Maria's "Gotcha" Family Day!!

11.17.2010

Guess what time we woke up at… 3:45am… I guess we do have some jet lag… Of course neither of us could or wanted to go back to sleep! So we got up! At 6:30 we were down for breakfast, since we skipped dinner last night and were so hungry!! I forgot to tell about the breakfast yesterday!!! They have everything in there! Chinese veggies, noodles, fried rice, as well as pancakes and boiled eggs, breads, health salads, fruit and you can have them make an omelet right there while you wait. Some interesting things we tried were marinated kidney beans (I think they were marinated in tea?), and a sprouted bean salad… weird stuff… but not too bad! Today they hard marinated hard-boiled egg, preserved hard-boiled egg, and salted… I couldn’t make myself do the preserved egg… it was a black yolk and a clear-ish red brown “white.” Nope couldn’t eat it… The marinated one was ok… but the salted one… nasty…

We left a couple of our bags with the concierge desk (on our way to breakfast) until we come back tomorrow. we gathered the rest of our stuff and met our new guide for our trip to Tianjin! The new Train station is beautiful… forgot to take a picture though… if I remember tomorrow I can post it. The Train is called the Bullet. It is the fastest train in the world! So cool, very nice and comfortable.. and tickets were just about 15 bucks to Tianjin! Our new guide’s name is Belinda. She is sweet and friendly!

So we rode the train… blah blah blah… just kidding. The ride was fun and the countryside was nice to see. Lots of fields and lots of town! Tianjin is about 12 million people… The city taxis in Tianjin are light blue, and everyone off the train had to wait in a long line to get a taxi, but they have it down to a system! A whole bunch of taxis pull up… a bunch of people go running for cars and off they all go… then they do it again until all the people have rides! Haha!

So we drove through Tianjin… there is a lot of construction going on here! Goodness! We went to our hotel, checked in and unloaded all our extras. We took our Paperwork with us and our gifts, toys and snacks for baby… puffs! Remember those!?

Oh! Our hotel is the Golden Ocean. Its very nice!! We would stay her again... so far.

We then drove and drove. We entered a neighborhood and suddenly we were there! It was just there among the messy street and little vendors, parked cars, and mud puddles. Once we walked in the gate we could see that this place was very nice. Our guide told us it is one of the nicest in China! And I believe it! It was SOOO clean and decorated with murals on the concrete walls, there were trees down the lane with benches and statues of animals. When we got inside, it was cleaner yet inside! Well furnished and more beautiful murals on the ceilings. We went up to the second floor and into a small room. We talked a few minutes and signed some papers! Shocker, huh? Then we discussed the little girl that I wanted to visit. We decided to bring her in first, that way, we wouldn’t be juggling Maria and her. They told me that “Jordan” and Maria are good friends, they play together all the time. That Jordan is doing very well after her surgery, I told them about her family a bit, they are very excited for her to have a family! They love her, too. When they brought her in she was scared of us and started to cry… they quickly got some chocolate and unwrapped it and gave it to her. Haha! of course she is trying to chew on it… so she is drooling and they are trying to quickly wipe it off of her! She was so sweet. We got to give her the clothes and her bear from her family. She held onto the bear pretty good. We took pictures and jerry video-ed the visit for a few minutes. I snuggled her and told her about her mama coming soon! Kissed on her for her mommy and finally had to send her back… so sad… I asked if I could just take her with us to her family. They laughed at me…

Then… tada!!!! Maria came in with her caregiver!! She was/ is so tiny!!! I expected her body to be tiny, but I guess I didn’t expect her face to be so tiny and dainty!!! She definitely wasn’t too sure about us. She did not want me taking her away from her nanny! But… too bad little girl! She started to throw a little fit… they quickly got her some chocolate, too. Haha! Serious bribery! That must be what they gave her to take those updated pictures in August!

I talked to her a bit and showed her the pictures some more… she calmed down… we gave her some puffs. She liked those! She was pulling away from us as much as possible. She would lean over backward to get away from me! She really wasn’t sure about Jerry. But he fed her puffs like crazy when he was holding her, while I discussed gifts with Belinda. Before I knew we were walking out!

I did not cry! Can you believe that!!! I was sure I would, but also wanted not to, ‘cause you know how scary you look when you cry… I figured she would be scared enough!!

We walked to the big street nearby and caught a taxi back to the hotel. We have been here ever since.

We played a while. She laughed and played cute… as soon as Jerry comes near she freezes up… and refuses to do anything… she is stubborn, and lazy, if you can call a baby that… she will hardly move, she only wants to stand if she is holding onto something…but she can walk just fine… well… like a 12 month old who just learned to walk. Toddle toddle. From what I can piece together, she doesn’t move around a whole lot, which gives me the lazy impression… Remember her referral photo? Lying on the floor at 11 months old… she will still do that if you let her, which is why her head is TERRIBLY lop-sided!! Very!

So she has had a little bath… well if dumping warm water over her while she stands up is a bath… she refused to sit and screamed about it… such a mess already! Haha! She doesn’t realize her momma is more stubborn than she when it comes down to parenting! :) We will keep working on the bath thing! She likes the stacking cups, but only with momma… she refuses to knock them over if daddy builds the tower. Silly girl! Her feet are TINY! Seriously I think a size 3 would fit her, but only brought 4, so she will wear four until we get home. No wonder she has a hard time walking! Nothing to hardly stand on! Ha!

Jerry took her for some strolls in the hall way with the white squeaky shoes… so hilarious. She likes the shoes… if you take them off she starts a fit! So funny! Jerry took her downstairs to walk around some, too. She goes with him, but doesn’t open up much, yet. Jerry went down the street to get some formula… she still drinks a bottle at night and we might give her more during the day. He brought back some baby cereal too. And some jars of baby food… she refused to eat the peas… silly. We finally got a few bites down her and will try again tomorrow.

She has thrown at least 4 fits today. When she needed to nap, we set her in her bed with her blanket and tucked her in… screaming like crazy! Oh! She looks just like Ryleigh when she cries! It so weird!!! Her cry is VERY baby-ish! Young baby!! We let her scream for a couple minutes and then Jerry went over and held her hand until she fell asleep. She really works herself into a tizzy! Good grief!!! She frequently gives us the evil eye! But we just keep loving on her and telling her we love her and telling we are not going anywhere, she is “stuck” with us!!!

She knows to come to us when we reach out our arms for her and say come here! She usually comes pretty quickly, once she gets to know us, I think she is going to be quite loving! She holds our hands nice when we reach for her hand, too…

She’s so cute! Tiny little hands and feet. Tiny little face. And body! Her belly is quite round though! And her booty is much chubbier than the boys’ ever were! So funny to open that diaper and see something different than all these years! Hahaha!

She just had another conniption before bed, but Jerry just held onto her and laid down on the bed with her and she fell right to sleep… I was typing over here, or I would have done it… although the fit she threw was over Jerry loving on her and not me. :)

So I am going to pick up a little and go to bed! We have to check out by 8 in the morning to get to the offices that we still need to go to!

I am SOOO tired!!!!!