not being able to comfortably stay in the nursery and Jay not really fitting in well with the children's program due to his sensory issues) have all contributed to me wanting to just crawl in bed and not come out until summer.  With my other children I have enjoyed the entire experience.  (Yes, I'm one of those weird people that truly loved the big round belly and all that went with it and loved all the craziness of the first 2 adoptions.)  I have felt sad and then felt guilty for not enjoying this process while wallowing a little in my grief.  The weather had turned pretty and I thought I had turned a corner and then this...ugh.  Adoption is hard.  It is also beautiful and so rich in blessings; a not to be missed experience.  Adoption is so much harder than childbirth.  I always knew that while those little ones were safely in my body, I could protect them.  With adoption, every day, every minute that you miss is another that you aren't protecting your child.  I wonder daily if Ian thinks we have forgotten about him or changed our minds.  We aren't allowed to send him a letter or care package until we get LOA.  So I can't even comfort him by sending a reminder that we are thinking of him and are trying to get there.  Adoption makes you powerless.  It is amazing following the journey of other families with children from PanZhiHua but it is also painful.  Each time a child leaves, I wonder if it worries Ian that he isn't leaving yet or if he is beginning to be afraid to leave.  I know he has no future as an orphan with no family in China but hopefully he is too young to see that.  It must be hard for him to anticipate leaving everything he knows behind.  Every delay just makes it harder for him.  I want to leave tomorrow.

Earlier today, I sent an email to another adoptive mom who works at our agency and asked if she thought they could go ahead and send the package of information that we need to file our next step.  They usually won't until the LOA is in their hands.  They actually ended up doing even better.  Xiaoqing was able to convince someone at China's Children's Welfare department that it was their error and they sent her an e-copy of our LOA so that we can file the I800 to the US a couple of days early!  Yea, that will let us get a couple of those days back!  It has helped so much just to get that little glimmer of seeing something turn in the right direction. 

Even with everything going on in our lives, we have managed to squeeze in some good things.  Laura finished her 4 months of rotations in Durant and is home (for a very little while),  Mitch and Laura were able to get away for a brief spring break trip to Six Flags with us and we got to spend an expected day with my niece and her family (including Bella, Katie's "hand twin").
Tim and I celebrated 27 years of marriage.  (Unfortunately, not on the beaches of Fiji  :) )
I was also able to connect with a doctor from the National Institute of Health about Ian's health, which was exciting to be making some headway with that.   And who says stress can't be good for you?  I'm at my lowest weight in years.  :) 

Often I pray with my patients and today I prayed with a woman whose husband of 60+ years is not doing well.  The first thing that came out of my mouth was "Lord, we know that it times of grief and worry we don't always see Your blessings but I'd ask that You help Your daughter (meaning my patient) see Your hand in the many ways You are blessing and protecting her--every moment, every day of this journey..."  Hmm, after I said it aloud, I realized that perhaps He was speaking to me even as I was trying to comfort my patient.  I want His peace, I want to know that He is orchestrating this.  It is a question that can't be answered but are even the delays part of His plan?  No, He isn't giving me exactly what I want (to leave NOW) but then Jaden wanted to bake a cake and decorate it with cookies tonight and I didn't give him what he wanted either.  We'll make a cake tomorrow but we may not decorate it with cookies; we'll get to China, it just may not be exactly when I wanted to be there.

 Lord give me the strength to believe that You've got this.  Help open my eyes to the ways You are blessing this journey.

Dossier to China

After my last post, my sister took a turn for the worse and didn't survive her fight with Wegener's disease.  I do appreciate all of the prayers and support.  Several people have brought food, sent cards or plants or flowers or prayed.  I am not at my best and I hope I haven't forgotten to thank anyone.  I will forever miss my sister and am thankful for the time we did have.  If you have sibs, hug them or call them; time is always shorter than we wish.

Jaden and Katie are doing well.  Jaden has officially been ours for 2 years now.  Weird to think that just two years ago, he didn't know we existed, had never heard English and was an orphan.  He loves, plays, writes and enjoys life so much.  And he never stops talking.  He is Mr. Social.  He hates when the waitress has to leave to put in our order.  He wants to talk and visit with them and get to know them better.  We went to the Aquarium and one of the docents was trying to talk to a group of kids.  If she asked for a question, his hand was up in a flash.  Unfortunately, the questions didn't always pertain to the fish.  :) He was more interested in her and her opinions than the fish.  I think after having such a limited pool of people to talk to, he is taking full advantage of the people he is exposed to.

He is still struggling with his sensory processing issues in school.  Academically he is fine but he has a very hard time with physical boundaries.  We are working on it.  Tonight at dinner, out of the blue, he reminded us that he used to live in China "where we didn't have any food."  Then he asked if he could go to his favorite Chinese restaurant tomorrow.  Yes, little man, you may.  (Tim and I both felt that like a kick to the gut.  It is so hard to know that there is nothing you can do to change the neglect of your child's past.  Sometimes I forget that there is a very good reason that he has the struggles he does.  Three years of neglect and hunger will do that to you.) 

Katie is growing, growing.  She can count to 20 (mostly) and recognizes most of the alphabet and so wants to be able to read.  I expect that she may be an early reader as she always wants to know what things say.   She has started into the "WHY???" phase.  It officially started at 2:19 PM on 2-3-15.  We are at 2314 times so far.  She has also begun noticing her differences a little more.  She periodically will count her fingers and then hold up her 4-fingered hand and say "Four?" and then the other, "Five?" back and forth several times. (Jay is so sweet, he often grabs her hands and kisses them and tells her how much he loves her hands.)  She also looks at her scar on her leg and studies it.  Perhaps it will help her one day that she has a hand-twin in my grand-niece and that I have scars very similar to hers on my leg.  We think she is perfectly and beautifully made and I hope she will feel that way too.

I'm a little late posting this exciting news but we are DOSSIER TO CHINA! For those of you that don't eat, sleep and breath adoption, that means that all of our paperwork, all 3-4 inches of it, is on its way to China.  At this point, we wait.  We wait for them to acknowledge our paperwork and log us in to their system (which will be our log-in date or LID), we wait for our letter seeking confirmation of intention to adopt (our LOA), we wait for the US to say that Ian is ok to come in to our country (I800), we wait for China to issue an invitation for us to travel.  During all of this, there is very little that we can do that will affect the time until Ian comes home.  There are parts of the process that can be shortened by sending things overnight and doing papers the moment they are received, but for now, we wait.