Jan 19th - signing the papers, she's officially ours!!!!

Tuesday January 19, 2016

This morning after waking up Lucee from her 13 hour night of sleep, we skyped with the kids and mamaw and Gumpa. Lilee and Lucee seemed to hit it off well. Lilee was eating a sucker and Lucee had a container of cookies. They were trying to share with each other through the computer screen. It was so cute to seem them smile and interact with each other. Noah and Gavin were trying to speak chinese to her and Mamaw and Gumpa seemed amazed to see Lucee sitting with us. Their 9^th grand child.

We realized we were running out of time and quickly went downstairs to eat breakfast before meeting our guide at 930am. Lucee really liked the yogurt and noodles. She also really liked the bacon, but we didn't have much time to eat it, so I wrapped it in a napkin to bring with in the van. We went back to the social building that we met Lucee at yesterday to finish the paperwork, getting things notarized, her passport picture taken, and finalizing the adoption. During the notarization, Ben and I both had to stamp our thumbs on a piece of paper in red ink. Lucee had to stamp her hand on it in red ink. What a memorable moment that we are officially, forever becoming family in that moment. It's official, Lucee Shan You Zacharias is ours!!!

I stayed upstairs with Lucee, while Ben and Ashley went downstairs to pay the orphanage donation and other paperwork fees. (FYI:They call it a donation, but it's really a required payment to the orphanage. Rather than saying we “paid” for our child, it is viewed as a donation to the orphanage to care for the orphans that are still there and will be in the future.) Lucee and I walked up and down the halls and played in the play area while waiting. It was so cute because also while we were waiting, Lucee would wander around saying, “Baba!! Baba?! Baba...” She was looking for him, wondering where he went. This was great for attachment reasons, as well as just super adorable! When he came up, she ran to him and gave him a hug. When we got in the van to drive out of the parking lot, Lucee spoke some Chinese. Our guide, quickly turned around and said, “She very clearly just spoke, 'We are leaving, we are leaving'!!! She spoke it so clearly!” He was very surprised, but it just proved again, how smart she really is. We had already seen glimpses of this yesterday, as anything we did, she would copy us exactly. She also was beginning to copy some English words and repeating the little sign language we were teaching her. This is such good news as before we were matched, the international doctor in Cincinnati said that her IQ score ranked her in a very low category, indicating that she would never be able to live independently. This is always a possibility, but becoming less likely the more we get to know her.

We went back to the hotel for lunch and more playtime/bonding time. We went for a walk to get water and some fresh air (not really fresh as there is a lot of pollution in the big cities in China, but it was still a nice day and not too bad of pollution today.) We found a park across the street and played for a bit. We are so much in the minority here, that it is so common for people to stare at us as we walk by. I'm sure they are staring at us, not only because we are white, but also that we have a Chinese kid. ( Or maybe because we are wearing jeans and Ben is wearing tennis shoes, ha ha, we've noticed most Chinese people dress very nice in dress shoes and black slacks/pants.) We asked Ashley what the impression that most Chinese have when they see 2 white people with a Chinese kid and he said it is usually that the child is lucky because they will get good care in America and any family is better than No family. They also will wonder “why” would they come all the way here to get a child. We were hit by this in Beijing. We told a couple ladies while shopping that we have 3 kids at home and are adopting a 4^th. They'd say, “Why? You already have 3! Why would you want more?” Some days I'm sure we'll ask ourselves this question too ;)

That night we ate in the hotel room again, Ashley had written down on paper the Chinese characters for “Not Spicy!!!!” so we could add that to the other characters he gave for suggested dishes. This time, all of the food was very enjoyable and we loved watching Lucee eat her dish of beef and noodles with chopsticks. This girl can go to town with chopsticks :)

