God's Greatest Gifts

When asked about God's greatest gifts many people will refer to their children if they have them. Many Christians will refer to Jesus. Others may refer to other loved ones in their life.   Adoptive parents and especially adoptive parents whose children are born in China sometimes have the special gift of meeting the foster parents of their children. Today Wim and I were very blessed and humbled to meet two very loving, giving and caring people who loved Clara Rose unconditionally and completely for the past 1 ½ years.   I think I have mentioned before, either here or on Shutterfly that this adoption is very different from when we adopted Josie. Josie lived in an orphanage her entire life and while it was a very good orphanage, it was still an orphanage. We were certain that we were giving her a better life full of love that she would likely not ever know living in an orphanage.   In looking through the photo album we were given for Clara Rose, we realized she had been living in a loving home with foster parents who clearly cared for her a great deal. The certainty of what we were doing by adopting her and giving her a better life was not there. I know that I felt guilty.   Having met with her foster parents, who were extremely gracious and genuine in their feelings for her, we feel better. These wonderful people came to our hotel where Wim and I took turns meeting with them and talking with them for a bit over two hours.    What do you say to someone who loved and cared for your child for most of her life knowing that she would likely be adopted and not in their lives forever?   Thanks?   Shie Shie (Mandarin for thanks)?   Doesn't quite cover it, does it?   It is a strange and wonderful thing to share a child and the love of a child with another family who lives on the other side of the world. How does that happen? In my opinion, only by the hand of God and we feel extremely blessed.   Our family has expanded by adopting Clara Rose, not just by adding her to our family, but also by adding to our extended family, her foster family, for whom, everyone has agreed to stay in close contact in the years to come.

Birds Nest and Hot Pot

Shortly after the girl's afternoon nap, we got busy with some fun playtime/attachment bonding with play dough. Little did Wim know where this would lead. Clara Rose and Josie thought it was hilarious when I made a little clay birdie and had it squawking around at them and BaBa. Then Josie made a bed for the birdie and we put it on BaBa's head.   I think Clara Rose is learning that there are certain things BaBa isn't so great about doing—like taking the lid of her sippy cup so she can drink from it without the top on; giving candy canes, Oreo cookies. Some people might call the bribes. I call it whatever it takes.  :-D   Clara Rose has tried to come closer to me, but there is one other problem—Josie. If Clara Rose makes any move toward me, Josie jumps in and does this thing with her butt to bump Clara Rose away while she *gracefully* proceeds to plop in lap.  We're working on it. Josie is being very honest—she flat out told me, "I no want Rose to like you.  You MY mommy." All said in a very soft, sincere, scared little voice.   Between Tianjin being a big city, a city covered in snow that we've been told rarely gets as much snow as it has so the streets aren't great, the weather being freezing and having two toddlers on opposite times zones—Wim and I are finding that we don't have the energy or stamina to be as adventurous as we usually are.   Even so, we did decide to eat at a VERY nice, Fancy Chinese restraint last night—with Clara Rose and Josie. Yes, the lack of sleep has made us delusional to think we can actually go to a nice restraint with a 2 and a 3-year old and enjoy a nice relaxing dinner. The staff was quick to bring out plastic everything for the girls.   Our waitress put our napkins on our lap, which Josie did not like because, "that's mommy's job!" As if she doesn't have enough to deal with with Clara Rose, now some strange woman is doing mommy's job!   I ordered duck and water chestnuts which were served in lettuce leaves and dumplings for the girls.   Wim ordered a Hot Pot: you pick a broth, meat, veggies, noodles sauce. They bring an individual pot over a sterno. The hot broth is inside and you put the meat etc. in it yourself and cook it at the table for a leisurely dinner. Wim's food for his hot pot took up nearly the entire table.   His food wasn't brought out all at once—one thing he thought was the sauce wasn't because that came later. For all we know, he mixed the finger water in with his broth. :-D    Clara Rose loves noodles and as soon as she saw those she started crying for them and for Baba to hold her on his lap. She kept trying to grab things on the table and Wim kept saying, "No." I reminded him that she doesn't understand "no" and he needs to say Boo Yao. Of course, the added bit where I called him Mr. Rosetta Stone was definitely too much. Then Josie also wanted some noodles and Wim became increasingly flustered and indignified. But, we managed through dinner without making too huge of a mess—at least neither of the girls pulled the table cloth completely off the table. Although, I think we burned more calories than we consumed.   Wim thought we were going to relax in the room afterward, but I had mentioned swimming to Josie earlier and she wanted to go. Wim somewhat begrudgingly decided he and Clara Rose would also go with us.   Was he glad they did! Clara Rose really enjoyed the pool. They started off slow as shown in the picture, but she quickly wanted to ride on Wim around the pool. Played in a ring and walked around a bit without holding onto Wim.   Josie is up now, so I gotta go.

