Home at last!

Brrrr!  It was really cold getting out of the airport in Indy!  Everyone had to bundle up in their jackets and hats and Lyric thought it was really cold on her face when we got out in the wind.

A good friend of ours, Joe (Thanks!), picked us up at the airport in his van so he was the first one to meet Lyric and to see our weary, sleep-deprived bodies.  Our friends were meeting for house church at the time we arrived so we had Joe take us over to the Mast's house to fellowship for a bit and to introduce Lyric.  We got to share some candy we had brought back with us and some other Chinese food.  I think we even shared some airplane food - packaged tofu!  Ahh, we also split up a moon cake for everyone to try. 

Before too long, our eyes were growing heavy (jet-lag was settling in) and we had Joe take us home.  It was so, so nice to pull into our driveway.  Lyric had fallen asleep in the van, so she didn't even get a first glance of her new home as we pulled into the driveway.  We carried her in the house as she was fast asleep and left her coat on her while she slept on the couch.  We had kept the heat turned down low while we were gone so it took awhile for everything to heat up. She slept cozily snuggled up in her jacket and a blanket. 

While Lyric slept, we brought in our luggage and did some unpacking.  We tried to stay awake for as long as we could, but I think we ended up falling asleep pretty early.  I guess we were all so used to sleeping in hotel rooms together that we all fell asleep in the living room!  We kept the fire going so it was nice and toasty.  In the middle of the night we were all wide awake and ended up watching a movie together.  The children thought that was great fun!  (So did I!)

Our original plan was to have Lyric sleep in the girls' room with them, but then we thought better of it.  We wanted her to really learn who her mommy and daddy were and we figured the best way to do this was by putting her toddler bed in our room.  Still, for about the first week we slept in the living room and gave Lyric her naps on one of the couches in there. 

One thing Lyric did NOT want to do was take naps.  She would fight taking them so hard - not physically - just with keeping her eyes open and by sitting up instead of laying down.  Her eyes would get so heavy and her head would start to nod and then she would jerk herself awake again.  When I thought she was finally asleep enough I would try to lay her down so she could sleep better.  But when I did... she would wake up and start to cry - she would be mad.  I should have learned the first time, but time and time again she would fall asleep the same way and I would try to lay her down again.  There were only a few times where I was able to lay her down without her waking up and crying.  Now we have her taking naps in her own bed upstairs in our bedroom.  She has transitioned really well.  When she wakes up from her nap she will call out to whomever took her to her bed to tuck her in and read her a story.  It's really sweet to hear her call out for Tyler, Laurel or Carissa.

Karen

P.S.  I finally did it!  I got caught up on all the posts I wanted to write about on our journey to Lyric! (And it's only been 6 months since we've been home with her!)  Now I can start posting some updated photos and let everyone in on some really exciting news that our family has!  Any guesses?   I need to switch the format of the blog around a bit also.

                               

Going home!

What an amazing time we had in China!  We added our daughter, Lyric, to our family.  We visited with Brad, his wife Jieying, and her parents.  We got to introduce our children to a new culture and to new experiences.  We made some new friends and, well, the whole thing was just amazing.  I tried to put some of it into words the past few weeks, but they don't even come close to the experiences we had and the blessings we received from God.

Lyric standing on American "soil"!

We were picked up early in the morning at our hotel by Brad and Jieying and taken to the airport.  It was tough to say good-bye to one another, knowing it would be awhile before we saw them again, but our lives had taken different paths, and we were all very grateful for the time we were able to spend together.

The plane ride from Beijing to Chicago went really well... except for one small incidence.  We were served a really good sandwich in the middle of the night.  I had already given Lyric hers when Kevin, from a few seats over, quietly gestured that he would like 1/2 of Lyric's sandwich.  Now, she really didn't need the whole sandwich to herself, and I should have known better than to have given it to her all at once.  But when Kevin told me he wanted some of it, I knew there was going to be trouble - and trouble there was... in the form of really, really loud hurtful, angry crying...   that went on and on and on.  I even caught the Chinese woman in front of us glaring, I mean glancing, back at us to see what was going on.  I wonder what her thoughts were.  Sadly, my first thought was that she was thinking that I had no right to be with a Chinese "baby".  But, she could also of been thinking, "Oh, that poor little girl.  I hope she's okay.  What a wonderful mother (me!) she has to be comforting her like she is."  I don't know... the look was more like a look of annoyance...

