Welcome Home, Little One

Epilogue: Jaime's Canadian life begins ...

2007-12-10T08:43:00.000-05:00

Time for one last post before we sign off from this blog ! Thanks to everyone who have followed our progressed and helped to welcome Jaime vicariously through the internet :)

After a loving reception at the airport, where severals members of our extended family greeted Jaime with all the love and warmth of a Canadian hearth, we brought her home. Her first trip in our ageing minivan ... her first time on the 417 ... her first time falling asleep in the worn car seat than has cradled each of our other kids before her. In the video below, Melissa carried Jaime into the house, past the full-sized mural on the front door, and up the stairs. Of course, all attempts at keeping her asleep failed ... :)

So much has happened since that first night ... from ear piercings to baby's first cold ... from her first taste of birthday cake to her first touch of snow ... from welcome-home parties to the mundane-yet-happy life in our home. Just yesterday, we took a family picture in front of a Christmas tree, for Christmas cards. There she is, in David's arms, looking like she's always been a part of this family. And truly, as strange as it may sound, it really feels like she has.

This blog was a chronicle of our journey from three kids to four ... it was the story of how we spent so much to go to China and came home so much richer. For this, our last post, we'll leave you with a shot from a photoshoot with Dale Hogan. Welcome home, little one !

Welcome Home, Little One

2007-09-21T00:30:00.000-04:00

Well, we made it! The trip back was great. We were on a much larger and newer plane (Boeing 777), and even had a couple of empty seats, so both Emily and Jaime stretched out and went to sleep. Jaime slept almost the entire time for the flight from Beijing to Toronto, and although she was awake from Toronto to Ottawa, she was in a great mood and spent part of the trip entertaining the Air Canada flight attendants. Another passenger (with a snazzy camera) even snapped some shots of her and promised to email them to us !

She feel asleep in the van on the way home, and we thought she might transfer right to her crib, but no way. There was too much partying to be done! After a bath, a meal, and much attention from her fascinated brothers, she's starting to settle in now for her first night at home.

Welcome home, Little One ! Finally ... it's been a long time coming.

Heading home !

2007-09-20T01:12:00.001-04:00

Well, this is it ... we're all packed up, and we're about to check out of the hotel. We should be getting into Ottawa shortly after 10pm tonight. See you soon !

News from China, Day 10 - Shopping

2007-09-18T10:38:00.000-04:00

Today we shopped until we dropped. Jaime hung in there really well, at times watching the haggling from the MEC backpack, at other times riding around in the stroller. We also visited a silk "factory", although there wasn't much "factory" to it and it was more like a silk "historical demo" and "shopping outlet". We learned some amazing stuff about the silkworms and how the Chinese harvest silk from their cocoons. The red bag of white eggie things in the bottom of the picture are the cocoons, which get boiled (to soften them) and then hooked up the machine, which pulls the silk from them.

We went walking in the evening and found a really cool artsy district along one of the side streets. They had mini North-American style wine bars, cool T-shirt stores, and even one quaint little pizzeria which served freshly-ground North-American style coffee ! We splurged and ate a cheese lovers' while David sipped a Columbian.

We were asked in one of the comments what Jaime's favourite foods are ... Well, she's been drinking her Nestle bottles steadily, and has made it clear that she prefers them hot to lukewarm. Nestle is the brand of formula that the orphanage was giving her, so we've stuck with that for now so that she has something familiar. She's also been eating watermelon at breakfast, although it's not clear if she really likes it or not. When we eat at traditional Chinese restaurants, we give her some of the scrambled-egg dishes, which she devours. And Melissa bought some North-American style baby food in the grocery store, and Jaime has loved the carrots and the mixed fruit. She's completely nonplussed about rice congee (watery rice porridge), for which we can't blame her.

We were also asked if Emily could contribute to the blog, so here are some of her thoughts ...

Dad : What's your favourite thing about China ?
Emily : It would probably be the shopping that we did yesterday.
Dad : Why ?
Emily : Because we bought some nice dresses and some hats for the boys.
Dad : What's the thing you miss most about home ?
Emily : The trampoline, and the boys.
Dad : What's your favourite thing about your baby sister ?
Emily : That she makes dinosaur noises. Like, she kind of does a "rahh, rahh" sound.
Dad : What's your favourite food here in China ?
Emily : Well, I've had a lot of the watermelon, umm, it would probably be the meatballs that they serve out at the place where we went not yesterday, but the day before. [ed: she means the pork balls in sauce]
Dad : What would you say if you could say something to everyone back home ?
Emily : I would say "I miss you" probably, and, ummm, hey boys, I'm home !

We were also asked to branch into multi media ... and post a video ! So here is the clip from the moments before we got Jaime, literally 120 seconds before we were holding her. All the babies were carried in by orphanage workers, and although we didn't know it as we were filming, Jaime was the sixth one in (note that two and three are being carried by one person, so Jaime's with the fifth adult, carrying a white plastic bag). Just try to imagine the energy and anticipation in the room !

