Good evening!

    It is 9pm on Saturday here, and everyone is asleep except for me and Mia. She is in bed babbling and sucking on her teddy bear’s ear. She LOVES the bear from build-a bear.  When we eat, so does the bear. Did you know that bears like bottles too? And they like to have their teeth brushed and hair combed? Well, they do! I have a feeling that it is going to be tough getting peanut to bed tonight. It has been a long two days.

    We flew into Guangzhou pretty late last night, and had to hit the floor running early this morning for the medical check up.

    Wow, that was an experience! There had to be about 50 adopting families, with screaming children, lined up at different stations being weighed, measured and checked over. There was actually a sign on the wall of the clinic that read, “Quiet Please.” I can only hope that it was some type of a joke!

    I guess that Mia checked out ok. We were just handed a few papers and told bye-bye. So, we went bye-bye.

    After the babies were stripped to their diapers, poked and prodded, they were expected to be all happy and smiles for their passport photos. Needless to say, that did not happen. Mia looks so pitiful in her picture.

    Well, after that wonderful morning of blowing any trust in us that she might have developed, we went to lunch and let her eat mashed potatoes and M & Ms. And yes, she likes Coke flavored Slurpees too! Guangzhou is a very beautiful city, and it definitely caters to adopting families. It is nice to have a little bit of home. And it has been great to get caught up with our travel group, and meet their new children.

     Mia is definitely the smallest one in the bunch even though she is not the youngest. She is by far one of the less demure of the little ladies. What ever the shy, quiet, still mood she was in a few days ago, is gone! She is non-stop with the babbling and wants to see everything going on and is trying sooooo hard to walk.  We think that she is brilliant, too. Really! She already knows how to say mama and dada, claps when she wants more food and she can dance! She really likes music. We bought her this incredibly annoying piano toy, and she will play with it until we take it away. She was also smart enough to give mama the FIRST KISS!!!!

    We spent the rest of the day just hanging out at the hotel and playing at the play area. It is a beautiful garden/park on top of the fourth floor roof. They are very creative with their use of space here. Nothing is wasted.

    Well, tomorrow is another get up and get out day. We have passport paper work to do, and some sight seeing.  We are excited to see the city. It is smaller and much less populated, and they are used to American families with Asian babies. This is where our American Consulate is, so everyone adopting from China has to pass through here for their child’s passport and citizenship papers.

    Hope that all is well at home. We miss you all, but we are doing great.

Love,