Superbowl and Gotcha together on one day! What a cause to celebrate. And i know how around 6pm today...
All kidding aside, this marks the two year anniversary of the day our life changed forever. Alot has changed in two years and for the better. We have gone from Hailey not sleeping to Hailey sleeping in. Hailey has gone from not even crawling at 1 to a Gymnastics star. She has learned a new language and sadly, probably forgotten the one she could understand. She has gone from having a team of nannies serve her every whim to having mommy, daddy and Grandma do that. She came with only the pyjamas on her back to having amassed what amounts to a full blown toys r us store and clothing chain. She has grown from a peanut to... well... still a peanut (maybe not that much has changed afterall)
We are thankful every day for the gift god has given us in Hailey. She is more wonderful than we could have ever hoped. We are blessed. I have again added the post from two years ago as a reminder of that crazy, amazing day. enjoy!
It is 9:30pm and i am sitting in the business center of our new hotel in Guangzhou. This is the most amazing day of our lives! We finally have our little girl. It has been such a special day for us. Just imagine delivering your baby at the exact same time as 20 of your friends in the same room after waiting for two years together... it was amazing!!
Let me start at the beginning... We all woke up by 2 am or didnt sleep last night. We had phone calls starting at 4am this morning throughout the rooms. Everybody was up and everyone was incredibly excited. We all packed last night and had our bags picked up so all that was left was our carry on and we forgot half the stuff we needed. We ate breakfast in the dark in the restaurant of the hotel in twenty minutes. The restaurant opened at 6am and we were leaving for the airport at 6:20am. On top of that, four families had just joined us so we had to catch up and wish each other well over a wolfed down breakfast anticipating that we would not eat again until late in the evening. We made our way to and through the airport and flew to Guangzhou landing at 12pm. Everyones bags made it (whew!), and we packed up and drove into the heart of Guangzhou to our hotel to freshen up and pick up the Chin family that were meeting us here after a few days in their first daughters province visiting. What a difference between Bejing and Guangzhou. Bejing with its wide avenues and orderly presentation. Guangzhou is quite old with its collection of high rise buildings- the highway, added later, winds through the buildings and you can almost reach out and touch peoples laundry hanging outside their windows. We arrived and in ten minutes, quickly reshuffled our bags and met to get back in the bus and head to the Civil Affairs office. We had a 2:30 appointment and the nannies had driven an hour from Foshan to meet us! We arrived at the office, went to the fifth floor, were shown to a boardroom style room where we waited. We did some small paperwork and reviewed the order in which the babies would be brought in. Of course the babies were brought in completely out of order and everyone was surprised to find out as their baby was brought in. We had arranged with Donna and Avery to be film buddies and not let the special moment go untaped. And thank goodness. We waited patiently only to have our baby brought last. Cute baby after cute baby brought in, we hoped they wouldnt run out! (ha ha) And saving the best for last, our little cutie finally arrived. Poor little Hailey had thrown up on the bus from Foshan and was not feeling well. On top of that we found out that she does not like loudness and she completely shut down. She was handed to Alex by the nanny and cuddled up close. What a great moment, what a wait for that great moment. It was so worth it. And to my surprise, our friends were all at the ready with cameras flashing capturing the moment with photo and video. And where do you ask are these special photos? Well, you will have to wait a little longer unless Deb posted our photo on her blog. The computer here does not accept my camera so i am unable to upload. Sorry guys, my storry will have to do for now. We had a chance to ask the nanny some questions with the help of our terrific guide Shirly and found out that her nickname is "Man, Man" which we understood to be quite common before travelling and had expected. We found out that she is quite attached to one of the nannies- that we didnt meet but hope to meet later at our visit to the orphanage. We paid our donations without incident and had to get moving quickly back to the hotel. We arrived back at the hotel and changed rooms to get one with a bath. The rooms here are incredible, spacious and modern. They wheeled in our crib and all is right with the world. I ordered some Congee from Room Service to make the bottle and then had to go back down to complete some paperwork while Alex fed the first bottle. Hailey wolfed it down and then cuddled in and fell into sleep. We ordered some room service food and finally ate for the first time since 6am at 8:30pm. We then woke Hailey up to feed her last bottle, which she sucked back in like 3 minutes flat. I left her and mommy falling asleep on the bed to come down and write this blog.
Favourite moments of the day: First time holding and snuggling her. She does this ET thing where she pokes a fingertip at the end of one of my fingertips and presses hard to see who will win- she is strong. She started waving to me soon after we arrived at the room with one hand.
We are back off to the Civil Affairs office first thing tomorrow to fill in more paperwork and then off to a local supermarket to pick up more formula, strollers, and other necessities. Everybody is so great and helpful both in Bejing and Guangzhou. We are really like sheep following the pack. They make everything so easy and answer the dumbest questions with seriousness.
Alex and i are in love again (not with each other of course) and we are walking on a cloud. Sorry again about the photos. She does look very much like the referral photos, only larger. She actually is a little porker, we dont expect some of our 6-12 month stuff to fit, she is bigger than we thought and has a little chubba. She is so sweet and terrific, i could go on and on, but i should probably go back up as i miss her already.
We wish we could come home right away, but are looking forward to exploring parenthood here and seeing more of the city that she might have called home, or might in the future.
We miss you all and we love checking the blog. I was blown away to see 15 posts today! Thanks for the love and support. Love Jason & Alex. (ma ma, and ba ba)