Tomorrow is our last full day in China ... we'll be home soon !

News from China, Day 9 - Doctor's Appointment

2007-09-18T10:14:00.000-04:00

Today Jaime visited the doctor ! Melissa took her to a local clinic on the bus with many of the parents. Went they got there, a cluster of four nurses dressed in blue stripped her down and took all the biometrics, and then a very nice man named Dr. Zhao listened to her heart and lungs. He declared her to be in perfect health (except for a slight redness in the back of her throat from her cold), and filled out all the appropriate paperwork for Canadian Immigration.

While all this was going on, David and Emily went wandering around downtown Beijing, browsing the shops for CDs, musical instruments, tea sets, and GoreTex jackets. No one was hit by any cars, which was a small miracle. The driving is quite different than Canada ... to quote one of the members of our group, the lines on the road are merely a suggestion, and the red octagonal signs are stoptional as well. Anything with 2 or 3 wheels seems exempt from traffic laws, as are tour buses. We saw our tour bus driver pull the manoeuvre of the century ... a U-turn from the far right-hand lane on a busy 8-lane divided street through an intersection with a red light and between clusters of pedestrians crossing the street. We almost applauded. He's a great driver, and he would have lost all his demerit points long ago in Ontario.

We got a little tricycle rickshaw tour of the off-the-beaten-path parts of Beijing, a Kutong neighbourhood. Our driver was a guy named Kong (but his first name was neither King nor Donkey) who spoke excellent English and explained the finer points of the architecture as we passed by. He certainly earned his pay that day, hauling all four of us in his rickshaw. At least one of us, and we won't say who, is not that light to begin with, and so poor Kong had to stop for a drink of water halfway.

The day ended with a trip to an acrobatics show. Words fail at this point. Acrobatics seems like the wrong word, but we're not sure what the right word would be. It was like nothing we've ever seen before. It made America's Got Talent look like a joke (which, come to think of it, it does to itself already without any help, so that's not saying much). The performers at this show were kids, some as young as 6 or 7, up to teenagers. They did absolutely unbelieveable things to ambient dance music, to which words don't do justice. We saw a 7 year old little guy do a headstand on a ladder which was balancing on a tight rope - no joke! We saw 8 people on a single bicycle, and as if that wasn't enough, 4 more hopped on for a total of twelve ! We saw two little girls, one up in the air on the foot of the other, spinning a total of eight umbrellas between them ! We weren't allowed to take pictures, otherwise we would have devoted an entire blog post to it ... it was simply stunning. Jaime took it all in at first, and then lost interested toward the end.

Aside from missing the boys back home, we are having a great time. Actually, a nice Tim Horton's coffee would go down really well too. Tomorrow we are attacking the silk and pearl markets, in hopes of finding deals on, well, silk and pearls. And maybe some electronics too. Stay tuned, only two more days in Beijing !

News from China, Day 8 - The Great Wall

2007-09-16T19:16:00.000-04:00

Apparently when Nixon came down from climbing the Great Wall of China in 1972, his remark was "The Great Wall is a great wall". We're not sure we can capture it quite so eloquently here, but nevertheless today was spent at the Great Wall of China.

What an experience ! First of all, we had no idea it would be so packed ! There must have been a hundred thousand people, mostly Chinese, on this particular section of the wall at Badaling. At times, especially near the top tower visible just over Melissa's head in the picture, we slowed to a mere shuffle, packed into a solid mass of fluid humanity. If anyone had been claustrophobic, they wouldn't have lasted long.

The other thing that struck us were the number of elderly Chinese doing the climb. It wasn't a simple stroll by any means ... we had to stop to catch our breath many times over the 45 minute hike, and we're (relatively) young and healthy. And yet we saw several people easily over seventy years old, with canes, booting it up the steep inclines. Any many of the vendors, who do sections of the climb back and forth several times an hour as they walk alongside potential buyers, were easily over sixty!

The Great Wall itself is 6,400 km long, in severals sections. The location that we were at is called Badaling. The "climb" was not to "get up" to the Great Wall, it was to "get up" the mountain "on" the Great Wall. The Wall was entirely paving stones and bricks, at times laid into flights of stairs, and at other times just a steep (maybe 30 degree ?) flat incline. We decided we wanted to make it to "the top", which meant to make it up through three watchtowers to the highest point in the area.

The watchtowers were formerly occupied by the Emperor's soldiers and bonfire beacons, but now have been annexed by the Free Market and its many street vendors. Guys playing Auld Lang Syne on Chinese flutes, or engraving your name on a genuine "I climbed the Great Wall" certificate, or selling Red Army knock-off uniform caps or 2008 Olympics T-shirts. The bricks of the Wall are covered, just covered, with graffiti etched into the stone in Chinese characters.

Jaime rode up the whole way asleep in the MEC backpack carrier. She woke up when we stopped for an ice cream treat when we got back to our starting point. Overall, she was very content, and mostly oblivious to the history of her native land which surrounded us. Jaime, Emily and David have been watching the Rugby World Cup in the hotel. Tomorrow she has her doctor's appointment, where hopefully she will get a clean bill of health and will be ready for Canada !

