Thanks so much for visiting us during our journey, Steve, Patty, Caleb, Danae (daughter-in-law), Logan, Drew and Annika!
For this child I prayed, and the Lord has given me my petition which I asked of Him.
So I have also dedicated her to the Lord; as long as she liveth she is dedicated to the Lord. I Samuel 1:27 - 28
I remember when I was saying, "two more days and we go to China". Now believe it or not, we are saying "two more days and we go home". We are so ready and so looking forward to not living in a hotel room and hailing down a taxi for wherever we go. We can not wait to get home and see our family and most of all our three boys. We have gotten what we came for, the paperwork is almost done and we are on our way Friday a.m. We actually leave China in the a.m. go back in time and arrive on the same day in the evening. That will be first, traveling back in time.
Our guide had a US Consulate appointment today at 10:00 am for all the families with all our paperwork that we did the other day. We were to stay in our room until she called us in case there was any questions, mistakes or whatever. Yes, two hours later, we were free to go. Me and another mother with her special needs (repaired cleft lip/palate) 3 year old daughter went to Shamian Island to finish shopping and Steve and Annika and her husband and son went to a Temple behind the Hotel. Annika does not do well in a stroller and I had some serious shopping to finish before heading home.
(Side Note), please pray for one of the couples in our group; their daughter was the only one from our daughter's orphanage. We were told to check all the paperwork that we have received hundreds of times. Passport numbers, birthdays, etc. tons of numbers to look at on lots of documents. They missed a spot that had their passport number wrong and they are having to pay a large sum of money to get things redone and then translated into English and if it's not done by tomorrow noon, they will not be able to get the baby passport and leave on Friday with the rest of the group. They have three children at home in California waiting for them.
Some from our group are taking the Pearl River Cruise/Dinner tonight. I hear it is beautiful, but I was sure that I would not do well with the food so we opted to hang out and play with Annika in the room.
As you can see from the pictures, Annika is in to sucking the salt off of McDonald's french-fries. And then she will hand them to me to eat. No thanks Annika. She is also liking the potato chip bag.
She is just a joy and I know I keep saying this, but this little girl is just too precious for words.
I have always prayed from the time that we received her referral picture that somehow in her birthmother's heart, she would have a peace to know that Annika will be leaving China soon to probably never return. And that she would know that Annika will now have a future, a home and a family to call her own.
We are very, very happy with the child that China now calls Annika Grace Mears. She will officially be a United States Citizen when she puts her foot down at the Pittsburgh, PA airport and if she is awake we will be taking pictures and celebrating and rejoicing for this new citizen.
I have not really put in our web site too many pictures of the sights of China. I know when I look at other China adoption web sites, all I want to see is pictures of the babies. So I have tried to do the same for you.
I will be continuing this as a blog through this web site when we get home. I might not be updating it on a daily basis, like I did before traveling for obvious reasons. But I will try to do it once or twice a week and adding pictures. At that time I may add some of my various pics of China that we have taken while here. So you too can see China for what it is and appreciate this country as we have and know a bit more about Annika's homeland.
Thank you again for sharing in our journey....until tomorrow....
