Finally in my arms

After waiting over a year, I finally have my precious little girl in my arms!

I was planning to post pictures of her smiling, but the internet has been painfully slow so I'm finally giving up for now. However, I have figured out the process now so at least I can do it later this evening. This picture was taken on our first day with her.

Micaelyn is doing absolutely wonderfully now. She slept till the alarm went off at 6:30 this morning, and she didn't cry any when she woke up. In fact, the only time she has cried today was when she got all her shots, and she had no problems letting me comfort her. She seems just as happy as can be, though I am sure she will continue to grieve for awhile. She is a very bouncy little girl, always smiling and giggling. I am completely in love with her!

Our little girl is finally smiling!

After nearly a week of terrible grieving, our little girl has finally opened up!  Thank you so much for all the prayers!  Not surprisingly, Caleb was the first to get her to smile.  Then the combination of Caleb and Malachi along with Joshua finally got her playing around a little (before she had pretty much done nothing but cry and scream for her foster family).  Eventually she broke out of her shell and we finally got to see our precious little girl's true personality.  My, oh my, this little girl is a spunky one!  She is every bit as spicy as the extremely spicy food her province is known for - she is my spicy Guizhou gal!  She most definitely is not a quiet little girl who wants to sit around playing with dolls, and she easily holds her own with the boys.  Her smile is adorable, her laugh is irresistible.  She is very mischievous, and I'm sure she will be quite a handful on her own.  The combination of her running with two little boys will definitely keep me busy, especially with two teenagers also!

Micaelyn still wakes up in the night crying for the foster family and refuses to go back to sleep so the nights are hard, but at least the days are not so bad now.  (Ernie gets to sleep in the other room, so at least he gets more sleep.) Also, before she kept trying to leave the hotel room (and since she had figured out how to unlock the deadbolt we were having to keep constant guard of the door both day and night).  Over the last day she has been getting her shoes on and bag packed but not opening the door quite as much.  Last night after she put her shoes on I took them off and hid all her shoes.  I also hid her bag she likes to carry everywhere.  Another thing she started doing right after we got her was saying she needed to use the bathroom (that was another phrase I figured out pretty quickly!).  In the middle of the night she'll say she needs to go, then after I let her go less than 5 minutes later she wants to go again.  It is a very difficult battle because on the one hand I think she is playing games with me, trying to be in control, and I have to win that battle.  On the other hand, it's hard to say no when your child is crying to go to the bathroom.  Not only is that akin to denying her basic necessities (toilet), how can I ever be completely sure she really doesn't need to go again?  Last night after she woke up I let her go, but I finally held my ground and completely refused to let her go again.  She refused to get back in bed, and since I didn't want her to bother Caleb I let her lay on the ground but made her lay right next to me so I could hold her down (not forcefully, I just wasn't letting her get up given her habit of trying to leave the room).  For 2 hours she kept trying to get up and I would lay her back down.  She cried, she screamed, and when it was finally morning she fell asleep for a few more minutes before getting up for good.  She was very happy and playful for a few hours, but now she looks exhausted and is cranky again.  I greatly hope she starts sleeping through the night soon!

Yesterday we had the medical exam for the visas.  What a nightmare that was!  The power was out in the building, and it felt like it was at least 100 degrees inside the building.  We had thought it was so hot outside when we were walking there, but after being in there for so long when we walked out of the building it actually felt cool outside after being trapped inside with no A/C.  Because of the conditions the kids didn't get their shots yet - they will get them when we go back to get the TB test read on Monday.  Micaelyn did NOT like the TB test, so I'm sure getting a pile of shots will be quite traumatic for her.  Please pray that doesn't set us back with her.

