Consulate Appointment.......

We had to wake Olivia this morning to go eat breakfast and get to our appointment on time, she was such a joy, so happy with lots of smiles.......until......she was dumping salmon congee (which she had been eating and liking) into her lap.  We took her toy food away, and yes, we had our first 3 year old pouting.  I wish I had taken a picture of how far she stuck that bottom lip out, it was quite funny......  

So our entire 2 weeks is based around when our Consulate appointment is.  I was expecting tears and, for it to be this really neat thing...........didn't happen......We went into a room, listened to a lady behind a window explain some things, then all 20 something families stood up together to take an oath (the lady was still behind the window and we were repeating what she said).  We were the first family to be called up to the window afterwards, which was nice, "White" is always last.  A different lady looked over all our documents gave a few back to me, and said, ok Congratulations!  That was it.......

Luckily, it took less than an hour!  

We got back to the room about 9:45 and thought Olivia was tired and would take a nap but instead she was playful and happy.  We went to the back of the hotel and got some beautiful pictures of her in her Chinese silk dress, then we went to lunch.  

After lunch her and I both took a good nap!  

 She was looking at herself in the mirror.

Found these in our closet........You know......Just in case......

 Olivia would feed the fish a cracker and then take a bite for herself....

A few pictures of our hotel.

A relaxing day.......

 Today was a nice relaxing day.  We went back to Shamian Island and did some more shopping with our friends and then had Thai for dinner at a restaurant named
Cow and Bridge.......
weird name, but yummy food!

Olivia was just adorable ALL day.  The smiles came before breakfast!  They have been coming earlier and earlier every day, she is so happy, so much fun, and such a blessing!
Here's a few pictures of our day.

 We decided to try the subway this time, instead of risking our lives with the taxi again.....

 Starbucks!!! ;-)

 Someone had just gotten married, and this was the car they were leaving in.......

Tomorrow we have our appointment at the U.S. Consulate.  This is the appointment to finalize the U.S. side of the adoption and to make her an official citizen of the United States when our plane lands Saturday evening! Soon we will be home, a family of 6!!!

Another Amazing day........

Another GREAT day!  We started today with breakfast (as we do everyday, I don't think I've mentioned the amazing breakfast buffets here, and to all my nightshift girls, the coffee is actually a little strong for me), then we went shopping with Ann!  Ann has a business here, sending care packages to your child and/or orphanage.  We ordered 2 care packages through her, one was how we got the photos of Olivia with the ginormous "Birthday" cake.  You can also hire her for about $10/hr to take you shopping.  She knows where to go to get the authentic (real) silk, jade, and pearls for CHEAP!  We were with her for about 3 1/2 hours, actually running after her to keep up......There were four of us adults, all tall with long legs and Ann is probably about 5 ft, maybe less!  We got some really good deals!! I feel a little stupid however, we went to the Jade factory in Beijing and bought something for $28, that was less than $5 today, and these things are real and good quality, they just jack the prices up!  After our fun shopping excercise, we went back to Shamian Island to get a few things we didn't see with Ann, and boy did we feel the effects.  The shop keepers would barely budge on their prices.......:-(  

We were again having a hard time getting a taxi back to the hotel, until a man in a van pulled over and said he would take us for  100RMB (about $15).  This was a bit expensive, since last night was only 24-30 RMB ($4-5), so we tried again to bargain and agreed on 80RMB. Our friends that were with us really needed to get back to the hotel so we decided to pay the extra money.  Well once we were in the van we all felt a little uncomfortable.  The seat I and our friend S was sitting on was not bolted into the floor, so everytime he slammed on the brakes (which is often in China) we, plus the seat went forward......Mike was sitting in the back with Olivia and he was lower than the rest of us and you could see the daylight around the back door.  I was getting a little nervous that we'd hit a bump in the road and he would go flying out the back.....It was actually quite funny.  I was laughing so hard, I was crying!  I thought I might as well laugh, rather than freak out......Another adventure!!

Once we were back at the hotel, we hung out in the room for a little bit, then went to eat Italian with our friends in our group, that I have gotten to know well through our Facebook group.  Dinner was really yummy, I got pasta, and Mike got a fried pork chop that was the size of his plate!   

Before we went to eat Olivia really started to liven up and PLAY.  She was crawling around on the floor and playing with her toys and ME.  It is so neat to see her come out of her shell a little more each day. As we walked back to the hotel after dinner she was getting very tired, so we thought she would go to sleep pretty early.  Well after her bath (which is getting a little better, she only screamed through 3/4 of it tonight....) she started playing.  We were sitting on the bed and she was playing with a brush and with me.  It was adorable.  She was up til about 10pm tonight just laughing and playing, we had to make her calm down to go to sleep.  She loves to play games with us.  When we take something of hers, she laughs and says something like "Wu da", which we think means "mine".  Then tonight we asked her where her koala bear was (in English) and she got down out of my lap, crawled right over to the koala bear, got it, and brought it back to us!  

Told ya she is smart!!! ;-)

 Silly girl! Like what she did with her head band??? :-)

 I bought lots of authentic, silk, Chinese dresses for her as she grows up!  Can't wait to put one on her in the next few days!!

 Our taxi driver (with Ann, not the scary one) got a ticket.  That was a little scary too, he was arguing so much with the police man that the police man was yelling at him to be quiet (I think) and another policeman came over and got right in front of the van, so he couldn't move.....

 This is the pedestrian street, it was a bit crowded.......

 Pearls, pearls, and more pearls........and this was 1 of about 50 shops like this......

 Our "scary" taxi ride.......

Thanking God for another amazing day!!!

Happy girl!! :-)

Today was another GREAT day!  We had LOTS of smiles!  She's still not very happy when we come in to the hotel, but while out today, we went from having the most quiet baby to the loudest baby!  
We started the day at the Six Banyan Temple, a Buddhist temple that is from the 7th century.  It has been rebuilt, our guide Elvin said that many times if the Emperor did not believe in Buddhism, he would have all the temples torn down.  They also use to allow people to climb to the top of it, but they have stopped allowing it because someone jumped off.  
After lunch, of noodles in the room, we went to Shamian Island.  Shamian Island is such a wonderful place.  It was first settled by the British, so the buildings are just beautiful.  It also use to be where everyone stayed when adopting, at the White Swan Hotel.  Now the hotel is being renovated and so it is completely closed.  The island was beautiful and such a nice place to walk around and just enjoy.  There were some shops, I have heard many have had to close since the hotel is not open, they have lost a lot of business, there were many models, and we saw someone dressed up and being filmed......We had dinner at Lucy's, they serve American food!!  Mike got his hamburger, not sure what the meat was because it didn't look like beef, but he didn't seem to care.....We ended up waiting FOREVER for a taxi to get back to the hotel, once it came, we crammed 4 adults, 3 kids, and 3 strollers in, once again had another fun adventure with our new friends from our travel group.  Last night was interesting as well, trying to get back to the hotel, walking up and down stairs with 3 strollers.  Lots of good memories!! So, as all my BTDT adoptive mom's have said, Guangzhou is AMAZING!  We have really enjoyed it here, especially when we are missing home and the kids so much!

 One of my favorite pictures of the entire trip!

 She was moving so fast, I didn't get the pic focused.....oh well, she's still adorable!

6 of the 8 kids in our group.  How awesome is it that these beautiful children are no longer orphans!!!

 We went to a craft market and this lacy was handpainting ceramics.  It was beautiful!  Also, if you break something here, you have to buy it...........yes, I learned this the hard way.......luckily it wasn't one of the more expensive items.......

The notorious adoption photo!

 This is a church on the island that has service every Sunday!