News from China, Day 7 - Summer Palace

2007-09-15T09:48:00.000-04:00

Ahh, recuperated. Today was a nice, easy pace. Jaime was back to her normal happy self, and so everyone's feeling better.

We loaded Jaime up in the MEC backpack carrier and headed off for the Emperor's Summer Palace. She seemed quite comfortable in it, and eventually slumped over and had a nice long nap, much to the amusement of the locals. The shot to the left was taken in the magnificent lobby of our hotel, the Oriental Culture Hotel. It's a fantastic spot, with marble floors, high ceilings, but no ability to change $US in Yen on Saturdays :)

The Summer Palace is hard to sum up ... it's a couple hundred acres of ancient architecture, jam packed with tour buses and knock-off product vendors, on the shore of a man-made lake. If you get bored of looking at tile roofs and lotus plants, you can saunter over and pick up a Rolex watch for about $8. One of our group (a PolySci prof) bought a watch with the solemn picture of Chairman Mao on it ... complete with a Red Star for the second hand, and a waving arm on Mao.

We learned first-hand about counterfeit Renminbi (Yuan) today, as David fell victim to a neat little money scam that gave him a $14 souvenir that he didn't intend to buy, a piece of paper that looks like currency but isn't quite. It happened as we stopped to buy a fake Gucci handbag from a woman ... yes, we got fake money from the purchase of a fake handbag. After a price of 80¥ was negotiated, David handed over his last 100¥ bill. The woman refused to take it, showing him that it was slightly torn, so David had to take the money back and walk away from the sale. What he didn't realize was that she had deftly swapped his bill with a "torn" (but counterfeit) one from her bag, and so he was walking away not only without a Gucci bag, but also without his 100¥ (about CDN$14). Apparently counterfeit Renminbi is a real problem here. The woman in the picture to the left is not the one who pulled the scam on us, but worked with her. The picture was taken before we figured out we had been scammed, or the smiles might not have been so broad. If you plan on travelling to China, make sure you learn up on how to detect the counterfeits here !

The day ended with a scrumptious dinner at the Chinese restaurant next to the hotel. Vivian, our guide, ordered dish after dish of delicious food as we drank Coke and Chinese lager. They kept arriving on the rotary tray in the middle of the table, and we poked at them clumsily with chopsticks. The eggplant dish would have to be considered the favourite, although the pork meatballs were probably a close second. Jaime tried most of them, and downed a fair bit even in spite of her already-full belly of rice cereal.

Back at the hotel, Melissa gave Jaime a bottle while David and Emily swam in the hotel pool. Then we went to bed early (9 pm) and everyone, including Jaime, had a solid night's sleep. The next day we head off to the Great Wall of China !

News from China, Day 6 - Test Flight

2007-09-14T23:01:00.000-04:00

Well, not much of a blog post for today ... the reason ? Sheer exhaustion. We flew from Chongqing to Beijing today, a mere 2.5 hour flight (which was delayed due to "air plane delay"). But even a short flight was quite the chore, and when we finally got to bed around midnight, we were spent. In our minds, it had been a test flight for how the 13.5 hour version would go in a few more days. Unfortunately, Jaime wasn't pleased with the pilot's takeoff, and registered her displeasure with the entire crew. So we slept in today and didn't have time to post, so we leave you with a shot of mom and baby. Enjoy !

News from China, Day 5 - Tour of Chongqing

2007-09-13T17:17:00.000-04:00

Today was spent taking it pretty easy ... a minimum of paperwork, mostly just a light bus tour and then relaxing in the hotel.

The shot to the left is at the junction of the two massive rivers which meet in Chongqing; the Yangtze, which is the longest river in Asia and flows for over 6300 kilometres, and the Jialing. The usual Chongqing smoggy haze was augmented by heavy fog and some rain, so the pictures weren't all that impressive. What was impressive however was watching a riverboat driver do a spin-o-rama move in the middle of the river with his 200 ft river barge, to sneak through the rapids and head up the Jialing.

We went to a government-sponsored tea house, where not surprisingly the staff all spoke excellent English and the souvenir prices were quadrupled from their market value (but then lowered by 30% for a special discount for us, of course). They put on a fascinating tea demonstration, taught us the Kung Fu style of drinking tea, and let us sample some of the most delicious teas we have ever tasted. Even for David the coffee drinker, this tea was amazing. In the image to the left, taken at the tea house, the expression on Emily's face clearly explains her opinion of the ginger-soaked sugared olives she so bravely tried. Jaime was clearly less interested in the tea.

The drive back to the hotel took longer than expected because some workers had staged an impromptu (and illegal) demonstration, and had blocked off one of the main streets. The solution for the inconvenienced drivers was simple ... throw it in reverse and drive until you can find a place to do a sharp U-turn, and then drive the wrong way on your own side of the divided road until you reach a good place to turn off. Six lanes, 3 on each side of the centre median, all driving the same direction. And no one stressed in the least. And it actually gave us an opportunity to see what some of the off-the-beaten-path neighbourhoods are like. The gap between the rich and the poor, or even between the poor and the poorer, is quite stark.