Ancient Culture Street

I have to say, getting up and going with two toddlers is somewhat exhausting-- then their is breakfast and we don't even have to cook it-- yet!  Oh BOY!   After eating, we all headed to Ancient Culture Street. Once there, we realized there was a little  bit of a language misunderstanding with our guide yesterday. We had talked about going and that we could dress the girls in the snow suits I brought. Our guide told us the stores were all inside. We asked if she meant like a Mall and she said yes.   Guess what? We didn't dress the girls in snow suits and yes the stores are inside-- sort of, but by Western standards it is an outside shopping mall-- somewhat similar to Garden City for our Rhody homebodies.  While I tried to have a quick look at some art work, Wim was attacked by three Chinese grandmas for not taking proper care of the babies etc.   It was too cold for how they (an we) were dressed.   We grabbed a taxi back to the hotel. Taxis are pretty cheap so not a big deal and kind of a funny story for Clara Rose and Josie later on.   Clara Rose and Josie didn't seem much in the mood for another car ride back to the market-- plus we would need to re-bundle them.   Wim and I decided that I would go back solo and check it out. I quickly threw on some thermals, grabbed my big coat, ear warmers, and big mittens-- all the Yuan we have on hand, and headed back.   What a great time I had. Lots of stores with all kinds of interesting crafts, different snacks of fried dough with brown sugar-- and by fried I don't mean funnel cakes or dough boys-- I'm talking crispy fried, crunches hard when you bite into it.  Pretty tasty too.  Shop owners were very nice and not pushy. I had a really fun time out exploring all on my own!

Baba-cise

Wim brought his workout DVDV, "15-minutues of Hell."   Here are the girl's watching him in Awe.

The Princess and the Pea

Silly us. We started out the night last night thinking we could put the girls in bed together after they fell asleep and Wim and I could have the other bed. That last about an hour or so.   Then Clara Rose went into Baba's bed and Josie and I snuggled in her bed.   Here is Clara Rose getting her beauty rest. Poor Wim-- she is like a gymnast in her sleep.

Living the Suite Life

As many of you know, we wanted to stay in a hotel that was a little less grande, so we could have a suite. As it turns out, we are staying in a regular sized room in a very nice hotel. So much for best laid plans.   Josie is still waking between 2:30 and 3:00 AM, which would be her normal time to wake up after her nap in the States. Since Wim and I aren't really on China time either, we've been joining her for some quality time wile Clara Rose gets her beauty rest.   One picture is of Josie watching her fave DVDVs (her name for them) of Dora. The other picture is of Wim in the late night reading room.

Baby Steps

Last night at bed time we didn't get a lot of crying. Instead Josie fell asleep pretty quickly and early. Clara Rose started talking up a storm. I showed her some pictures on the camera and she was really interested. She came and sat by me on the bed. I showed her how to take pictures and took some of her and showed her the pictures. She started say Ba Bao , which means darling, then she would do the first pose (I think) pictured here.    Then she would point to pictures of Wim and say Ba Ba (Mandarin for Dad). Wim told me to take my glasses off. I did and took a picture-- she pointed to that picture and said, Ma Ma. Then she looked at me and said, Ma Ma.   We think my glasses freak her out a bit. We sent her pictures of us in a care package and I don't think I was wearing glasses in that picture. Anyway-  She was touching me and letting me touch her and was very happy. This morning, we seem to be back to much of the same as yesterday and the day before-- but we think maybe there was clicking going on her head last night.