After dinner we again got ready for bed and prepared ourselves for a rough night. (It always seemed like with the other kids, the first night in the hospital was a dream and the second night was a nightmare ha ha, so we were bracing ourselves for this to be the same, I know, we're weird. :) ) however, this night was just the same as the night before. She fell asleep great, we didn't put her in a diaper because she said no when I tried and she slept 13 hours the night before without wetting the bed and drinking a ton of water, so I thought it'd be okay, and it was. We woke her up 12 hours later. She again, fell out of bed at like 2 am, but this time we had put pillows down there so I actually didn't hear her fall. I happened to wake up at 2 and realized she wasn't in bed, then looked in the crack and there she was, sleeping peacefully on the pillows. We moved her back into bed, again without waking up at all. This girl is a heavy sleeper! 

Lucee feeding Lilee a cookie on skype :)

Ben, signing the paperwork to complete the adoption process!

Lucee with Teacher Hu, from her orphanage - saying goodbye!

Lucee stamping her hand on the paperwork as her "signature".

Yay, It's official!

Eating a snack with chopsticks

In front of our hotel- Love this smiling girl!

Having fun,  out and about.

Playing on the playground across the street from our hotel.

Ben working on homework... Ugh, definitely not a highlight for him.

Hot Stuff eating with chopsticks!

More photos from Gotcha Day!

Our first meal together.

Sleeping Beauty

Jan. 18, 2016 - "Gotcha Day"!!!!!!

Monday January 18, 2016

Today is the day!!!!! Hard to believe! We woke up and got ready for the day! I began to prepare myself for Ben to lose his mind. It seems that right before having the other kids, he kind of loses his mind and can't think straight. Lol, he began doing this about an hour before leaving... pacing the floor, and not being able to focus on finishing getting dressed, ha ha. These moments are fun for me and are probably good because if he wasn't losing his mind, then I'd be losing mine. This makes me have to focus on thinking clearly otherwise we'd both be in trouble. He pulled it together and we ate our last meal as just the 2 of us. I looked at our plates and the food was delicious, but very different looking than back home. To have steamed cauliflower and spring rolls for breakfast seems strange, but everything was so yummy!

The time seemed to be in fast forward. What was an hour that we had to eat breakfast, somehow sped by so quickly it only felt like 15 minutes! We met Ashley in the lobby at 10am and got in the van. He was talking the entire way there (15 minute trip) we don't really remember what he was saying. We pulled into the parking lot of the social building and Ashley got off the phone saying, they're here. We walked into the building and up the elevator and out of it into a room and there she was right at the right side of the door. Her nanny said “momma, Baba” and I hugged her... tears are being held back as I don't know if she will know that they are tears of joy! She said, Momma when looking at me and Baba when looking at Ben. Such a surreal moment. Ben, Lucee, 2 nannies, Ashley and I went over to a coffee table where Lucee had a bag that had all of the items in it that we had sent to her in a care package. We were able to ask the nannies, through our guide, questions. I asked if she was allergic to anything(no), what she likes to eat (rice and most of the food at the orphanage), how she soothes herself (sucks her thumb), if she was closer to one nanny or child in the orphanage- so we could get a picture of them (no, she seemed to get along with all of the nannies and kids), is there any suggestions they have regarding her legs (remind her to stand flat and have a Dr. do surgery on her back ankle because they are too tight). I had a list of 20 or so questions to ask, but these are the only ones I asked while Ben was interacting with her. I ended the questions with is there anything else we should know. The nanny said, she's very smart and sweet.

About this moment I realized there were other families in the same room meeting their children. We later found out that there were 3 families from TX, 1 from Tennessee, and 1 from Canada (we didn't meet this family, but was told about them from the Tennessee family) who were adopting children this week and would be in Guangzhou next week with us.

A lady came up to us and asked for our passports and travel approval form. We showed her and then the nannies began to say goodbye. The one nanny, Wendy, became really emotional, and we learned that she cared for Lucee a lot over the past 4 years. We took pictures and said tearful, thankful goodbyes to them as they left and we moved to another area with a table where Ben began signing a bunch of paperwork. These papers were like a Harmonious contract. Kind of like a 24 hr signing that allows us to keep her, but she's not officially ours yet. Not until tomorrow.