Back at the hotel, we took Jaime for another swim. The pool waters were a bit chilly today, so we didn't stay long. David and Jaime went to bed early (8 pm !), while Emily watched The Voyage of the Dawn Treader on the mini DVD player and Melissa went out to the town square to snap some shots of the night-life. Buildings are lit up with neon signs and huge TVs. Note the KFC logo in the middle of the picture :) The streets are always crowded, even in the evenings, sort of like downtown Ottawa on Canada Day. Oh, and the horns ... the switch for the horns is mounted on the gear shifter, so you can constantly honk without even moving your hand from the shifter ! It's 5:39 am right now as I type, and I can hear the non-stop honking below. The horn is not an indication of annoyance, like it is in Canada; it's a completely unemotional "I'm over here", or "you shouldn't be there" signal. Quite considerate, actually.

On Day 6 we will be saying goodbye to Jaime's hometown of Chongqing and will be heading back to Beijing. We figure the two hour flight will be a test run for Jaime for the 13 hour version later in the week :) Stay tuned !

News from China, Day 4 - Zoo

2007-09-12T18:31:00.000-04:00

Today, we took Jaime on a trip to the Chongqing Zoo, famous for its pandas and tigers, which is right in the middle of the city. The entrance leads you onto a walkway which is lined with massive, leaning bamboo trees which create an archway through the zoo. The giant panda graciously roused herself from her nap, walked over to her bench and sat up for the photo-shoot.

After picking up some souvenirs, we took the bus to the Fine Arts gallery, which is attached to a massive amphitheatre, supposedly one of the top 3 most famous architectural sites in China. Paintings which were made by professors at the local Fine Arts University were on sale.

We headed back to the hotel, and David spent the rest of the day in bed, sick with traveller's diarrhea and stomach cramps. Fortunately, it passed fairly quickly, and he seems fairly normal today. His sleep was only interrupted by a strange yelling right outside his window ... who could be yelling outside the 30th floor of a downtown hotel which doesn't have any balconies ? A window cleaner suspended hundreds of feet in the air in a tarp, that's who. He was shouting directions to the guys on the roof, who were swinging him around.

Jaime is getting more and more comfortable. Lately, she's started crawling all around the hotel room - previously she stayed more or less in one spot, now she explores the whole room. And her voice ... she's found her voice. We guess she was still feeling a bit shy before, but not any more ... now she yells and shouts at the top of her lungs from excitement, with a huge grin on her face. She was very vocal at dinner, and entertained all the other guests. She also went for her first swim with Melissa and Emily in the hotel pool, and she loved it. She was kicking and splashing around in the water while Emily practised her underwater handstands.

Tomorrow we go on another bus ride, stay tuned !

News from China, Day 3 - She's officially ours

2007-09-11T18:34:00.000-04:00

Today was a day of paperwork (Chinese: paperworks) mixing with adventures in parenting a new baby. The day started early, with the usual jet-lag waking us up, fully rested, around 5:30 am.

The day started off with her first bath with us. Emily got in her swimsuit, hopped in the tub, and held onto Jaime while Melissa bathed her and David wrote yesterday's blog post. She seems to love the water ... totally comfortable with it, splashing around and smiling. We will probably take her swimming in the hotel pool today, since she watched David and Emily swim yesterday with much interest and enthusiasm.

The bath was followed by breakfast in the hotel restaurant, where we enjoyed a Western-style breakfast buffet. Jaime ate lots of different things ... some rice congee (watery porridge), muffin, omelet, and some croissant. She was really happy sitting in the high chair with her favourite crab rattle, which was the very first toy we handed her seconds after we got her (Emily handed it to her, actually), and has now become her constant companion.

Our first appointment was in one of the hotel conference rooms, where we filled out paperwork and scrutinized documents. One mistake on some of these, and Jaime stays in China ! So we poured over them intently with a fine-toothed comb. The official "signing" pen was a brand-new Peanuts "Snoopy" gel-pen, which will remain in the family for years to come (or until the gel runs out, whichever comes first).

Next, we spent some time in a bank across a busy street from the hotel, changing $US into Yuen, which we'd need for the orphanage donation later in the day. Apparently the US dollar is like a second-rate currency around here now ... the rates changed twice the day before, and they'll only change so much money for people per day. We haven't been keeping up on the news, but maybe fears of economic stalling in the US are weakening its value worldwide? And the process of changing money, like most processes here in China, is ridiculously labour-intensive! Filling out paperwork, stamping, phone calls back and forth, more stamping, more paperwork ... perhaps in a country where man-power is the least restricted of your resources, labour-intensive processes aren't much of a problem?

