Feeling so blessed..

We have had such a good week. Minus a few moments of jealous boys who are adjusting to their new sister.

Jeff went back to work Monday. I think he was glad to get back there after 3 weeks. (and I am sure Stephen who ran his desk for that long was glad too! Thanks Heidi and Stephen. Thanks to Heidi who probably dealt with a stressed out hubby) Although, I know Jeff he missed seeing all of Mayleigh's smiles.
I had my first week of getting 4 kids up and breakfast and loaded up to take Brennan to school. And we did it...on time. It hasn't been too bad. Now if you ask me to have EVERYONE dressed and out the door early....that will be another story. At least this week everyone except Brennan could stay in jammies. We are praying Chase can go to school next week. They have had a snow day on Mon and Tues every week for as long as I can remember. And those are the only two days he goes to preschool this year. Poor guy forgot what school is!

The boys are doing ok. They are for sure having some issues with the new addition. Natural issues, I think. Kullen might be having the hardest time not being the baby anymore. He has been naughty. Dont get me wrong, he was testing us quite a bit before we left for China. But he is crying more and having more tantrums. My laid back Chase is doing the best with the adjustment. :) Brennan loves Mayleigh and is so sweet to her but he has had some days with a serious attitude. In general, none of them have been listening and that has been driving me nuts! Hoping we can all get adjusted soon! I know each time we have added to the family, this has happened. It will just take time. My boys couldnt imagine life without each other and I know they will feel that same with about Mayleigh!

Mayleigh has continued to smile and laugh and play all day long! She has been awesome!! She is eating more and loving exploring the toys!! I have showered and done laundry, dishes, paid bills, etc. all while she is content playing by herself! It is so great to see her so comfortable! No walking still. She is crawling all over and she has even pulled up on the furniture but still hasnt walked. Hopefully soon! We are anxious! She is sleeping pretty well. Usually wakes up once and we change her and she goes back down. Hoping soon she will sleep straight through the night but for now, I can't complain. She goes down for naps without a peep too. I feel so spoiled!

Mayleigh had a busy week seeing the town! Tuesday with another snow day and we had to get out. So some friends and I met with the kiddos at the museum. Between the 3 of us, we had 10 kids. Crazy! The kids had a blast and Mayleigh enjoyed watching! Then that night she had her first Culvers dinner for Chase's birthday. (his pick ;) ) Thursday we headed to target with my mom. And boy I was glad I had my mom! Just getting in and out of the car in the freezing cold with the 3 kiddos was quite a feat! I have been so thankful to have my mom here this extra week. She has ran errands for me, folded laundry, and helped while we were still in the hospital! We will be so sad to see her go back to Arizona Sunday. I am glad she has had the extra time getting to know Mayleigh. There is no doubt Mayleigh has already fallen in love with her Gramma!

Jeff and I wanted to say a HUGE thank you to the crazy amount of people that have sent meals, desserts, gifts, prayers and love to our family! It has been so nice to not worry about dinners and to be able to spend the time with the kids. We just have been so spoiled that I am not sure how I am going to start cooking again! ;) If you know me well, you know I hate cooking dinner!!! Worst time of my day by far! So thank you thank you for taking that stress away!!!
I have also been so touched by the number of friends who I havent talked to for years and years and have written to tell me they would love to help in some way. Or old friends who have sent beautiful notes to our family and sweet gifts. We feel so lucky to have such amazing friends. We are truly blessed!!!! We absolutely love it here and you are all the reasons why! Our friends are SIMPLY THE BEST!!!!

Out and about in the freezing cold!!!! 

With Jeff sick and the hospital visit, we never got around to taking our first family pict of 6! Let's just say with this many people, it didnt go so well! Enjoy!

My birthday boy! Having fun at the museum! Love this boy's smile!!

So lucky... not only do we have great friends, but our kids are such great friends!! :) Love this crew!

