Leaving Xi'an

We are leaving beautiful Xi'an and only happy to be that much closer to home! Frannie had a sort bad day yesterday. I think she may have been sad/confused about the trip back to the orphanage and after a nap, she had a slight fever. I couldn't tell how bad because our thermometer read Kevin's temp as 96.5 or so twice. She felt warm and was whiney so we walked her for a while which seemed to soothe her. She STILL will not drink from anything expect her leaky orphanage cup! We got her two different kinds of cups yesterday and I'm starting to believe she would drop over dead before she would take a mere sip from anything else. We will have to write more about the orphanage trip later. We took lots of photos and promised to not post them on the internet so I only sent them to the families. I was more impressed with everything about it than I expected. I think after the orphanages in Kingston, this place seemed much more new and clean.

Kevin's Two Cents' Worth
Friday AP -- Auburn University administrators, amazed at the reading proficiency of not-yet 2-year-old Frannie Fay, have retained the services of Ms. Fay to coordinate the "Teach a Tiger to Read" program for all Auburn student athletes. Head football Coach Tommy Tuberville says "This program is a must if we are to compete with th University of Florida for the best student athletes in the SEC and we believe Ms. Fay is aptly qualified to take us to the next level."

Shopping Adventures

For those of you who have asked, Frannie is in 9 months to 12 months size and her shoe size was way off. Not one of the shoes we brought with us fit her (the shoes were too big by about 2 or 3 sizes). She was just sitting here with me at the computer, but I had to put her down, she saw me typing and wanted to try. She's a fast learner. Kevin taught her the word BOOK (one of her favorite things) and she has said it now about 10 times.

Frannie a/k/a Frances a/k/a Emma a/k/a Rui Zhen a/k/a Mer Mer (?) and sometimes Brini is such a little trooper. She has been put into such unknown situations with these two weird-looking, weird-sounding people and yet she'll toddle right over to Kevin when he's on the floor, makes a 180 and plop right in his lap. She'll stretch her arms up to us to be picked up and she started to touch our arms and hands and hold us around the neck. Other than Gotcha Day, she has not cried once -- only a whimper -- and she's sleeping 9-10 hours solid every night. Yesterday at lunch the restaurant had a high chair for her (a first) so I put her next to me, scooted it close and started to get a bib when her lower lip started to quiver and her eyes got red, but she didn't make a sound. I took her out and fed her on my lap as usual and she was happy as a clam.

The other day we bought a facial cleanser/exfoliating gel product from a market. That night I used it and noticed the clear gel wasn't really exfoliating per se, it was more like sticking, akin to super glue on all my facial parts that have tiny little hairs like around my jaw-line. I scrubbed and scrubbed with a face cloth and I finally had to pluck the glue balls from my face with a tweezer. Red and blotchy-faced I went to bed thinking of the trip to Italy with Nicole and the "Ben Gay" incident. We had walked all over Rome for days and then around Florence and by the end of Day 4 or so my feet were swollen and sore. We stopped into a Farmacia to find something like Ben Gay for some sort of relief. The barely-English-speaking pharmacist said "Ah si!" and brought out a tube of something that looked like a prescription cream and before bed that night I applied this foreign cream liberally all over my feet. Within about 10 minutes my entire face had broken out in a sweat and I was hopping around the room like there were hot coals in the room. I washed and scrubbed and washed again, but it did no good! After about 30 minutes of agony I tried baby powder, which gave me some relief. Even a day or two later, whenever my hiking boot-clad feet would get warm, I continued to feel this warming sensation. I seriously considered taking that tube back to the U.S. to have it chemically analyzed. I was sure it was sulfuric acid or nitric acid (or paint remover) or.... Moral of the story, I guess.... don't forget your American crap which is better than unknown foreign crap.

An international incident broke out yesterday at the Muslim Market in Xi'an due to an argument over a cheap suitcase. I'm not kidding or exaggerating. We were all walking down a narrow lane in the market with cheap goods on all sides. A row of suitcases lined one side of the "alley." When Kevin passed a Chinese woman, right next to the suitcases, one of them knocked over a suitcase. The Chinese lady kept walking fast in the other direction. The saleslady started to yell at Kevin to pick it up and she pointed out a scratch which could not have happened from just falling over. She screamed and Kevin screamed back and next thing you know, we were surrounded by other salespeople yelling and the saleslady started to push Kevin! They threatened to call the Police and we said OK, sure. Poor Sally -- she was so upset. Kevin offered to buy her cheap luggage for 40 yuan and she yelled that she paid 60 for it. We finally gave her the money and Kevin then put his fist through the front of the suitcase (easily) because it was thin plastic and he placed the luggage where it had fallen and left the area as quickly as possible! Sally was pretty shaken up! But we got some good bargains from the Muslims while we were there! We are banned from the market for life!

