New BLOG Website Link

We have decided to move our Blog to a new site, so we moved all these posts and added several more posts from when we were in China to the new site...

Check out one that was in the middle of the trip:

Friday, June 26, 2009: Meeting Some of Our Group

And several others:

Sat & Sun, 3-4 Jul, 2009: Living in a Hotel
Monday, July 5, 2009: Pretty Easy Day
FAST FORWARD: Back To Real-Time

Here is the new site - http://phillipson5.spaces.live.com


Darrell

E.V.'s Passport & Medical Exam (7-1-2009)

E.V. didn't sleep quite as well last night. She got up for a bottle at about midnight and wanted to play for 2 hrs. She was happy as can be, but not about to go back to sleep. After she finally went back to sleep, she got up at about 7 or 7:30 and was happy again. Here she is playing on the bed.... I just couldn't capture a very good picture, but she was smiling and laughing all morning.

Although this might not seem like blog-worthy news, E.V. had her first poop with us this morning. That is actually big news in our world, as the travel to the big city and the stress of all the changes in her life tend to constipate them.

After that big moment, it was off to breakfast. We had nothing formal to do till 3pm, so we had a nice calm, long, breakfast and were able to talk with everyone about how things were going with the new members of their families.

After breakfast, we went up to the room and played for a little while, then Tammy went to get her massage for the day. We arranged to have a couple other folks meet her in the lobby and she showed them where the massage place was. When they got back, they told me of something funny that happened. There was one guy, one other woman, and Tammy. When Tammy and Rita came out of the room from thier "foot" (called a foot massage even though it includes much more), thier bill had already been paid. Well, John had already inadvertently paid for all three. In the middle of his massage, he decided to add oil, which was an "additional charge." When they told him the total bill, he thought it was a bit high for only the addition of oil. However, $28 didn't seem like too much for an hour massage with oil, so he just paid. Yeah, you guessed it, $28 was the bill for all three massages... crazy isn't it!

While Tammy was off on her massage, E.V. took a nap. When she got up, I took her for a walk while it was sprinkling. About halfway through the walk, it started to downpore. It's really warm here, like a sauna, so the rain is warm too. Anyway, we stepped under an overhang and sat down and sang together while the rain passed overhead. Then we finished our walk and did some shopping.

Before we knew it, the time had come to go get E.V.'s passport paperwork and medical exam done. Here is a picture on the way.

The first stop was the Police Station and we were "advised" not to attempt to take any photos. Just get the paperwork done and get out... try not to make too much noise.... I guess that is the end of that story. It was kind of surreal to be in a police station in the middle of China.

After that, we were off to get the medical exam. Here are several photos of E.V. getting her exam. All went well. She has a common cold and we have been giving her some medicine for that for the past couple of days. As you can tell, she got a little tired of being poked and prodded... she really didn't like having to take off her clothes (maybe she's bashful)

Then we rode over to the island where the famous "White Swan" hotel is that families have traditionally stayed at to finalize thier adoptions. We were not able to stay there due to renovations. Although we will be going by there tomorrow to check it out. We didn't have time to do much while we were there today, just eat. Tomorrow, we will be going back to check out the White Swan and do some major shopping! Here is a photo from the ride home after dinner.

Finally, E.V. finished the day with a bath and some more play time.


She is such a beautiful girl... has she got Daddy tied around her finger already or what?

-Darrell

Finalizing the Adoption (7-1-2009)

Last night was our first night with E.V., so obviously this morning was the first time for E.V. to wake up with her new family. She slept for 12 hours through and was very happy to see us in the morning. We were equally happy to see her.



First up on today's agenda was to go back to the adoption center. The first night, we were just E.V.'s guardians... In order to finalize the adoption, you go back the next day to do more paperwork and confirm that you still want to adopt the child. I guess it is like a cooling off period or lemon law. Anyway, we went back to the center to do some final paperwork.



Here are a couple of photos looking out the window. We were on the 8th floor. In case you are wondering, this was not a particularly bad area of town, many of the large office building structures are actually residential and are in pretty bad shape. Elsie told us today that there are 12 million people living in Guangzhou.



When we got to the center, we noticed a lady from E.V.'s orphanage who had stayed overnight to make sure the adoption went through. We had been told that she was just an office worker from E.V.'s orphanage, but you could just see her eyes light up with love when she saw E.V. It made Tammy and me feel good to see that E.V. had been so loved for her 1st year of life. We were able to get a translater and ask several more questions about E.V.'s medical history and such... priceless. Here is a picture of her with us.


After finishing up the adoption, we were headed home. But first, we stopped at the market. Here is E.V. shopping with Mom and what we bought... she wanted to push the cart.




Just outside the market, we saw a Papa John's Pizza, complete with delivery bikes.



Later on, I went out for another massage and to check out the side-streets, where you can get just about anything in the local street stores.



- Darrell

Elizabeth Violet Phillipson has Arrived (6-29-2009)

Just a quick blog today and a bunch of pictures. We are very tired after a long day and E.V. is sleeping here in the hotel room with us, so who knows how much we will be up tonight or how early our day will start tomorrow.

The day went just as planned and E.V. is wonderful. She is very small, but can sit up on her own and stand a little, holding my fingers. She is very ticklish and laughs out-loud like a Phillipson. Check out the photos and we will update the post throughout the week with more details. Cheers, - Darrell