Be home soon!

We are leaving Guangzhou, China today and heading for Hong Kong.  We will stay there overnight so that we can catch our flight out tomorrow and head to Detroit.  This has been an amazing 2 weeks and I can honestly say I am a little sad to leave.....but, more happy to be heading home!  I can't wait to cook a home cooked meal and sleep in my own bed!   I miss my family and can't wait to see them!!

I wonder if Bret thinks this hotel room is his new home!?  He must think that!  I am sure that he will also be happy to get into a normal routine.  I am glad that spring is here so that he can experience all the outdoor things too!  He is very smart and I believe he will be communicating with us very soon.....he already knows alot of English words and it doesn't seem to bother him at all that we don't understand what he is saying! lol  He is pretty easy going and fits in with our family very well.   He loves watching TV!!! The minute that we get into the room on goes the tube!!  Don't try talking to him at this point because he won't hear a thing you say!! LOL

Better get going.....we are leaving soon to have lunch with our new friends that we have made here in China....our group was awesome!!
Our home away from home at the Garden Hotel....would definitely recommend!!

 A see through shower and tub......does have a shade that comes down ;)

 Of course he has to sit by big brother!

We are taking the train to Hong Kong.....another first time thing for us.

Pearl River Cruise and other pics!

Last night we went on the Pearl River Cruise and it was so very nice!  We really enjoyed the beautiful views from the top deck of the boat.  We had a dinner buffet on the 2nd deck and they also had a magician there to entertain us.  Guangzhou has many beautiful buildings and they make them even more impressive with all the lights and things that they use to put on quite a show in the evening!!

 

Our hotel.....The Garden Hotel has a beautiful garden in the middle.  We took a walk there today.....here are some pictures.

Guangzhou, China

We have been doing some sightseeing in Guangzhou....our guide Simon keeps us very busy.  We went to a park not too far from our hotel to look at all the new construction and very unique buildings.  The weather here hovers around 80 degrees and is awesome.  There are very beautiful trees and foliage everywhere as they are sub-tropic.

Today we went to another park....it is a very lovely park where lots of people come to walk and dance and play hacky sack.  We could learn alot from the people here.....they keep very active and take good care of themselves.  There were men and women playing hacky sack that were in their 60's and 70's!!

We then went to a market where there were many shops.  We stopped at the pearl market where there are all kinds of pearls and freshwater pearls.  Our trip is winding down to the last 5 days before we leave for Hong Kong on Friday so that we can fly out Saturday morning for Detroit on to Omaha.

Here are some of the pictures of things that we have seen in the last couple of days.

 Men hanging from our hotel cleaning it with brushes!

 Guangzhou statue of the Goats representing Gruangzhou.

 People playing hacky sack in the park.

 Several layers of shops in this mall where the pearl market is in.

The Provincial Museum and other stuff :)

Today is our last day in Taiyuan so our guide took us to the Provincial Museum here in Taiyuan.  It is all about the Shanxi Province where Bret is from.  It was a very nice museum and very interesting.
They had strollers there and Bret saw one as soon as we walked in the door and wanted to ride in one.....thank goodness!! :)   He also told our guide that he wanted us to buy one for him too!

 The Provincial Museum is 4 stories!

 A view from our hotel room.  This is on a less smoggy day!

 There are taxi's everywhere!!  And the driving here is terrible!!!

Tomorrow we are flying to Guangzhou to finish the week there and finish everything that needs to be done for the adoption.  We are really looking forward to going there.

Bret is officially ours!!

We went to the Civil Affairs office here in Taiyuan and got all of our paperwork done and Bret is officially our son!
We picked him up on Monday and when he walked into the room he had a very mischievous look on his face and was not quite sure what to think of the whole situation!  He did hang on to his orphanage directors hand and didn't really want to look at us at first.  There was another younger man with the orphanage director who we later found out was actually a son on Bret's foster parents that he called his brother.
He really mourned for his foster family for a few hours after we left the Civil Affairs office.  All we could do was let him know that we are here for him and try to make him feel better.   He even went to the phone in our hotel room and tried to call his foster mother.....our guide was in our room when this happened and told us that he said that his brother just didn't want him anymore and that he wants to get rid of him.  Very heartbreaking :(
But, what a difference a day can make.  Tuesday he was a whole new little boy :)  He is such a talker it is crazy!  Oh how I wish I could understand him.  He was having complete conversations with our van driver and the driver was laughing at how he could talk!!  He is starting to say many English words already...among them is car.....he has 2 Hotwheels cars that we sent him and keeps them in his pockets at all times.  Bret is a very independent little guy and is very happy!  He tries to entertain us all the time!  He is going to keep this mama very busy!!
We have a free day today (Wednesday).  Honestly....we are not crazy about Taiyuan.  So busy....people are not one bit friendly....they smoke everywhere....and the city is just not that nice.  We are looking forward to heading to Guangzhou on Friday.   We had dinner last night with a nice couple from Maine....they are going to be traveling on the same flight to Guangzhou.....it sure was nice to hang out with them!!

Here are some pictures from Monday......Gotcha Day!!

The Great Wall, Tiananmen Square and The Forbidden City

Today we got up early to go and do some sightseeing.  We first went to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City.  So much history and it was so beautiful!  Because it was a Saturday and the start of tourist season here it was packed with people.....mostly asian but quite a few other nationalities too!  Our Guides Tim and Amy are the best here!   They are both so nice and helpful and very informative.  Tim was full of all kinds of facts and talked a mile a minute :)

After we were finished walking around here Amy and Tim took us to a great lunch.  It was served family style on a large lazy susan in the middle of the table.....very delicious food!

After that we went to The Great Wall of China and it was awesome to see! We went to the Juyongguan section.  The last part was very steep!  I chose not to go that part but Gary and Michael did it!  We were all very tired when we got back to our room so we just chilled and watched a movie.....but all fell asleep in 5 minutes :)


Tomorrow we will have to get up at 5 am so that we can meet out guide in the lobby at 6 to fly to our son's province.  We will be meeting him Monday morning!!   Here are some pictures from today.

We made it to China!!!

We are in Beijing now after a very long flight!  We had some major excitement at the end of our flight that made us all jump!  Our plane hit some sort of turbulence and we dropped quite a ways!  At least it made us wake up so that we could get to our hotel!

I will post some more tomorrow....it is 1 am here and we need to get some sleep so that we can get back up at 7am to get some breakfast before we go on our tour of The Great Wall and Forbidden City, etc.

Internet is a little slow so hopefully I can get some pictures posted then also!

P.S.  Amanda or Eric if you read this tell each other we made it here!