Back in Beijing!

Hi everyone! Sorry I haven't been posting anything lately...it's amazing how much a wee little one can cut into your spare time!

We are back in Beijing now - thankfully! Although I will always think of Nanchang fondly since it is the place that we first got to hold Iris in our arms, it really wasn't a very nice place. But now we are back in Beijing waiting for the Canadian Embassy to grant Iris her Canadian citizenship. While we wait we'll be doing some touring around Beijing. Yesterday we went to the Beijing Zoo to see the pandas. Amelia loved it! Here are some of the pictures she took there - we arrived just in time for feeding time!

And here's Amelia with her own panda - a gift from Dad!

Today we went to the Great Wall - WOW! It was amazing!! We took the 'challenging' route, but our guide made sure to note that the part of the wall we were on was quite easy. Holy cow! It was STEEP! But so beautiful! It felt really good to be out of the city too.

We tried to recreate the drawing that our friend Cathy did for us quite a few years ago...check it out on an earlier posting.

Here are a few more pictures of my favourite three people...

And my favourite picture of my two girls...

More Iris...

Yesterday we...did nothing. Nothing but lay around in the hotel room, smiling at Iris and taking loads of pictures and trying to get some laundry done (biggest mistake I've made here in China so far, but oh well). Most of the other families went on a tour, but we decided to stay in. For one thing, it's SO hot here. Hotter than anything I've ever experienced or even imagined. And most of the tour would have been outside so we decided to skip it. Also, we just wanted some down time with Amelia and Iris. So we didn't leave the hotel at all yesterday. Here are some of the pics of Iris - nothing but pure cuteness!!

Oh yeah!

One other crazy cool thing...Iris is potty trained!! If we put her on the potty and whistle, she'll pee!! How crazy is that? Not sure about poo though...haven't had the opportunity to experience that yet. But I'll take what I can get!
Just took her for her first swim ever. Seemed a bit unsure at first but was splashing around in n time!

Here's Iris!

Here she is! Iris is now part of our family! We met her just after 4pm yesterday, but have been so busy (obviously) that we haven't had a chance to update the blog until now.

Yesterday was a crazy day...we had to be up before 4am to catch a very early flight from Beijing to Nanchang. We arrived in Nanchang in the morning but then found out we wouldn't be meeting the babies until 4pm. This gave us time to get our hotel rooms in order (diaper station, formula station etc) and relax a bit. But for me, there was no relaxing. I was just so anxious for 4pm to come.

At 4pm we all walked to the government building where we were meeting the kids. We were told that the babies would be brought into the room we were waiting in one by one. But when we got to the room there were already some three babies there. One of them was Iris! I just wanted to go grab her, but I knew that we had to hold back until we were invited. And we had to show them our passports before they gave her to us...which felt kind of weird, but I guess they need to make sure that the babies are going to the right people! Finally they hadn't Iris to us and she immediately started bawling! She cried, and I cried, and all the other moms were crying and I even saw a few tears in some of the dad's eyes! It was amazing and a blur and I wish I could go back and watch it all happen!

We left the office within 20 minutes and brought the babies back to our hotel rooms. We didn't leave our room after that. We just hung out with Iris and let her get used to us. For the first few hours she cried a bit and then just let us hold her and stuff, but she definitely wasn't too sure of us. She had a little nap in the sling, had a bottle and some cereal and seemed pretty content, but still no smiles. At around 9pm, after order pizza for room service, Amelia was ready for bed. She came over and gave Iris a huge hug and Iris gave her a BIG smile! It was perfect. After that she didn't stop smiling! She loves bouncing up and down (can't wait to get her into the Jolly Jumper at home) and laughs out loud while she does it. At around 10pm, Amelia was asleep, I was doing some tidying and when I looked over, Dean and Iris were asleep. It was so sweet and so perfect. Dean woke up and put Iris on her bed and we didn't hear a peep out of her until 6am this morning. What a perfect evening!!

Today, we had to do all the paperwork. We spent all morning going from government office to government office to do all the paperwork to make the adoption legal, to get the papers notarized and to get Iris' Chinese passport done. After all the running around we also stopped off at Wal-Mart. Yes, Wal-Mart in Nanchang. It was 4 stories tall. Ick. But we were able to buy a few things that we had forgotten as well as some snacks in case we don't want to go out for all of our meals. It was a hot, yucky morning, but the babies did amazing and so did the older children. Now we are back at the hotel and don't have to do any paperwork for the next day or two. I expect we'll cuddle Iris lots, go swimming at the hotel pool, nap...that's about it.

Everything went so perfect - we are over the moon with Iris. She loves being held and cuddled and reaches out for us when she wants to be picked up. She loves watching Amelia and Amelia has been incredibly patient and understanding.

Tomorrow...

Tomorrow morning, we meet in the lobby of our hotel at 5am, go to the airport, fly to Nanchang, check into our hotel and then go to meet our daughter! Oh my god, I am nervous/excited/overwhelmed. Wish us luck!

Beijing is amazing!

Here we are on day 3 of our adventure. The first night we got here and went out for dinner with a couple of other families in our travel group, I was freaked out!! I was so thankful that Yulin, our facilitator, was with us to help us order food and navigate the grocery store. I just felt so useless, being in a place where no one can understand us, we can't understand them and I can't even read what any of the signs or menus said. Ai ya!

But then the next day (yesterday) we ventured out. Dean, Amelia and I just decided to go for a wander around our neighbourhood, by our selves! I was so nervous! But we survived! Not only did we survive, but we did great. We stumbled onto some AMAZING places, like the Lama Temple and loads of hutong. Hutong are traditional alleyways of courtyard . They are tiny, but somehow cars still sneak through them. Dean posted a few pictures of the hutongs we saw yesterday. Below are a few more.

This last picture is one of four archways that span a beautiful and quite famous hutong (but I can't remember it's name). So pretty!

So, by the end of the day I had fallen in love with Beijing! People are so friendly and have loads of smiles, especially for Amelia!

Today, Dean, Amelia and I went to Beihai Park. I've never gotten so emotional about a place! When we first walked in I immediately teared up. It's absolutely beautiful. I don't really know how to explain it all, so let's just look at some pictures!

Not only was it beautiful, but Beihai park was absolutely entertaining. It was an amazing place to people-watch. The one thing that really struck me, was the many, many elderly people exercising there. Some were dancing (choreographed performances or ballroom dancing), some were doing a martial art of some sort, some were playing hacky-sack (but with feathers attached to it) and some were doing this cool sort of raquet-ball dance. Again...can't explain it all, but check out the pics...

But the absolute most entertaining part of the day at Beihai was watching how people reacted to Amelia. Many stopped to watch her walk by, some said hello to her and then people started taking pictures of her. She had her picture taken with so many people today! She was a great sport about it...we kept calling her famous! And she also interacted a bit with other children...very sweet.

So that's our experience with Beijing so far. It's been so lovely. And so different from life back home! Pedestrians are definitely NOT the priority...cars will NOT stop for you, neither will bikes, of which there are a ton. But I've already picked up on the skill of jaywalking...quite proud of myself. Personal space is not as sacred here as it is in Canada, which makes sense as there are 17 million people in this city. The other thing we are facinated with are toddlers' split pants. I'm sure you can imagine what goes on with these!

Must go wake up Dean and Amelia now...they are having a pre-dinner nap. A lot of families from our travel group are just arriving today so we are all having supper together in a few minutes. Can't wait to meet them! Wan an!