Kevin's Two Cents' Worth
In Beijing, the Hory (Holy) Cow! Institute is investigating a cheeseburger sighting that is leaving researchers baffled. Room service in the Shangri La Golden Flower Hotel in the Shaanxi Province delivered this 18 lb. slab to the Fay room late on Wednesday night. Exclaimed young Frannie Fay (F squared) "that thing is bigger than Barry Bonds' head!" Balco officials declined to comment.

Gator Fan in the making

Frannie is doing better and better. She slept for 10 hours last night and may have slept more if we didn't have to wake her up. Today we are off to the Muslim? market for shopping. Can't wait! We went to the terra cotta store yesterday (the one where they make the "official" replicas and we bought this cute embroidered print of a little Chinese baby in a tub for 240 yuan framed. We thought that was just fine -- about 30 dollars? We got back to the hotel later in the evening and the hotel gift shop has the same ones -- ha ha, for 80 yuan. We got another one which is adorable. We had dinner last night at the chicken place, as Sally called it and one of the seemingly innocuous dishes almost killed us. We thought we had picked all the chili peppers out of it, but we each got a few mixed in and yikes. This region is known for noodles instead of rice which is fine with me -- but eating long spaghetti shaped noodles with chopsticks is a treat.

Kevin sent a picture of himself and Frannie in their Gator gear to the director of the SEC show this Saturday in Gainesville. Watch or tape the Lincoln Financial game of the week for a potential Tex and Frannie sighting! Someone please Teevo (sp)? this for us?

Kevin got a few cell phone calls in the middle of the night -- fyi people, we are not home and guess what? 3:00 pm EST is 3AM Xi'an time! Thanks for the wake-up call two mornings in a row!!


Tex's Two Cents Worth

Frannie Fay has declined a University of Tennessee offer to become the chairperson of the school's Engineering and Architectural Program. Her bold thinking and innovative ideas made her a natural fit for the program. We can do a lot more with blocks than just putting a '74 Malibu on top of them. Negotiations broke down when the UT administration balked at replacing Rocky Flop with Molly Hatchet's "Gator Country" as the school song.

Terra Cotta Warrior Day

Today we went to visit the Terra Cotta Warriors. I would love to say it was the most exciting thing ever, but we've been bombarded with replica warriors and photos of them since we arrived -- I realized the enormity of it, but I was somewhat distracted. Sally is incredibly knowledgeable about the history and lots of pertinent information regarding the surrounding area. She is from Northeast China originally and she told us the funniest/saddest story about her first year in university here in Shaanxi. She said she could not afford to fly home for Chinese New Year so she bought a train ticket with her friend, but they told them there were no seats or sleep cars available so they would have to sit on the floor the whole 26 hours to her town. She said by the time they got on the train it was literally jam packed with people and they barely found a place to stand. She said she tried to give right leg a rest for a while and then give left leg a rest by standing like a stork, switching back and forth. One time she closed her eyes and she lost her spot for the other leg and almost fell over, etc. She was laughing so hard telling this story (which sounded like absolute torture to me!) She's adorable. She loves to tell us Harkness stories too!

Yesterday we went to this restaurant for lunch with Sally and a whole group of the waitresses gathered around our table to watch Frannie (and us) eat. The teeniest bit distracting, but they were very nice. I wanted to cry when one of the waitresses picked up Frannie (yes, we had not even had her for 24 hours at this point, but...) and when I tried to get her back, she latched on to this woman and turned away from me. The ladies kinda giggled and although I knew it wasn't Frannie's fault, it made me sad for just a minute. She's better with us today, stretching her arms up to be picked up. This picture is a tummy tickling photo.

Frannie is eating like a moose today, thanks be to God. We're trying not to give her too much Western food yet so she's been eating rice cereal, rice, noodles, formula, fruit and some crackers. She sits and does this little hand motion thing like she's doing interpretive dance (ha ha Karoline), bringing her hands together and rotating her wrists around in front of her face like ... Chinese dance, I guess!