Laurel was so happy to bring that hat home!

Ahhh.... but when all else fails I can always, always result to bribery by candy bar!  There just happened to be stuck in the box with each sandwich a twix bar with two "sticks" on it, and in the midst of the yelling I thought, "Maybe, just maybe, she will stop crying over the sandwich if I give her the twix bar!"  Well,  I didn't want to give her the whole thing.  I thought one sugar-laden bar would be enough to calm her down so I attempted to open the twix bar without her seeing it and attempted to break it in half - all while she was sitting in my lap screaming.  I got the tiniest of pieces broken off  before she saw it.  Her tears stopped, the screaming stopped - and I quickly handed over the bribe.  Silence is a GOOD thing in the middle of the night on a plane that is flying from Beijing, China to Chicago, Illinois!

I didn't get a whole lot of sleep on the flight home, but I don't think Tyler did either.  Almost every time I looked over at him he was awake.  Laurel was in the middle of her daddy and Tyler.  She could cuddle down into the seat really nice and probably got the most sleep out of any of us.  Carissa sat next to me by the window, helping with Lyric when she could. 

Our layover at the Chicago airport wasn't too long... only 8 hours :)  Fortunately, we have great children who can entertain themselves pretty easily.  We ate a little food.  Took a few walks. Got lots of drinks at the water fountain.  Almost before we knew it we had to get in line to board our last plane home!

See their backpacks?  I had them stuffed!

Tyler is in DS world.

See Carissa's sleeve?  Lyric is asking her to take her to the drinking fountain - for the 4th time.

She really liked drinking at the fountain.

Last day in China

What a busy, busy day trying to pack in all of the last minute things we wanted to do while in Beijing (shopping!)  We stayed at the same hotel that we stayed at before, just a different room. 

Brad had wanted some American food so he took us to a restaurant called Grandma's Kitchen.  They had lemonade, milk shakes, onion rings, and huge burgers - called American Burger. (I think he was trying to prepare us for arriving back in the U.S!)

Yum - biscuits with sausage gravy at Grandma's Kitchen

On the right, above is Brad and Kevin digging into biscuits with sausage gravy.  I snuck a bite also - it was really good and disappeared way too quickly.   The milkshake glass in the left corner was Tyler's.  That disappeared really quick also!  I have a picture of the burger that Carissa got, but it turned out blurry.  It was a HUGE burger, and she ate every single bite.  I was shocked that she could eat that much! 

I had a really good sandwich and onion rings.

After a filling meal we went on to do all of our shopping.  We had Renminbi (Chinese currency) burning holes in our pockets and we still had a lot of gifts left to buy.  We ended up back at the same market we had gone to before, which is good because we knew our way around.  We negotiated for and bought a lot of tea, a tea set, chop sticks, Chinese decorations and many other items.  One of the items I really like is a box designed to hold chopsticks.  Back home, I have all our chopsticks wrapped in a rubber band and stuck in a drawer and this holder was one of the items I had set out to purchase, that and a tea set I got to pick out myself.  There was one section of the market we hadn't went into the last time we were there, and it was filled with tea cups and tea pots.  It was wonderful!  I had a hard time deciding on just the right one, but I managed!

Laurel in the street lights.

Some of the other great items we bought were tea tumblers - you know how there are coffee mugs?  Well, these are for your loose leaf tea and they are great!  I was so excited to discover them because we really like loose leaf tea.  We ended up getting three plastic ones and two glass ones.  It's a good thing we bought the plastic ones!  Not very long after we were back to the states Laurel knocked one of the glass ones over and broke it and then about a week later Kevin knocked the other one on the kitchen sink and broke that one.  They were really good quality glasses, we just happened to knock them in the right places...