After the paperwork was done, we went to take a picture for a document that will have Ben, Lucee, and me on it. After the picture was taken, we stayed in that room sitting on bench talking with our guide when he said, “she's sad”. I look down and she has a sad face, sitting really quiet with her head down. Then tears start rolling down her cheeks. Then she starts to cry, which turns into wailing. She cries for about 5-10 minutes like that in our arms. Then she starts to settle down and Ben carries her out of the building, still crying, but not as loud as it was. She completely stops crying once we get out of the building. Our van pulls up and we get it. Ashley (our guide) said he was surprised she didn't show much emotion when the nannies said goodbye. Usually the kids show emotion at that moment, but she didn't. However, it's good that she had this moment of mourning, because it shows that she had attachment with them. She's sad and uncertain about what is going on. We had been trained that kids who don't cry when leaving their nannies/orphanage typically haven't been able to attach to them and therefore attachment to parents is more difficult. So, in a way, this was a good sign to us. Sad, but good. Our guide asked her in Chinese if she was hungry, she didn't respond. He asked her if she was sad and she didn't respond. He wasn't sure how much Chinese she could understand or if she could speak much Chinese. We'd find out tomorrow that she is very smart and was just choosing to not respond to him.

We got back to the hotel around 230 and had really good time bonding in the hotel. We showed her new toys, jacket and shoes. In order for her to take off her shoes or jacket, we had to show her the new ones and then she immediately took them off to put the new ones on. While we were playing, one of her favorite games was she'd point to the pile of dirty clothes and we'd say, P.U. STINKY and she'd laugh and do it over and over randomly throughout our playtime. Also, any toy we'd show her, she'd put it in her bag or backpack and carry around like she didn't want to forget it when she went back to the orphanage – little did she know she'd never go back there to stay, only to visit if she wanted to.

I really wanted to show her the drawer of her clothes, but wanted to give her a bath first. She also hadn't gone potty at all since we had been with her! This was a moment Ben and I were both a little worried about before meeting her. We kept thinking how weird it must be for her to have strangers see her and help her go potty. Plus, we didn't know if she liked baths or if she usually had a bath in a tub or more of a sink bath. Ben got water in the tub while I took her potty. She hopped in the tub and I began pouring water on her head. She immediately put her head down to let the water run off her face. I got some soap and she held her hands out for some too. She went right to washing her hair with me. I rinsed off the soap and got more soap to wash her body and when I put the soap in her hands too, she washed her hair again. Ha ha, so we washed her head twice. The next time I put soap on her hands she went to put it in her hair, but I stopped her and showed her to rub her belly and wash her body. After her bath, I wrapped her in a big fluffy towel and carried her to her drawer with all of her new clothes. I told her to open it up and said, Shan You's clothes (The US agency gave her the name Lucy, she doesn't go by that yet, so the first few days we just call her Shan You and eventually start calling her Lucee Shan You until she understands that her name is Lucee). Her eyes got so big and she smiled a huge smile and went right to picking them all up and looking at them. She chose an outfit and she got dressed. Then I combed her hair (something I had been looking forward to doing since we knew we were adopting a little Asian girl. Her hair is so beautiful in color and texture!)

After this, Ben went to go get us dinner to bring back to the hotel. Lucee and I played some more and watched some Chinese cartoons. She liked repeating what they said and it seemed like she enjoyed understanding what they said, as opposed to Ben and I sounding like aliens to her. It was also during this time that Lucee gave her first kisses on the cheek to me!