I just had the weirdest massage in my life -- it felt great, but the tiny lady actually climbed on my back and kneeled on my lower back and butt while massaging my back and shoulders. Sixty minutes for about $25! Tomorrow we are shopping and Thursday is the orphanage visit. I'll blog asap after the orphanage. In case any Yahoo Group people are reading this, we were told we could see the Hope Haven kids AND the Chinese side too! I've got everyone's name written down to ask for. I'll take as many pics as possible. FYI: We have spent quite a bit of time driving to and from the Office of Civil Affairs and noticed that the Sofitel Hotel is directly next to this office and if we had to do it again, we would have liked to have stayed there. We had 3 or 4 trips ? to this office and the traffic is horrible and the time taken adds up. We like the Shangri La, but check the prices for the brand new Sofitel! Kevin and Frannie are napping and we are heading out to the Fish Head Restaurant later. Just kidding. That's next door to the chicken and rice place that Kevin picked out. Our best to everyone -- how is my Brett? XOXO Ellen

Up and down Day in Xi'an

Frannie is definitely progressing -- she only cried when she woke up yesterday and got in the bath. We had to wake her to get her going (she slept solid from 9:15 or so until 6:15). I didn't want to startle her too much, so we just started turning lights on and making some noise, but she slept on. I finally stood next to her crib and coughed and stamped a bit and she finally looked up wide-eyed and furrowed her brow like "Knock it off!"

We had a lot to do yesterday with her passport and the meeting with the Director of Civil Affairs. He's the guy we had to answer to -- why do you want to adopt from China? Why a girl with a disability? What would you do with her if she got sick or if you found out she had something else wrong, etc." It was a bit nerve-racking because he was so serious and I had heard from another adoptive Mom that they have the right to say no. Yikes. Sally our guide told us she had never heard of him saying no, but....we had to pay all the fees -- more than Hope had warned us -- 2,000 yuan to one guy, 2,500 yuan to another, 200 for passport photo, etc. We met the Director of the Orphanage who was very, very nice and we met two other families who were adopting from Spain. One family had a little boy with a deformed hand too, only he had just little bumps with no real fingers. This little boy's Mom (they named him Lino) spoke about as much English as I do Spanish. She had her two nieces with her, the oldest of whom spoke English very well. She looked to be about 14. She kept trying to get Frannie to smile and I told her, "No, she hasn't smiled for us yet." So she danced all around her and jumped up and down and her little sister was singing this beautiful little song in Spanish and ... nothing. So she said "I think she will like bubbles" and I told her we had tried that and Frannie didn't like them. So she said, how about tossing her up in the air above your head? So I tried it and Frannie totally cracked up. Kevin got it on video. Later Sally tickled her slowly up her leg and she gave us lots of smiles then too. What I have failed to mention is that Frannie would not take any milk or water in the morning which concerned me. She ate only a few little bites and would only eat this one cracker that the orphanage had given us. At lunch, nothing. The night before, we had taken her orphanage sippy cup and it leaked all over the place so I had been trying yesterday with her Braves sippy cup. At lunch she only took a tiny bit and again, no liquid. I started to get nervous and when we got home for a 1 hour break she laid on the bed squirming and started to whimper. I suspected she was constipated so I rubbed her belly which calmed her down. She got whimpery again so we laid her in the bed and Eureka! She finally went. I tried with the Braves sippy cup and again and NOTHING. I decided I needed to try her leaky orphanage cup and she drank and drank and drank. Thank you Lord. Later in the day at another office, the Spanish Mom and I were trying to communicate and I understood about 70% of what she was saying in Spanish and at one point I told her I didn't understand so she turned to her Chinese/Spanish interpreter and she asked her "How do you say.... in English" and the interpreter said "I don't know English" (she said this in English) so that interpreter turned to my interpreter and asked her in Mandarin so Sally told me in English and I asked her to ask a question to the lady so Sally turned to the other interpreter.... it was hysterical.

She is getting more and more attached to us, but I think she would go to Sally just as easily as to us. Kevin and I have been so exhausted and still messed on with our sleep -- she are wiped out at 4:00 pm so we go to sleep for a few hours, then again at 9pm, but then we wake up at 3:00 wide awake. We played cards one night and read another, etc. Last night we decided to try to stay up as long as possible to get regulated and it worked. We ordered room service both nights to spend some private time with Frannie which has been nice. Tonight we are going to the local restaurant on the corner.

The new name of Kevin's article is "Tex's Two Cents' Worth"

Tuesday August 30 (AP) -- The U.S. Commerce Department is reporting that the U.S. trade deficit with China is shrinking rapidly and will be a surplus by the Chinese New Year 2008. Officials cite University of Florida paraphernalia worn by Frannie Fay (F squared) is the catalyst to this economic phenomenon. As the "Frannie Across China" tour continues, China officials proclaim "this stuff could become bigger than Peking Duck."

She had a sad look almost all day

It's a Girl!

