Isla Day 1: Our family is official

Isla is now officially part of our family. We returned to The Civil Affairs Office this morning to complete the adoption process!! All went smoothly, and Isla is now our daughter, not only in our hearts, but also on paper.

Last night went well with Isla sleeping 6 and a half hours, then waking for one hour, then back to sleep for another 2 and a half hours. The only one having difficulty sleeping was surprisingly, her baba.

In the morning, Isla had a full bottle, then she played with her stacking cups and rings (thanks Anna and the girls).  Isla is curious and observant and is imitating what we do with the toys. We all went down to the breakfast buffet where Isla enjoyed her first bites of yogurt and mashed banana. She also enjoyed playing "drop the toy" game.

It is so great to see her little smile and hear her laugh! She is not too generous with these things yet, but we already see her opening up with us. She recognizes us and will look at us and smile sweetly. She loves being cuddled by both of us!

Right now she is napping soundly!...We will be back soon, hope that all of you in Tahoe and Reno are shoveled out and enjoying the snow!

Love, Barb, Will, & Isla

Here she is!

We have our daughter! She is fast asleep right now after a very big day for her.

We went to the Civil Affairs office at 2pm and waited for her to arrive. It took 45 minutes for Zi Shao and her nanny to arrive. Being so excited it was hard to wait.

When she came in with her nanny we immediately ran over to them. Barb took her into her arms and into our family. She didn't cry too much and even let me hold her (Barb that is).

We managed to feed her one bottle this evening. After dinner it was bath time which proved to be the highlight for Zi Shao. She loved the bath and even let us wash her hair without any protest.

Ok. We are joining Zi Shao in sleep. Love to all. More to come tomorrow.

First family photo

More to come!
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Leaving to get Isla

The wait is finally over. We are heading to the Central Affairs office to meet our daughter. We spent our last hour of parental freedom playing some tennis at the tennis club that is just down the street. I was very late arriving as we needed to change some money at the bank which was a very slow experience and Barb became the hitting partner of choice for a group of local players. I included the picture of Barb with her new tennis friends.

Love to all of you back home. Look for the first family picture arriving shortly.

Yángshuò

So we are in the final hours and as one of our good little friends from Incline said, only one more wakeup. But first a little more about Yángshuò…

 

We are very glad we had the opportunity to experience Yángshuò and the Guilin area. Though it is touristy and caters to the needs of many travelers it is still possible to get a glimpse of what rural Chinese life entails. We spent 3 full days in Yángshuò and each day traveled to a different spot.

 

The first day we weaved through rice paddie ponds on a road only wide enough for the narrow taxi. The second day found us just above a field of onions being harvested by two women, likely a mother and her teenage daughter. And on the third day we climbed Moon Hill and took in some beautiful views.

 

Yángshuò and Guilin are in Guangxi province which borders Guangdong to the west. In it's recent past Guangxi was an autonomous region and is home to many ethnic minorities. During our stay we met a Naxi, Miao and Xiang (sp?) all tremendously nice people with interesting heritages. We were able to share the purpose of our trip with a few people we met as well. We liked to hear their reactions and understand from their perspective the social reasons that lead to the abandonment of daughters in China.

 

Our only regret with visiting this area is that we didn't have more time to spend there this trip but we plan to return one day with Isla.

Back in Guangzhou

We arrived back to The White Swan last night. There is a crib in our room and the stork is due tomorrow!! Will post more later today.

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Yangshuo China

We will post more pictures of Yangshuo and the surrounding area in a few days, but here is one to keep the blog current. It has been an amazing couple of days here. The scenery is beautiful and the people wonderful. For some it is a tremendously hard life but they still seem to live with a contentedness we seldom find. We are experiencing such different and a diverse part of China and would love to be able to one day take Isla here.

Only three more days!
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