Looking cute in her new outfit! Thanks Jen for the adorable outfit! :)

Yep, we did it. In the snow we ventured out to get a few groceries. I opted for Aldi since its smaller and not as overwhelming as Walmart! It went surprisingly well! Snacks help a lot!! 

Dressed in her Chinese dress for Chinese New Year!! 

And eating pizza for the new year! Ha ha! Even if I was organized for the Chinese New Year, you all know I wasnt going to make homemade dumplings! LOL! 

I think this is my favorite picture to date!! :) Oh Mayleigh, sometimes I cant believe you are actually here in our house! Love you to China and back!!! 

Good to be home...

We are home from our 2 day hospital stay and I hope it stays that way! Life needs to slow down a bit. I cant keep up this pace much longer! Finally, Jeff is feeling better and back at work. I think we are all glad for that. He was so tired of feeling yucky, and to be honest, I was too! ;)
I will kind of give you a run down on what they ended up finding out about Mayleigh at the hospital. She was extremely dehydrated. She was extremely constipated. But her kidneys look good. They were only looked at so far by a radiologist, we are hoping to have them checked out by a pediatric radiologist but for now they look fine. We have heard that sometimes a regular radiologist dont pick up on some stuff so we want to be sure they are looked at again. We are sending all this info to the colorectal team in Columbus for them to review it all.
After an awkward afternoon at the hospital, we were released with a preventative antibiotic for the UTI's and sent home. Mayleigh will also be on a dose of mirilax to get her cleaned out. She certainly is on her way. The 2nd night in the hospital she was up every hour with poop. Needless to say, it was a very long night!! But glad to see she is getting it out! The afternoon was awkward because our pediatrician explained to me that Mayleigh had e. coli in her urine. I guess this is common for causing UTI's. But he was saying it was resitant to most antibiotics. He wanted to talk to our surgeon and come up with a plan before we left the hospital to be sure these UTI's dont come back and we are back where we started. I thought this sounded great. He would be on the same page and collaborating with our surgeon. But when our surgeon and pediatrician talked, there wasnt much collaborating. I guess our surgeon just thinks we need to put Mayleigh on a preventative and she will be fine. Our pedi is still worried that the antibiotic wont do anything for the E. coli. Who knows?? But the conversation didnt go well. The surgeon was wonderful to me but I guess didnt feel like collaborating with my pedi! The good news the surgeon told me was that Mayleigh doesnt seem to have kidney issues and the pictures I sent him of her looks like she has a good outcome after surgery!! :) That is great news. We are most worried that after surgery Mayleigh will not have bowel or bladder control. That is worst case scenario. But the surgeon seems to think things look good for her!
Our sweet girl was so happy and fun in the hospital. Go figure?? I guess those fluids really perked her up!!

Sweet girl. She loves her bed. I am thankful she reaches for it and is comfortable to lay alone. Even in this creepy hospital crib!

All smiles

Love this girl!! 

Since we have been home Mayleigh continues to do great!! She is so happy playing in the family room. She doesn't care if I am in the room or if I am busy doing dishes or cleaning. She has been trying new foods. She loves grilled cheese now. She also ate tortelinis tonight. :) She is making so much progress. It is amazing to think how far she has come. She hasnt walked yet but today she crawled all over the upstairs. Then tonight she pulled up on the kids mini trampoline. We were hoping she would take some steps but not yet. Hopefully soon! We are so completely smitten with her! She just smiles at everyone and has really brought so much joy to our house. It was a long road to get to where we are so it makes it that much sweeter! 

A turn for the worse...