We got to the Office of the Civil Affairs and Frannie with two nannies were already there. We poked out heads into an office and saw her sitting on a nanny's lap just staring at us. The nanny had brought along the picture Lucy gave to her of me and Kevin and she still had a death grip on that photo. The nanny would not let her go! I held out my hands about 3 or 4 times and Frannie would turn away from me so the nanny held her tight. Hmmm. Give me my darn baby. Kevin was videotaping and suddenly the camera shut itself off -- Our worst nightmare. The camera quit working! I shut it off and got a few more film clips, which were fine. Sally took lots of pictures with the disposable camera and when Kevin finally pried Frannie away from the nanny, she did extend back and cry for only a few minutes. She did marvelous. She cried only briefly and didn't utter a sound in the car. She fell asleep on my shoulder and woke up when we had to take the "group photo" at the Fujifilm studio. We have been sitting in our hotel room ever since just playing and offering her every toy or book we brought. I laid down on the bed with her for a few minutes and she did start to sniffle, but she recovered very quickly. We just put her to bed a few minutes ago and eeeek, she started to climb out of the crib. She wasn't upset or anything, just a little monkey. She seems to be equally comfortable with me and Kevin, thank you Lord.

The pictures won't attach! *Update-pics are up!* Lucy, any ideas why we can't get into our own "View this Blog"? Sally said that when she typed in ally's blog address, she got the same "Unknown site/check brower/refresh" type message. I can't read any comments. Please send me a yahoo e-mail !!
More tomorrow!

We are Hours Away

We had some internet problems last night -- I can't read your posts for some reason. However, I wanted to thank everyone for writing. Maybe I can ask a nice attendant here in the Business Center at the Shangri La to help me read all the chinese symbols (all the buttons are no longer in English).

We got up this morning at 2:00 and never went back to sleep. Our guide and driver arrived at the hotel at 5:30 to take us to the airport. I couldn't help but think about some concerns for Frannie. I'm just so nervous about doing the right thing for her. I can't even think about it without getting welled up. It is now 12:15 in the afternoon and we are leaving here with our new guide, Sally, to head to the Civil Affairs? office. We unpacked about an hour ago and put all her clothes in the drawers. This is so surreal! She will actually be wearing the little outfit Judy& Meghan or Mary Pat bought us soon! She will be wearing the little hat Lisa got her and playing with the books Skelly bought her!

It has been a long time since I was awake for 38 hours straight. When we finally got in bed in Beijing I counted the time and it had been just that -- I felt like I was on drugs. I can't believe we slept through everything yesterday! We never got to see Tiennamen (sp) Square or eat real Beijing Peking Duck. Our guide Sally assures us that Xi'an has some great Peking duck too. She loves to talk about little Ally and the Harkness girls. She really loves them!

The streets are really packed with people, even at odd hours. I still can't get over the bikes veering in and out of traffic with no fear at all. The drivers get so close, but we've seen no accidents yet.

I'm off to see how much a massage costs and tell Kevin about the huge workout room here. By the way, my back feels much better thanks to the ice and supine position for a while. The right side of my hip down to my knee was numb for a while. Hmmm.... this can't be good. Better now, however.

We will try to get on later to download the pictures of our Gotcha Day! Kevin's daily article will be read at that time. xo Ellen

Finally!

We are in Beijing after, oh, I don't know, about 4 days in the air? We only had one layover and it felt like an eternity. We spent 5 fun-filled hours in the Tokyo airport and had to sit in COACH for 3 hours to Beijing -- imagine the horror of Coach class. We were devastated. No more shiatsu massage? No more footrubs?

We spent our day with Vivian, our guide and Mr. Wang who took us to the Great Wall, a jade factory and the Cloisenet (bad spelling, I know) Factory. Lucy, you are exactly right, the pressure to buy something was incredible and although Vivian assured us it was ok to not buy anything, the saleswomen and Vivian herself were saying "yes, but the quality here at this factory is not going to be the same in Guangzhou! There - everything is crap!" We wanted to get Frannie a little jade rooster -- the animal of the year of her birth -- and this teeny little rooster jade pendant was something like 1,000 yuan or $130. I held strong and said no, we are going to wait.

The Great Wall -- hmmm. I had no idea that I needed a harness, carabeeners and cramp-ons. Kevin made it to the "top" of the steep portion and I made it about 75% of the way up and realized a heart-attack was not worth the accolades I would receive for having made it to the top. The steep side was less crowded, but I'm sure I have 50 new grey hairs.

We had to forego the rickshaw ride due to my annoying back issues. I think 19 hours on a plane did a number, regardless of the comfort -- 19 hours of sitting is 19 hours. We came back to the hotel and rested and didn't wake for hours. My back feels better.