Ben came back and we ate dinner in the hotel. Our guide had written down suggestions for him to order (since the restaurants do not have English descriptions like most places in Beijing had) however, the 2 main dishes were extremely spicy! Thankfully the fried rice, white rice, broccoli, and “quesadillas” were not and that's what Lucee and I ate, while Ben (who loves spicy) tried to swallow down these ExTREmELY spicy dishes! (By the way, Changsha is known for it's spicy foods and silk embroidery!)

After dinner, we prepared for bed, expecting a long night of crying and not sleeping. Brushed our teeth ( Lucee is excellent at brushing her front teeth, not so much in back, which explains the major cavities she has in her bottom molars. :( super sad for her, but she doesn't seem to be in pain?? ) and got on jammies. They told us to put her in diaper at night cause she sometimes has accidents at night, so we did. We were told by the nannies that she sleeps well and sleeps with it dark, so we put her in bed, turned out the lights and literally within 5 minutes, she was asleep! This was around 730pm. We didn't hear a peep from her all night. The only thing we did hear was her falling out of the bed at 4am. Ben and I both picked her up and put her back in bed. Even with the fall and being put back in bed, she never woke up. We actually had to wake up the next morning at 8:30am! This was a pleasant surprise to us, we couldn't believe how great she slept on her first night with us!

Changsha view from our 30th floor hotel room.

What a typical breakfast looks like.

Walking into the building to get Lucee.

First moment with Lucee.

First Picture with Mama and Baba (Daddy in Chinese)

Daddy showing Lucee pictures in photobook we sent her earlier.  Showing that he is Baba.

Lucee with one of her nannies.

Comforting her...

Leaving to go to the hotel.

Walking in the hotel lobby.

Traveling to Lucee's City- Changsha, Hunan Province

Sunday January 17, 2016

Today is our last day without Lucee... We woke up and decided to go check out the pool area, since we unfortunately hadn't done that yet. The pool area, like everything else in the hotel was amazing and over the top. Definitely the best pool area we've every been in. It was a huge pool, perfect temperature, all to ourselves. The ceiling was glass, so could look up and see the morning sky. The pool was an infinity pool so it looked like it was the same level as the walking area around it. They gave us a magnetic key to the lockers which had water, a towel, and Croc-like sandals for us to wear. The marble floors were heated. After swimming, we each enjoyed the hot tub, steam room, and sauna before showering and heading back up to the room. We went to enjoy breakfast at our super fancy breakfast area. This time, we tried many more things since it was free and if we didn't like it we could try something else. I had what was like a noodle soup with cilantro, mushrooms, meat, water chestnuts, Chinese noodles, asparagus, and green onions in it. It was so good, hard to believe I was eating this for breakfast. Most of the foods we ate for breakfast were not sweet or typical for a breakfast back in the US. After that, we went back to the room to try to pack our bags... We had to juggle things around because the weight limits in country are less than coming from US. Also, we had bought items, so we had more stuff this time. Thankfully we had carry on luggage to fill with the heavier items. We were so thankful for the Swain's letting us borrow their hand held scale.

We met Rocky in the lobby after checking out of our room. They drove us to the airport and Rocky helped us get through check-in. We realized we were really going to miss him and Mr. Wu. It's hard to believe we will have 2 more guides and 2 more drivers on this trip. How could they compare to Rocky and Mr. Wu? Also, how could a hotel and accommodations compare with what we had at the JW Marriott? We were going to have to leave our expectations behind and move forward with different expectations. Thankfully, the weather should be getting better. Rather than being in the teens and 20's we are going to a place where the temps are in the 30-40's now.

We walked to our gate and now that we were traveling in country, we definitely were the minority! In fact, we only saw 3 other Caucasian people the entire time, and we're pretty sure they were from Europe or Australia. We didn't hear them talk, so we really have no clue except for the way they dressed. We were traveling to the Hunan province, away from the very international Beijing city where we'd see other people occasionally (maybe only 20 total the past 4 days we were there, but more than 3).