Oh... Lyric was a big hit at the market.  When you first walk into this market there is a tea "shop" set up on the immediate left.  One of the ladies here gave Lyric a gift, it is called "pee-pee boy".  I know.  Strange.  It's a little ceramic boy about 3 inches high.  When soaked in water he will go potty.  Really.  After being given this "wonderful" gift Lyric played with it for just a bit and then broke it by dropping it.  The lady who gave it to her was wonderful about it, but it was still a bit embarrassing... 

Later, when we were picking out the tea pot Lyric was given a few more gifts.  Paper folded into the shape of a gun (it was just for fun!), a squeaky toy mouse, and another pee-pee boy, except this one wasn't a boy, it was a mouse.  Pee-pee mouse successfully made it home with us without breaking and is now hiding in a drawer somewhere...

After spending almost all the money that was burning holes in our pockets we headed out for our last dinner with Brad and Jieying. We voted to go to one of our favorite restaurants and had a great meal and a great time.

At the hotel, Kevin ended up going back out with Brad for one last "night on the town" together.  After getting the children tucked in for bed (with Chinese cartoons on to help them settle down), I began the daunting task of packing and repacking all of our clothes, gifts, and souvenirs.  By the time I was done, our backpacks were very stuffed and pretty heavy!  To be honest, I really like the challenge of packing a bunch of suitcases or even packing luggage into a car.  I look at it as a puzzle that has to be figured out.  I can happily announce that not one item broke on our way home from China!

Looking back, I don't even remember sleeping that night, but I'm sure I did...  I do kind-of remember that the morning came really, really fast...

Taking the Train from Guangzhou to Beijing!

We woke up early in the morning to finish packing for the train ride.  Brad met us at the hotel and we took two separate cars to the station where we met Jieying and her parents, who wanted to see all of us off.   We had a lot of luggage with us so it was good to have the extra help!

Lyric liked sitting on the top bunk.

Everything went by so fast that before we knew it we were on the train getting all of our luggage settled in.  Kevin and I had traveled on a train in Ukraine a few years ago so we were happy to see the soft beds we paid extra for were really nice.  There was even a built-in television at the foot of each bed, clean sheets, and soft pillows.  Carissa, Laurel, Lyric, Jieying and I shared one cabin and Brad, Kevin, and Tyler shared another cabin with a Chinese gentleman.

Lyric and Laurel couldn't decide which bunk they wanted to sit on so they were like little monkeys going from bunk to bunk (which kept us busy lifting Lyric up and down!).

We had brought a few snacks with us and Jieying and her parents had packed food as well.  It was going to be a long train ride - it took about 23 hours, so we had to eat a few meals on the train.  Around meal times,  someone would come down the isle selling food, like noodles and rice.  Most of the time we ate our snack food and got hot water for Ramon Noodles.

Laurel was being a monkey.

Every now and then the train would make a stop at a small station.  Kevin, Brad and Jieying got off the train to stretch their legs and ended up buying some corn on the cob.  We had learned by now that Lyric did not know how or when to stop eating.  When they brought in the corn, she had already had a good meal, but she wanted more.  She really, really liked eating the corn on the cob, but we eventually had to take it away.  I honestly think she would have made herself sick had we let her keep eating.  Everything is so new to her.  She likes to try everything.  When we get home we will start working on regular meals!

It was really nice taking the train because we got out of the city and were able to see a lot of the countryside.  At one point when we were in Guizhou, Laurel had asked when we were going to get into the country.  We didn't get to walk around, but at least we got to ride through it!

Protecting their crops.

The children also got a big kick out of going through tunnels.  They didn't particularly like using the bathroom on the train, but at least they had a western toilet to sit on!  When we were on the train in Ukraine, the bathrooms would be locked 15 minutes before we got to a town and unlocked 15 minutes after we left the town.  Know why?  Anything that goes into the toilet drops right on down to the tracks below - biodegradable, right?  I think it was about the same way on the China train.

Beautiful girl

I slept better than I thought I would on the train, although I still woke up quite a bit.  I put Lyric at my feet to sleep, and I woke up a few times to make sure she was alright.  Then, the train would stop at stations in the night and I woke up at each one thinking it was time to pack up our bags.  Still, it was very comfortable, and I would do it again it a heart-beat.  It was much cheaper than taking the plane for all of us from Guangzhou back to Beijing where we would get our plane home.