Beijing is great. They are preparing for the Olympics like crazy and the traffic is awful. No one seems to be overly concerned when a little old lady walks right out in front of your speeding car or bicyclists veer in your path.

Kevin's daily column is known as "Kevin's Two Cents."

August 25 Associated Press -- Beijing

"Kevin's Two Cents"

"The Great Wall is ...... Great."

"Why do they eat with two pieces of wood?"

Our Itinerary

The following is our itinerary for the next two weeks:

August 23 – Poor Nancy picks us up at 6:00am for airport
August 23 – Delta Flight 55 departs ATL 10:05AM
August 24 -- Arrive in NRT (Tokyo) at 1:25 PM.
August 24 -- Depart Tokyo at 6:25 PM arrive Beijing 9:20 pm
August 24&25 -- Stay at Crown Plaza Beijing, sightsee, sleep.
August 26 -- Depart Beijing at 7:20AM and arrive Xi’an 9:25AM
August 26 -- check into Shangri-La Hotel in Xi’an, Shaanxi province
August 26 -- We get Frannie in the afternoon!
August 27-31 apply for and receive (let’s hope) Frannie’s passport
August 31 – Depart Xi’an on 7:10pm flight, arrive Guangzhou 9:25PM
August 31 – September 6 Stay at White Swan in Guangzhou
September 1 -- Frannie’s physical
September 2&3 -- sightseeing, shopping
September 4 -- 10:00 am consulate appointment
September 5 -- Consulate and oath-swearing ceremony (get Frannie’s Visa?)
September 6 -- Depart Guangzhou 8:15 AM on NW flight 10 to Tokyo
September 6 -- Arrive Tokyo 1:55PM
September 6 -- Depart Tokyo 3:30PM for Atlanta
September 6 -- Arrive ATL 3:10pm, customs, etc. Mary Pat to pick us up at 4:15 or so

Send us "comments" so we can keep in touch with you too! Thanks for everything, K&E

Thank you Baby Jesus

As my grandmother used to say "Thank you baby Jesus" which always cracks me and my sister Katie up -- she would thank Him for everything -- not adult Jesus, not adolescent Jesus, specifically BABY Jesus. I bet you were praying for us too Gramma. If anyone ever had a doubt about the goodness of God AND the power of prayer, BELIEVE. We got our September 4 consulate appointment due solely to the number of people praying, I am sure. It's hard to understand the complicated nature of this request, but believe me when I tell you, this was a big prayer request.

We can now officially depart as planned and be back for SEC football! No, I'm not THAT much of a football fan (although Kevin is a big college football fan, he needs to work that game on the 7th because he feels it is his fatherly duty to provide for his family and this schedule helps out a lot). NOTE: he is missing the 1st SEC game of the season which happens to be at his alma mater, The University of Florida. Poor guy. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the prayers.

Our TA finally arrived

After tracking this package all weekend and having the website tell me it was in Wilmington, OH for the whole weekend, I found out that the website never updated the tracking and it was in Atlanta, preparing to be delivered. We need to continue praying for the consulate to respond with YES, we would love to see the Fays on September 4! We should know this by tomorrow sometime.

I made the decision to fly out on Thursday instead of Wednesday because the rush would have killed me. Delta was able to accomodate us with this and the connection right on to Beijing will work out fine. We can't spend any time in Tokyo (except for the 4 hour layover), but that's ok, it would have been too crazy anyway. Come on consulate!

I am starting to...

I'm starting to believe someone out there wants me to learn the value of patience and faith! I got an e-mail at 5:30am from the agency saying "Can you wait until we get the final word on Wednesday before you go to the airport?" I think I actually could hurl at some point today. But we are so close, I am so happy regardless of which day we go. Ha ha, this kills me.

I won't get gushy

I hope Kevin won't mind my posting this, but I just have to make a comment about how wonderful he has been this last week. As you may have surmised, I am a basket case, crying one minute (usually it's a "good" cry) and the next minute, cranked up on caffeine sputtering out some info that I've gotten or need or what I've been doing. He has remained so calm and supportive, I really have needed that. I haven't mentioned him a whole lot on the blog because he's a private kind of guy, but he's also the silliest guy I know, he has the most creative, crazy sense of humor, he's the most dependable, loyal employee, friend and person there is. I've learned after 3 years of marriage that he has more integrity than anyone I know. Okay, I'll stop. Here's one of my favorite pictures of us.

