Hope refused to sleep in the crib last night so we put her in bed with us. She was very restless and seemed to enjoy kicking her Daddy in the back! She refused to take her bottle so I tried rocking and singing her to sleep. I sang Jesus Loves Me over and over. It is still unclear how much Hope can hear but if you had ever heard me sing you would know that not being able to hear my singing voice might actually be considered a blessing. :o) I knew that even if Hope could not hear me she could feel the vibrations of the singing while her head lay resting on my chest. She did go to sleep in my arms and I was able to lay her down in the bed beside us. Hope slept for about 8 hours! :o) Hope definitely exhibits some typical behaviors from being institutionalized and is of course developmentally delayed which we expected with her hearing problems. She behaves more like a one year old rather than her actual age of three. Hope woke up around 4:30 a.m. and drank a bottle of formula! Praise the Lord! We all got up at 4:30 a.m. which is probably a good thing since it seems to take quite awhile getting everyone dressed and ready for breakfast! At breakfast I offered Hope many different foods by spoon and by putting small bites in her hand. She still is not eating and in fact just plays with her food! Hope does have a runny nose and her nanny, Miss Lin had sent some Chinese medicine (herbs) along with her that they had been using to treat Hope’s cold symptoms. Her cold may be part of the reason she is not eating. We elected not to give her the Chinese medicine. We know that Hope is probably going through the grieving process right now but are starting to get concerned about her not eating solid foods. Please pray that she starts eating soon!
The girls seemed to attract a lot of attention where ever we go. I think it is because there are 3 of them and they are so close in age. An elderly Chinese gentleman approached Holly yesterday and she actually let him rub her arm. He indicated that he thought she had pretty skin and she responded with one of her award winning dimple filled smiles! We are quite surprised to see how well Hannah and Holly are responding to an environment filled with a strange language and a lot of strange sounds, strange smells and strange stares.
We met Cordelia and our driver in the lobby at 9:30 a.m. today for the trip back to the CAB office. After arriving at the CAB office we were once again each scanned for fever. They did this by waving an electronic gadget a few inches from our foreheads. China can quarantine anyone they think might have the H1N1 flu so it is very important that we remain fever free. We waited our turn to have our picture taken with Hope, our notary interview, and the final adoption interview. Some of the questions we were asked were: what are our ages, what year did we get married, what is our income and occupations, why did we want to adopt, would we give this child a good education and would we promise to never abuse or abandon this child. The adoption was now complete and Hope is now officially our daughter.!! HALLELUJAH!! There are still many things we are required to do before we can bring Hope home. We will have to get Hope’s visa exit medical exam done and because the US is now a Hague country when we started the process to bring Hope home Hague rules have to be followed. One of the Hague rules is that children cannot enter the US until all their immunizations have been completed. This means most children are getting 5 or more shots when they get their visa medical exams. This is really ridiculous because if you started the adoption process before the Hague was implemented then you could sign a waiver exempting your child from getting the immunizations while here in China. The ridiculous part is no matter how many immunizations your child receives in China chances are most American physicians will go ahead and start all of their immunizations all over anyway!
We spent the afternoon in our room and Hope took a long nap while Mommy and Daddy got some much needed rest. She is starting to cough some now and we pray her cold doesn’t get any worse. Hannah laid down in the floor and when we tried to get her to lay up on the bed she told us the floor was softer than the bed. So very true! All three girls have spent an awful lot of time sleeping today!
We had quite an interesting time trying to find a pizza delivery place that could speak English! Finally our pizza from Papa Johns arrived and was really good! We gave Hope her first bath this evening! She let us know that she didn’t like it very much at all but didn’t put up too much of a struggle.
We really enjoy reading all of your emails and appreciate all of your prayers!
From China With Love,
Ann, Tracy, Hannah, Holly and Hope
