handsful

Now that I posted some pics of our little guy, here’s how yesterday went –

We all met in the lobby of our hotel at 9:30. All holding our precious paperwork, gifts, and wearing our anxious smiles. We made it to the Civil Affairs office about 15min. later and saw that one child had already arrived. We all oohed and ahhed over their forever family moment (I was already crying…what would I do when MY child arrived?!?). I walked to the corner of the office to put my things down on a chair, and a cloud of tiny moth-like bugs poofed up. Okay then.

Our group is big…about 16 families total and our children from about 5 different orphanages. We knew the children would come in waves, so we paced the room and waited. About every 15 minutes, a new van would drive up and everyone would start whispering “here come more!”. We were eventually told that the children from Luoyang wouldn’t arrive until nearly 12pm. It wasn’t even 11am yet. So, we enjoyed watching all the other new families and took lots of pictures for everyone.

Then, suddenly, here comes Dylan (who is still Yu Hai right now) in the arms of a nanny. Ahhh!! We were near the door, so we walked right up. The nanny was all smiles and started telling him that I was his mama and Randy his baba. I held out my hands, and as the nanny handed him to me, Yu Hai kissed me. Oh my! He was quiet, no crying, and making eye contact off and on. He fussed a little initially about going to Daddy, but eventually went right to him. Then later, he cried when Randy tried to give him to me. He was so confused, as expected. I can only imagine what his little mind was thinking. We gave him a stuffed frog, and he held onto it with a death grip. We sat in chairs and let him play with a cell phone, which he loved. He loved the fruit puffs we brought, and took water from his sippy cup.

We boarded the bus around 12:30 to go back to the hotel. He sat with me, and played with my necklace a little. We started noticing him copying me…I tapped the window, he tapped the window. Back at the hotel room, we ordered room service and set out some toys on the floor to play with. Stacking cups were a HUGE hit. If you ever consider adopting, do NOT forget these. Lainey loved hers too :) Yu Hai figured them out right away, putting them in the right order, then putting them in different orders, then putting the small ones in the big ones, etc. He’s very detailed and inquisitive in his play – you can tell he’s thinking the whole time. We were told by the nanny at the office that he was considered very handsome and very smart. That’s my guy.

It was while playing that he started smiling. And, pretty soon, he was giggling…and, then laughing right out loud. We believe we have a giggle box on our hands. :)

Lunch came, and we laid out a twin sheet and ate picnic-style. He had congee (watery rice, basically – a staple of every Chinese baby/toddler), rice, and bread. Bread is a favorite of his – mien bao. He lights up when he sees mien bao! Randy and I tried a “beef burger” but it wasn’t much of a success. At least the pizza in the hotel Italian restaurant is AWESOME (we found out the night before Gotcha).

Pretty soon, I had to meet the group with our guides to do paperwork, and Randy laid Yu Hai down on the bed with him to rest – he fell asleep for about 10minutes before I came back and told him they both had to come to the meeting room to complete the paperwork and do Yu Hai’s hand stamp.

A little more playtime, and soon it was dinner time. We decided to try a noodle restaurant in the hotel next door. We got a highchair for Yu Hai, and he played samarai swords with the chopsticks. :) We ended up with dumplings, fried rice, and a beef noodle dish. I tried the noodles, and at first they were great…then, the heat turned up and Randy said they were swimming in curry. It was so hot, it was burning my lips, so I gave that to Randy and ate the rice. Yu Hai acted like he’d been going to restaurants all his life…ate politely, let us help him with his fork, smiled as he ate. Could this truly be this easy??

Back to the hotel, play time, and then PJs and teeth brushed. We laid him in his crib about 8:30, and he laid there quietly until drifting off to sleep soon after. Randy and I also crashed (we had been lying in the dark, quietly, so he could fall asleep).

It was a wonderful first day with our Dylan. We are blessed beyond measure, and all glory and honor goes to our God who ordained this child to us.

I’ll post about today later on…we have to be downstairs in 5 minutes for our trip to the Lotus Center (a.k.a. Wal-Mart). Pictures later I promise!!!