Complicated Travel Plans

I am leaving in a few minutes to go to the airport to pick up Frannie's paper airline ticket. Northwest, for some reason, makes me do it this way and it has to be in her Chinese name -- so exciting. Her ticket is only $99 for sitting in our laps. I'm not sure what Delta will charge us (10% of a regular fare?) but we will deal with that when we get the call on Tuesday. Let's just hope that Frannie doesn't have to pay 10% of what a first class seat would be or else Frannie will be riding in coach. Just kidding!

We can't officially make any plans until Tuesday when we are given the go-ahead from Hope, our adoption agency. I have tried this week to make as many tentative plans as I possibly can without confirming/paying, but MAN it is hard without knowing for sure. As of now, we have a tentative reservation with Delta departing Atlanta on the 22nd that will get us to Tokyo on the 23rd where we will spend one night, then on to Beijing the next day (the 24th) where we will spend about 20 hours sleeping, touring. That is where our Delta frequent flier ticket ends and a travel agent from Texas has made tentative reservations for us to fly from Beijing to Xi'an for Sunday morning (Air China?). Hope for Children then takes care of our travel plans for our hotel stay, guide, etc. and flight later in the week from Xi'an down to Guangzhou. We will spend about 4 or 5 days (I'm not sure?) in Guanghzhou and, please Dear Lord, we will have our consulate appointment on September 4, pick up our final papers on the day/evening of the 5th, when she will be officially ours! The Guanghzou to Tokyo part of the travel has been bought and paid for (because they were running out of seats and we got "reasonable" rates from Northwest Airlines, leaving 8:00 am on the 6th and arriving in Tokyo with 1.75 hours to transfer to our Delta frequent flier connection -- God willing that leg is on time). I just love how we leave Tokyo on the 6th at 3:30pm and arrive in Atlanta on the same day at 3:10 pm! We will be travelling back in time!

If you have tried to call me and I either don't call you back or sound like I'm running a marathon while we are chatting for 1.53 minutes, you may have a small glimpse now of just a small segment of the complicated nature of this last week -- not only calling airlines every day to make sure flights are still available or e-mailing the travel agent or taking care of school business, purchasing items for the suitcase, getting a booster Hepetitis A shot, getting e-mails from other "Waiting Moms" who have their children in Frannie's orphanage who want me to take photos of their kids (I have gotten requests from 4 Moms and one Dad) through the Yahoo group I joined that is affiliated with this orphanage, etc. etc. I plan to call my Mom and Dad to say goodbye before we leave for China, but other than them, I don't think I will have the strength to call every person I know and love to give you/them the details about what is happening. Please understand my frazzled state -- you probably wouldn't want to chat with me anyway given these circumstances!

This morning I attended our quarterly Magnificat Breakfast and helped with the kitchen staff. I had run into Karen Hanley this last week at church and she asked me to assist -- not only do I miss these women (the Columbiettes) horribly since I am no longer participating, but I have not attended a talk since I have been a manager at St. Vincent de Paul -- the Magnificat talks have historically been held on the 2nd Saturday of a particular month and that always fell on my SVDP weekends. It was a wonderful talk with fabulous music and prayer -- thanks to all the women who prayed for Kevin, Frannie and myself and our pending trip and parenthood. The prayers are needed more than anything.

The second I hear about our travel plans, I will post a message. We may not hear until Tuesday afternoon and by then I will have to immediately run to Dunwoody to grab the travel packet, have something or other notarized (Lucy, what do I have to get notarized?) and call all these airlines, the travel agent, etc. and say GO! Dad, I promise to call you Tuesday evening.

Kevin's last day of work before this is tomorrow (a Braves day game) so he will have some time to get his things together -- he has to have a Hep A shot and a tetanus too and probably get some more cash from our bank, etc. I will work on Monday, wrapping up some paperwork and seeing my last student before I leave -- Mariellen threatened me if I didn't come on Monday to say goodbye to her and my student D -- she has been so very supportive of this whole thing -- I was pulling up to her house the day we got the Waiting List (May 1) and showed up on her doorstep bawling my eyes out -- I just couldn't help it. I needed to keep teaching my kids that day, but I was so emotional about "picking" a child from the list that I just cried and cried. She gave me a big hug and said "Go, go, go! Do what you need to do!" And although I will stop by with Frannie while I am on maternity leave, I have to give her a hug before we leave.

Because I just haven't cried enough already...

Thanks Donna for sharing this (and everything else!!)

