On to Guangzhou!

Yesterday we finished up some paperwork in Hefei and caught an evening flight to Guangzhou.  We were all glad to leave a very hot, dirty city with absolutely no Americans!  I was sad to not see the orphanage where our daughter spent her first four years, but she has had a little bit of trouble accepting her new situation, mostly due to the language barrier, so our guide (and I agreed) encouraged us not to visit as it may be very traumatic for her.  She is finding it very frustrating to have a Mama that can't communicate with her or understand her needs when she voices them.  She is very talkative and chatters away in Chinese constantly!  Praying that we can bridge this gap quickly!  It has brought me to tears several times when she pushes me away in frustration.  I feel her pain and so long to be able to comfort, encourage, and just understand her.

After arriving at the airport in plenty of time, we were dismayed to find that our 7 pm flight was delayed almost 2 hours!  WAY too much time in the airport with hungry, tired kids.  And then after finally boarding and getting underway they were so sound asleep when our dinners finally came that I couldn't wake them to eat.  Thankfully the flight attendant kindly let me take them off the plane which normally isn't allowed.  Our guide, Grace ( such an appropriate name to encourage me in a hard moment) met us at the airport and we checked into our new hotel around midnight.  We were totally blown away by the opulence of our new digs!  I am too tired to describe it in detail but something along the lines of the Taj Mahal comes to mind!  We will try to post pictures later.  By the time we all got to bed it was after 1:30 am.  This morning on our way to the breakfast buffet we ran into a family who adopted a little one from our daughter's class in the orphanage that we had connected with on Facebook.  What an amazing, sweet moment!  I felt like bursting into tears when I heard someone calling my name!  We hugged and got a cute picture of our girls together.  Thank you Lord for these special moments just when I'm not sure I can keep going here on my own.  Unfortunately they are flying out today, but hopefully we can connect in the states at some point at home in America.  After a fortifying breakfast, we completed her medical exam in record time, and the rest of our day is free to relax which we really need to recover a bit.  Please pray that her TB test comes back negative because if it is positive we could be stuck here another week or more.

Thank you again for all the prayers and wonderful comments on FB.  I finally got to read them this morning since we have decent internet for the first time, and I feel so blessed by all your love and support from home!  I wish you could all hear the music in the background of lots of laughter as the girls tease and play with Peter!  So precious!!!!