Well, unfortunately after having a few great days with Mayleigh smiling and happy, things went down hill yesterday. She started being more clingly and fussy, kind of like she was in China. We also noticed that she was having yucky diapers. What gave her the first UTI was the stool that was getting down to her urinary tract and this started happening again yesterday. While she was happy for those few days she had clear urine. Obviously there cant be anything comfortable about having stool coming out where you pee. :( We had an appt for Mayleigh at Dr Patel for tomorrow (Monday) to get on the preventative meds for UTI's but after emailing with the surgeon yesterday about the stool, he suggested calling Dr. Patel instead of waiting until Monday. Dr. Patel was worried about waiting to long to clear the infection and her becoming more dehydrated, which we were already slightly concerned about. So last night around 7:45 we checked into the hospital. Luckily my mom is still here and she came with me since Jeff is STILL sick with this virus.
So we got all checked in and they wanted to start an IV of fluids and antibiotics and they had to catheterize her to get a urine sample. The nurse gave me the option of going in the room with her while she had all that done. I decided I didnt want her to associate me with pain so we stayed in the room and the nurses did the blood drawl and everything else. My mom and I had to sit in our room holding our ears cause we could hear her screaming! It was awful. They had a really hard time getting a blood drawl. The nurse said she was so dehydrated and they were so glad we brought her in. Dr. Patel came  in around 1030 or so to check her out which I wasnt sure if he was going to. I was really thankful for that. He said her stoma looked good and she was looking pretty good overall considering the dehydration and the UTI.
We finally got settled and I sent my mom home around midnight so she could get some sleep. I got Mayleigh to sleep in the crib (that looks like a jail) and we finally got a few hours of sleep. She slept pretty well considering.
This morning we went down to do an xray of her belly to see if she is constipated. Now we are waiting to go do the kidney ultrasound and to see the nurse practitioner on call. Unfortunately the nurse last night said she highly doubted that Patel would release us today. The antibiotics have to be given every 24 hours by IV. So that wont be until tonight that she will get another dose. They are testing her urine to find out what bacteria she has. That takes 24-48 hours.
My mom was suppose to fly back home today. With us being here for a few days and Jeff sick, I was sooo thankful she canceled her flight and is going to stay longer. I am so appreciative of that to have the extra help! I think we will need it!
I dont have my camera cord here at the hospital so I cant download any pics but we at least have a smiley, happy girl this morning. She has eaten cheerios (and thrown them all over) and yogurt this morning. She has been smiling at all the nurses and playing with her toy purse. She started waving when we say bye bye! :)
Just trying to take it one day at a time. I am having a hard time being here because I want to be home with the boys. Brennan is kinda nervous about why she is here. Luckily when we left last night Mayleigh was smiling and happy so he could tell by looking at her that she was ok. But he had come into our room in the middle of the night wanting to see if I was home yet and Jeff said he ended up sleeping with him. Which he NEVER sleeps in our bed. :( Just want him to know so bad that Mayleigh is going to be ok and I dont want him to worry.
I will keep everyone posted as we know more. Please pray for good results on her kidney ulstrasound. I am kinda nervous about that. Hoping things are functioning fine.

Family Days

Each day home with Mayleigh she has become more and more comfortable here with us. She has started trying new foods, playing, crawling, and laughing. It has brought a lot of joy to our house!! This cold weather and Jeff's sickness has kinda been a blessing in diguise because it has forced us to be home and just have some good family time for Mayleigh. We have all enjoyed the down time after that crazy few weeks in China!
She has been sleeping pretty well so that has helped our jet lag immensely. We really haven't felt bad at all. I was expecting the worst when we came home so it has been a nice surprise. She is still taking 2 naps. About an hour in the morning around 10 and then she goes back down from about 2-430. She is so easy to put down for naps...what a blessing! :) At night she has done pretty well. She sleeps in her own crib in her room. Most nights she has slept straight from 8-2. Then we are usually back and forth to her room a few times between 2-4 or so. She has a little bit of a cold and she seemed to be having a hard time breathing through her nose so she was up a little more often last night.
Yesterday I had a phone conversation with Mayleigh's surgeon. Wow...I was so impressed. We had already been emailing him a little bit from China and I was already so impressed at how quickly he got back to us to help us out. We spent almost an hour discussing her care and any questions I had for now. I was so appreciative and feel so much better with where we are headed with her surgeries. He is in the process of moving from Cincinnati Children's hospital to Nationwide Children's hospital in Columbus, Oh. so we will not see him until he is in Columbus at the beginning of April. He is setting up a new center in Columbus that will encompass GI, gynecology, colerectal, and urology all working together as a cohesive team. This will give Mayleigh the best care she needs in gynecology, colorectal, and urology. At first we were hoping to get surgery done within the first 2 months but now with us being forced to wait because of the surgeon, I am kind of thinking this is the best thing for us. We have been through a lot of stress as it is with our trip in China and just getting adjusted at home so I am honestly not ready to take on the stress of surgery any time soon!!
For now we are going to get Mayleigh on some preventative meds to keep her from getting any more UTI's and we are going to do a kidney ultrasound to check the function of those. There can be kidney issues with kids with AI so we will rule that out. We will also be taking her to an International Adoption Clinic in the next month in either Chicago or St. Louis to have her completely checked over and figure out immunizations for her. Her files says she has had no immunizations. Even if she had, we would probably just redo all of them anyway.