After the medical exams we had lunch at the infamous Cow & Bridge Thai restaurant that seems so popular with adoptive families.  I hate to say it, but it was a huge letdown to us.  We had had really high hopes for a wonderful lunch given how much we love Thai food, and we were terribly disappointed.  I know we are greatly biased when it comes to Thai food since my in-laws own an excellent Thai restaurant (Ernie's step-mom is from Thailand), but honestly we get better Thai food in Pigeon Forge right outside the Smoky Mountains.  Hopefully soon we'll be able to make a trip to San Antonio to let the kids see their grandparents and fill ourselves up with some awesome spring rolls and Thai food.

Ernie is doing a lot better and didn't even need any medicine to get over his sickness.  I have been taking antibiotics for several day now and seem to finally be improving, though I'm far from over it.  I think I spent half my childhood with bronchitis, so I guess it's not surprising.  Unfortunately, the pink eye is still quite obvious.  We have had places to go every day, and I have to wear my contacts to be able to see which prevents me from putting the drops in as often as I need to.  At least with Micaelyn waking me up during the night it's no problem to keep up with the drops every 4 hours through the night!

We are very ready to come home.  We were told by our adoption agency to plan extra days at the end of the trip in case something didn't work out, so instead of flying home on the 17th like we could we don't get to fly home until the 20th.  As soon as we arrived the staff here started asking us why we are not going home as soon as we get the visas.  They were shocked we were told to stay a few extra days and said that was completely unnecessary as they had worked so hard to get things expedited for us.  We are more than a little annoyed that we are having to spend so much extra money and time here (which means more time away from work for Ernie and more time away from Christina and our home for all of us) when it was completely unnecessary.  Had we not been told to leave some extra time at the end of the trip we could be flying home next Friday.  Needless to say, we aren't too pleased with our agency for that.

I'll post pictures soon.  We are trying to let Joshua have a lot of time on the computer since there is really nothing else for him to do when we are sitting around in the hotel room, and Ernie has to use it sometimes as well so it's a challenge to find time to post. We are going to go out walking for awhile so they can clean our rooms, and after we come back I'll get the newest pictures downloaded and posted.  Now that I finally have some of Micaelyn's adorable smile I am eager to post them!

We have BOTH kids!

I'm sorry for being out of touch.  First something happened with the computer that prevented us from accessing the internet.  Initially we thought it was a problem with the hotel internet access, so that kept Ernie from figuring out the problem sooner, but once we moved on to Micaelyn's city and still couldn't access the internet we knew it wasn't just the hotel.  By the time Ernie figured it out we moved on to a new hotel in a new city that had no internet service.  Once we got back to Micaelyn's city and got her I was tied down with her.  Now we are in Guangzhou and shouldn't have any more internet problems.  Hopefully I'll get a chance to do some posts on each of our previous days here in China, but for now I'll just tell you about our new kids!

First we got Micaelyn.  There really aren't words to describe what it was like to finally see my little girl I had waited so long for.  I have known she was my daughter for more than a year, for many months before that I had constantly looked at her picture on the photolistings and prayed for her to find a family.  For more than a decade we had planned to adopt from China once I was old enough to meet the age requirement.  For more than 2 decades I had dreamed of adopting a little girl from China.  Needless to say, finally holding Micaelyn was a very long awaited dream come true.

When we arrived at the adoption center on Sunday afternoon as soon as we pulled up I saw her foster grandmother (who we had thought was the foster mom because she was always the one with Micaelyn in the pictures we had).  I started eagerly searching the street for Micaelyn, and then I saw her walking up with a young man (who we soon learned was the foster dad).  At that point the endless months of waiting caught up with me and the tears started flowing.  I did the best I could to control myself, but once I had my precious baby girl in my arms it was nearly impossible not to cry those tears of joy.

