Monday, April 20th – Adoption Day and Happy Birthday Brynlee!

Monday we had to be ready by 8:45 to go to Civil Affairs office which is where the official adoption takes place.  Bennett is very pensive each time we go somewhere. He is pretty active in the room, but each time we are leaving he gets quiet and looks around and you can see the wheels turning in his head.  Hmmm… I wonder where we are going this time.  Am I going to get left with someone else now? Or who knows. He’s definitely thinking.

We took a small bus/large van and 3 of the families rode together. All four families were there and we were the second family to go into the ‘adoption’ room.  When we went in and they asked questions like, “Why do you want to adopt a Chinese child?” and “What is your plan for his life?”. Then they asked us to promise that we will never abandon or abuse our child. This was similar to what I have done with my other kids.  I signed a bunch more papers with my signature and with my thumb print. They had JunJun sign with his hand print and then they told me, “Ok, adoption is done. He is yours now.” This took about 20 minutes. So the moment I’d been working towards for almost a year had finally arrived.   He is now officially my son.  Yaaaayyy!

Waiting to be adopted. 

(I've got an 11 year old photographer 

and she knows who the most important subject is. :)  

We waited for the other families to go through the same process. 

He's my son!

When they were all done, we went to the notary office. We had our picture taken again. I’m not sure what this picture was for, but by this time I was so sweaty and hot and my hair I’m sure was a mess, that I’m sure the picture was awful.  Plus Bennett was fussing and not wanting to sit for a picture. Oh, well. 

After we were all done with this process our driver took us to Walmart to do some shopping if we needed.  So we picked up a few things, some soups and drinks and diapers and other essentials.  I didn’t realize it was Walmart so I didn’t take a picture.  After that we were free for the raminder of the day.

For the most part JunJun is a very happy little guy. :) He's been doing great. He has packed his backpack, put his jacket on and gotten us all our shoes a few times. Like ok - I'm ready to go, but when we got back from our last appointment of the day on Monday he was so happy when we got into our room. He ran in and laughed and laughed and just jumped around the room!

Happy Adoption Day, Bennett! I do promise that I will love you forever and will not abuse or ever abandon you.  You are mine to love and cherish forever and ever! Welcome to our family!

Today was also special for another reason.  This is the day that my sweet Brynlee turned 11! When we went down for breakfast and were seated at the table they brought Brynlee a big bowl of noodle soup.  It is a Chinese traditional thing to do. It means to have a long life.

When we were on our way back to our room from breakfast, the staff came running after us and brought us a cake for Brynlee for her birthday too.  So special.

What a beautiful cake!

Happy Birthday to you!!

Brynlee cutting up her cake.

Here he is watching Brynlee cutting up the cake and he's so sad looking.  

I'm wondering if he is thinking about the going away party where they had cake for him and 2 other children about a week before he left.

 Yummy!

This is a birthday I think Brynlee will not forget. She got to celebrate with some Chinese traditions and she got a new brother. What a day!

 Happy 11th Birthday sweet Brynlee!! I'm so happy you're my daughter!

Bennett Day!

The couple hours after our walk had to be the longest hours of my life. Well, since the last time I was waiting for a child anyway. But finally, the moment came that I had waited for for oh, so long.  The time had come to walk down to the room where we would meet Bennett.  Oh, the excitement and anticipation in the room as we watched all the families gathering in the room.  Each family probably a bit nervous and a lot excited. We waited and watched and finally Bennett walked in - at 3:22 pm on Sunday afternoon, April 19^th, 2015. 

He was quite scared when they brought him in but you could tell that they had shown him my pictures as he seemed to 'know' me. He didn't want to come too close though, until I brought out a truck and the fish crackers.  Then he warmed up a bit. We played trucks and I fed him fish crackers and water as we did a bit of bonding.  Then I had a few papers we had to sign.

