Day Five

  The LORD has done great things for us, and we are glad indeed.  Psalm 126:3

This is day five of our trip here in China.  We have now been the proud parents of Li Qing for about 30 hours and just like any new parents we can't help but keep looking at her.  It's so hard to believe that after 16 months we are finally a family.  

Today is the first day we have actually had down time.  We got up early and went back to the civil affairs office and signed the papers saying that yes indeed we will keep this precious angel and treat her as if she is one of our own children.  Yes indeed!!  After that we went to a Chinese grocery store to get some food for the room.  That was interesting.  It was three stories tall and had just about everything you could imagine.  We came back to the room to catch up on some much needed rest.  

Tomorrow we will go and explore the city of Wuhan.  It is huge and being just about the only Americans we stand out.  The local people will stare and some will smile.  At breakfast this morning another American couple (probably the only Americans in the entire city) came into the dining room for the breakfast buffet.  Li Qing quickly noticed them and ran over to their table.  I believe she thought they were someone from her family picture book.  It is amazing how warm and friendly she is to complete strangers.  Later at the civil affairs office this same couple came in with their baby.  Li Qing recognized them and took a small baby doll out of her purse and gave it to their baby.  This girl has the heart the size of Texas.  Do I sound like a proud Mama?   

Yesterday when we got her the orphanage director gave us a photo album with pictures of her from the previous years.  Today Li Qing took her photo album and added her pictures that we sent to her to this same album.  I think this was her way of saying the her family is complete now.  She carefully took each picture out and put them with the others.  So touching because she keeps getting the book out to look at. Now she has all her pictures in the same place.  She especially likes the pictures of my dad.  She points to his picture and then flips the a picture of the orphanage building and repeats something in Chinese.  I believe she is telling us that her foster father was an older gentlemen.  I know that her foster family is the retired director from the orphanage. So this would make sense.  We are communicating remarkable well and relying very little on Goggle translate.  She has picked up so many words and hand signals in just 24 hours.  We were able to Skype some family and friends and she absolutely loves that!!  

One of the highlights of our trip have been reading your comments.  Thank you so much for being a part of this incredible journey. Each person reading this blog has a specially place in our hearts.   I will write again tomorrow and had some pictures.