Gotcha Day!

We both agreed this was the best day of our lives, bar none. We're not so sure that N thought so too. But she is finally sleeping tonight, and life is good. She is a great baby, and very good. She's not showing much emotion yet, and pretty much just sits there and eyes us suspiciously. She was averting eye contact with us at first, but tonight she was watching us walk around the room, and C even got a very brief smile. She is a little congested and has a little cough, and the only other concern is a diaper rash and her skin is extremely dry and cracked in spots. Other than that she seems fine. After about 9 hrs of sleep over the last 4 days, I'm not in the mood to add much, so I'll just upload the pictures. I'll add more tomorrow. Isn't she beautiful?

We made it to Tokyo

Well we made it to Tokyo and everything went fine. Even though we weren't able to upgrade to Business Class (it was full), we were able to get very good seats towards the back of the plane. There was a center row open, so C was even able to stretch out and sleep for awhile. What a LONG flight! We left JFK at noon, and since we were flying west the sun never went down. So now it is Monday at 5:30pm here, and just starting to get dark, but our bodies are telling us it is 4:30am. Hopefully we'll be able to get some sleep on this next flight going into Guangzhou (another 5hrs on the plane...!). But other than being tired, we're doing fine.

The Tokyo airport is nice. We're in the international terminal, and since we have a connecting flight to China we didn't have to go through customs. Our bags were checked through all the way to Guangzhou too, which was convenient.

Our next challenge will be to get from the GZ airport to the White Swan hotel, where we will be staying for the whole trip. Tomorrow...Meeting N!

I uploaded new pictures here.

Our Travel Approval is here.

Well we finally received our travel approval from the China Center of Adoption Affairs today. We will be traveling on Jan 28, and will be returning on Feb 14. How appropriate to bring N home on Valentine's Day! Instead of flying with our group from the adoption agency, we were able to book tickets using our frequent flier miles with AA, which will save us quite a bit of money. So to also save some time, we're going to forgo the 3 days of sightseeing in Beijing at the beginning of the trip and fly directly into Guangzhou. We'll be able to meet up with our group on the 29th for all our scheduled meetings and appointments. This also means we'll only have to stay in one hotel (the White Swan-see link at the right), instead of taking the in-country flights from Beijing to Guangzhou. What a nice answer to prayer to be able to use our miles for this trip! Here is the TA for those of you who need to brush-up on your Chinese.

Here is our schedule in China:
Jan 28 - Fly from JFK
29 - Arrive in Guangzhou
30 - Meet N!
31 - Registration and Notary appt
Feb 1 - Apply for Passport
2 - Sightseeing
3 - Sightseeing
4 - Sightseeing
5 - Sightseeing
6 - Visit Lianjiang Orphanage (where N lived)
7 - Sightseeing
8 - Get Passport
9 - Take Visa Photo and Medical check
10 - Free Day
11 - Free Day
12 - Visa appt
13 - Get Visa, Swearing in ceremony
14 - Fly back to NY and Home