After a decent night's sleep it was time to pack up the bags, catch a ride to our hotel, and then head back out for our last day of shopping in Beijing before we headed home!

Older building.  Wonder what the signs say?

Nice house all by itself.

Baskets of vegetables are at her side.

Pretty view.

Lyric was happy a second ago!

Brad is liking that corn on the cob!

Lyric thoroughly enjoying her corn.

Just hanging out - great smile.

This beautiful girl looks suspicious - I think she got into the candy!

Picked up Lyric's Visa, Out With Friends, Last Meal With the Inlaws

Sleepy Tyler

Today was another busy, fun-filled day.  It started out with taking a picture of Tyler - he was half on and half off the blow-up mattress.   We had brought two mattresses with us to China, knowing that we would need the extra beds.  They served us well the entire time, and it was well worth it to haul them around in the suit cases. 

Laurel is pretending to be a knight.

We had planned in advance to meet with the Bates Family for a walk around the town and for lunch so we headed over to their hotel, the White Swan,  after breakfast.  On the way we took pictures of the children with the many statues that are around the island.  In the first one, Laurel is pretending she is a knight.  In the second, she is fighting the pawn.  In the third, Laurel and Lyric are with the rest of the children, following the music player, and in the last one, I think Carissa is showing off how tall she is by leaning on the child's head!  (It's official, Carissa is now taller than I am!)

We really enjoyed walking around town with the Bates family.  I know for sure that Laurel and McKenna liked skipping and hopping along!  We ended up taking the Bates to our favorite restaurant and successfully ordered a bunch of good food.  If I remember correctly, when we were all done, we were stuffed.   On the main floor of the restaurant, Kevin and I ended up buying a bunch of single-yoked moon cakes so we could take them home with us to share with friends and family.

Laurel is fighting the Rook.

Toward the end of our walk-about with the Bates family we stopped at another McDonalds for some coffee and hot chocolate.  We sure did visit McDonalds a lot in China!  I don't think we go there that many times in a year back in the States!

After our walk with the Bates, we parted ways and headed back to our room for a bit.  I remember that Kevin had a bunch of business work he had to get done in the hotel room.  It was hard for him to be away from his business for as long as what he was, but in the end everything worked out great.  We rested a little in the room and then it was time to meet Brad, Jieying, and the Wu's for one last meal together.  The Wu's took us to a restaurant that served hot pot.  This time, we had clams in it.  

For some reason my stomach wasn't feeling well that evening so I decided to pass on the clams and just stuck with a few bites of bread and vegetables.  Each of the children hesitantly tried the clams, and Laurel wanted to take the shells home with her!  It was really nice of the Wu's to take us to dinner there. The kids enjoyed the rest of the meal and the evening with Brad, Jieying and her parents. 

Before we knew it, our meal had come to a close and it was time for us to get the kids back to the hotel room.  If memory serves me correctly, we did a little bit of souvenir shopping on our way back to our hotel.  Even though it was late, there were still some shops open.  The kids bought some gifts for friends, and I bought a few little items for stocking stuffers for Christmas.

All the little children following the violin player.

When we got back to the hotel room, I had a lot of packing to do.  In the morning we were taking the train to Beijing! 

We had a wonderful time in Guangzhou, touring the area, and visiting with Brad's in-laws.  It is an experience we will never forget. 

Enjoy the pictures.

Carissa showing off how tall she is!

McKenna and Laurel - two peas in a pod.

Bikes, like the one on the left, are pretty common.

The entrance to our favorite restaurant in Guangzhou.

Caught on camera - Carissa using her hands and Tyler using his chopstick like a spear!

Side street.

Big Mac, Fila-a-Fish, Quarter-Pounder, French Fries... You deserve a break today at McDonalds...

Two beautiful girls drinking hot cocoa together.

One beautiful girl drinking hot cocoa.

Laurel is sniffing her clams.  She wanted to keep the shells...

Sitting around the table for hot pot.

