Isabella Tang

Final Christmas 2008 picture at Ning-ning's

2009-03-13T12:49:00.002-07:00

Tang Grandkids are all so cute!

Christmas at Ning-Ning House 2008

2009-03-13T12:49:00.001-07:00

Playing Peek-a-Boo and Posing with Buddies

2009-03-13T12:25:00.001-07:00

Copy Cat

2009-03-13T12:00:00.001-07:00

Bella really like to copy everything her brothers and sisters do!

Crafts with the kids

2009-03-13T11:58:00.000-07:00

Bella with the kids doing crafts! We sent these pictures to China with our very nice social worker, Donna. We had our 6 month post adoption homestudy about this time in January. We passed by the way! Whewww!

Temple Square

2009-03-13T11:56:00.001-07:00

We went with Uncle Paul and Ning-Ning to Temple Square at Christmas time(2008). Here are a few pictures. Paul was so nice and brought a big thermos of hot chocolate and cookies!

Bella's Twin Brothers, Bella and her sisters

2008-09-28T19:05:00.000-07:00

Brigham and Joshua!
Mckayla and Kristen!
Bella loves her new family and they sure love her!!!!!

Bella Walking

2008-09-28T18:58:00.001-07:00

Bella and the Wagon

2008-09-28T18:51:00.000-07:00

Bella Escapes outside to play with her brothers and sisters

2008-09-28T18:48:00.000-07:00

Bella's first trip to the Gateway

2008-09-28T18:47:00.001-07:00

Bella's brothers and sisters with HYRUM Walker

2008-09-28T18:45:00.000-07:00

Bella sitting together with her cousins!

2008-09-28T18:22:00.000-07:00

WOW! Gorgeous! Cute! Love it! Way cute cousins!

Bella and her Cousins

2008-09-28T18:12:00.000-07:00

Bella has quite a few girl cousins around her same age. She loves them already! Three of them were also at Grandma Heidi's house so Bella got to play with them!
Here is a picture of her twin cousins, Ariana and Ariah(Uncle Taylor's kids) and Addeleine,(aunt Anneka's little girl). You will also see Anneka and Johnny sitting at the dinner table.

Bella at Grandma Heidi's

2008-09-28T18:03:00.000-07:00

Bella was all tuckered out after running around Grandma Heidi's house all day.

2008-09-28T18:00:00.000-07:00

Bella Meets the Riddochs, Bella gets Blessed, and Mckayla gets Baptized

2008-09-28T17:42:00.000-07:00

We went to Idaho a few weeks ago and Bella met her Grandma Heidi and Grandpa Mark and some cousins, and aunts and uncles. We baptized McKayla the Saturday we were there and then blessed Bella on Sunday. Isabella was lucky to be blessed on the same sunday as Hyrum Walker(Aunt Anneka's new baby boy). I am including all the baptism and blessing pictures here on this and the next post. I apologize for not including Hyrum. Isabella was so fussy after church that we had to rush back and get her changed. So we didn't get any of his cute little man outfit. As you can see in her blessing dress, she is not feeling well. She had a tummy ache. :(
We will be also using this same dress to seal her to our family in the temple soon. More about that later. Enjoy the pictures!

Bella brushing her teeth and WALKING around!

2008-09-28T17:40:00.000-07:00

Bella Up Close and Personal!

2008-09-28T17:39:00.000-07:00

Mom:"Bella, what words can you say in English now?"

Bella: "Um...ball,owe,ma-ma,dad,mom,bed,night-night,bath,hi,bye-bye,no-no,pita-boo,
mommy,yeah,cookie,cracker,book,eat,ba-ba,go play."

Mom: "Thank you for your time, Bella!"

Bella with her brothers and sisters!

2008-09-28T17:12:00.000-07:00

The Tang kids all together one sunny sunday afternoon after church!

Bella Crawling!

2008-09-28T12:22:00.000-07:00

A few pictures of Isabella crawling!

Bella and the Frisby Family

2008-09-26T15:00:00.001-07:00

I thought it would be nice to show Isabella with some family from my side. And the Frisbys were the only ones who came down to see her. Of course they were really coming to see off Kaleb at the MTC. But they did visit and brought a cute outfit for Bella! We got to have the wonderful McKenna come stay over night and Bella really liked her. She even let her hold her a lot and this was rare in the first days at home. Here is a picture of Bella and McKenna and one again of them when we all went to the Brick Oven. And the last is the Frisby Family at the MTC. It was neat to go see Kaleb off! I think he will do great!

Bath Time With Bella

2008-09-26T14:47:00.001-07:00

For about a month bath time for Bella was very hard. It sounded like we were torturing her by her screams. We decided to take turns having the girls hold her in the tub. This helped! Now she loves to be in the bath or shower even with the other kids or by herself! In fact she says bath and will try to take off her clothes when she sees the tub! Thank goodness we don't hear those screams anymore when we bathe her. This is a picture of Kristen and Isabella in the tub!

Bella Visits at Ning-Ning's House

2008-09-26T14:43:00.001-07:00

Bella loves to read!

2008-09-26T14:41:00.000-07:00

Bella and her first family Outing!

2008-09-26T14:08:00.000-07:00

We took the kids to the mall to get an icecream cone!YUM!

More Recent pictures will be downloaded ASAP!!!!

2008-09-25T15:11:00.000-07:00

Bella Out to Celebrate at a Chinese Restaurant

2008-09-25T15:07:00.000-07:00

Bella Meets the rest of her Tang Family

2008-09-25T15:03:00.000-07:00

Special Thanks to Jean

2008-09-25T14:55:00.000-07:00

We owe a special thanks to Auntie Jean and her kids. They were wonderful! We would not have been able to make this all happen with out Jean. Jean took on an extra 4 kids for about 2 weeks. And my kids are not easy. She is the best Auntie in the world and we love her. I have included a picture of her family. Thanks Jean!!!! And thanks to Natalie and Maddie for letting us borrow your mom for awhile!

