Adoption Day

today was the ceremony presenting us with the adoption certificate. the lady read our promise to not abandon, to always feed and educate and love our children and then proclaimed she is ours forever. after that we went to an embodriay factory and saw the area that they are creating the pictures. this long one you see is a winter scene and will take several years of 30 people working on it to complete.

 

 AFTER WE GOT BACK TO THE ROOM WITH NOTHING TO DO PENNY AND MORGAN WANTED TO SLEEP OR WATCH TV SO I TOOK KATE AND KIM TO THE POOL.

 

kate actually got her to go under water for a few seconds and otherwise she just played in the water. when we went to the mall she did find a pair of sandals that she liked. the only things she brought with her seems to be clothes that have tags on them that are more winter. she has nothing personal with her at all. that makes me sad. she seems to like the color pink! guess that won't be a problem at our house.

 

tomorrow we fly to GZ and i can tell you that we are all looking forward to getting out of changsha...and to the vacation part of the trip. pray for kim to do well witht he vaccines...

 

 

 

More Changsha

so yesterday penny and kate "did" kims hair. then put all the do-dads back in! love the braids. at first she was not to sure about it but then she did accept it. i had though several times thru the day i saw sad eyes and a tremble at the mouth so was not sure if she was going to accept them messing with her hair. later we were going to go out, walk to the book store and we had to wait for a bit for the guide so kate entertained all with getting them to do si do..even kim got into it. amy and bills little girl maddie is such a hoot! the girls have her doing the heart sign such as a taylor swift....

ok so the guy doing dishes along the street is not the food stand we ate at! can you imagine?? we have been very careful eating...this time i simply did not want to miss out on some of the fruit opportunities so this time my checked luggage contained two very sharp hunting knives :) and so we are having dragon fruit, pears, apples, etc here in the room along with the occasional instant noodles, mashed potato's and cereal. (kate still has one box of fruit loops she is keeping for a bad day) and of course the chicken feet. yuck...the lotus bloom gone to seed is something that kim has shown us has seeds inside sort of like a grape looking thing that you peel and eat. it really isn't to bad. you can buy those heads all around. when we finally got to the bookstore there were displays all around. this one looks like a ship. we bought a few books but learned a long time ago that the problem with books is the weight adds up really fast! and luggage weight is now so limited that it is hard to haul stuff back.

Wednesday

photo 1 is mama g holding onto kim, i took this picture because this lady to me has always shown such care for not only our daughters but even other children without parents. the next is of kate...we walked around a city block, or was it 6? and kate got very hot. so hot she finally asked me to carry her. scary? yes...as it is not as hot as at home but the humidity was very high...mama g dabbed several drops of a small bottle of greenish stuff between her thumb and fingers, then on the back of her neck in three spots...i kept the water in her and morgan gave her her battery powdered fan. kate admitted that after the mama g drops that she started feeling better right away. we now have 6 bottles of it as it is for headaches, getting to hot, a cold, etc...mama g said i needed this many bottles because we have so many girls. got kate back to hotel and put a cold towel on her feet and around her neck and she felt better fast. mama g came in about 45 minutes to check on her and kate showed she had performed a miracle by jumping on the bed and laughing. morgan has been a godsend this trip. her chinese understanding is so great. yes she stumbles over some of it but she has done so well. she actually posed for this photo!

I just love the dimples that kim has! she also showed huge interest at breakfast with two sign language books that amy brought to us. amy feels she can develop speech although will be nasally...kim really enjoyed amys interest in showing her the sign language alphabet. penny got her foster sister in-law sunglasses as her gift she had brought to her so they posed together. we are going to go to a book store tonight, waiting until about 5 pm to go though so not so hot. personally i am hoping for some ice cream. and get this, i have checked every store we have went by looking for diet soda...NONE

Mama G and Dimples

penny and mama g have really enjoyed each others company.

mama g's grandson chowed down on pizza and it was funny to see him eating it with chopsticks and penny with her hands...

morgan is so in her element and really likes mama g's daughter in-law. they decided what to order for all of us, kim requested one dish and it was a dish of chopped pig intestin's with lots of hot spicy stuff in it. but she really loved it.

we took photos of us afterwards...kim has greatly appreciated the i-pod and thank you to judy, vicky and whoever else loaded it with the music, etc. she has really taken to it plus likes the camera in it. i was so glad when we went to the civil affairs office today as the swi staff brought a back pack and a duffle bag of kims stuff.

yesterday she showed up with nothing! what a welcome sight to see those two bags, but now i am dying to know what is in them. kim is hoping to get her ears pierced.

 we will get that done in the u.s. thank you. this city there is nothing to do so far that we have found. we did go to awl mart today and then on thursday we are going to a silk factory.

birthday cake!!

can you tell from the hunched shoulders she was just shuddering in delight? Maddie turned five today and the hotel sent her a cake that Bill and Amy shared with all of us! and yes it was good! Maddie tried her hardest to get her mama Amy to stick her finger in the cake too! i think Maddie has settled into the family like a dream and boy are they in for a ride! She is just the cutest thing to watch and they are adjusting well.

 

 

 

i will send photos soon of mama g and her family that arrived today. this is penny's foster mama and her son and his family. when we last saw the grandson he was crawling and now he is five! he likes the matchbox cars we brought and mama g said he calls me his u.s. grandma.

kim, myself and kate took a ride to the police station with our guide this afternoon as kim is over 13 so she has to sign for her passport. kate walked the distance we had to with her sweatshirt sleeve over her nose. but she is starting to venture a little into the chinese food. she has also started enjoying her self a bit.

kim is still doing well, admitted that she does not like to ride in the cars and is not used to this city traffic. penny's tummy is feeling much better. morgan really is great with mama g and seems to enjoy talking to her. i value morgans ability to talk to her in chinese! so far we are counting down the days to leaving changsha so we can be at gz...who cannot like gz?

adopted, tears of goodbye

this is the chandler that welcomes you into the Dolton hotel. very grand. but don't worry there is nothing to do here...thursday we are going to a silk factory and today we did go to walmart. we bought water for the room oreo's and fruit. kate has been eating mashed potatoes that i brought to make, and we have ritz crackers that i brought peanut butter and nutella for.

 

 

today we did the adoption papers and put our finger print o our names. kim is officially ours! and we are officially hers. after doing all that i asked the guide to explain that the swi people were leaving to go back to loudi and that we would not see them again. that was when tears were shed. the ladies did so well with her and they cried also...i have this rule of let's move forward to keep moving into the future and so even though i felt i could also cry i kept all moving forward all the time telling them thank you for having cared for our daughter. a few bracelets and nail polish later at walmart and the tears have dried...they will be shed many times again we all know but for now we are good.

the photo of the guy in a red t shirt, kim and another lady are of our guide richard, and amy also a guide but both are employees of LWB and Amy has known kim for the time that she was at the swi as she got her sponsored at the school she attended. our family values LWB thru the years and again share that feeling.

 

 

in about an hour mama G and her family will be here. penny has not felt perfect today but soon will and so we are resting until the get here. we arranged to spend about 24 hours with them....right now i feel that things are going good...and pray they continue this way!

addie the blue nail polish was perfect that we bought you! gracie we are looking for sugar cane for you...vicky are you sure you don't want a dress from here? they are sooo cute! and judy, kim loves chicken feet. i have taught her the sign language sign for throw up and i keep telling her i am going to throw up if i eat them. so you and her now can share chicken feet!

What to do~

what else can you do in a hotel, no way to communicate in a good way, and it is 100 degrees outside? we went to the pool..so here are a few photos of that. swim caps were a new experience for all..for kim it was all new! she for sure cannot swim.