Last Night in Guangzhou

We just put Chun Le down for her last night of sleep at the Victory Hotel in Guangzhou. This time tomorrow night we will be en route to our hotel in Hong Kong for one night and then on Thursday morning 11am we take off for Chicago (that would be about 9pm Wednesday night Chicago time). Our day started off with a trip to the US Consulate where we had a 10am appointment with about 10 other adoptive families. We took a group oath that all of the paperwork and documentation that we were providing the consulate in regard to our adopted child were correct and truthful to the best of our knowledge. They will process all the paperwork and our guide will pick it up at the US Consulate at 4pm tomorrow right before we get on the train to Hong Kong. The rest of the afternoon we finished up shopping for gifts and enjoyed just walking around the beautiful sights of Shamian Island and taking a few final photos. During the second week of our stay here in Guangzhou, the stores and hotels and restaurants have been busy putting up Christmas decor. So we got to see the Island all dressed up for Christmas! One restaurant we strolled by today had a small Christmas tree at the entrance with Budweiser boxes sitting underneath it as gifts...had to include a photo of that. :) Our hotel lobby has a big Christmas tree and snowman display that is pictured also. It sure doesn't feel like Christmas as we enjoyed a sunny day with temps in the high 70s! For dinner we stopped at a little Deli Shop outside the White Swan Hotel and ate outside on a pretty porch area. The BBQ pork and lamb curry dinners we shared were very tasty and it was a great way to enjoy our last night in Guangzhou. (Thanks for the reccomendation on the Deli Shop, Michelle--that was the second time we ate there and enjoy it a lot!) Taking a suggestion from another adoptive family, we borrowed a stroller from the hotel to take Chun Le around in as we walked around this afternoon. Since she has never been in a car seat or anything like that before, they suggested a stroller might be a good first experience before landing in Chicago and heading home from the airport strapped in this strange thing called a car seat. She got scared when we first put her in the stroller, but within a minute of being pushed she was fine with it and I think even enjoyed the ride. Hopefully the transition to a car seat will go as smoothly! I included a couple pics of the time we spent at the local park. Chun Le loved playing there. She needs lots of help and can't climb stairs on her own at all (she had probably never ever had to do stairs in her life before!) but thought it was a very fun game to have us help her up and down and across all the playground equipment.

There is a good chance this may be our last post from China. When we check out of this hotel at 2pm tomorrow we will no longer have internet access unless we have time at the airport in Hong Kong before our flight takes off (assuming they have Wi Fi at the airport). So there is a good chance that you won't be hearing from us until we are settled down at home sweet home. We are so anxious to be home with our big kids and introduce everyone to Chun Le. This has been a great start to a wonderful adventure as we become a family of five...right now it feels like a family of three :). We appreciate the many prayers that family and friends have poured out to the Lord on our behalf. We are so thankful to Him for the perfect match that He has made in allowing Chun Le to be welcomed into our family and look forward to all that He has in store for her and us. We will give you an update of how everything is going when we arrive home in a few days!