Today was pretty much a do nothing kind of day. We didn't have to be anywhere until 3:00 this afternoon, so we just really took it easy today. It has been raining since we arrived here in Guangzhou. When we go for our walks, we are all three walking under an umbrella. Supposedly it is supposed to be warmer here by the weekend, which I think we are looking forward to that. It continues to be trial and error with Arisson, although we are seeing more successes than failures, so I feel we are starting to get her figured out. Of course, what we learned today could be different tomorrow. Today she has really taken off on her crawling. She is roaming a larger part of the room now. I can't get over how tiny she is!
The bottle thing continues to be hit or miss. I worry the most about that, because I don't want her to wither away to nothing. She will start taking her bottle great, and just as I am breathing my sigh of relief, she arches her back and cries. I have tried different temperatures, different combinations of formula and rice. I have tried congee, I have tried a very little piece of banana and I have tried yogurt. I know she will eat when she gets hungry, but I am praying it is sooner rather than later. She's my daughter, I thought she would over eat when she is stressed out, not stop eating.
We took a little trip into Guangzhou to the police station. We had to put our application in for Arisson's passport. We will be getting that in a week. It is unbelievable to think that our trip is approaching the half way mark. I was feeling a little blue yesterday after getting an email from Aislinn. She sounds like she really misses us and wants to come home, and I want to do just that. At the same time, I want to experience as much of Arisson's birth land that I can.
Thank you so much for all the emails. I would love to answer all of them, but really haven't had the time. I am so tired by the end of the day, especially since I have yet to sleep all through the night. I am guessing that I will have it all figured out by April 10th. Or start adapting to China time when back in Chicagoland. We even got some April Fool's emails from Austin and Aislinn. Aislinn said she was sick with the flu. The email said to scroll down. When I did it said April Fool's. Austin's email made me mad because I didn't see the part that said scroll down. It said he got a zero on his Spanish project. I was annoyed because I told him to remember to take it to school when it started back up after break, and I figured he forgot. I am typing rather slowly right now because I am celebrating in my head as Jason feeds Arisson a bottle. Praise the Lord! Now she is crying because it is all gone. God is good! (All the time)
I haven't really much to say tonight, so I thought I would tell you about Arisson's name. Some of you may not realize that a lot of thought went into picking it out. Arisson is actually a made up name. It is all of our family's names put together. The 4 kids at home all have names that start with "A" and end with "n", which wasn't done on purpose, and we didn't realize it until we were listing all their names one time (I think it was doing our taxes, so very timely story), anyway, when we started this process, we knew we needed a name that met those requirements. I think we had about 15 listed, and of course, all of us had a different favorite. So one day I picked up a MagnaDoodle, and just wrote all our names down. So, (K)ris is me, (Ja)son is Jason, and all of the kids have at least 3 letters from their name in it. We knew it wouldn't have an American meaning, but we decided that it will mean that she will be hugged all day by us. I look at her, and I think she fits her name. Although we have called her Aislinn and Aaron. I am already honoring my promise that we will treat her like the other kids, since I rarely call them the right name.
Last night we went to eat at the Cow and a Bridge Thai restaurant. The food was good, it was nice to be back together with our group, but Arisson was a fussy girl. I ate with chopsticks and held her at the same time. I am Supermom. Anyway, we were the first to leave because she couldn't be soothed. As soon as we stepped out the door, she was fine. We got up to the room, and we got her smiling, and then we got her laughing so hard. She laughed so much she got the hiccups. I was so excited, because we really hadn't seen much happiness come from her yet. After she went to bed, I asked Jason if he thought she was laughing because she knew she had us right where she wanted us. Yup, she won that one.
Tomorrow we leave for 2 days. We are taking the laptop with us, but we don't know if we will have internet access, so we will post the next few days of entries when we can. Don't think something happened to us if we don't post. I am thrilled with our field trip. We are going to the Welfare Institute that Arisson was living up until a few days ago. Then we are staying at a Seaside resort for 2 nights. Aces! We did a little packing tonight, including sunscreen...I am hoping we get to use it. It will be nice to break up our time, since we will be here 9 more days.
The pictures are all of Arisson tonight. She is a cutie. We are seeing more and more of her personality as the hours go on. She is definitely starting to like us. I told Jason this morning, that I was glad that it wasn't up to her whether she would keep us or not, because I am not so sure she would have stuck it out with us. I am letting her lead. Thank you all again for the emails, and we will post again, as soon as we are able. We love you A1, A2, A3, and A4. I can't wait to see you all. I never want to be away this long from you again. I hope you are being good for Grandma, otherwise you will be very sorry! |