Born in My Heart
It took me awhile to realize
But now I clearly see
When I look into your eyes
I know it was meant to be
A simple twist of fate, I guess
Was holding us apart
But my child I must confess
You've always lived inside my heart
A stranger to you, I am right now
But the time is drawing near
And soon you too will see just how
You've always been right here
by Marsha Roberts

Home from the Hospital

Yeah! Brett and Lisa are home from ICU. I am so excited for them. I am not going to put anything confidential or private on here, but let's just say two of my favorite people are home where they belong. Here's a pic Lisa took of us at Christmas-time almost 2 years ago. Keep up the prayers, he's not completely out of the woods (Me? With my eyes open in a photo for a change?)

Tuesday Post #2

We finally got our baby's room together, photos attached. Thanks to Katie and Jim for the crib, the e-mails and the instruction booklet (*phew*). FYI, Frannie will be baptised on her auntie's birthday, October 21 for those who may want to attend the baptism and/or the follow-up party at the Fay House.

We are getting closer, but still no official date

We got word today that our TA should be here from China on Monday. If this happens and all the planets line up for us, we should be leaving in 9 days. Or 10. We need to make travel arrangements, but without a consulate appointment, you can't make travel plans. We can't get a consulate appointment until the TA is in the hands of our agency. Nothing this good in life comes easily, I know. We are so happy that Delta will still get us frequent flier seats with little or no notice, if there is a seat on the plane. As of today, there are about 20 empty seats for the flight to China (1st class) and about 25 empty seats on the way home (also 1st class) so I have all the confidence for that portion of the trip. The muscles in my shoulders are tight from the minute I wake up and I feel pretty nauseous all day and I'm not sleeping very well and I have an occasional headache and I'm crying about once a day so I guess it's sorta like being pregnant.

We were told that the estimate for the TA would be 1-3 weeks so now that we know it will take 4 weeks, we hear that it can take 4 weeks sometimes too. That's the way it goes.

My student Brett was sent home from ICU today, thanks be to God.

Please Lord get us back by September 6 in time for SEC football. Thanks, Ellen

Ok, I've calmed down

It's a good thing I didn't post this morning at about 9:45 because I would have sounded like a lunatic. My response from Chrissy was not what I had hoped (I'm being very diplomatic here). After a call from Chrissy, followed by bawling my eyes out to Lucy, I got a more ...er... reasonable e-mail from Chrissy. Initially she said I needed to be considerate of the Ohio family's needs who want to travel on August 17. After much emotion and discussion, we found out that our TA hasn't even left China yet! We probably now won't get our TA until AT LEAST Tuesday or Wednesday and travel on August 23 for a September 4 or 5 consulate appointment.

I'm not going to get into details here because I don't want to write down anything I'll regret.

What the....??

I woke up this morning with a start and thought about what Chrissy said from our agency -- even if we get our TA today and they request a consulate appointment for August 27 or so, we probably wouldn't get a response back from them, due to the weekend, until Monday which only gives us 4 days' notice to travel. I wrote back to Chrissy, et al and said "Hmmmm... I don't think so." I am waiting for ther response. If Delta won't let us use the ff miles to travel due to a MERE 4 DAYS' NOTICE then we would have to pay cash for the tickets which will probably be astronomical. I'll let you know what Chrissy says. I want to get our little FCF ASAP, but 4 days notice!@@#$

No TA as of today

We have been thinking every day -- this could be it, but no TA yet. When I called Hope today and asked if we can discount an August 17 departure, Chrissy said no, we are still shooting for August 17! If they receive the TA via DHL in the next two days, they will still request an August 28 or 29 consulate appointment which would still mean travel on August 17! Either departing next week or the following week, we are fine with that. Frannie sure is not holding her breath and God is taking care of her so we will take either date.

Thanks for the phone calls of support today women, you know how crazy our life is now -- we are 90% sure we are buying a new car in the morning -- it's at our local mechanics now being checked out and if it all works out, we (Kevin) will be the proud new owner of a 2001 Camry with only 69K miles, it's an LE model so it's got the nice seats, cruise control, it's nice and clean and smells good, which always influences me greatly. We are playing Chinese firedrill with the cars -- I'll get Kevin's Pathfinder and Mary Pat's daughter will get my car -- it all works out great for everyone. We are renting out the Avondale condo and our Tucker tenant moves out this week! We haven't completed the new deck extention or the dog house either. The first week of school is a blur to me because all I think about is the TA, the space in our suitcases, Hepetitis A and getting last minute flights.

Keep up the prayers!

Attachment story

Thanks Donna for sharing this article -- Friends of Frannie, please read this to understand!!