Laurel, delighted with her new glasses.

First Lyric, then Jieying, then Jieying's mom - all in different stages of taking a bite.  Cute.

Folk Art Museum, Traditional Chinese Tea, Christmas in China

Very intricate details at the Folk Art Museum

Today was another adventure starting out first thing in the morning!  Originally, we weren’t going on the FTIA group tour to the Folk Art Museum and Jade Market because we were going to have Hot Pot with Brad at 11:00.  So… we didn’t get up and get moving right away.  But then Brad called and said we would have hot pot at a later time in the day.  So then we decided to go on the tour, but it was already the time that the group was meeting to leave.  Rats.  Wait!  We got a phone call from Ike, our tour guide. "Can you be ready in 10 minutes?"  Not really, but we decided to do it anyway – Ike said the group would wait for us.  We moved quick!  Most of us weren’t even dressed for the day and Carissa's hair as well as mine was still wet.  Ike had said to meet them in the lobby so Kevin ran downstairs with the kids and grabbed some bread, bananas and yogurt while I finished getting ready – and then I soon followed them downstairs. 

I would of loved to look at all the details up close.

When I got downstairs, there was no Ike in the lobby, but we soon got a phone call.  Ike said to have the hotel golf cart driver take us to the White Swan Hotel.  Okay, we're flexible.  We go out to get the cart and find out that it won’t be there for another hour.  Oops!  We will have to walk/run to the White Swan so they don't have to wait for us too long!  We get there, huffing and puffing, and are soon on the bus for the tour to the Folk Art Museum - eating breakfast along the way.

I think many stories were told in the art work.

Wow!  There were a lot of people at the museum!  Really, really, really long lines.  We found out that it was an “everyone gets in free at the museum” day – and people sure were taking advantage of that!  We almost didn’t go in, but then Ike got it worked out and we went to the front of the line and walked right in.  I wonder what all of the people were thinking about us when we walked by them?  We were a bunch of white people with Chinese babies, who didn’t have to wait in line…

Laughing tiger statue.

The coolest thing I saw in the museum was called “bone art”.  It is actually hand carvings made out of ivory.  There was one carving done in the shape of a ship.  It was extremely detailed and very beautiful.  The other thing I liked a lot was the design and architecture of the building.  It had a lot intricate details on it, most of which seemed to tell a story.  I also had a lot of fun going into the shops.  Laurel bought two little items.  I can’t tell what one is b/c she may give it to a friend who is reading this.  The other thing she bought was a necklace with blue on it, and she already gave this one away to McKenna.  Laurel wanted McKenna to have something to remind her of herself and their good times in China.  Very sweet.

I thought we were supposed to go to the Jade Market but we ended up going back to the hotel, which was good.  We were then able to meet Brad for our first experience with the subway system in Guangzhou (pretty easy to use, but I like Beijing’s better) and also for Dim Sum with Jieying and her parents.  Dim Sum is Cantonese food and some of the items were pretty good!  There were many dishes to choose from, including fried rice with pineapple and shrimp in it, a couple different types of bread-like items, con-gee, and many more.  Wasn’t too bad – I’m sure I could find a favorite among the dishes.

Brad getting our sweet potatoes!

OH!  On our way to the subway we passed a street vendor and Brad asked if anyone wanted a hot sweet potato.  The kids and I had read the book Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze awhile back and in the book the main character, Young Fu, often got himself a hot sweet potato from a street vendor.  This was one of the things I wanted to experience while in China.  With only a few days left, I am so glad that Brad saw this and asked if anyone wanted one!  I was really looking forward to eating it, but it was so hot that I had to put it in the side of my backpack until it cooled down. (I never did eat it until just now.  It is about 1:00 in the morning and Kevin just got back from going out with Brad.  I was really hungry and writing about the day reminded me of it.  Call me crazy, but I just thought it was really cool to eat a sweet potato in China from a street vendor!)