We have come to find joy in seeing similarities in certain Chinese people that remind us of people back in America. It's kind of a game now for us... we'll see someone and then say to each other, person to your left, looks like so and so. The other person will look nonchalantly and say, yep I can see that! Overall, we have seen a Jacob Kennebeck, Steven Dexter, Mike Jitjaeng, heard a mr. kielchewski, and I can't remember all the others. We wish we could take pictures to show to these people, but that would be a bit awkward. :)

After a 2 hour flight to Changsha, Hunan province... We arrived to meet our guide Ashley, a 39 year old Asian man. Very nice, and very much business. He was very helpful in telling us what to expect as we get ready to meet our daughter in less than 24 hours! Our driver Mr. E. is good, but we don't hear much from him. We get checked into our 5 star hotel (Changsha standards, it's hard to leave our expectations behind!!!) We get settled into our room and head down to eat at the “western restaurant” for dinner. We each order a hamburger and hot lemon water. It comes out and looks AHHHMAZING! It even comes with french fries. As we eat it though, we realize, this is definitely not beef. Not sure what it is and with a pink center, we didn't eat much of it. Even still, as a very loaded burger, it tasted great without the meat. And those french fries... yummy!

We went back to the room and tried to get some sleep. Ben fell asleep quickly, but I had to “nest” before I would be able to sleep. I enjoyed unpacking Lucee's clothes, shoes, and toys before heading to bed. Praise the Lord, I was able to fall asleep quickly, despite the super hard bed and flat pillow.

Cheers to our last night of sleep without Lucee... We are left with wonder of how the next several nights will be...

Beijing - 19 Million People

Our Guide in Beijing - ROCKY

Our Driver in Beijing - Best driver ever!  Mr. Wu!!!

Boarding the Chinese Airline!

Our Awesome Looking Burgers and hot lemon water

All Ready for Lucee!!

Last full day in Beijing...Lots of Lessons Learned.

Saturday, January 16, 2016

We were excited that this morning and the next we have complimentary breakfast! It's the little things that excite us. :) We made our way to the 4^th floor and was welcomed to a buffet breakfast that was beyond what we have ever seen. They had western style food and Chinese style food. We tried a little bit of both. They had a juice bar and everything was very fancy. We enjoyed taking our time and savoring the flavors and smells.

After breakfast, we decided to venture out via taxi to the Silk Street Market. This was a place that we were told would have great items that we could bargain with the sellers. Anyone who knows Ben, knows that this is his kind of shopping. Me on the other hand, not so much. Ha Ha. I've learned to just look the other way and walk a bit away to avoid the negotiating. We ended up getting amazing deals on 2 custom made suits and 2 dresses (1 custom made). Great job Honey! 4 items for less than the price of the original price of 1! We went to get a taxi to go back to the hotel and this is where our day changed for the worse... up until this moment, everything had been going extremely smoothly. All of the people had been very nice, and we were surprised by how many English speaking people we came across. We go to get into this particular taxi and he gives us 60 Yuan (Chinese money). We knew that it cost 40 yuan to get there, so we assumed he was giving us 60 change so we could give him a 100. So we did that but as we gave him the 100, he said what sounded like, “Neeewwww 100, Neewwww 100” and gave us the 100 back. It had a small tear in the top, so we thought he wanted one without a tear. So we gave him a different one. This happened a couple times and by this time, he had pulled over not more than 2km from the silk street and started pointing to a building saying, neeww 100, neeww 100. We were so confused and nothing seemed to work with communication, so we gave him the 60 back and got out of the taxi. We were very excited to ask our guide, Rocky, tomorrow when we saw him what ''neeewww 100” meant. We walked a bit and found another taxi. We got to the hotel and gave him exact change for the trip. He was very kind and surprised by the little Chinese that I knew in regards to Chinese numbers.

