Looking Back- Day Before Gotcha

One year ago today:

There's a Crib in our Room

Today was a travel day. We had to be ready to leave for the airport by 6:30am, which was not a problem since I was up at 2:30 (having crashed at 7:30pm).   We sadly said goodbye to our amazing Beijing agency rep, Jean.  She is WONDERFUL and helped us every step of the way in Beijing.  We're so thankful for her!

We flew to Zhengzhou, which is in the Henan province.  Maggie's province!  It was a quick 2 hour flight, met our 2 new agency reps, then an hour bus ride to the hotel.  We dropped our stuff off in our room, then enjoyed a great Italian late lunch at a restaurant here at the hotel with some members of our group (there are now 6 families total here together).  When we got back to our room, we found they had delivered us a crib!  Talk about surreal.  We just all keep talking about how crazy it is that we're actually going to have a new child tomorrow.  It's easy to get caught up in the travel and tourism things we're doing, and then all of the sudden it will hit me the real reason why we're here.

We got a little update from the orphange on Maggie. No new pictures, but says she takes 4 bottles a day and also eats eggs as a supplement.  No other solid foods yet.  She turned 13 months the day we landed in Beijing.  It also says she likes the bath but it sometimes makes her cry.  Love how things get lost in the translation here.  :) It also says she takes one 1.5 hour nap and sleeps 9pm-6am.  We're going to work on that, cuz she needs more sleep than that!  It says she's lively and active and likes to have attention. Sounds just like her siblings!   It also says she's crawling, pulling herself up and can walk when holding onto things.  We missed Allie's first steps (since she was RUNNING when we got her at 11 months!) so we're excited to see Maggie's first steps when the time comes.

This afternoon we walked about 20 minutes to Walmart.  Not your typical Walmart in some parts! There were whole ducks you could buy, squid, etc. But we also found Lays potato chips and snickers, so we're all good.  We now know where we can find formula and diapers, too.  The streets are wild and crazy here too.  Cars and people everywhere, and here there are scooters on the sidewalks and they do not watch for pedestrians! We walked back at rush hour and it was a little scary.  Made us very glad we didn't bring the kids with us.  There are older kids here in our group and they are doing great; ours just aren't old enough to handle all we're doing.

So we'll meet at 9:30 in the morning for a short bus ride to the registration office, where our babies will be brought to us.  We already feel so bonded to the 5 other families in our group, and I can't imagine how emotional it's going to be to experience meeting our children for the first time together, and to go through these next weeks together.

I don't know if it will happen, but I'm praying for a good night's sleep tonight, as it's our last one just the 2 of us!!!   Even though she is our 4th child, it's just as nerve-wracking and exciting as the first!  We'll post pictures as soon as we can tomorrow.  Any prayers for her and her transition and for wisdom for us would be greatly appreciated!!!  We can feel the love, prayers and support from all of you, thank you so much!!!  This is it!