It's Good to Be Home

We arrived home at 11:30 p.m. Wednesday night. What a trip! The kids were good and slept on the plane for a couple hours. Marc and I were able to doze a bit as well. The drive from Chicago was tough. Poor Marc could barely stay awake and I wasn't doing much better. It was nice to get into our own home again. The flight attendants on the last leg of our journey gave us a bottle of wine as congratulations. Marc and I opened it when we got home that night. It was very tasty. The only wine we had in China was a rice wine-56% alcohol. Whew! We only had a thimble full each, and I almost felt the hair growing on my chest!

We took Lucy to the doctor on Thursday morning. She has a nasty sinus infection and is teething as well. We are up to our armpits in mucous and slobber!! She's making a nice transition to our home. Max still is crazy about her and we are too. She retaliated the 2nd and 3rd night we were home and cried every time we put her in our crib. Marc and I took turns holding her while she slept. Actually, Marc held her more. We were all exhausted after that, even Lucy. Two days ago, Max and I put her down for her nap. We let her cry for about 10 minutes, went up and comforted her, then Boom! She was fast asleep in 4 minutes. I did the same for her at bedtime. She fell asleep in 4 minutes. When I came back downstairs Marc was asleep on the couch, and Max was asleep on Marc. We are all adjusting to the time difference.

Lucy, Max, and I went to church on Sunday. It was such a nice welcome she received. She was fairly quiet during the service, but she was digging the organ playing and all the music. She loves music.

I'll try to post some more pictures here soon when I get the time. We are almost unpacked, but still have stuff scattered everywhere. Lucy is starting to feel better, but is still loaded with snot. Max also has a cold now. Until later--take care!

Signing off from China

Well, we are winding down right now. Perhaps Max is winding up! He usually does when he is over tired. We ate dinner at Lucy's because it was fast and easy and they have the best congee on the island. We are all packed up and ready to go. We have a 4:30 a.m. wake up call planned.

Our consulate appointment went very well. There were probably around 50 families taking the oath at the consulate office. The consulate administrator congratulated all the families then recognized Lucy and another little one as having birthdays.

We just celebrated Lucy's birthday with cake from a local bakery. It was very yummy. I think she could have eaten more, but we decided not to risk it.

It has been an amazing trip. We will miss China, most definitely. Our hotel is right across the coutyard from a school. The kids come in around 8:00 in the morning and we can see them working in their classrooms from our hotel room. Last night they did not leave the school until 9:30 p.m. It is now 8:05 p.m. and I see that they are still working at their tables. Wow! That is dedication.

Anyway, good night! We hope to see all of our Warsaw family and friends within the next 48 hours. It's hard to believe. Take care! I'll try to keep up our blog once we are home. Thanks for coming to China with us!

Last Morning in Guangzhou

Michael and our driver picked us up this morning and took us sight seeing. We went to a beautiful Buddhist temple in an older part of Guangzhou. There were many people practicing there and we were able see a Buddhist ceremony. The temple is the oldest in the area. It had such a quiet and tranquil feel to it. We didn't feel it was appropriate to take any pictures, but take my word for it, it was beautiful.





After visiting the temple we went to a museum. The museum is located in what was a residence of the Chen family, a place that was built to honor all the ancestors of the Chens. Chinese people believe that everyone who has the same surname share the same ancestors. The museum showcased beautiful arts and crafts of the local people. We saw some beautiful ivory carvings, Chinese Calligraphy, and traditional Chinese paintings. This beautiful ship is carved from ivory.



It is raining here now. Marc is finishing up some shopping right now. Soon we will be going to the U.S. Consulate in order to Complete the paperwork for Lucy. After our consulate appointment we will return to the hotel for a birthday party! Lucy's birthday is tomorrow, so our agency provided us with a birthday cake for her. Michael took us to a bakery today and Max picked one for her. What a way to end our trip to China!

What's for Dinner, Mom?