The meeting to finalize the adoption took place at the Registration Centre of the Chongqing Marriage and Adoption department, the huge looming building from yesterday. A family picture (parents + adopted child) was taken in the "red" photo studio (apparently not just for weddings), to put on the documents. The gift to the orphange, which had been wired to their account earlier at the bank, was now receipted. The orphanage Director was there again, to answer any more questions, say a last goodbye to the babies, and to receive the gifts for the orphanage staff. We handed over a big bag of Robeez baby slippers, which the company generously donated to Melissa to pass on to the children in the orphanage. We also gave gifts of ginseng and body lotion for the orphanage staff.

Then, the final step ... fingerprinting. Our fingerprints, as well as Jaime's, had to been taken in red ink to be put over our signatures on the official adoption documents. Jaime's fingerprints were, well ... more of a full-fingered smudge ... but close enough anyway. Emily snapped pictures as she was the only one with ink-free hands at this point!

Then, weary from all the errands, we headed back to the hotel. The realization slowly sank in ... she was ours. She is ours. She belongs with us now, we have solemnly sworn to care for her and to never abandon her, and she has become our daughter. Jaime Fu-dieh A. :)

The response from the Chinese people has been overwhelmingly positive. People stare when we walk by, and the more outgoing ones wade across the cultural barrier and start talking to us about Jaime. Invariably people talk about how beautiful she is, and comment on the symmetry between the two beautiful daughters. At least, that's our guess as to what they're saying :) We've handed out some Canadian souvenirs; a rubber key-chain flag, a snazzy pen, etc.

Jaime's doing really well. She's more relaxed around us, she smiles more often, and she's even making sounds sometimes. She's got a bit of a cold, so she coughs periodically and has a bit of a rattle to her breathing. A couple of the other babies have it too. She's a good size, she'll be moving straight into her 18 month sized clothing when we get back.

Thanks to everyone for the comments ... the emotional reality of sharing this precious moment with friends around the world is huge. Stay tuned, we'll keep posting pictures !

News from China, Day 2 - Gotcha !

2007-09-10T18:58:00.000-04:00

Gotcha Day ! It was amazing, we were so exhausted afterwards, but was it ever an incredible time. Let me tell the story. We're blogging blind here for some reason, we can get into the blogger dashboard to create posts, but not our URL (welcomehomelittleone) to actually inspect the results.

There was a nervous, almost holy silence on the bus on the way to the municipal building. People talked quietly, or not at all, as we all desperately tried to hoist in the significance of this bus ride. Many fought back tears from the emotional intensity. And then wham, almost too quickly, we were there, at a towering downtown building, taking elevators to the 14th floor, and we found ourselves waiting in a large room with some low furniture and mirrors everywhere. A long desk separated us from the half a dozen employees, who sat at desks and typed at computers. Through a red-beaded curtain at the far end of this waiting room we could see a bizarre photo studio which we assumed was for newly married couples, since this government office covers marriages as well as adoptions. The 20-minute wait seemed to crawl by, as we learned that the babies had not yet arrived from their seven-hour journey from the orphanage. The air was hot and still and humid.

All of a sudden, with no warning, a train of nannies carrying babies all wearing matching outfits, came in from behind us, from the very elevators we had just taken, and walked right through the group into another room, separated from us by a glass wall. People gasped, rushed for their cameras, and a paparazzi-style storm of eager parents and entourage followed the babies' progress into the other room. Melissa immediately picked out Jaime as she whizzed by ... so much bigger than we had imagined ... so much more hair ... yet those same sparkling eyes.

The Orphanage Director spoke rapidly with Yulin, and a list emerged and all of a sudden they were calling "Aitken, David and Melissa." The crowd parted and we stepped through the door into the other room, cameras flashing and expectant moms beginning to cry behind us. The Director inspected David's passport, declared him to be the right guy, and immediately a nanny handed Jaime into his arms.

She was so quiet, lips closed, looking around, clutching tightly to her only possession ... the little picture book of the family that we had sent ahead several weeks previously. It looked well-used, in a baby way of speaking, which means well-chewed-on and well-drooled-on. She looked around at the people, as Melissa and Emily crowded in to get a look at her. She was cautious ... not crying or fussing at all, just looking around and taking it all in. Guarded, but not scared.

The rest of the families' babies were quickly handed over in a similar way ... too much of a blur right now for us to remember, although no doubt burned brightly into their memories the same way our moment was. We played with our babies, compared their hair styles and mosquito bites, comforted those that fussed and played with those that were warming up, trying to help them reach a comfortable temperature in the steaming room. The orphanage Director showed us how they could crawl, sit up, even walk with both hands held. The room was full of excitement and happiness. Two families were told that their babies had still not arrived, as they were coming from a different orphanage, and they had to wait in tortured and fidgety silence for another hour or more until theirs arrived.

