Swimming

Ok Mommy has gotten picture happy now!

Pool deck Princess

Jadeybug

We are starting to get into a normal routine finally! Jade is a good baby thankfully and just takes everything in stride. She is sleeping 12 hrs and starting to eat more table food. She can sit up well and roll over both ways now, both of which she couldnt do a month ago! Its hard to believe we'll have had her for one month on Friday...wow, we are so blessed!

Jet Lag!

Hi from home at midnight! We are still on China time especially our little China doll! The boys are up at all hours wanting to eat and watch tv. Hopefully it will get better soon. I am thankful they are on spring break so they can rest up for school next week.

We are going to see family this weekend for Easter! Cant wait to see everyone and let Jade play with her cousins. Here are a few pics my Mom took while she was here yesterday.

We're home!

Hi from home! The 16 days went so fast and now it all seems like a dream especially when I look at Jade's sweet face :>) We left Guangzhou at 8am Friday morning flew to Bejing then it was 13 hrs to Newark. The kids did great! Jade slept 11 hrs of it and the boys were good about staying busy or sleeping. Mike and I had a harder time getting comfy...we left Newark late and arrived in Tampa at 1am where we were greeted by our excited parents and dog ! We were home by 2:30 and eating the best tasting Sonny's bbq by 3am. Big thanks to Kathryn for that and to Renee and Kim for stocking the house with essentials. You guys are the best, ((((( big hug)))))

We all slept till noon the next day then unpacked and said hi to Jade's first visitors. Last night the princess was up from 2-4am wanting to play. Hopefully she will get back to the 12 hr sleeping nights she has had since we got her! Wishful thinking...

I will send pics when I find the camera, its buried somewhere in my diaper bag!

Love to all and thanks for your prayers, it got us thru the trip home.....

Michele

More pictures from today

The red couch photo is a tradition with the adoptive families here at the beautiful White Swan Hotel. These are the girls adopted from Chongqing, our Jade is 2nd from the left. The other picture is our group of travelmates. We will miss everyone! Safe travels home...

Our last post from China

Hi! Well we are almost at the end of this incredible trip! Today we had the swearing in ceremony at the American Consulate here in Guanzghou. It was very quick! When Jade lands in Newark NJ she will be an American citizen! We had dinner tonight with our special friends the Mrkalls and the McSorleys' whom we hope to keep in touch with for sure. We then shopped for last minute treasures and bought a $20 Polo suitcase for the trip home... we hope the wheels dont fall off in the airport...Ryan was excited about his $20 Rolex as well :>)

I want to add a special thankyou to everyone who has been interested in our journey to China to get our Jade. The messages from all of you have been priceless and helped us feel closer to home THANKYOU! Please post again if you get a chance as I will be printing all this out for her baby book. We will continue to update our blog when we get home as we get the time. If you are even thinking about adopting a baby from China, follow your heart as we did!!! It will be one of the most amazing things you will ever get the chance to do. Our family is so in love with this precious child..

How to sum up this trip?? The first part in Bejing was very tiring with the time change but also fun with the touring schedule and meeting of new friends. The boys really enjoyed climbing the Great Wall and all received plaques certifying the trek. Being in Chongqing was like being under a microscope with all the peering eyes at us and the babies. I tried to soak in as much as I could about Jades birth province sometimes looking at the faces and wondering if she was related to them. I kept coming back to the thought of her birth Mother having to leave her at the Park gate with 'old cotton clothes' as it was described. We didnt get to see this place as it was 8 hrs away as was her orphange. I will try to honor her birth Mother in bringing up Jade and by talking about her China Mommy when the questions begin. Coming to Guangzhou was a relief to be like everyone else (from all over the world) here with a baby adopted from some area in China. Becoming Parents of FOUR children has also proved a challenge and overwhelming at times. But we're not giving her back!!! :>) She is the best thing ever "Made in China" :>)))

Our next post will be from home after 20 hrs of total flying not counting layovers!Thankyou for all your prayers and support.

See ya'll on the other side...

xoxox
The Waters family of 6

Tues/Wednesday 4/4 4/5

Hi from Guangzhou! Whew what a nice place to be! We are actually on an island called Shamian Island where adoptive parents stop for the last time before going home. We had Jade's medical exam which was very vague and almost funny. The most we got out of it was that she weighs 20 lbs 3oz. !!! My friend Marsha and I shopped today and bought some neat things for very little $$. Jade now has more outfits as she didnt have enough :>) Ryan picked out an interesting knife that will be confiscated the first time he threatens Luke and Will with it. We're headed to bed, more tomorrow and we leave the next day! Lots of love from us to you!

Pictures are of Jade now sitting up by herself!

Gotta catch up!

Pics

We're finally in civlization here! Try to send out some photos!