At the tea house

After Dim Sum we walked to a little store that served tea in the traditional manner.  It was really neat!  This was also something that I had wanted to experience.  We sat at a table while a lovely Chinese woman prepared and served us tea.  She cleaned our cups with hot water and did not serve us the first bit of tea so that the tea would be free of any dust.  I think we tried about 3 different kinds.  Kevin bought some puh-ar and a flower tea, and I had him get me another type of flower tea, where you add a type of sugar to it while it is steeping.  (Later, Jieying, Brad’s mother-n-law, Carissa, Laurel, Lyric and I bought the sugar at a grocery store so I could take it home.  It is like rock sugar, not like the sugar cubes we have at home).

At the tea house, the girls all got to take turns playing a Chinese Harp.  Where our harps stand up, this one lays down.  It was very pretty and all of the girls, even Lyric, were very excited to play it. 

We had a picture taken of all of us at the tea shop and then the workers wanted pictures also.  They took ones with just Tyler this time (it was all girls, well, young ladies as the workers.  One thing about the Chinese is that I can never tell how old they are!  They could be 30 years old and still look like they were 18!)  Ty was a bit embarrassed but he did well.  Then they took pics with Laurel.   Brad and Kevin stood together in a hug and asked why no one ever wanted to take pictures of them!  After it was translated everyone burst out laughing.  It was really funny!

Look at the tiny tea cups!  (It's good they were tiny - we sampled a lot of tea that day!)

Out of the tea shop, the guys went and got our train tickets while we girls went and got the rock sugar, visited a more traditional Chinese grocery store, and went to the in-laws apartment.

I have to say, the traditional Chinese grocery store was very interesting.  There were live chickens in cages and you could have them butchered right there on the spot!  It was stinky inside the store and there were chicken parts on the counter.  Quite a difference from our grocery stores with our prepackaged meat!  My greatest surprise was to see a black-skinned chicken!  I was amazed and pointed them out to the girls.  Even the head was black!  I thought for sure they had somehow just blackened the chicken but Jieying assured me that it really was a black skinned chicken!  I was shocked.  Really!  I took pics also so if I can ever figure out how to get the pics uploaded I’ll post one of them.  (I did finally figure it out...) The other items we saw included big fat frogs, turtles, eels, a variety of fish, clams and many other items.  I’m glad we got to see these things!

Lyric getting a few lessons.

We soon found ourselves on the 15^th floor of the in-laws apartment building, where we had plans to celebrate Christmas with them.  It was so sweet of them - Mr. Wu (Jieying's father) - went and found a small pretend Christmas tree from somewhere, along with garland, and he hung them up in their apartment.  One of the gifts that we brought the Wu's was a Christmas music cd so we gave that to them early in the evening so we could have music.  We brought snacks to share and the Wu's set out snacks as well.  Our meal for the evening was... pizza!  It's so funny.  We wanted to have Chinese food and they wanted to have American food - pizza!  The Wu's were so generous.  They bought our family, children included, many beautiful gifts.  Each of the children received beautiful pen and pencil holders that in all of our souvenir shopping I didn't see anywhere.  They also gave us a beautiful tea set along with many other items.  One day the Wu's may travel to America, and I can only pray that we will be as hospitable to them as they were to us. 

Laurel getting a lesson.

Aside from all of the gift giving, one of the highlights of the evening was when Brad shared the story of our Savior with the Wu's.  Brad would talk in English for our benefit and then Jieying would translate in Mandarin to her parents.  Each of us then took a turn telling what Christmas meant to us.  We pray that any seeds that were planted continue to grow in each of their hearts.

All of us at the tea house.

Early on in the evening Tyler found himself with an earache.  It hurt so bad that we had him lay down in a bedroom for awhile.  He must have felt pretty bad.  In some of the pictures I have of him he looks quite miserable.

Chicken for dinner anyone?

Some lovely memories I have of the evening include Laurel drawing pictures and giving them as gifts, Lyric successfully fitting in a tiny box and looking like she was a perfect Christmas gift (which she really was), and the pure delight on Lyric's face when she received gifts for herself. 

See the black-skinned chicken?  See the eggs in the chicken?

What type of fish would you like?

How would you like your fish prepared?

Brad better watch his fingers!

Lyric was our precious gift this year!

Lyric was so happy to call these gifts her own.