Thursday, January 4, 2007

“Looks like we made it
Look how far we’ve come my baby
We might have took the long way
We knew we’d get there someday”
Shania Twain

We are packed (had to buy another suitcase) and ready to leave tomorrow morning at 5:00 a.m. We will have a VERY, VERY long day including an 8-hour layover in Detroit and we will arrive home at 11:45p.m on the 5th. All on the same day due to time changes, very strange!

Today we strolled around Guangzhou had a last lunch at Lucy’s, the girls did a little wheelin’ and dealin’ with the last of their Chinese money. I picked up a beautiful shirt that I had custom made for less than $30. We then had our last authentic Chinese dinner with our guide Nelson, who has been absolutely amazing! He really made us feel welcome and knew everything about the adoption process, he was a true professional and a wonderful person, we will miss him.

In today’s pictures you will see our “red couch” pictures. These are traditional pictures for adopted Chinese children. All children leaving the country go through Guangzhou and most stay at the White Swan Hotel, even those who don’t make a trip to this hotel to have their pictures taken on one of the famous red couches. So we join in this tradition with our daughters!

We stopped at the 7-11 to stock up on goodies for the plane. Please pray for us, Jia can be a bit of a wild one, we are hoping that she sleeps and is calm on the plane (HA!)

You may have noticed that in all the original pictures we had of Jia-Li she had a little pink “lucky dot” on her forehead; tonight Jia came up to me with a pen and wanted me to draw one on. It made tears come to my eyes. Anna got a lip pencil for me and I drew one on for her, she looked in the mirror and seemed satisfied. She has come so far, I am sure she is still mourning, and the road ahead will be rocky, especially with me, but she is a small miracle from God. We are saddened to take her away from China but joyous that God has given us the gift of our “mini goat.” We promise God and the Chinese people that we will take care and protect this little one for the rest of our lives!

Tonight I want to thank everyone who has followed us on our trip to China; we will post again from home, so keep watching Jia’s Journey Home.

But tonight I want to thank the person who never, ever doubted me. The person who didn’t think I was too old or that the idea was too strange, the person who always believes in me no matter what—Drew. I started this post with a Shania Twain song, I would like to end it with the rest and dedicate it to my husband, the greatest father in the world and my best friend:

“They said, I’ll bet they’ll never make it,
But just look at us holding on
We’re still together, still going strong.

You’re still the one I run to
The one that I belong to
You’re still the one I love
The only one I dream of
You’re still the one I kiss goodnight

Aint nothing better
We beat the odds together
I’m glad we didn’t listen
Look at what we would be missin’”
“Still the One”
Shania Twain

May the grace of God be with you all, our wonderful family and friends.