Jaime fell asleep on Melissa on the bus ride back, as Emily did on David, as David did on the window of the bus. Everyone was exhausted, not only from jet-lag and a bare minimum of sleep over the past two days, but also from the emotional intensity of the afternoon. We took her out for a walk around a busy Chongqing downtown square, with the locals staring as much at David with Jaime in the hip-carrier as at Emily's blondish hair. Our card with "this is our adopted daughter" in Chinese, laminated over a Canadian flag, came in very handy, invariably producing enthusiastic "thumbs-up" from the readers.

She slept soundly last night, has been enjoying her bottles, and generally warming up to the family. She opens her mouth more now, and we can see at least eight sparkling white teeth. She's sitting on the floor now with Emily, who's enjoying introducing her to all her new toys and clothes. We'll keep you updated over the coming days, but for now, you can rejoice with us that we finally have our new little daughter !

News from China, Day 1 - We're here !

2007-09-09T10:08:00.001-04:00

Well, we made it ! To the left is a shot of us just before we got on the first plane. That was a short one, but the next flight was LOOOOOOOOOOOONG ... Emily watched some movies, and had a little neighbour peeking over the chairs to watch too. She slept probably 4 hours, I slept for probably a total of 2, and Melissa barely slept. Her inner ear must be weirded-up, because she still feels like she's faintly moving.

Beijing is crazy ... construction everywhere. Loads and loads of buildings going up for the Olympics. We ate at a restaurant called "by the lake" ... it was a feast, came to $8.39 per adult, including drinks, tip, taxes if there were any. And we ate like kings ... the dishes kept coming, we were stuffed and they had to take stuff back ! And apparently, that was EXPENSIVE ! Yesterday's crowd said dinner cost half that.

Well, it's hard to believe that tomorrow we get Jaime ! It'll be an early morning (4:30 wake-up), so I'd better get to bed ! More news, of the really exciting kind, tomorrow !

Orphan Charity

2007-09-06T20:33:00.000-04:00

The picture to the left (and it's really there now) has nothing to do with this post, it's just a cool picture. And it seems to me to be a great metaphor for what it means to have brothers and sisters ... poor Caleb can barely see out from the massive group hug, and yet you can tell his eyes are sparkling. Although she doesn't know it yet, Jaime belongs in this picture, and she'll be in one just like it very soon.

Tonight while we were putting the kids to bed, a telemarketer called; ironically, from a charity which saves orphans and other children from hopeless futures in foreign countries. Apparently we've supported them in the past (although don't they all say that ?) and they were hoping for our support again. Well, I certainly believe in the cause ! But we're working for the cause in a very different way :) I initially said no without explanation, but after the woman politely and gently persisted, I decided to level with her. The reason I said no, I explained, was because the day after tomorrow we're actually flying to China ourselves, to adopt one of these very orphans you're talking about. I'm totally serious, I explained, I'm not joking. I don't think she believed me though ... probably thinking yeah right, not the first time I've heard that excuse tonight ... which sort of makes me smile. What can I say - I really was telling the truth.

Departure time is getting closer ...

The earliest picture of Jaime !

2007-08-30T21:05:00.000-04:00

This is kind of cool ... a really early baby picture of Jaime ! It's something you wouldn't think of, but most people have seen baby pictures of themselves when they were first born ... not necessarily so with adopted kids. Our earliest picture of her before this was at six months ... but now, we have one of her which was taken when she was only a few weeks old.

I think she looks a little sleepy in the picture :)

How did we get it ? We hired a research guy (Brian Stuy) to go through the Chongqing newspapers and find Jaime's finding ad. For those unfamiliar with the concept, a "finding ad" is an ads that the orphanage runs in the newspaper when a baby is brought in, just in the off chance that the baby's parents might really be looking for her. Jaime's finding ad is shown below; sorry for the low-res picture, but I want to respect Brian's copyright.

Care Package for Jaime

2007-07-31T08:40:00.000-04:00

We have made a small care package up for Jaime that she will get sometime next week. Our agency coordinators are taking a group to China to get their children on Saturday and she said we could send a small box of baby gifts and she will mail it directly to Jaime's orphanage while she's in China. So here's a list of things we sent... a disposable camera (so the orphanage nannies can snap some pictures of her that they will give back to us for developing), a taggies blanket (thanks Catherine), a plush toy duckie rattle, teething keys, and a photo album containing pictures of all her new family members. We have been counting down the weeks until we travel... five more Saturdays to get through and then we leave!!

Fu Die, or Fudie, or Fu Tieh, or Fu-dieh, or what ?

2007-07-13T21:47:00.000-04:00

David's been trying to figure out what her middle name is going to be. Or, more precisely, how to spell it so that the average Joe Canadian gets it sort of right. The way it was translated on her dossier ("Fu Die") lends itself to being pronounced it like the English word "die", which is a little odd to have in your name. We certainly started saying it that way when we first read it, so likely everyone else will too. The way it's really pronounced in Mandarin is actually closer to "dieh", or maybe even "tieh", or maybe a combination of the two ("dtieh").