Mayleigh had such an awesome day! Smiling, playing, crawling, and laughing. OH and EATING!! She tried pretzels, cheese stick, a hot dog, melon,  and sausage pie for dinner. :)  She has finally turned a corner and you can tell she feels safe with us now!! It just completely warmed my heart and I couldn't stop smiling all day!!! Totally in love with her smile!!

Chase playing with his new sis

This melted my heart to see all my kiddos playing together!!! WOW...we have 4 kids!!!! 

Gramma got some loving with Mayleigh today too! :)

Playing doll house with Gramma!

Mayleigh was just all smiles today!

so sweet!

My best friends kiddos came over to play since we have all been going crazy being inside. Mayleigh loved Cole!! 

Meeting Cole and Camden! Mayleigh needs to get to know them real well...they are around a lot and we like it that way! :) 

Our first few days home...

We have had 3 days at home now. It has been nice but I am also a little stir crazy already!! I am in trouble. We need to be staying home a lot to bond and keep Mayleigh away from a lot of people so she understands that we are her family and that is going to be tough for me! I like to be out and about!!
When we got home we got those first smiles when Mayleigh was watching the boys. That happened so quickly after we got home that I think my expectations were too high. I assumed that since she opened up that fast after getting home that the next day she would be happy, smiling, walking and playing. But that didnt happen. :(
Has she made progress... Definitely, just not quite as fast as I had expected. She is now sitting in her high chair and every meal we are giving her different foods. Sometimes she wont touch any of it and then tonight she tried quite a few things. So she is for sure making progress. We started also giving her pedia sure in her bottle and we are hoping the calories will fatten her up a bit!
Mayleigh had a hard time in China being put down. The first day home was tough. She really screamed when we put her on the floor to play. But everyday she has gotten a little better at playing. She is very attached to Jeff and when she sees him she starts to whine and reach her arms out toward him. Its like all of a sudden she isnt happy on the floor anymore, she needs to be in Jeff's arms. Its a hard mix between pushing her a little and picking her up and cuddling her constantly. She still is not walking at all. Its hard to think of her as a 19 month old. She seems more like a 9 month old who sits really well but cant walk. I know there is a developmental delay from the orphanage but we are hoping to see big strides in the next month.
I was pretty bummed that Jeff was going back to work today...then he came down with pink eye Sunday afternoon. It has just gotten worse. He can barely open his eye and its really bugging him. He ended up not going to work today so it was nice to have another day as a family. Brennan and Chase had school cancelled too because of the weather so we had everyone home again for the day! That was nice. Unfortunately, Jeff's eye isnt getting better from the pink eye drops. We are wondering if its viral instead of bacterial.
Tonight I had a hair appt scheduled. I was going to cancel it at first but after the stressful trip and few days home, Jeff encouraged me to just go. My parents came over to help him get dinner for the kids and help out. It was honestly the best thing I had done! I needed a little break. So thankful for Jeff always encouraging me to take a break.