We decided to walk around the hotel to see some shops near by and asked the Concierge to recommend some. He said there weren't very many, but there was a mall and a Walmart within a block. We didn't really want to go to Walmart, but then decided to just to see what it was like in comparison to ones in America. We walked there and I was surprised by how much it is different. Rather than blue signs everywhere, there are red ones EVERYWHERE! It was packed with people! The grocery section was on the ground level and then to get to the home goods items, you had to go down a level. Rather than escalators, stairs, or elevators to get down, they had a incline belt that you get on, with your cart, to go down on the moving belt. So, we decide to look at Chinese New Year celebration decorations and candy (it falls on Feb 8 this year and we plan on celebrating it with Lucee when we are back in the US). We blindly choose candy that we can't read what it is, but based of pictures and touch, we chose several kinds. The decorations we decided to wait to get due to our luggage restrictions that will be better once we can add Lucee's bags. We go to pay for the candy and Ben gives a 100 to get change back and the cashier immediately says, “no good!” and hands it back. We are so confused at this point why this money keeps getting rejected and pay with credit card. We realize now, that we can't wait to ask rocky tomorrow, we need to talk with someone at the hotel since that's where we exchanged the money in the first place.

We go to the concierge and ask him about it. He says this money is fake. We hand him our money and he begins separating the real money from the fake money. He starts asking us questions about where we were and how we discovered that it was fake. Overall, there were 8 – 100 yuan that were fake. With the exchange rate where it is now, this is equal to $125. Ben thinks it is from the hotel's exchange machine and goes upstairs to get the receipt. Meanwhile, a manger has come over to ask me questions and tell me that the ATM is certified and they have records of all the money that comes in and out of the machine. She shows me how to tell that it is fake and explains that it more than likely happened at either silk street or in the taxi. As I think about it, the taxi seems like the most likely person to have switched the money. In silk street, the money was all in a money belt and only 200 yuan was in Ben's pocket. The purchasing of clothes was not with cash. Ben came back and the manager explained everything to him, Ben is not convinced that it was the taxi driver because he never had 8 100's, maybe only 3 that were ever in his hand. Unless it was a magic trick, there's no way he had access to 8 of them. We called our guide who offered to come over to help and possibly drive to the spot where the taxi driver let us out. Ben and I went upstairs to our room to wait. This is not how we had envisioned spending our last night in Beijing. We had planned on this night being the night that we went to a fancy restaurant for to have an anniversary night out. Instead, we are in our room, waiting for our guide to drive to our hotel. We couldn't do anything because we weren't sure how long it would take him. Thankfully we had a deck of cards, and tried to occupy our thoughts with playing Canasta. We thought it would take him only 20 minutes to get here, it ended up taking over an hour. When he arrived, he and the manager went back and forth talking in Chinese trying to make sense of it all. Rocky was very helpful, but since we didn't have the taxi driver's cab number or a receipt from him, we couldn't turn him in to the police. The manager brought out the list of the numbers of each money that comes out of the ATM and the fake numbers we had, were not on the list, so that was proof that it didn't come from the machine. We realized, there was nothing we could do about it. Chalk this one up as “stupid tax” and a lesson learned with a smaller amount, rather than the big orphanage amount that it could've been! Praise the Lord! $125 is better to learn this lesson on than $5K!

By this time, it's about 730, we decided to still get dressed up and go out to eat. We went to the fancy restaurant Man Ho in our restaurant. We were very surprised that although the rest of the hotel had workers that spoke pretty fluent English, this restaurant did not. The waitresses spoke very little English and didn't understand much either. I ordered a Sauteed Chicken dish, and Ben went to order a steak and the waitress asked if he wanted 1 or 2. he didn't know why she was asking this and changed his mind to order a Kung Pou chicken dish. She said, “No, you already have chicken dish.” In China, they don't really order a dish for each person, they order dishes to share with everyone, so to her, this seemed weird to order 2 chicken dishes. She also said, “you order kung pou chicken anywhere, get something else here.” Ben looks for another beef dish and orders one with garlic and onions. The waitress says, “you get 2 cold dishes (like appetizers) on the house from me, would you like rice cakes? Very good, very special with new year” At this point, we just want to eat and feel so out of our element, we say sure. She asks us what we want to drink, and we order water with lemon. Ben may have gotten a drink, but I don't remember.

