Gotcha Pictures

Final Preparations

We are now one hour and 20 minutes away from meeting Meili. In many ways we feel prepared for this experience but in other respects I feel like we're brand new parents. The diaper bag is packed. Notice the polar fleece. It's about 90 degrees here and very humid, but the Chinese like to dress children with lots of layers. If her arms or legs are uncovered, we may get a lot of stares and comments, not that we wouldn't anyway. I think we want to try and make today as calm as possible, especially for Meili.
I was looking for a Bible verse that seemed appropriate for this experience, and my mind went to Jeremiah 29:11-13. "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart."
We are so humbled and honored to be have the opportunity to provide this little girl with a future and a hope, especially a hope for eternal life.
Thank you to all of you who are praying for us. It is a priceless gift.
Laura

Last Day in Beijing

Today was another packed day of activities: visiting a jade factory, climbing The Great Wall and then flying down South about two hours to our daughter's province. We have enjoyed all the sightseeing in Beijing, but are so thankful to be able to be in Guangdong where we'll spend the remainder of the two weeks.

It doesn't seem real that at 2:00 tomorrow afternoon we'll be going to the Civil Affairs office and be handed a little girl. This afternoon our tour guide had to teach each of the families how to say their daughters Chinese name so that we would recognize it when they call our her name tomorrow. We think we have everything we need for her except shoes. We have no idea what size her feet are but very small sounds like a pretty good guess. As we anticipate meeting 20 month old Meili, two other families in our travel group will be accepting older daughters: one twelve and one seven. We are excited that our girls will have a couple of weeks to be together and look forward to keeping in touch with these families through the years.
We spent about an hour climbing The Great Wall and didn't get too far considering it was originally 4500 miles long.

Leanne and Maddie at Starbuck's in the Beijing airport. Maddie's family is adopting a seven year old girl.

Sightseeing in Beijing

Spent the day seeing the sights, eating Chinese food, and fighting jet lag.

Tiananmen Square with the Forbidden City Gates in the background

A welcome sign

Roof in the Forbidden City

a lane, why yes, in the forbidden city

Checking out the Summer Palace and the lake - dug by hand

Leanne Spreading silk

Portland Tokyo Flight

Surreal really when you think about it.  It is 6:35 PM Pacific time.  We have been flying for 4 ½ hours.  We are over the Pacific Ocean due West of Alaska.  It’s surreal that we are flying to someplace completely foreign to be united forever with a baby girl.  Even more foreign than our experience will be her experience.  To leave the walls she knows the language she understands, if not speaks, the faces that have cared for her.  We don’t know what would have been best for her when she was born.  Why was she abandoned / placed on the side of the road for adoption?  We can’t say why there are orphans but we know that we love a God who loves the orphan and he has called us to be like him.  This morning, or yesterday – given that it is 11:00 AM Monday in Japan, I read in Hosea where he is exhorting Israel to abandon all other things they place their hope in and to return to their God acknowledging that he is the one in whom the orphans finds mercy.  May we be God’s hands.

Travel Confirmed

Laura, Leanne (our oldest daughter) and I will be traveling to China on Sunday, September 12th and returning Thursday September 30th. We expect to have our little girl in our arms on Thursday, September 16th. We look forward to this moment with much anticipation. A moment when we will be overjoyed and Meili will be, well probably less than overjoyed at being left with the oddest looking people she has ever seen.
Due to the way our various appointments worked out, we will be spending an additional four days in Guangzhou.

Travel Approval 8/23/2010

We received our travel approval today! We are tentatively headed to China on 9/16, and will have Meili in our arms Monday, 9/20.