TODAY TODAY TODAY TODAY...It's TODAY!!!!

Family and Friends,

Hope all are doing well!

John and I arrived in Nanning, China yesterday afternoon (Sunday afternoon--China time) and we are all settled in our hotel room. Nanning is much different than Beijing. I am grateful for the time we had in Beijing. It really helped us adjust to the culture.

Last night we ate at a Cantonese restaurant. It was amazing! Well, it was to us. John and I had Roasted Peking Duck and Pigeon. It was soooo good. I have been wanting some duck so bad and we both wanted to try some of the local food. Pretty stinkin' good! Glad we are still feeling good today..that's for sure!

Now....The moment we have all been waiting for has finally arrived. We are just hours away from meeting Lydia for the first time. We are pretty calm right now. Other than a few butterflies here and there. The Lord has given us great peace and we are grateful for all your prayers. PLEASE don't stop! :)

We are with 4 other families from our agency that will also receive their girls today. It has been a huge blessing not to do this on our own. They have all been such a great help. Not to mention our coordinator. She rocks! We can't thank her enough for all she has done thus far to make our trip smooth.

Our schedule is going to be like this today:

2:30pm-leave hotel for Civil Affairs Office

3:00pm-we receive Lydia

4:00pm- take bus back to hotel

4:30-5:30pm-hang with Lydia in hotel room

5:30pm-?-- one parent goes with coordinator to complete some paperwork (at this time--we are not sure who that will be...I think we are going to draw straws!)

It's hard to imagine what it's going to be like --meeting her for the first time, riding on the bus, our first night together as a family of 3, etc.. so we are trusting the Lord for the outcome.

By the way, our first trip to Wal-Mart is tomorrow. Yes, you read it right...Wal-Mart, baby!

Anyway, it's been wonderful thus far. We are (well, I guess I should say I am) getting adjusted to the time. Finally getting some sleep..thanks to Melissa! :)

This picture was taken at the highest peek we climbed at the Great Wall. Good lookin' group, huh?

Keep checking our blog for more updates....we will have some pictures of Lydia to share with you very, very. soon.

Great Wall, Summer Palace...with some misc. pics.

More to come! Stay plugged in!

What an amazing day!

Greetings from China!

It was a very busy day, but it was so worth it! We headed out around 9am to The Great Wall..and let me tell you..it is GREAT! You think that from looking at some show on TV that it looks relatively...um..challenging to climb..I stand corrected! My word! My legs shook for hours after we left and we didn't even go to the highest peek! The stairs going up were so steep and all the stairs were different, so it was hard to judge your step without having to constantly looking at the ground. The mountains that were surrounding The Great Wall were so beautiful and rugged.
It truly was a spectacular sight. There were so many people there and they are just so friendly. We had a ball with them today. I am learning so much about China and I will never forget these past couple of days. They will remain with me for a long time to come. The Chinese are such great folks. They came up to me today touching my hair, fixing my jacket, and wanted several pictures of me with them. One of the fellows in our group kept on saying, "She is a famous rock star! It's Madonna!" Then we all laughed and got our pictures taken. Lots of hugs were going around and certainly lots of smiles. Then that guy from our group was called Tom Cruise, and various other Hollywood stars. We all got a kick out of it. They obviously knew we weren't these famous people, but they just jumped on in and we all had a time!

To top this amazing moment off.....we were standing on the highest peek of the side of the wall we were on and the coolest thing happened.......it started to snow! For those of you who know me...know that I love snow. So this was a real treat. Thank you Lord!

Afterward, we headed to a Chinese Restaurant and Cloisonne Factory. It is amazing to see these items done and to watch the process. It is incredibly highly detailed and intricate art.

Then we ate a wonderful meal with our group. We just love our group. It has been wonderful
getting to know these folks. We have had such a good time together.

After we got full, we headed out too the Summer Palace. This was very similar to the Forbidden City. The Summer Palace did have a huge man made lake that was still as glass.

