Pictures from Monday

Here are some photos of Gotcha Day!
The bridge entering Wuhan.



Red bags with the customary gifts for the provincial officials.



Luci's corner, all her fun stuff and cute outfits ready and waiting.


Here she is!





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Looks cute...she is actually planning her escape! About two minutes later she bolted after the ladies that brought her, tears, tears, tears!


Back at the hotel, sticker time. Anyone preparing to make this trip...it is impossible to have too many stickers with you. Seriously, they are magic!

















And of course, she has to count her money again!

Go ahead, you tough my money...you lose finger!



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We made a mistake!

We definitely should have named this little one after Brian! Somehow she ended up with all her Baba's genes!

Oh this little Luci precious!! We went to the Civil Affairs office this morning and and she was there waiting for us.

I swore I wasn't going to cry and scare her...I barely made it!

She was so sweet and She sang a song and did a little dance for us. They keep telling me how smart she is...after spending about 8 hrs with her...holy crap! A few minutes ago she was sitting here in bed with me and had the Chinese translation app on the iPad talking to the Talking Tom App on the iPhone, so the cat on the iPhone would repeat the Chinese words she made the iPad say...but in a funny voice...took her all of 3 minutes to figure that one out!

When the ladies from the orphanage were leaving Luci couldn't be strong anymore. She bolted after them crying...uggghh very painful to watch, more painful knowing how scared she must be. They both talked to her, pretty sure it was some version of the "be a big girl" speech. And she pulled it together like a little trooper, we finished up the paperwork and our guide took us next door to do some shopping for her a few pair of shoes and some drinks and snacks.

She was great the whole time!

And yes, I am afraid we should have named her "Briana" or "Danielle" after her daddy.

When we got her this morning I gave her a purse with some goodies in it...one of which was a change purse with some coins in it.

I swear she has counted that money about 200 times! She will play with me a little, pick up her purse, get her change purse out, check to make sure all of her coins are in there, then go back to playing...then do the same thing again in 10 minutes.

I suggest that everyone stay away from her funds, she is keeping close count!

She really is spectacular! Very affectionate, very playful, so far so good!

We took a cab to McDonalds tonight...apparently the guide bribed her to be good...if she was a good girl we would take her to McD...ok, I agree to that deal.

We came back to the room and she took a bath and had lots of fun with the bubbles.

The only thing that went wrong today is the horrid bottle of wine my mom and I bought...it was like watered down slightly fermented grape juice...I think my tongue is still stinging a little...no telling what that really was... it was a let down...but a survivable one.

She is sitting here next to me, putting stickers on me and intermittently stopping to play with talking Tom on the phone, she is talking her little head off in Mandarin and then the cat repeats it bask..it is hysterical. I can't wait until I can have our guide see this tomorrow and tell me what she is saying...I might end up getting my feelings hurt!

Oh..and she is now counting her money again!
Well we have to go back to the civil affairs office tomorrow to finalize things. Below is the video of gotcha day...hopefully it will post to the blog...if it doesn't I will have someone smarter than me attempt to make it happen.

And the book that I sent her ( You Are Special by Max Lucado), they have definitely been reading it to her! I sat with her before bed to "read" it to her, basically just told the story as I remembered it...ha! When I was done she took the book and proceeded to read it to me...all 30+ pages and I swear she must have it memorized, you can tell she is going into great detail about the characters and putting much drama into it. I will try to have mama film her tonight if I can get her to read it again. So I guess now she thinks her mamma is a big dummy and can't read!

Oh yeah, and it is easy to tell when she has to go potty...she runs and puts her shoes on and heads toward the shower?

She is used to using a squatty potty...and I guess the shower is the closest looking thing...so we are introducing the concept of the western toilet and so far so good...except you can tell she is scared she will fall in.

Hopefully the Gotcha Day video below works ok...enjoy!

Tara






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Day 2 Beijing

Well, got about four hours sleep last night, mamma and I were both up at 5:00 making coffee. We had breakfast and met out guide Charlotte for the second day of touring. First stop..the great wall...spectacular and massive...not for the weak or weary. It is located in the mountain area outside Beijing and there were a ton of people there, it was packed like sardines all the way up...we went up to the first little tower thing and tok some pictures, very beautiful scenery, some local people wanted to take a picture with my mom and I. I was told this might happen but didn't expect it...I thought they would rather have pictures with the blond foreigners....each person took turns standing with us getting their picture taken...very odd feeling.












I was planning on putting a brass lock on the wall with








"Newton" inscribed on it but for some reason they aren't currently selling the locks. There are vendors there that can inscribe them if you have your own. Wish I knew! Our guide takes her clients there all the time so she said she would take a lock up and have our family name inscribed on it and take a picture of it's location so one day we could come back and find it.








And I definitely would love to come back here with Brian and


Mac & Luci when in 5 or 6 years.








My mom is a great travel buddy, we are really enjoying learning so much about China's history and culture. After the great wall we went to the jade factory. Like the silk factory it is a government run store with guides that show you the process. They have the artists there carving the jade. The art is passed down from generation to generation in certain families. The carvings were amazing and huge...and seriously expensive. Even the small little carved pieces, considered "promotional" or tourist pieces were $42 each...no thanks. And the jewelry, very expensive also. We loved learning about all the different kinds of jade and the history of some of the traditional carved pieces. Learned how to rub a Buddah correctly! You have to rub the belly for happiness, the long earlobes for long life, the head for intelligence and something in his hand for money...I will let you know how it works!
After the Great Wall and the Jade factory we walked through their Olympic park.







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After that we went to a tea house for a traditional tea ceremony and some great education on the benefits of tea. And for those of you that have done this...yes we got the "pee-pee boy"!






After the tea ceremony we took a break and went to KFC and had ice cream. We didnt recognize anything else on the menu...definitly not selling original recipe over in China!

Then we walked to the theatre and saw the acrobat show. I didnt take pics of the first act because i was scared my flash would startle him and i would be responsible for his death! He kept stacking chairs up and up and up...and he kept climbing ip and doing all these balancing tricks on the wobbly stack of chairs...i could barely watch, it stressed me out!

The rest of the acts were beautiful and these kids were very talented.

































Yep, that would be five guys on five motorcycles in front of that steel ball.


And below you can see they are all in there at one time! FIVE!!
It was stressfull to watch, they were doing in different directions, barely missing each other...nuts!


The closing...very beautiful!











Great show! Now time to get dumplings, go to bed! Head to Wuhan tomorrow morning!

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