Sunday/The Zoo/Walmart

Hello! We hope all is well on the other side of the world! Everything here in Chongqing is going very smoothly. Today we went to see the Pandas at the zoo and one in particular was very playful and entertained us with his tumbling! They are sweet looking but dirty. The zoo was beautiful and we were impressed with the lush surroundings and very thankful for the bamboo to shade us from the sun as it was extremely hot and muggy. There were alot of children there and Will likes practicing his Chinese hello 'Ni Hao' on them and they do the same with their English 'Hello's' back! Very cute :>) Ryan is enjoying the history and sightseeing parts of the tours. He likes to be in charge of the camera. Luke goes with the flow. We all enjoyed the China Walmart today after the zoo! It is attached to a very nice mall but walking into the entrance the smell of fish was quite a shock.. There are all sorts of unidentifiable foods in bins, live fish- huge catfish, worms, squid hanging to dry, some very strange things. It has floors and the buggy's attach to the escalator somehow and after the food area we then went up to the childrens area for forumula. Alot of the items were exactly as we're used to in America.

Laundry here is a breeze. Every few days we take the bags to our guides room and someone comes to pick them up. The next day we are delivered everything cleaned and IRONED in sealed bags. I told Mike not to get used to his boxers being pressed :>)

Jade is doing great! Everyday she seems to snuggle further into our family. She has such a sweet disposition which we are thankful for. She is bonding well to me as I try to be the only caretaker for now. The boys treat her well and want to help with her so I'm enjoying that while I can :>) Mike is smitten as you can see in the picture from yesterday. We cant wait for you all to meet her.....

Tomorrow is our last day here in Chongqing so we'll get packed up and be at the airport the next morning at 6am for Guangzhou. (Gwanjoe) This is the last leg of the paperwork journey and we'll meet up with some of our other friends who went to separate provinces to get their daughters.

Keep the posts coming we love to hear from everyone! Special thanks to Kim M for your help with Marta and the spring cleaning. It will be so nice to come home to a clean house!!!! (((Big Hug)))

More to come later,
Love,
The Waters
xoxoxoxoxoox

We have a new pic of Jade and Dad

Saturday

Hey! Sorry still no pics but working on it as we have time! And what little time we have! WHEW I have forgotten what alot of work a baby is :>) Especially in a hotel room. She had a major screaming fit today but it was a small one and I think she was overtired. The rest of the day she was all smiles!

We went to an old part of Chongqing today where the buildings were from the Ming dynasty. Ryan will fill us all in what exactly that is..heehee....It was exactly how you would picture China from the movies we have seen. Cobblestone streets with merchants selling all kinds of interesting things. The food actually smelled pretty good but we were all afraid to try it. It was very crowded and there were many university students walking around. Some girls took to us and talked to us about America. They were majoring in English and wanted to be guides for tourists like us. We bought a few toys that the boys wanted....weapons of course....2 Asian dresses for Jade and 2 pretty paintings for her room. It was very hot and muggy so we couldnt wait to get back to the AC and a spaghetti lunch!

Tomorrow we visit the pandas at the zoo. 3 more days and we're off to Guanzghou for 4 days then home next Friday! A special thanks to Genie Mom for helping us with the flight home. We arrive Friday night in Tampa at midnight. Dreading the trip already!!!!!!

Hope everyone has a great weekend and send us some notes on what your all doing!

XOXOXOXOXO
MMRLWJ

Friday/ Eling park/pizza party

Ni Hao!

Things are getting better and we're adjusting very well!!! Jade is doing great! She started smiling yesterday alot and i even got a giggle when I tickled her neck! It was so adorable it brought tears. We walked to a beautiful park yesterday filled with spring flowers. There were school children there all practicing their English language on us. We tried to give stickers but there was such a frenzy for them the teacher said No! We went with 3 other couples and their families and were again surrounded. All of them were nice and gave thumbs up when they read our info card. They dont have the 'personal space' that we have and get too close for comfort. They pull Jade's thumb from her mouth as they dont like the babies to suck their thumbs and they tell me to cover her up more. It was 80 degrees yesterday and muggy but they think babies should be layered anyway.

Last night our guide Rui (Ray) organized a pizza party for us in the meeting room. It was great to see our 7 families with their babies that have all adjusted over the last few days. The pizza was from Pizza Hut and tasted just like home!

Thankyou for all the great messages, its nice to know we are missed. A special hi to my Mom and thanks for your help with the pics. To Rod, Kathryn and Joan, you are in our prayers! Keep us updated!!!!!!!!! I'm so sorry I am unable to post pics from here but in a few days when we go to our next stop, I have been assured the connection will be better.

The boys are doing great and we are all happy and rested. Jade sleeps 10 hrs at night so I hope that continues! We feel very blessed to be able to have this little girl in our family. We thank God for her. She is amazing....and she's ours....

Love,
MMRLW&J

These are the 2 pics Michele has been able to send so far!

Hi everyone

I hope you are all doing well! Thankfully I was just able to access my email but still am having trouble posting pics...Mom is going to try to from her computer. Our hotel is 5 star but internet connection is very horrible. Thanks so much for everyone's SWWEEEEETTTT comments...loved them...Renee please send me your email address to my yahoo acct..Willi wants to send a note to Drew...

I feel like I have so much to write about...the places we have seen have been incredible...The great wall of course being fabulous. I will have to work backwards and post pics later I suppose.