阳 = yáng (listen here)

福 = fú (listen here)

蝶 = dié (listen here)

David even consulted his Taiwanese friend from work who speaks Mandarin, who in turn consulted her mother and a phonetic dictionary. Listen here to how she says it. The phonetic dictionary she consulted actually translates 蝶 as "tieh", compared to the "die" in Pinyin. [Aside : for those unfamiliar with Pinyin, it's a standardized way of "romanizing" Chinese characters, ie translating them into the Latin alphabet. It's sort of phonetic but not really.]

Anyway, I'm sure you're less interested in the process and more with the conclusion ... after much discussion, we decided that we will make her middle name "Fu-dieh". Jaime Fu-dieh. Sounds kind of nice :)

Setting up the crib

2007-07-13T21:31:00.000-04:00

Well, the whole family pitched in tonight and helped get Jaime's room ready. Jared showed his prowess on the screwdriver in putting the crib together, Emily did the heavy lifting of the mattress, and Caleb brought up the basket of baby toys and picked out a ball she's bound to love.

It's mind-boggling to think of the happy and excited preparations that are being made for her, of which she is completely unaware.

10,000 hits

2007-07-11T18:36:00.000-04:00

Wow, it's hard to believe, but since we posted the news about Jaime, we've had over 10,000 hits on this page ! We're happy to have as many people as possible celebrate her with us; hope you keep checking back as we get closer to bringing her home !

Judge for yourselves

2007-07-10T21:10:00.001-04:00

No, these aren't both Jaime ... the one on the right is a baby picture of Melissa (circa mid-1970s). Part of the application included sending current pictures of both the parents, ostensibly for the purpose of using similarity in visual features as one of the many matching criteria. (The Chinese government didn't have this picture, but we dug it up to see if there was any similarity.) I'm not sure quite how that all works; it seems pretty subjective to me ... but who knows, maybe they've got fancy CSI-calibre pattern recognition software :) Anyway, judge for yourselves ... did Melissa look anything like Jaime at her age ?

Her name will be Jaime

2007-07-09T22:30:00.000-04:00

Well, we've decided ... Yang Fu Die will join our family as Jaime ! It's pronounced like "Jamie", but spelled like French for "I Love" (j'aime). We're going to keep Fu Die as her middle name, but Canadianize by making it into one name (something like Fudie, we'll work on the actual spelling of that once we figure out how it's supposed to be pronounced). Apparently, from her file, the staff at the orphanage gave her the name (which means Fu = Lucky, Die = Butterfly) because they wanted her to be "as beautiful as a butterfly, and have a happy life." We echo their blessing on her !

Here she is !!!

2007-07-07T23:55:00.000-04:00

We just got in from seeing the Transformers movie with some good friends, checked our email, and saw that our agency had emailed us her pictures ! She's awesome, we even think she looks like Melissa (sort of). Her Chinese name is Yang Fu Die, and she was born October 28, 2006. We're so excited - we'll have to show the kids in the morning when they wake up (since it's midnight) !

Unbelievable news !!

2007-07-07T18:27:00.000-04:00

We just got news that we'll be traveling to Chóngqìng, which is in Sìchuān province ! That's spice-land ! We don't know anything more at this point, but we assume that this means our child will be a spicy girl ... since David was hoping that of all places to go in China, Sìchuān would be the best, this seems like unbelievable news ! Stay tuned as we should get her picture in a day or two ...

It's official...

2007-07-06T14:13:00.000-04:00

The CCAA has updated their site and they have matched families up until Nov. 14/05. They don't normally update the site unless the referrals have been sent out. So we wait a little longer. Perhaps we will get the call on Monday but I'm still hoping for this afternoon!! Thanks for checking back and all the well wishes in the comments, we appreciate them!!

The stork is in the air...

2007-07-05T20:25:00.001-04:00

We have heard that people on the West coast have received "the call" from their agencies. We expect the East coast and Canada to receive their referrals on Friday!!!I can't believe the wait is almost over. David and I are really excited. We can't wait to share our good news with you!!

The current family

2007-06-10T08:19:00.000-04:00

So, here is a picture of me with the kids at the Ottawa Tulip Festival last month. We take pictures of the kids every year in front of the tulips for their scrapbook albums. I was looking through our blog and wanted to add some personal pictures with colour, so here we are. Next year there will be a new family member in the picture with us, I can't wait!!!

Soooo close....

2007-06-10T07:46:00.000-04:00

Well, we missed the cut-off by 2 days. As you can see they matched families with a Log In Date of Nov. 7, 2005 and we are Nov. 9th. So, I think it is safe for us to say, we are next. We have held off on setting up the crib, because this past month there was a wide range of ages of children that were matched, some were boys and some were girls that could skip the crib and go right into a bed. I think we will wait until we get our referral for changing the rooms around. Some of the baby names that we like are Jaime, Jessica and Eden. We will likely keep one of her chinese names as her middle name and she will have our last name. We are getting really excited and can't wait for June to end. I know this month will fly by with school finishing in 2 1/2 weeks, soccer for all the kids and summer parties. So July will soon be upon us and we should get the call. So stay tuned and check back with us and we hope next time we can share some good news with you.