We were running a bit behind on schedule, so instead of stopping to see the Olympic buildings, we drove past them very slowly and snapped a couple of pics from the bus. :)

Then we headed home, went and grabbed a bite to eat with several members of the group, and then we were back in our hotel room packing for our plane flight tomorrow morning to Nanning, China. Yes, less than 48 hours we will be meeting our daughter for the first time. Let me tell you my friends, it has FINALLY hit me.

(By the way, a few of you have asked if I have been able to sleep. Well, that would be a negative. I have had approx. 5 hours of sleep in the past two days. Please pray that I get some shut-eye tonight. I am totally going to need it.)

Oh, I almost forgot to tell you..last night we went to the "Flying Acrobatics Show". It was wild! John says it should be called the "Dare Devil Show." Just watching these ladies contort their bodies made mine hurt! It was pretty cool and the Chinese love it! They really get into it.

Well, I am going to do another post with just pics...so stick around..

Here are some more pics from China!

By the way, if you are thinking of taking a trip to China, we highly recommend it; however, John and I have one word of advice.....

DO NOT DRIVE IN CHINA..or RIDE BIKES IN CHINA...or.....WALK IN THE STREETS IN CHINA!!!

Seriously, these people are fearless! :0)

We are in China...and loving it!

This picture is from an Origami mural at the Tokyo, Japan airport. It was fascinating.

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Hello folks! Sorry we are just updating our blog..we are trying to figure out this converter/adapter thing and we didn't have internet access the first night.

Okay, so we arrived on Thursday, November 6th in Beijing, China! It was a super l-o-n-g flight, but we made it with the Lord's help. We got in a bit late on Thursday, so we went straight to the hotel. We are staying at Zhaolong Hotel in downtown Beijing. This is truly a city that never sleeps. Cars honking all night long, reminded me of NY. I REALLY tried to get some sleep last night, but I managed not to. Way too much on the brain. This city is beautiful and the people are so very friendly.

Today we started early and went to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square. It was amazing. It was SO crowded! I don't think I have ever seen that many people at a tourist attraction.

It looks like we will receive Lydia on Monday at 3pm!!!

Tomorrow we will be going the Great Wall and some other amazing places.

By the way, haven't tasted anything unusual yet..but I am hoping to!!

We are just hours away....

Whew! We are just hours away from taking off to China. It seems so surreal. We are packed, ready, and right now, trying to figure out how to use this video camera. :)

We are chillin'...checking out the Election coverage..hopefully YOU got out and voted today. What a privilege we have as Americans to vote. Regardless of the outcome...we need to continue to pray for our leaders.

Well, this is going to be a a very small post...we need to get to bed and get some rest. Big day tomorrow...wow...tomorrow....

We will do our best to post each day. We will be arriving in Beijing, China on November 6th at 9:40pm....can anybody say JET LAG?

Lydia, we are only days away. We are coming to get ya pumpkin!

See you in CHINA!

Wan an! (Good night)

Counting Down!!

Sorry for my delay in posting to our blog. It has been so crazy busy and I haven't had the chance to sit down and blog my little heart out. :)

While I am taking a break from slaying the dragon...I mean.....cleaning my home from top to bottom...I thought I could chill and blog for a moment.

We are less than 48 hours away from taking off to China! My heart swells with joy just thinking about it. I just called John to check on him and he is on cloud 9 right now.

We met with John's parents yesterday to eat and for them to see us off. They were surprised at our "calmness" and sense of peace. I told them that they should've seen me in church earlier that morning...I was trying to keep myself from passing out!!! It was our last Sunday..our last weekend...in the states....as a family of 2!! Who wouldn't feel like passing out?? :)

In all seriousness, truly, God is our Peace. I am reminded of a passage of Scripture..

"You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on You, because he trust in You. Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock." Isaiah 26:3-4

Please pray that we will take every thought captive to obey Christ and that we will not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving let our requests be made known to God.

I will leave you with a picture we took to put in Lydia's "Who loves Baby book".....

More posts to come....