I imagine we were supposed to meet Micaelyn in the office rather than in the street, so right away we were led up there.  I could tell she was scared but she did let us hold her.  We spent a few minutes talking to the foster family (foster dad and his mom and dad) and then all of a sudden they were gone.  Within a minute of their leaving Micaelyn noticed their absence and was distraught.  She was screaming, kicking, flailing, etc., and that was the way it was getting her to the hotel.  She wouldn't let go of the bag of yogurt her foster dad had given her, wouldn't let us touch it.  Eventually we took her for a walk to try to calm her down.  It worked, but I think that was only because she thought we were taking her home.  She had even gathered her things together along with a picture of her foster dad holding her to carry with her.  Once we got back to the hotel she let loose again.  She spent endless hours screaming at the top of her lungs, even all through the night.  It was easy to figure out the Chinese words for "go home" because she kept repeating them over and over.  She was especially close to her foster dad.  She would not let go of his picture even for one second to change her clothes, and she would hold it right up to her face and scream "Baba!" as loud as she possibly could.  Even Caleb couldn't sleep through her screaming, and I was honestly afraid the hotel would say something to us due to her incessant screaming.

So went Sunday evening, Monday, and Tuesday.  On the bright side, despite her screaming to go back to her foster family she had no problems attaching to me.  This was truly an answer to prayer as I have heard so many stories of the child rejecting the new mom.  Ever since we got her she has wanted me to hold her.  The only time she tries to reject me is when we are around other Chinese people.  The airplane ride Wednesday morning was especially painful.  She kept crying to go home, so the people behind us started talking to her.  Immediately she wanted to go to them instead of staying with me.  Then the airplane stewardess offered to take her to the back of the plane (thankfully we were in the next-to-last row so that wasn't far away).  Of course, then she wanted absolutely nothing to do with me anymore which made getting off the plane quite difficult. 

Later that day we went to go meet Joshua, and just as with Micaelyn we met him in the wrong place as we happened to show up at the same time as him.  As we were walking into the building I recognized him waiting by the elevator - he was wearing the same clothes he seems to always wear.  It was a little bit awkward, and once we got off the elevator he was taken away and we were apologized to for meeting him that way and soon we were allowed to meet him properly.  It was obvious right away he is a very quite kid, particularly around strangers.  The language barrier didn't help.  Due to the fact the adoption has to be completed and registered before his 14th birthday this weekend we were quickly moved into a room to sign the adoption paperwork (we didn't do the normal 24 hour wait).

Once we came back to the hotel we went out to the walking street by our hotel and found a Pizza Hut to eat at (which made Caleb and Malachi very happy).  It was really nice that they also had some Chinese dishes, so Joshua got some soup to go with his pizza and we got fried rice for Micaelyn (she didn't eat any pizza).  Joshua has been really good to all his little siblings, and his presence seems to be helping Micaelyn since he can talk to her in Mandarin Chinese (Cantonese is actually his first language, Mandarin his second).  She hasn't shown such a preference to him as to reject me, but she is happy to be near him.  She likes holding his hand, sitting next to him, etc.  He has been really sweet to her, but at the same time he hasn't tried to actually take care of her so she gets the perfect combination of having him nearby for comfort and language familiarity with me still being her caregiver.  She finally slept pretty well last night and hasn't spent too much time crying today.  She still says she wants to go home but she hasn't been screaming at the top of her lungs so that is a big improvement.  We have yet to see her smile or have her laugh with us, but right now I am just thankful that she has attached to me so well.

This morning we did the notary, and later today we go get Joshua's passport.  Ernie and I are both sick, me especially, which made the airplane ride difficult.  I still haven't gotten my ears to clear out completely, and to make things worse I have the pink eye.  For the past week my eyes have been horribly red, but I was just contributing it to the terrible smog, allergies, and lack of sleep, especially considering it got worse after we got Micaelyn and I was getting almost no sleep.  Yesterday I finally got a nap, and when I woke up my eyes were covered in yellow mucus.  Now I am so glad I asked for the prescription for eye drops for pink eye which I had really doubted I would need!

I will have to ask Ernie about posting pictures.  Since I am using the VPN he said I wouldn't be able to post them straight from the computer like I normally do.  Right now Joshua is wanting to message his friends on QQ (sort of like Facebook), so I'm going to give him the computer.  Hopefully by this evening I'll get pictures posted.