Touring Qingxiu Mountain Park

Janeen here... I am posting for Janice as she explains directly below... I know I miss the sweet photos, but glad she figured out a way to share an update!

From Janice:

I received an email that The VPN servers have not been working since yesterday as they are cracking down on them, so I am going to skype message this post to my sister, Janeen, who is posting it for me. (Thanks, Janeen!)  I can’t send any pictures yet and we can’t email out at all either, so the posting will read kind of funny until I can later go back and add the photos.  At this point, we can still receive emails and I can still get your comments as they are automatically emailed to us. We just can’t respond back.  Hope they get it unlocked soon.  It’s frustrating not being able to email or post!!

**Added photos 12/8

Today was a relaxing day, so this post will be mainly pictures!  Emily slept much better last night and didn’t wake up until 7:15!  We went downstairs and had breakfast before meeting Caroline at 9:30.

Seth drinking dragonfruit  juice~ really yummy!

Kyle’s breakfast…..looks like I need some new recipes!

Our driver took us to Qingxiu Mountain Park today, a local park that was built 10 years ago.  The local parks are used often as a place to exercise and meet up with friends.  It was really beautiful.  John loved all of the marble everywhere, and the buildings were all made without nails.  It was really impressive!

 

 

I carried Emily in her Ergo today (thanks, Lisa for the advice!)  She really loved it.  Carrying her is great for bonding, and even though she is only about 27 lbs, she still gets heavy!

 
We got to feed the koi….it was crazy how many fish there were!

 

 

We got lots of stares because the boys were in shorts. A few asked us if we were cold!  I don’t know if you’ve noticed in the pictures, but they all feel that it is cold here right now.  It feels like Florida to us, and we are warm.  We tried to continue to wear coats and pants, but it is just to stinkin’ hot to do that!!  We have dressed Emily warmer because otherwise we would get reprimanded, especially by the elderly. 
One group of boys asked to have their pictures taken with our boys!

We walked up this pagoda which had an amazing view!

On the way back home, Emily fell asleep.  She travels so well, and seems to like to go on trips!

We had a fun afternoon at the hotel playing.  The boys went swimming and Emily and I colored, read books, and sang songs. She LOVES to sing and listens so closely trying to learn the words.  I had made a little photo album with numerous child-like pictures of things like hands, feet, mouth, shirt, pants, toothbrush, shoes, ball, etc., to learn the words and to help us communicate if needed.  We haven’t used it at all to communicate, but she loves parroting back every word as we go through the book.  She brings us that book often, and wants to learn the words.  It is so sweet!! 

While the boys were gone, I put her hair up in piggy tails.

I love to hear her little squeals when she gets or sees something new!  She patiently let me put them in (boy, this mama needs some practice!!) and was so excited to look in the mirror.  She swung her little head left and right to let them bounce off of her face and was so happy!!  In fact, tonight after her bath, she wanted them BACK in!!!

Our guide finished translating the journal that her foster mama wrote for her.  What an amazingly beautiful keepsake for Emily with so many memories and sweet letters to Emily and to us.  John and I were in tears reading it.  To all the adoptive mamas reading this: I bought the journal from Ann at Red Thread and sent it with one of the packages we mailed to Emily.  It’s on her website, and the book itself is just beautiful!  I highly recommend Ann!!!

We have a free morning tomorrow, and then meet Caroline at 2 pm.  We are going to People’s Park and then around 5:30 will be heading to the airport.  We fly out at 9 tomorrow night (which will be 8 in the AM on Friday, your time).  Please pray for our travels.  It’s such a late flight, and we will likely be delayed.  Thankfully, it is only a little over an hour flight to Guangzhou.  We are headed there to do the US portion of our adoption at the US Consulate.  We will stay in Guangzhou until next Wed and then fly out of Hong Kong on Thurs. to go home.   I wish our flight tomorrow wasn’t so late, but we’ll be fine.  Just pray for Emily to feel safe.  She has to go through so many changes.  A part of me will be very sad to leave Nanning, Guangxi.  It’s Emily’s birthplace, her foster family’s home, and a part of her.  We hope to bring her back some day to Guilin.

Next post will be from Guangzhou!