AND now for news on our girl! She is so sweet! She cried only a little the day we got her. That whole process was unreal. I picked her out right away and they checked passports and then she was handed to me. She stuck out her lip a bit and in went the thumb! TOO CUTE...she has alot of hair and the other babies have hardly any. Would you believe that I only brought headbands in case she had no hair. Her bows got left on her dresser :>(

Yesterday we went shopping for formuler (as our guide says)and had a traditional chinese meal. Ryan had rice and chicken, Willi tried a bit of everything and Luke had a roll. :>) Jade screamed thru the whole process so Mommy stayed in the lobby
but nothing would soothe her so it was very stressful. Will be good for my diet tho as she does this thru most meals.

Today is a better day for her, we woke up and had breakfast and she had a bottle. At 10 mo old she cannot sit up, get on her knees or roll over. Its so sad! She also spits all solid food out like she's never had any in her mouth. She has two bottom teeth trying to peek thru. I have gotten a few smiles and she pushed our guides hand away yesterday when she tried to hold her so I think she is starting to like me a little. Last night she slept in my bed and she woke up twice and would just touch my face and run her hand over my hair. It was the sweetest thing and I'll never forget that moment.

The boys went to a park today while we stayed here to regroup. Being in China is very strange. I dont like being the center of attention and everywhere we go we are. Some of them dont know why we are carrying around Chinese babies. We have a card we wear around our necks in Chinese that reads that we are Americans and are here to adopt the abandoned daughters of their beautiful country. We promise to care for them with all our hearts. The older generation give us smiles and thumbs up. Seems the younger generation arent as thrilled. Our guide says they are ashamed that women abandon their babies.

I'm going to try to get some pics out but if they wont attach I'll get Mom to try..thanks for all your sweet posts..I miss and love you all.

Michele & Men & Princess Jade

Tuesday Morning (couldnt post pics this morning :>(

Hi! Sorry we didnt post yesterday we had a full day and I didnt feel like fighting Ryan for the computer! We went to Tianneman square yesterday, the Forbidden City (huge) and THE GREAT WALL! It was all amazing and I hope to go into greater detail but am in a hurry now as we have to get our act together and catch a flight at 8am for Chongqing!!! In NINE hours we will have a daughter and you all will have a grandaughter, great grandaughter, neice, cousin or a new little friend from China! I was too anxious last night to sleep so i'm running on adrenaline. Here are some pics from yesterday. I'll post more pics later today. While you are sleeping at 2am we'll be getting our girl!

Keep those messages coming!

Love,
The Waters Family

Sunday night 3/26

Ni Hao!

We hope everyone is doing well! Thanks for the emails and posts, we love reading them and helps us not feel so homesick! KEEP THEM COMING!!! We had a good sightseeing day today..we saw the Summer Palace where the Emperors vacationed. We all agreed that was our favorite part of the day. Its how I pictured China to be from the movies :>) We had Chinese food for lunch and it was ok but seemed to be more Americanized and we had hoped for authentic. Will was adventurous and tried the different things, Ryan had meat and veggies, Luke had a roll :>) We then went to the Temple of Heaven where the Emperors went to pray. It was beautiful and peaceful as you'd expect such a place to be. I'll include some pics of both places. Tomorrow is Great Wall and the next day we fly to Chongqing to get our Jadey Jade as Will calls her. Luv and miss you all! The Waters....

Saturday morning 8am (I think)

Good morning! We are all feeling better today after a good nights sleep, yahooo! Yesterday we went into town via a 45 min shuttle ride with some friends. We shopped at the silk market which was too overwhelming for all of us. The salespeople are all up in your face without hesitation. Mike got conned into buying 2 Hard Rock Bejing t-shirts for about $15 each. "special price just for you" :>) We walked around for 3 hrs after that and ate at the Hard Rock Hotel where the t-shirts were, you guessed it $15 each. Well at least he didnt overpay..ha...We are a bit intimidated about eating anywhere just now..it will be easier when our guide steps in as of tonight and we eat more traditional chinese fare. Luke fell asleep yet again at the dinner table.

We have met some neat people from all over the world and this is great fun, but I'm ready to GET OUR BABY!!!

WIll write more soon....

M&Men

Friday morning/Pic of NY City

Hi,
We miss our family and friends! Its hard to believe we're on the other side of the world from all of you. We have two hotel rooms in Bejing and somehow I got Luke and Will together out of the deal :>) Luke fell asleep eating his pizza last night so he was easy to put to bed. The beds here are so hard!!! I should've practiced by sleeping on the garage floor to get used to it before getting here. Yes its that bad...Being thrown off with the timezones, Luke, Will and Mommy were up at 3am China time watching the Simpsons in Chinese...its funny even in another language we cant understand.

We are waiting for a few hours to catch a shuttle to downtown and will explore the markets a bit looking for bargains. We are here with about 10 other families that we have gotten to know over the last year so we're all having fun seeing each other in person.

Its about 60 degrees today and beautiful. Mike took the boys to the park here so I could catch up on our blog.

So far so good..we'll write more soon! Hope your all well...

Countdown to Jade 4 days!!!!

Love,
Michele & Men