Emery last day in china!!!

Well we are packing up and we must be down stairs with our luggage in 30 minutes. We are them coming back up to our room for emery to nap and then will meet our guide at 6:30pm in the lobby. We will head to the Guangzhou airport and at 9pm will fly home----yaaaaaa!!! We can't wait to be home. We miss the kids a ton and can't wait to get life back to normal.

The last couple days have been super slow. Haven't done much. I have some
Pics on my camera but I'm posting this from my phone because the computer is already packed. I'll post the coming home pics with the others once we are home. Just can't wait. It's been quite a journey and emery is quite a little girl!! She is doing so much better than we could ever have imagined and is such a vivacious life living little girl. She makes everyone laugh and is the most outgoing of all my kids. She is bonding amazingly and is such a gift! She is going to really spice up our family!!!

Here are a few pics taken with my iPhone before we leave. emery is constantly on the move so it's hard to catch a picture very easily but here is my attempt.

Emery Days 7 and 8

We have had two very busy but wonderful days!!! First off, on Sunday, Judy Wu (the amazing Judy Wu as many like to call her)and her family took us to a wonderful lunch and then sight seeing around Guangzhou. Judy, her son Mike and her husband Steven were amazingly generous and really showed us a great time. We started with a lunch at our awesome hotel with Judy's sister Wendy and her daughter Emily. Emily and Judy's son Mike are coming to the US for a month and will be staying with us for about a week so Judy thought it was a good opportunity to get to know them a bit before they came to the US. We had a great lunch and then said goodby to Wendy and Emily and headed out to see the sights of GZ. Steven, Judy's hubby is high up in the largest China bank and was so interesting to talk to. He is a Christian and his father, back in the Chairman Mao days was imprisoned for his faith. It was so great to hear the stories he had to tell. Very interesting! They first took us to a Buddhist temple which was very interesting and we got to know more about Mike while we were there. We drove around the city and Judy pointed out the areas of GZ that use to be farming communities less than 20 years ago. It was crazy to see how much the city has grown. We then went to the second tallest Tower in the world-- The Canton Tower-- second tallest only to one in Tokyo. We went to the top of the tower and saw all the sights. It was pretty awesome to see all the sights from so high but also to stand on the glass floor and to get our pictures taken-- very cool!!! After the tower Judy, Steven and Mike generously sent us to the Pearl River Cruise where we met another family in our group- Jamie, Chris and Olivia. It was such a special day with Judy and her husband and Mike. They are such special people and I know Judy and I will continue to be great friends and we cant wait for Mike and Emily to come stay with us in the US!!!

Today had our consulate appointments at 8:30am which meant meeting our guide at 7:30am which meant getting up FAR TOO EARLY to get to the buffet and have breakfast before we met. The 3 families in our group had our appointments together where we take an oath and do all Emery's citizenship papers. It was fast and easy and tomorrow our guide will pick up the "brown envelope" and Emery's visa tomorrow- those who are in adoptions will know what that is- basically the immigration stuff but it is built up to be a huge deal. As soon as we have the visa we can leave China and come home but unfortunately, we could not leave that night (cant leave till after 7pm) so we are leaving Wednesday.

After the consulate, we came back to the hotel and took a nap-- we all were exhausted and then Jamie, Chris and Olivia and us went to Shamian Island to visit. Olivia is their first adoption so they had lots of dresses and things like that to buy. We ate a small snack at Lucy's and then shopped and walked around the island. We then walked over by the Holiday Inn Shifu and saw the sights. It is pretty amazing over there. We then had dinner together and then took a cab back to the hotel and got home around 8:45pm. We really like Jamie and Chris and little Olivia is amazingly cute and sweet so we really enjoyed our day!

Tomorrow we are just hanging out and may go swimming. We are supposed to do dinner with another group of people so we will see. We only have tomorrow and then we pack up and leave on Wednesday. We will be sad to go but happy to return home. We miss the kids terribly and we so appreciate our parents all pitching in to help out so we cant wait to get home to normal life.

Emery is doing super well. She is a kid with a BIG personality and makes people smile and laugh all the time. She is constantly on the go and a total wiggle worm. She is such a ham and people just love her-- so do we!! She is also a very strong willed little girl and fights sleep like crazy and when she does not get what she wants she screams and throws a fit. She is also super loud and will scream MAMA and DADA and BABA and whatever thing she wants to say. She again will fit into our family well. She currently has been fighting Kevin putting her to sleep for about the last 40 min and is still in there screaming It is crazy how long she can go on for-- she is fine-- she just wants to still play and not sleep although she is exhausted Anyway, I will post again soon!!! Looking forward to a relaxing day tomorrow!

At the temple

horrible pic but Judy Em and I

Long Pagoda

In the lobby before we went up into the tower-- that is Mike-- judy on the side

Going up in the elevator- crazy high-- ears popping and all

The views from the top

Mike and us on the glass platform

We had an ice cream up on top

At the boat with Jamie, Chris and Olivia

The tower we were in earlier in the background

Jamie, Chris and Olivia after our consulate appointment. We cant take cameras in with us so we only can take pictures in the lobby after the appointment is over.

The Gratz family and little Abby!!

Our travel group from Wasatch! They have all been so wonderful. We have enjoyed spending time with all of them--we were lucky to have such an awesome group!

