Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Our First Week Home

Our first week home has been EXTREMELY BUSY!

Please know that we are thankful to all who have provided meals.

Valerie is excited to see what each dish is and has been a very good sport in trying the different types of foods. 

It has been helpful to us for many reasons:
- We have been able to spend a lot of undivided attention to help her settle in.
- We have had MANY doctor appointments that have taken up A LOT of our time.  It has been nice to have home cooked meals to come home to after sitting in a doctors office(or 3) all day!
- It has been fun to see the foods that Valerie likes.

MEXICAN!  Who would have thought?

THANK YOU
 
to those of you who sent packages or cards to
ALL THREE girls.
 
I won't lie, there have been some moments of jealousy that have been pretty emotional.
 
Robbie has said that we should buy stock in "Kleenex", as we are going to increase their sales.
 
(Just wait until we hit the teenage years dear.)
 
 
THANK YOU
 
for
calling
texting
or Facebook messaging us.
If we have not gotten back to you,
please know that we are appreciative of your kind words.
 
We will continue to keep the blog going, but want to keep our family needs first.
 
 
THANK YOU
 
most of all for your prayers.
 
We have had such a smooth transition throughout this journey.
 
- None of us got sick or hurt the entire time we sere in China.
 
- Valerie was such a brave girl to "agree" to the adoption.
to leave with a strange family who she had never met.
to leave everything she has ever known.
to know that she would never come back to China or her "family" here.
(believe me, they told her all of these things.)
 
- We had safe flights to China and back home.
 
- We THOROUGHLY enjoyed our time together.
three weeks without
the comforts of home,
jet lag,
stress,
different foods,
bathroom smells,
walking A LOT,
language barriers,
and more
can create an environment for difficulty.
 
THANK YOU
 

Monday, October 21, 2013

WELCOME HOME

We have been really blessed by friends and neighbors.

Thank you for the wonderful Welcome Home!

Here is a VIDEO that a dear friend of mine made for us.

Thank you to all who prayed us through this journey!

Thursday, October 17, 2013

FAREWELL

 
 
 
Our Guide, Translator, and Friend Aron
taking us to the airport.

 
 
Final hugs before we go through security.  Hopefully we have don't have any issues like last time.



 
 
 
When they called for boarding
they basically opened the doors
and everybody boarded shuttles.
When they let us out we walked to the plane.



 
 
 
Valerie knows how many planes we will be riding to get to her new home.  Every time we got on another plane she would say how many more planes we would take before we got to her new home.




 
 
Layover before we get on the LONG flight.
Pizza and dumplings!

 
 
 
 
Yay!
We get to watch T.V. and eat snacks
all the way home!


 
 
 
How many hours will that be???

 
 
OK

 
 
Back to the T.V. and Snacks!

So Long

It is so sad to have to say goodbye to some wonderful people 
 
 
 

 
The Whole Group

 
 
Our Chongqing Family!








 
We sure are gonna miss you.
 
It is amazing what close bonds you can form
in such a short amount of time.

Judy dinner

When we saw Judy the other day, we made plans to come back and have dinner with her before we left China.

Judy was so excited that we had come to meet her.  We were able to meet her brand new baby and her parents.



We walked 20 minutes to a local restaurant for dinner, zig-zagging through crowds of people.   

 
The restaurant was small, maybe 10 tables total.  Most of the people there seemed to know one another.
 
 

Judy ordered several different dishes of local foods.  We got a chicken dish, beef dish, and lots of vegetables.  
fried bread - yummy
 
 
Some were extremely spicy, and others fairly mild. 
 
We ordered a plate of fried rice for the kids, just in case.
 
 
  
 
The food was great!



We visited with her and her family and enjoyed our time together.  Our time together seemed to go by very quickly and before we knew it we had to go.  I am so thankful to have had this time with her and her family.
 
 


  A long day.  Gotta love it when daddy carries you!

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Dinner Cruise

We had a blast tonight!
 
 
Our adoption agency arranged for all of the families to go on a dinner cruise.

 
Getting ready to depart



Our awesome travel buddies

 
 
 
We had heard from others who had been on this cruise
many stories about the food.
 
 
It looked pretty good.

 
 
Here is a close up of some of our choices

 
 
 
Valerie's top pick

The chicken foot was steamed
very flimsy and pale
She didn't end up eating it.
 
 
Let's move on.................


 
We went outside and the sites were beautiful!

 
The bridge and all of the buildings continued to change colors


 
More cruise boats





 
This is the Canton Tower.  It is one of the tallest buildings in the world.  It stands 1,969 feet high.  It is the tallest structure in China and the fourth tallest in the world.



Then we went back inside for a crazy clown performance.