So thankful to have this guy!! He is pretty amazing!!! 

If I can be completely honest....I have struggled with the fact that Mayleigh really reaches and wants Jeff and she isnt doing the same for me. She doesnt cry when she is with me, but if I am holding her and she sees Jeff, she instantly cries and reaches for him. Honestly, when I went into this process I knew this could happen. I thought it would be great as long as she just bonded with at least one of us. But it has been way harder than I expected. It makes me so sad that she only wants Jeff. It makes me feel like I am doing something right for her to want me. Or I am not loving enough for her to want me. etc. I know those thoughts are not rational and I am trying to be realistic, but I am just being honest, its been hard!
The boys are doing pretty well. Maybe a little stir crazy after a few days of not doing much but they are good. They love making Mayleigh smile, and they usually are the ones to do it! I am proud of them for being so loving to her and being patient with the transitions we are all going through. I am pretty bummed because I have another cute video I wanted to put up but it doesnt work. I guess they are too long. I will try and record a short one so you can all experience her sweet giggle when it happens!! I have to share something Brennan said when I went back and watched a video tonight that was from Sunday. Brennan said, "She gets it, tonight has been pretty cool." It was so sweet. I had forgotten he said that until I went back and watched the video. It warmed my heart!!

She is actually smiling! Kinda looks like she is crying. She likes the balloons. 

My mom's first hugs with Mayleigh.

Kullen showing Mayleigh her panda bear they made for her at Build a Bear! 

We still see this sad, lost face all too often. :(

Happy at dinner tonight. (of course while I was gone!)

Love this silly boy who loves his sisters sunglasses!! 

The long journey home and lots of hugs!!!