Shamian Island

Emery Days 5 and 6

We finally made it to Guangzhou after many problems and delays. We finished up getting Emery's passport in Kunming and headed to the airport yesterday- Friday. When we got to the airport our guide attempted to check us in and we then encountered our first bump in a long day of bumps. The check in people in china said they had no record of Emery's ticket and that we could not take her on the flight-- Ummm... excuse me?? We are just going to leave her here-- ok ma'am, why don't you look a little bit harder for that ticket since we HAVE A RECEIPT PRINTED OUT IN FRONT OF YOU!!! Oh Lord was I pissed and the Chinese official people knew it. Our guide even got our beloved China coordinator Sabrina on the phone from the USA to help sort it out. After what seemed like forever and literally involving every China official person they had at that stinkin airport they realized-- oh, I guess we were wrong-- she can go with you! Oh thanks so much official China person who shows no emotion or care that you freaked us out like that-- GEZZZZZZZ.... Anyway, she had her ticket and off we went to the gate. ]

We got to the gate and there were a big group of missionary college kids from Arkansas and Mississippi and they were great to talk to. After some time we realized- hay shouldn't we be boarding soon. Oh yes, then came our next bump. I guess the weather in Guangzhou was typhoonish and all flights were delayed. We were delayed 3 hours and we did not get to GZ until 10pm. Oh yes, let me forget to describe the flight-- oh yes the flight. Let me paint a picture of a 14 month old being forced to sit in an airport for 5 hours and then on a plane for another 2 hours where she has lived her whole life at elevation 6600 and now she is overtired and flying down to sea level. It was not a pretty picture. I would have to say, she screamed about 80% of the flight. It was a lot of overtired and fighting sleep and a lot of ears hurting and also I think we are starting to see a pretty strong personality who is very strong willed and likes to get what she wants. She did not like being forced to stay in her seat and she did not like being told no. This girl is a strong personality and we have been seeing it creep in over the last week but the plane really brought it out.

So we landed in Guangzhou after a horrible day of travel-- to fly only 2 hours- and we were now in GZ. The only bright light at that point was Judy Wu was at the airport waiting for us which we love and adore Judy. She is wonderful and I had the privilege of taking Judy and her son to Disneyland several years ago and we are hosting Judy's son and niece for a week in July while they come to the US for vacation. We love Judy and seeing her was the bright point in an otherwise bumpy day. But, don't think the bumps were over at that point-- oh no, they were just getting going.

Most of the families we know from being online are staying at the Garden hotel in GZ. It is super nice and we thought about staying there but we wanted to be closer to Shamian Island-- where we stayed for the Mia and Fin's adoptions- and the HI Shifu was closer so we decided to stay there. Judy took us to the hotel and attempted checking us in and after about 30 min (it is now 11:00pm) we realized we somehow had a duplicate booking-- somehow 2 different bookings under our name was made. Because of the hotels "rules" we were unable to cancel one of the reservations and just keep one. Instead, we would have to pay for both hotel rooms-- no matter what. We had no choice. If we were to stay at the holiday Inn Shifu, we had to pay for both rooms even though it was a mistake made by someone else. So Judy asked if we minded changing to the Garden where all the other families were and we said ok and we left. The hotel rather 2 rooms go empty than cancel one room. It was ridiculous!! Poor Emery was exhausted but still fighting sleep and tying to play and run around. So at 11:15pm, we headed to the Garden. We got to the Garden and they were awesome and they got us to our room right away. Unfortunately they only had 2 twins available for the night but moved us to a different room the next morning. We finally got Emery to bed at midnight and I was finally able to shower and take a deep breath. Emery slept well but has been kind of fussy today because she did not get enough sleep. While typing this she has been screaming trying to fight off the afternoon nap and almost managed to do it since she has only been asleep for 15 min and I have to wake her in about 15 min. She fights sleep hard-- uggg!!! So that was the end to our miserable day of travel.

We were not alone as almost everyone doing adoption traveled on Friday to get to GZ and everyone was delayed by several hours. This morning at breakfast we got to meet so many of my great online friends. Jamie and Joanne and Annette and Shandra and Janiene and so many more. We again got to see each other at the medical appointments today. So many families and so many kids going home to their forever families. It was so awesome to see-- loved every second of it!!!

Speaking of the medical exam. First off, as many of you know, it is the most pitiful exam ever. BUT, they do care what the special need is and want to confirm the need. With Finley it was easy because she was spina bifida and has a big scar and a lipoma so they didn't question us much. With Emery it was not as easy. Emery has a minor VSD, a small heart murmur. That is it. Nothing more. We have been told her murmur might have been closed by a year if not 18 months so we were not sure what they would find when they listened to her heart. Well, they didn't find anything. Now I am not sure how closely they listened but the Dr. kept asking us over and over-- what is her special need and we kept saying VSD but she said it is not there. We started getting nervous because we have known people who have had referrals pulled when they could not duplicate the special need again. So we just stayed quiet and finally Judy spoke with her and she allowed us to move on-- but she kept saying her murmur was not there. We will see when we get home but praise God if that is true!!!!!

Anyway, we are heading downstairs to the lobby in about 10 min to meet a bunch of families to go to dinner together. Looking forward to it. Enjoy the pics and I will post again soon!!!

Look Finley-- they have your China crackers!!!!

Packing up to leave Kunming!

During our issues with them not letting Emery go with us-- so lame!

Waiting for sooooooo long!

Waiting longer-- luckily they gave us food and Emery was happy

At the medical today

More medical-- this was the lady who said her murmur was not there

 

In front of our hotel-- The Garden

Our room is awesome!!! 2 rooms and super nice!!!!