The cold dishes come out and we find out they are “spicy turnips” and “black fungus”. They both are spicy. The black fungus was very slippery and rubbery. I ate one, but was done after that. Ben ate a bit more. The spicy turnips were great to me, except they were too spicy :) The texture was crunchy and I wish I could've eaten more. Ben loves spicy foods, and really enjoyed this dish. Then our water comes out. It's hot water in a glass with a lemon slice floating in it. As weird as it seemed to us, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this! From this point on, this is what I ordered and probably will continue to drink hot lemon water when we get back home. Our chicken and beef come out next. The dishes are super hot (heat wise). So here we are trying to eat extremely hot meats and wash it down with almost boiling hot water. Ha Ha... when we are almost done with the meal, our rice cakes come out. By this point we are both pretty full but we try the rice cake anyway. There are about 10 of them on a platter. They look a bit like scones. 5 of them are white with brown seeds or cocoa beans in them. The other 5 are like a cinnamon color, but didn't have much of a taste. Neither one of them really did. The outside texture was crunchy and a bit greasy, but the inside was a mush, like really cooked rice turns to mush. Needless to say we barely finished 2 of the 10. We joked about how the bill would probably be $300 with the day that we've had. We got the amount of the bill but didn't really look at how it was broken down. It wasn't an outrageous amount, signed for it and as we were leaving, the waitress asked if we wanted them to box the leftovers and send them to our room, we explained that we were full and had to fly tomorrow so didn't want to take them. We took pictures and got on the elevator to go to our room. We get up there and are looking at the bill broken down and find out the rice cakes were $50, more than half of the bill!!! No wonder they were so insistent on boxing the rest of them up for us. Oh my, what a day. Thankfully we were able to laugh it off and enjoy the rest of the night, despite being woken up at 330AM because Ben's suits and my dress were delivered at that time after being custom made. The man had us try them on right then to make sure that they fit. They did, just like a glove. I was able to go back to sleep, but unfortunately, Ben wasn't.

"This is the way we wash our clothes..." due to the fact that it costs a ton to have it done there...                                             $5 for 1 pr of pants, $2 for pr of socks, etc. ! 

Picture in our 1st taxi in Beijing...

Walmart... the meat is just out in the open...

Walmart, they have these flat escalators so people can take their carts between the 2 levels.

Fancy Dinner

Happy Early Anniversary dinner

3:30AM Ben and his suit

Gotta take a picture of our custom made items...  :)

Jan 15, 2016 - 2nd Day of Exploration in Beijing!!!

Friday, January 15, 2016

This morning we woke up and had yogurt and banana for breakfast. I guess I should go back to the fact that since Ben fell asleep so early last night, he woke up at 1am and couldn't go back to sleep. I woke up at 430 but was able to go back to sleep till 530am. We went running in the top floor gym, Ben ran a 5K, I ran/walked 3 miles. Then back to the room to eat breakfast and get ready for the day! We talked with the kids and heard all about their day. Every time we hear from Lilee, she says over and over, “I really want you momma and daddy! I really WANT you! “ So sweet and makes us miss them even more. Noah says he misses us lots and can't wait to be with us, he wants to jump through the computer to be with us. Gavin seems to care less, as long as he keeps busy with acting like a wild animal or playing with toys. :)

