The Red Couch, Group Dinner and Brea's Angel!
This morning we got together as a group for a few quick pictures of the babies from Shaanxi on the famous White Swan Red couches. As you can see from the pictures...the babies were not in the mood for a photo shoot! The children in the photo are all from the Shaanxi Province. From left to right they are Gracie (2), Chloe (2), Noah (22 months), Laura (16 months), Samantha (19 months) and Brea (16 months). These were all Children of Promise (special needs) children assigned to our agency by the Chinese government. Our agency then published the list of children to their offices and collected names of families interested in adopting them. After two weeks of collecting names the agency picked a family for each child from multiple request for each child. We are honored that we were chosen and thank God for the blessing of thise little miracle each and every day.
The Barbie in the photos is a gift from the hotel. It is an American woman carrying her precious Chinese baby. Needless to say, we will be putting this up out of Brea's reach and giving her a new Barbie to play with.
We learned today that the White Swan is a very famous hotel. President Bush, the Queen and many other famous people have stayed here.
Tonight our group went out for a family style dinner at a local Cantonese place. The food was good but we have no idea what we ate...scary!
I'm including a picture of Shiyan. She is Bethany's guide here in China. She and our social worker Jaclyn have been real advocates for Brea and our famiy. The orphanage tried to convinceShiyan that Brea was not adoptable but she told them that the family coming for her was committed to her and would not take another baby. She explained that Brea would not have survived in the orphanage and she expressed her gratitude to us for taking a chance on Brea but un fact it is us who are grateful that we have been given the opportunity to parent this sweet little girl. We will never forget Shiyan and Jaclyn and we will keep them informed of Brea's progress as she grows.
In the morning our guide Connie will go to the consulate to go over all the paperwork for Brea to become an American . If all is in order we will have a free day...if not we will work on paperwork until it is all perfect so we can go to our consulate appointment on Tuesday for the swearing in ceremony for Brea to become a citizen.
Goodnight from Guangzhou. Enjoy the pictures.
Mary