"Another adoptive mom shares her story...I am hoping not to offend anyone -- just wanting to share our experiences with no holding. We have three children adopted from Korea. With our first two, we did very little reading about attachment and thought we would just love our children to pieces and all would be well. Our first two arrived at 4 1/2 months of age. My husband is from a large family; they love to pass the baby and believe the child should be content and snuggle with each one. This is what our two sons experienced soon after their arrival - - one struggled and cried and the other seemed indifferent. I felt sad and sick after each visit. With our third adoption, our daughter was 6 1/2 months at arrival. Before her arrival, we read about and researched attachment. I asked our social worker about no holding for six weeks. She said she had seen wonderful transitions with those who had done this. With the loss and uncertainty our children have experienced before coming to us, not allowing others to hold our child made sense. Before our daughter's arrival, we informed family and friends that we would be the only ones to hold our daughter for six weeks. Because we had allowed our first two to be held, we explained that our daughter was older and we felt we needed to do this to help with her adjustment and attachment. We knew some might not be accepting, yet it wasn't about what other people needed; this was what our child needed. Our daughter's adjustment has been remarkable in comparison to our sons'. We can't know if this was due to no holding initially, personality, or the other attachment methods we have implemented. Our daughter was never anxious and upset when others visited during those first weeks. Our sons were. My seventy-year-old father was so struck by the difference in adjustment with our third child, he remarked that maybe we shouldn't be so anxious to let others hold our daughter after six weeks! (a. 4.5mo, 4.5mo, 6.5mo, FC)"

Frannie's All Packed

After careful consideration, we have packed only the necessities for Frannie's daily needs. Under the top layer you will find a rake and a ping-pong table.

I have been thinking this morning about how grateful I am for my Waiting Children friends. Through Hope and the Third Friday meetings, I have met some wonderful sisters-in-adoption and I want to tell each one how thankful I am for sharing this experience with me. There are no two, exact adoption circumstances, but Chinese adoptions are so unique, confusing, long, emotional and interesting that to have Lucy, Donna, Darcy, et al. to share this with has been priceless. Darcy, by the way, helped me pack this bag. Ha ha -- she really gave me some good ideas the other morning when she visited with her two cute daughters, Stephanie and Elizabeth. They helped me re-think my fragile item placement in the room too -- I need to start thinking about these things! Thank you Donna for sharing your never-ending abundance of knowledge, thanks to Lucy for being so telepathic when meeting Frannie -- you sent all the pictures and words I was hoping for -- your family is such a model for me. Darcy, I'm so glad we are 0.3 miles from each other to have many, many play dates when your beautiful Danielle comes. I'm not crying, really.

Okay, now that Frannie is packed, can we get a travel date please? Thank you Lord for all of it. Thank you Lord for the things I don't have and I'm not even aware of it -- just like Karoline, I'm sure that if we had had a baby before this, maybe we never would have gone through this whole process. God rewarded you with that beautiful actress Savannah AND the twins! Thanks for your secret, invisible blessings.

I'm starting to freak out a little

We are praying that we get our TA today or tomorrow. If it does come in, we should be travelling 2 weeks from tomorrow! I usually show my stress by getting sick or having an upset stomach or not sleeping which gets me sick and right now I feel like I could vomit blood. I've never been known as being dainty with my thoughts and words, sorry.

In so many ways I get so excited about her being part of our family, but I worry about our reaction to her. God is so good and I know He is in charge, but I have this vision in my head of her crying or throwing a tantrum and me completely freaking out. I don't think I've ever done this before in all my years of teaching, babysitting, etc., but I just get nervous about the Mom part. I don't want to scar her for life by taking her away from everything she has known, her food, her beloved nannies, her friends, her language, her culture, her smells.....and we bring her to Atlanta to subject her to potential pain of surgery to her little hand and confuse her with our garbled language and new surroundings. Keep praying for her. And us.

Keep my students in your prayers too -- a student at school passed away this week. Eileen's family is very, very upset right now and although she herself is in paradise, her family is in shock. I only taught her a few times over the past year, but her family is very dear to me and I'm sure they are distraught despite their strong faith. Keep Brett and Michell in those prayers too.

This picture of Frannie and her friends shows their play room, I guess. Frannie is directly under the flying....antelope?, she's the little tiny one.

Meeting Ally

We got to meet the Harknesses' new baby Ally yesterday at Atlanta Bread Company. She is in this photo with Frannie on the little pots (we don't know who the little one in the middle is). Ally was pretty shy at first (covering her face with her hand and looking away), but she quickly warmed up to us and gave us a few shy smiles. I am so impressed with the way Sara and Lauren are so loving with Ally. Lucy and Doug gave us so much good information about where to stay, eat, shop and what to bring. We are so thankful for all the loans for the trip! Their family went to every place where we will go so their advice is crucial.