Although we get to take our child with us the day we meet them, we don’t officially adopt them until the next day. We are given a period of time to make sure that we really want to adopt this child.  Because he was not officially mine I had to have permission from the orphanage to have him in my care until the next day.  So we signed papers and we were free to go to our room for a bit.

The crackers were a big hit. And they ran out about the time we were leaving the room.  I asked the guide to tell him I will get him more crackers and he decided he could follow us. When we got to the room, he got his crackers and filled his little arms with as many toys as he could and turned around to go for the door.  Poor little guy.

We had a bit of time in the room and then had a few more adoption related things to do so we left for a bit. He was pretty pensive and looking around, like where are we going and what’s happening to me as we are driving around.  When we got back he was still a bit scared at first. Then he warmed up and played with his toys and ran around the room. He looked in everything, picked up everything from the floor and put it away in cupboards, closets, or suitcases. We had a lot of fun and he was pretty happy by night time. 

When it came time to go to sleep he was so sad that first night. He didn’t want to go in the crib and didn’t want to lie down on the bed. I rocked him in my arms and sang to him for a long time and then lay down on the bed with him and held him in my arms.  He cried so hard for about 2 minutes then relaxed and fell asleep after a bit.  And so that was our first Bennett day.

Getting to the Hotel

So, Sunday morning our guide, Maggie met us at the train station.  She right away, said, “Oh Kristin, I was so worried about you! I didn’t know what happened to you.  Your plane didn’t come and I didn’t know what to do.” She waited for about 4 hours for us to get there.  There was no announcement that the flight had been diverted. She said she didn’t dare leave because if the flight was just delayed and I got there I wouldn’t know what to do. She couldn’t get ahold of anyone either to ask so she waited as long as she could and then she finally left. I felt so bad for her and the driver.

We got to the hotel and checked in and it was still morning.  I was so glad that I had decided to take the train instead of waiting.  Brynlee and I sorted the suitcases and organized everything so that we could find things when we needed them.  As I was busy doing some things Brynlee fell asleep. I then decided I would take a short nap.  I napped about four hours and then got up and got Brynlee up.  When she got up she told me she had slept for 7 hours! Oops! We ate and got a few things ready for the very exciting next day, and then it was time to go to bed.  We both had a very hard time sleeping that night.  Brynlee especially so.  I think she was awake most of the night. 

We finally got up and got a few things organized for the very important Bennett moment and then went to breakfast.  Now breakfast is one of the best parts of staying at a hotel here. The have the most amazing breakfast buffets!  They have the most incredible assortment of foods you could imagine. They have a huge array of Chinese types of foods and an astonishing number of ‘American’ type foods too.  I think my favorites are the puff pastries and the yogurt. The yogurt is nothing like I’ve seen or had anywhere else. It’s drinkable and SO good!  I wish I could get it at home.

We knew that Bennett would be coming at around 3:30 and that he would be coming to the hotel. So we went and found out where he would be coming to make sure we would know where to go for the very important and oh so exciting meeting.

Then we decided we would go for a walk.  There’s a lake right outside the front of the hotel and there is a wooden walking path along the lake.  Our guide said that it takes about 40 minutes to walk around it.  We weren’t sure at first if we would walk around it, or just go see the lake.  Then we decided we would do the walk around the lake.  Well we walked and walked and walked, long past 40 minutes.  It was so humid out there!  Well we made it around and it took us about an hour and a half and we weren’t walking slowly.  We decided she must have meant that it takes 40 minutes on a motorcycle. :)  It sure was a beautiful walk.

On our way to our  walk. We are on the 12th floor. 

This is from by the elevators, but we see same view from our window.

 Our hotel above and below.

 These 2 are for Willem. :)

 In the above, there was a concert going on. 

The cutest little lady was directing it. 

When we got back from our walk we were so hot!  We showered and got ready for the moment we’ve all been waiting for, for nearly a year.

I suppose I shouldn't post this. :)

This is how hot we were! 

Good thing my smart daughter reminded me that we should take water!

Next post ~ Bennett time!