Rumours

2007-05-16T14:37:00.000-04:00

Here is the latest post from the Rumour Queen, she pools all the international adoption information and posts the goods for all of the anxious waiting parents. So here's what she wrote the other day...

I’ve got a lot of rumors, all of them pointing to a large batch this month, though none of them agree on a specific date.
I’m giving the “large batch” rumor an R3 at this point. I’m pretty sure we’re seeing it from at least four sources, one of which is a pretty reliable source and one of which I’ve never heard of (but googled to confirm they are legit). Some sources are North American and some are European.
Based on what the CCAA did last year the very best we’d hope they might do would take us to November 16th or 17th. Some are pointing to those days, some are taking us all the way to the very early 20’s and a few are back around the 14th or 15th.

Well, that is wonderful news for us. Our log in date is November 9th 2005, so it would be wonderful if it's finally our turn.

I spoke with our adoption agency the other day just to check in considering we are so close to being matched, and he said if it is our turn we should hear news at the end of this month. So we are half way through May, and watching the SENS is helping pass the time.

18 months

2007-05-09T14:10:00.000-04:00

Wow, I can't believe it. It's been 18 months since our paper work arrived in China. There is talk on the adoption rumour site that we should be next and should expect our referral sometime before June 4th, 2007. We can't wait!!!

We wait some more...

2007-05-02T22:08:00.000-04:00

Last month the CCAA matched 2 calendar days .... AARRGGHH!!!! We feel like we are close and yet still far away. Update: There is hope in sight, the first week of May and referrals arrived, hooray!! The CCAA has matched families who have a log in date of Nov 1st, 2005. That means we are only 8 days away from being matched. Our file has to be on someones desk in China and are deciding which little girl will join our family, what an awesome thought. Stay tuned because our next post should have a picture of our new daughter!

“An invisible red thread connects those destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or circumstance. The thread may stretch or tangle, but it will never break.” - Chinese Proverb

Another month goes by...

2007-03-10T09:22:00.000-05:00

Well, the CCAA updated their website and families have received referrals for their precious babies. We are so close, we are hoping that we are the next group to be matched. We are 15 days away and the CCAA has matched a 15 day span so we are counting on that! Some families from our travel group have spoken with our agency and they are hopeful that referrals should be here before April 4th. Wouldn't it be great to have her picture to share with family and friends over Easter! I'm also holding off on decorating the girls room because I don't want to set up a crib and find out that we were referred a 2 year old or something. So there will be a lot of organizing, shopping to do within the 6 weeks to travel. I went through all the clothes I've bought over the past 2 years and I have filled 2 dressers. She better get here soon because I'm running out of room. Hopefully the next post we will be announcing our daughter!!!

Getting EVEN closer ...

2007-02-02T20:32:00.000-05:00

The CCAA published their new date ... they've gotten up to Oct 13/05. Now, this means that they move about 17 days in a month. We still have 27 more days until our LID (Nov 9/05), so it's unlikely that we'll be in the next batch of referrals, but very likely we'll be in the batch after that.

Why are we doing this?

2007-01-11T17:03:00.000-05:00

We actually get this question alot. I have always had an interest in helping other children since our first child Emily was born, (she is now 8). My husband David and I attended an info session on fostering children, but the timing wasn't right with such a small one in the house so we put it on hold and had 2 more children...our boys - Jared (now 6) and Caleb (now 4). Then, in Dec 2004 I saw an interview with Lisa Ling on Oprah, yes, I said Oprah. It was an expose on China, their culture and adoption. I taped it and had David watch it later that day, and that's when the seed was planted. Over the next couple of months we talked, searched ourselves, prayed to see if this was right for our family. So, we started to find an adoption agency, social worker and all the other stuff required to do and our paperwork was sent to China Oct/05 and we have our Log In Date (LID) of November 9, 2005. It has been a long road, but there is a beautiful baby girl waiting for us to be her forever family. People say, oh she is so lucky to have you as parents ... in fact, the reality of the situation is that it will be US that are the lucky ones to have a beautiful little girl added to our lives !

Getting closer ...

2007-01-04T21:08:00.000-05:00

Evidence that we're getting closer ... according to this, they've made it to Sept 27th ... which puts them 43 days away from matching our file !

The China ultrasound

2006-11-11T09:21:00.000-05:00

This picture seems to pop up on everyone's blog ... so it doesn't seem right to omit it from ours. Whoever did this up has a real creative streak ...

Waiting seems to take forever ...

2006-11-11T09:15:00.000-05:00

Waiting seems to take forever ... but we're waiting. We started this process in March/05, and our application was logged-in with the Chinese government in Nov/05. It's been a year ... and so far, the estimates are that we'll be travelling to China in March/06.

We have three bio-kids, aged 8/6/4, and we've asked for a little baby girl as young as possible (which means probably somewhere around 10 months). We love kids, and so we're doing two great things at once ... building a bigger family, and giving a home to a little girl who doesn't have one.

Stay tuned for updates as we get them ...