We met our guide down in the lobby at 9am to begin our adventures for the day. He took us first to the Olympic Village for a photo. We didn't have a tour, but were able to see the hotel towers (shaped like the Olympic torch and dragon) where the Olympians stayed, the Water Cube where Michael Phillips broke the record for most gold medals in any Olympics, and the Birds Nest. We hopped back in the van and drove next to the Jade Market where we learned to tell the difference between real and fake jade and tell the difference in quality, color, and design. I never knew that Jade comes in all different colors, including purple, brown, white, yellow, orange, blue and of course the famous different shades of green. While at the Jade place, we saw a couple that was on the plane ride from Chicago to Beijing with us. They sat on the other side of the plane and we didn't get to talk with them, but I wondered then if they were coming here to adopt. They had a young girl who was not the same ethnicity as them, which made me wonder. I went up to them and awkwardly introduced myself and that I had noticed them on the plane. They acted as though I was little crazy and that they didn't notice us on the plane. However, after a minute or two, the conversation was very natural and they asked us why we were visiting and that they were adopting an 18mth boy from China on this trip. We will more than likely see each other in Guangzhou with our additions to the family. Their embassy appointment is the day before ours and they fly home on the same day, but out of Beijing, rather than Hong Kong. They are from Nebraska.

In front of the Olympic Village (Water Cube and Bird's Nest)

Olympic Village Hotel built to house the Olympians.

Man carving a jade figurine.

After the Jade Market, we drove to the outer part of Beijing to visit a section of the Great Wall of China. This wall is over 4000 miles long stretching across China. It is the only man-made object that can be seen from outerspace. There are 6 areas that you can visit in Beijing. The one we went to was a very high part of the wall, Jutong Pass. Ben and I went up over 1600 stairs and then had to come back down the same way. What an amazing adventure! Words can't describe it and pictures can't portray it. It is definitely a destination that everyone should attempt to visit in their lifetime! We had envisioned ourselves on the wall before we left the US and now was the moment we were actually climbing the wall. Surreal for sure! Lord willing, we would love to bring Lucee and the other kids back here one day to hike it as a family.

The Pass that we climbed.

We Conquered this section of the wall!

At least 1,610 steps to the top... kiss from the top.

After the wall, our guide took us to take a photo in front of a fire station in Beijing. Then we took our guide and driver out to lunch at a local restaurant that is one of their favorites. It was delicious except for a flowery hot pepper that we carefully tried to dodge in one of the dishes. The spicy noodles, garlic broccoli and fried rice were yummy though!

Then with full bellies, we were dropped off at our hotel for a 2 hour window (aka nap time) before going to a Kung Fu performance at the Red Theater. This performance was different then I thought it would be. I expected to see very disciplined martial arts, with stern faces. However, it was more like a play about a young boy who was trained to be a Kung Fu master. While he was a boy though we got to see a lot of spunk and personality, from not only this particular boy, but the other boys. They would smile a lot at the audience and their performance was extremely relational. Their movements were done with perfection. There were about 6 boys, 30 or so men, and 2 ladies in the show. The show was very well done and we know for sure that our boys would've loved to see this. 

This actor behind us was about  8years old and sat here for 30 min or more before the show!

Our guide left before the show was done, due to the fact that he was riding his bike home and the theater was a 40 minute bike ride, rather than if he was to ride home from our hotel, it would've been over an hour bike ride. We got in the van with Mr. Wu and he drove us home to our hotel. By this point, we have come to appreciate Mr. Wu's 20+ driving experience and although there are moments of craziness, we feel like we are in great hands while in his van.

We got home around 930 pm, Skyped with the kids. For them, they have an exciting day planned since Mamaw doesn't have any daycare children in her home. They are planning to go to Chuck-e-Cheese and tonight, their cousins Seraphina, and Cherubelle are coming over for a sleepover. We on the other hand, are very hungry and tired. So, after our Skype date, we head down to the western restaurant in our hotel called Casalingo. We enjoyed a margherita pizza. Ben had a beer, and I had a ginger ale. Much to my surprise the ginger ale here is much more natural than the ones at home. I could actually taste the real ginger. Everything was delicious. We went to bed, excited for our “free” day tomorrow. The one day in Beijing without a guide, driver, or schedule.