Saturday morning (in China), Friday night in Illinois we headed to the Hong Kong airport for our long journey home. I always thought I would dread this trip. 15 hours on a plane with a toddler...but I could not have been more excited for that 24 hour trip home. At that point, I didnt care what I had to do to get there.
Our first flight was a quick flight to Tokyo. When we booked our tickets we got a bassinet. I really didnt know if M would sleep in it but thought it was worth a shot. Really the best part about having the bassinet ended up being the leg room you end up with. You have to seat behind the bulkhead so I could stretch my feet completely straight out and even put my feet up! :) That made a huge difference. Our plane to Tokyo was so nice. It was just 3 hours and it was pretty easy. We figured out our first airplane diaper change. Imagine 2 adults squeezed into an airplane bathroom! It was actually pretty comical. We need 2 diapers, wipes, wet paper towels to wipe her stoma, diaper rash cream, and vaseline every time we change her.
When we got off we were waiting in a long line to get through security to transfer flights in Tokyo and we kept thinking how bad M smelled. The poor people around us. It was awful. Well, poor girl had a huge blow out. Luckily it was AFTER we got off the flight. So on to another set of clothes for her. The only other pair we brought for the trip. We were a little nervous that we were only a few hours into the trip and already onto the spare outfit. So I decided to was her little leggings out in the sink and dry them in the bathroom just in case we needed those again later. SO GLAD I DID! Sure enough, get on the 11 hour flight and I hand her to Jeff and he says, ugh, what is on your shirt?? So we rush to the bathroom. The wonderfully small airplane bathroom. Luckily the other black leggings were pretty much dry so I am so glad I decided to wash those out and dry them. UNTIL things were a little chaotic in the bathroom and Jeff drops the clean leggings into the bathroom sink and they got all wet. You would think I would be crying at this point but Jeff and I seriously laughed sooo hard. It was hilarious!! So M wore an airplane blanket while we laid her leggings out to dry. She didnt care one bit! :)
All and all the flight wasnt bad at all. Mayleigh did great. I guess I say that cause she really wanted Jeff most of the time so I guess I kinda lucked out on the flight! Jeff held her probably 90% of the time. She slept a lot so that was nice. And its not like she is a very active toddler yet. Since she is still not comfortable, she doesnt want to get out of our lap so she wasnt squirmy or wiggly! Once she would fall asleep, we could read or watch movies with her on our chest. We did try the bassinet once and she didnt love it but she did kinda fall asleep for about 20 min. The bad part about it was the bathroom was right on the other side of the bulkhead so when people would flush, it was kinda loud. I think that kept waking her up. Then she didnt want to go in it again. Thats ok..it was so worth the leg room we got!!!
I was so anxious to finally be home and of course it was snowing in Chicago. Our flight ended up landing an hour late. We started to land and then went back up and the pilot said it was too icy to land and we had to go to a different runway. That took awhile. At that point, I was chomping at the bit to get off the plane and start our 3 hours car ride home to my boys!!!
Now that we were so close to being done and it had been 24 hours since we left the hotel in Hong Kong, I was done. Was dreading the 3 hour car ride which became 4 hours because of the roads. That was a LONG 4 hour drive!!! Mayleigh did ok in her car seat. She didnt love it but fell asleep pretty quickly. She was pretty exhausted. After we stopped to change her diaper she was not happy about being in it. Dont worry, we had just stopped and got some food. Jeff started feeding her fries...then the carseat wasnt so bad. I promise you we do not feed our kids french fries that much. The problem for M is that she is not eating barely anything and she is so tiny. We feel bad and feel like she just needs to eat something. We are hoping as she gets more comfortable in the next few days, that she will try new things. Thanks to my wonderful neighbor who had a huge breakfast spread for us when we got home, M already tried something new. The Gerber crunchy things. They are similar to fries. M likes those!! :) And those veggie ones are much better than fries! So yah to that!!
I was pretty emotional coming home from Chicago. Was in tears because I was so happy to be so close to squeezing my boys. I was in tears because I was just overly exhausted..physically and emotionally! I was in tears because it felt so strange to be bringing home my daughter who in some ways felt like a stranger. I was in tears because I just had no idea how the next 24 hours was going to go. Basically, I was  mess!! ;)
The boys were staying up late to see us. Gramma let them camp out in their sleeping bags on the family room floor and watch a movie to wait for us to get home! Finally at 9:30 I had 3 boys bouncing off the walls when we got home! I didnt know if they would ever go to bed last night!! But I cant even put into words how I felt hugging them!!!! It was the BEST feeling!!!
They were so cute. They had made a sign and got balloons and a cookie cake. The house was so clean and picked up. It just felt so good to be home!!! Mayleigh wasnt sure at first about all the commotion but as we headed upstairs to get ready for bed, about 30 min after we got home, she started smiling. It was so amazing. After that long journey...all the heartache, the stress, the frustration, the fevers, the hospital visits in China, and the lack of sleep...those smiles wiped it all away!!!!

These pics are pretty bad quality. We just snapped a few on the phone when we got home. Jeff, M and I looking like a hot mess from traveling, and my boys in their PJ's made for not so great pics but love the hugs!!

I will post tomorrow about our first day home! Too tired tonight....heading to bed!

