"I Fall To Pieces"

I am reminded of that Patsy Cline song whenever Rebekah sees a rabbit, dog (this includes Wags the Dog on the Wiggles DVD), cat, leaves blowing across the ground, Madeline's fuzzy butterfly wand, and putting her feet in grass. She litterally falls to pieces, crying and screaming! I hate to say it but it is almost quite comical especially when we put her feet in the grass...you put her feet on the grass she cries, take her feet off seconds later,she stops, put her feet on CRY off STOP CRYING. I have to chuckle.

Rebekah is now sleeping through the night...YEAH!! She has a few restless moments which wake me up but I am easily lulled back to sleep by Kelly's snores. I am feeling more and more human with the more sleep I get.

almost human

It is 8:30pm and QUIET. Everyone, except me, is tucked away in bed sleeping. Sorry for the lateness in this update. We returned home on Friday September 26th exhausted. We were greeted warmly at the airport by family and friends. By the time we got home we were very tired and that tired feeling has not left yet. Although, today I feel almost normal.

Rebekah is adjusting very well, although her body alarm clock is set to WAKE between 12:30 and 1:30am for about 2 hours. In China we had no sleep issues with her, she slept through the night with only a few restless moments, none of which required anyone to get out of bed. That is all changed now. The first couple of nights both Madeline and Rebekah would be awake at the same time crying and in turn I would end up crying. I am ready for normal again.

We have all had head colds from the stuffy plane ride. Rebekah's nose wont stop running and she hates her nose to be wiped so it is a fight every 10 to 15 seconds. She is getting use to new foods as well. I have learned how to steam an egg and I think she approves because she is not spitting it out.

Her first doctors appointment went GREAT! She had to get 5 shots to update her vaccinations but did not seem to be all too bothered by it. She cried for each shot but once the shots were over so was the crying. I am sure ya'll have heard of the contaminated baby food formula in China. The Social Welfare Institute Rebekah was at did not use the contaminated brand but she got a Nestle's product. But to be on the safe side we had the doctor run a urine test on her and all is fine. The doctor and nurses were very surprised that Rebekah would pee for you when I whistled, so that saved a lot of time waiting for her to pee. She has been a bit feverish and fussy today because of the vaccinations and now she likes Motrin and Tylenol, she always wants more because of the yummy grape taste.

Madeline is very glad to be back in school, it is as if she has not missed a day. She has learned her Recitation verse (Philippians 2:14 - 16) and poem on creation they are to recite on Thursday. We worked on it some during the trip but she seems to pick it up faster when I am not the teacher. Kelly went back to work on Monday and comes home exhausted.

I have been having issues with uploading pictures to the blog. I have set the resolution of the pictures to "large" when I take the for when I make copies. I have to make them smaller for the blog. I have a lot of pictures I want to share with you and hopefully I will be able to get them up soon.

On a boat or on a plane, we come into America!

We were singing that Neil Diamond song as we de-boarded the plane in Mineapolis. Rebekah officially became a US citizen the moment we cleared passport control. Join us welcoming our new 10 month old citizen.

We have an extended Thursday, 13 extra hours. This whole trip we have had good sleep and the night we NEED a good night sleep Madeline has a nasty bout with tummy cramps and Rebekah is fussing in her crib because of all the commotion we are making with Madeline. Our day in a nutshell...we get up a 4am (after about only 3 hours sleep for me), get to the airport at 6am, go through 4 security check points where we show our passports, bording passes, and have our bags searched, board the plane at 7:40am, sit on the plane for 2 hours at the gate while they change the nose tire, I get a migraine during the delay (and it is really not fun throwing up in a plane toilet), take off 2 hours late knowing we will more than likely miss our connecting flight, land in Tokyo to learn they have delayed our connecting flight just for us (YEAH!!!), have to book it thourgh 2 more security checkpoints, board the a loaded plane of frustrated passengers, bump a few heads and shoulders with my carry-on while I walk the narrow aisles to our seat, plop down in our seat, and take off 5 minutes later. Our flight was shorter than expected, plus they flew a bit faster to make up for the delay.

It seemed once we landed on home tarmac all was well with the world. We were all smiles and I was crying as usual, I don't know why, I just couldn't stop the tears from falling. We got to the hotel at 1:30 inthe afternoon and promptly took a nap while Madeline watched PBS (which she missed terribly). It was very hard to wake up. Kelly is already sleeping and I am tending to the little ones while I wait for the magical hour of 8:30 when I put all to bed and finish packing before our long awaited flight to Fort Worth at 9:30am. I never know how to end a post on our blog so I will just end it with GOOD NIGHT!

water water everywhere, water water in the hotel

Woke up this morning after a very good nights sleep, which is rare when you are sleeping on a box spring, to look out our 14th floor window to discover that Shamian Island was flooded. Some areas were knee deep in water. Our hotel lobby was flooded as well to an extent. They had sand bagged the north doors 3 foot high where the hotel was lowest then had to shopvac out water. Although by the time we made it down for breakfast it was business as usual. The hotel restaurant has a river view and the river was up to the window. The beautiful chrystal blue pool is not a pukey river green.The water is receding quickly though. All this flooding has not stopped the locals from getting out and about by foot, bicycle, or car. Even some of the shops are open with water lapping up to their entrances. We believe that we should have not problem getting to our Consulate appointment to get Rebekah's Passport and Visa as well as take the oath that we will lover and care for her. There is an elevated road to and from the White Swan Hotel from the main land. We have not heard if any flights have been delayed yet but we still have a day before we leave. Hopefully by then the storm will have passed and we will be on our way. I would rather be delayed in the hotel than at the airport.

We prepared for just something like this yesterday. I went to the deli and bought sodas, water, peanut butter, bread, and snacks just in case we were stuck in the hotel. Madeline is happy with her dvd player and the Ariel Beginnings video we bought for her before the trip is almost worn out. She has watched it umpteen times. There is a play room on the 1st floor where it did not flood so we will go down there to get our energy out. I still have a few things that I ordered that I need to pick up later tonight and hope the water is all gone by later this afternoon becasue I am not going to wade out in the water because I do not know how polluted it is.

We cannot wait to see ya'll soon. Our total flight time to Mineapolis is going to be about 17 hours with a hour and a half layover in Tokyo. So by the time we get in to Mineapolis we should be wiped out. More to come soon.