Greetings from China!

I want to take some time to get you caught back up with what is going on here in Guangzhou. I mentioned in my last post that we were going to try and give Emma her first bath. We started off slow by putting her feet in the water that we had put in the sink, which she was okay with. I began to lightly put water on her legs, which went okay for just a bit. She started then to get really upset. We really needed to at least get her little bum in the water because she had just had a really wet, leaky diaper. We quickly sat her in the sink and of course she was screaming. We rinsed her off and got the heck out of there. I believe that was enough of that for a while. We’ve just been wiping her down and putting on baby lotion and that’s that. I believe next, I will put her in the tub with me and see how that goes but I’m going to give it another day or so. Emma has been traumatized enough that we don’t want to do anything that is too upsetting for her. We have nothing but time. We’re just loving her right where she is.

Emma’s second night with us was not as smooth as the first night. She did wake up about 6 times and would cry out once and then she was quite again. Her crib is right next to my bed and so I sat up and waited a second to see if she was truly awake. I wanted to make sure that if she woke up scared that she would know that I would be there immediately, but I didn’t want to pick her up if she wasn’t really awake. No need of starting any bad habits if I didn’t need to. Everything was good; we just didn’t sleep as sound.

Yesterday we woke up and Skyped with family and then had a little breakfast. After that Emma was ready for a nap. We’ll we both were actually. After nap we headed over to Lucy’s for lunch. Lucy’s is notorious within the adoption community. Matt and Eli had the cheeseburger and fries and I had a grilled cheese with fries. It tasted so good to me. Emma doesn’t like it when I sit down though, so I ate my lunch walking around with Emma strapped to me.

After lunch, we walked around to a couple of stores where I picked up some dresses for Emma. After two stores Matt’s wallet was empty and so we headed back to the hotel. Next, we loaded up the bus and headed to the police station to apply for Emma’s passport. She slept on the way over and was doing great until they made me take her out of the Sleepy Wrap to take her picture. She wasn’t liking that but they had a little rattle and was able to get her attention long enough to snap a photo.

Yesterday evening some of us took a taxi to what our guide called a “good shopping place”, with 5 floors of toys. Well, it was actually a building with 5 floors of shops that I would compare to the flea market. There were many toy stores but there were all kinds of other stuff too. Now when I say “store”, I really mean like a booth. They were so small that all 4 of us adults couldn’t fit in the same store at one time. It wasn’t a complete bust though because we did come across one good find. We then had dinner on the first floor at a KFC. We ordered chicken nuggets and fries all around. It was pretty good I might add. I would say the taxi ride was the most interesting, exciting, scariest part of this whole adventure. I just can’t describe the driving around here. There are no traffic laws and so it’s just get where you gotta go, however you can. We even got into a fender bender but they don’t even blink twice about that. What fun.

Last night was a good night for Emma, she slept through the night again and we are beginning to see her relax her body as we hold her. She will even lay her head on us when we’re holder her. We will have quite a bit of work ahead of us but right now, it’s all about the bonding. I will keep her in the wrap and walk with her as much as I have to. Please continue to keep her in your prayers. Pray that she will be able to become more comfortable with me sitting and holding her, otherwise it will be a LONG, LONG, LONG plane ride home.

We so appreciate your comments, they mean the world to us right now. We are so ready to come home!