Last night we ate at a very lovely Cantonese restaurant. The entrance of the restaurant was filled with individual tanks of silk worms, sand worms, water beetles, lobsters, crabs, frogs, toads, fish, and fish larvae. There were also cages and tanks full of snakes (some of them pretty fierce looking), turtles, and mud eels. And what do you think they were for? Hmmm....We chose a nice dinner of chicken fried rice, sweet green beans in garlic, fried dumplings and chicken. It was very yummy. We noticed that our fare was pretty tame compared to the dinners of the other diners.

It was absolutley pouring by the time dinner was over. And it was a soaking rain, a rain you knew wouldn't stop anytime soon. We only had one umbrella and our hotel was on the other side of the island. Marc carried Lucy and I put Max in the stroller and we made a mad dash for the hotel. It has been very warm here, so the rain actually felt nice!

Pearl River Cruise

Last night we took a dinner cruise along the Pearl River. It was nice. There was a buffet served and we were able to eat some of the local food. The food is not as spicy as the food in Nanchang, but it is good.

Today we have no major plans. Michael is taking care of some paperwork for us at the U.S. consulate. Our guides have been awesome. They don't just take us around for sight seeing, but they handle the majority of adoption paperwork for us. It's amazing.

Tonight we plan to eat at a Cantonese restaurant here on Shamian Island. Lucy is getting a cold, and Max really wants to stay around the hotel today to play. That's fine with us.

We haven't had the chance to tell you too much about Lucy, because she is so new to us, but this is what we've noticed:

1. Lucy isn't walking and doesn't appear to be close to walking. She isn't even crawling yet. We haven't noticed that she is able to sit up from a reclining position. We keep telling her that once we get home we are going to enroll her in an exercise progam to build her up.

2. Lucy likes congee and eats it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We haven't tried too many new foods with her because of her past tummy problems. We plan to introduce new foods when we get home.

3. Lucy really doesn't have any words yet, that we can recognize. She did repeat ayi, ayi, ayi over and over again the 2nd day we had her. Ayi means nanny. She does like to babble.

4. Lucy has a great sense of humor and loves to laugh. It appears she likes to tease.

5. Lucy's nickname was La La, but we've started calling her Lu. She really seems to like this and laughs when we say Lu!

Well, that's it for now. I'm sure we will lots to write about tomorrow as we have a trip to a temple, museum, and consulate planned. Until then, goodnight!

Happy National Children's Day!

China is celebrating National Children's Day today. The streets are full of children and their families. Max and Lucy and the rest of the kids staying here at the Victory received presents and candies this morning at breakfast. After breakfast Michael took us and another family to an amusement park. It was rainy and overcast, but still a lot of fun. Lucy received alot of attention from the women and small children. Marc and Max spent time on the lake captaining a small electric boat. Max told Daddy he was Captain Jack Sparrow.



Lucy enjoyed herself at the park, then promptly fell asleep when we boarded the bus. We are noticing a pattern here. It seems movement puts her to sleep. Hope that holds true for our flight back home!



We ate lunch at Lucy's again. It was nice. It poured while we were there and Max had to use the potty. Max is our world traveler and gets the award for the first Vosler to use the squatty potty, twice! Awesome job Max. Sorry, I didn't take pictures of this exciting event! I did take a picture of Capt. Jack Sparrow, who was at our table. Ahh, life is good!



Tonight we be taking a dinner cruise along the Pearl River. That should be fun and I know Max is really looking forward to it.

Last night we ate at a Thai restaurant. It was very yummy! On the way to the restaurant the fashion police nailed Marc. Lucy had a bit too much skin showing and a Chinese woman wagged her finger at Marc and told him to cover Lucy's leg up. Well, that's what we think that's what she was saying. It could have been, "Feed this little girl! She's so tiny!"

Tomorrow is our consulate appointment. This will signal that our trip is coming to an end. It has been a blast, and we are sorry it is almost over, but we are excited to introduce Lucy to everyone back home.