US Consulate Appointment

Today was the big day! The day Mayleigh got her visa and is one step closer to becoming an American Citizen. That actually doesn't happen until we land in Chicago! She was less than thrilled...let me tell you!! ;)
Jeff and I (and the rest of our travel group) was surprised at how much different it was than we pictured that consulate appt. to be. It was basically like we were at a DMV. Our guide had told us we would have to take an oath as a group but we didnt do it. We were all a little freaked out and quite a few families asked if we needed to do the official oath and the guy said, nope, you are free to go. He only asked me if all the information we had given him was correct. Our guide was shocked when we told her that we didnt actually do the oath. Who knows! Nothing surprises me anymore on this trip!! :)
We werent allowed to take pictures inside so our guide held our cameras and we did a picture outside to celebrate!
We are packing!!!!!!! I cant tell you how exciting that is!! Packing not to go to the next city...but to GO HOME!!!! We have just about everything ready. Tomorrow we have the day to wait for Mayleighs visa paperwork to be done and then at 4:30 we are heading to Hong Kong. We were going to take the train but that meant taxi rides and lugging our bags and Mayleigh around the train station. It sounded less appealing as the trip went on so we changed and are taking the van to Hong Kong. They pick us up at the hotel and take us the hotel in Hong Kong. Way less stressful. Just way more expensive and crazy. We have heard horror stories on how fast the drivers drive!!  But at this point, we just want easy and to get home with as little stress as possible! :) We will have enough stress on our flights home!! Wish us luck changing her diaper on the flight! Not sure how that is going to work. Not to mention the smell might kill everyone on the plane. Boys, get ready, cause your sister's colostomy is stinky!!! We have just gotten used to it but I am sure I will hear lots of complaints from the boys!

These were from a few days ago when she had come out of her shell and was looking at books! :) 

She really seems to like her books..when we can get her out of her depression!

Wish the dumb towel wasn't in her mouth for 99 % of the pictures!! 

The consulate wore her out! 

Dressed in her special red, white and blue outfit!! :)

This is the face we see all too often! How dare you put me down!!!! :(

 We got the towel out of her mouth before pics but as you can see, she was not thrilled with pictures!

Our travel group. We were so lucky to travel with such nice families! Definitely lifelong friends!! :)

Update on Mayleigh. Today was an ok day. She wasnt as tired since she slept great last night so we saw more of her eyes! ;) (unlike the day before where she was catching up on sleep and slept most of the day) She had moments where she came out of her shell a little. She ate her usual...half a yogurt for breakfast and a snack cup full of the crunchy french fry things. I think that was it. Even though we tried so many times to get her to eat. We decided to give her more formula than we would like at this age but she needs the nutrients and the calories. At the orphanage it is very common that kids (even 2+) are still drinking formula. I think its just easier for them. We would love to ween her off these bottles but for now she just needs the calories. She will drink about 3 oz. at a time so we gave her 4 today trying to get her to fatten up. I cant even begin to tell you how little she is. She has lost 1.5 since we got her 12 days ago. 

She played a little at times and at one point was sitting on the bed alone and found the remote. She pushed a button and the red light lit up and she kinda giggled. That was it though. No smiles. She did sit with me for awhile tonight and we read her books and she was touching the touch and feel parts. She then sat with Jeff and played with her bracelets. We so desperately want to see her act like a normal toddler...running around with the rest of the kids, playing and exploring. It has been quite depressing being with her to be honest. 99% of the day she just looks so horribly sad! It is really getting to me. Sometimes Jeff and I go back and watch the video we have of her playing and laughing from a few days ago, just to remind ourselves that it is in her somewhere! Praying she opens up at home. She is going to have to get down from us. The poor girl has probably spent 95% of the 12 days with us in our lap. It just cant be that way when we have 3 other kids to take care of at home. We really didnt push her too much while we were here. Just trying to build trust with her. But she is going to have to be pushed once we get home. She still has yet to walk. :( That really bums me out. If we put her down she just buckles and falls to the floor crying. We know she can. She did once between the two of us last week and the orphanage said she was walking and running. She just is still not feeling secure enough to get down from us. 

Tomorrow we are going to head to Shaiman Island and do some shopping. We were suppose to go this afternoon but I have been battling a bad head cold and wasnt feeling up to it. We stayed in the room and let Mayleigh take her 3 + hour nap so we could rest. The good news about her is that she wants to go to her bed and be alone so putting her down for bed or naps is a piece of cake! Hope that part stays that way!! :) 

LAST DAY FULL DAY TOMORROW!! Then a day on the plane and I can kiss my sweet boys!!!!!! 

Goodnight from Guangzhou!