Final thoughts from our trip

2008-09-25T14:30:00.001-07:00

-It is crazy trying to get around the Chinese airports and not speak Chinese.
-We had to wait in some long lines at the airports with lots of luggage and hold Isabella
-China Southern Airlines rocked! The flight was 14 &1/2 hours long and was LONG but we were able to fly straight from LAX to Guanghzou. The last 4 hours were tough. I enjoyed watching on the little TV our flight path. It was cool to see how far we were and where we were passing through. My travel pillow was the best and I will always take it whenever I fly or drive. I bought it at walgreens. The Chinese flight attendant girls were so fun to watch. They had on the cutest outfits and were very gracious. I wish I had taken their pictures. My girls would have been copying them the whole flight.

-Judy really helped a lot with all the paper work at the airport to help us get out of there. When we said good-bye to her at the airport it felt like I was saying good-bye to my mom. I really wanted to take her with me. She was so wonderful.

-I am probably leaving out a ton of stuff but I wanted to crank out as many posts as I could to finish Isabella's blog. I don't want to forget any details and as time goes by I know I am already forgetting stuff.

-Chuck was so excited to be back to SLC that he threatened to kiss he ground when we got off the airplane. He didn't but I would have joined him if he did. It was so nice to be back and have some real food.

-Ying met us at the gate, which was so nice to have someone we know there waiting for us. She works for Delta so she was able to go right to our gate. I was really surprised. She also gave Isabella a cute little Delta toy airplane.
************************************************************************************
we both feel so blessed to have Isabella in our lives. We blessed her a few weeks ago and also baptized McKayla. She is special. We have been home for a few months now and Isabella is walking and playing with her brothers and sisters. She has a special bond with McKayla. We are still working on getting her to eat different foods and are working on her sleeping through the night. She says MAMA all the time and is now a little mommy's girl. She likes to sit in things and put things on her head. Bella is very cute and smart. She already says a lot of English words and understands a lot. We are lucky to have her! She is such a blessing! We know she was meant to be in our family! Our next exciting step is to have her sealed to us in the temple!

Pictures at the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou

2008-09-25T14:23:00.000-07:00

These are pictures of us right after the swearing-in ceremony. Scott and Nicole(another couple in our group) with their McKenna are in a few and also one with our wonderful guide, Judy.

Consolate Appointment

2008-09-25T13:53:00.000-07:00

The last day we stayed at the hotel while Judy went to the consulate and presented our paper work. The she called us to say we passed. We packed and checked out of the hotel the next day and went to the consulate for the Sworn-in Ceremony.
The whole swearing-in ceremony is a complete blur to me because I was so sick I thought I was going to die. I think I had some food poisoning at breakfast because I was so nauseated and my head was spinning. So I remember going up a lot escalators and finally going into a big room with lots of families who were also adopting. There we sat down for awhile and I had to run to the bathroom a few times since I had to throw up. Thank goodness I didn't acually throw up but almost. I did take my antibiotic and some zofran earlier. These were both life savors because I swear they helped(and of course I had some help from above because I was praying like crazy to feel better for the plane ride) I started feeling better a few hours later and was not sick on the long airplane ride. So, anyways, back to the swearing-in. We were all told to stand up and she said a bunch of stuff I didn't hear and then we raised our right hand and we were done. Chuck thank goodness took notes, j/k , he was holding Isabella so that would have been impossible. Chuck said they were basically making the adoption official. We raised our hand and repeated after the official person and said we would take care of our baby. Once we were done Isabella was officially ours to keep! Yeah! Pictures in next post!:)

Final Days in Guanzhou!

2008-09-25T13:34:00.000-07:00

We had to take Isabella to a clinic for her chinese medical check-up. All of our group went together. It was very quick. We went in 2 rooms and they were so speedy that I can barely remember what they did. They just checked her ears, throat, etc. but it was so fast that I don't think they really checked anything. But we passed and that was what was important. (but then maybe everyone passes?) Here is a picture in front of the Chinese Clinic.

Judy took all of our group to a nice chinese restaurant near the White Swan. It was actually really yummy! We ate the best tofu. Chuck tried some new spicy green bean dish and loved it! It was fun to be all together. And so much better food than in Nanning.

Then Judy took us shopping around to the little shops. There is one shop that had a sign that they were going out of business and must sell everything. Well, Judy said that sign had been there for about 7 years. The shops didn't really want to bargain with Judy. They knew they could get more from us. So I am sure we paid more than we had too. But everything was so cheap anyway that it didn't really matter. It was fun to watch everyone and just walk around.

Judy also took us to out of the island(Shamain island)to go to a jewelry warehouse. It was like a huge mall with every store selling different jewelry. We went to look at jade and pearls. The others in our group bought jade and pearl necklaces. I only bought 2 small pearls. I should have bought more but I am really not a jewelry person. It was fun to see though. I went by myself with the group. Chuck stayed at the hotel and slept with Isabella.

Famous Red Couch Photos

2008-09-25T13:23:00.000-07:00

So most adoptive couples get their babies pictures on the famous red couch in the White Swan. This is usually done with all the babies from our group but sadly the twins were sick and one in the hospital(the other had to be admitted to later). The babies are also usually dressed in the traditional chinese clothing for their picture. We weren't sure if there was a special red couch to use because all the couches were red. This is Isabella and McKenna(not sure how they spell her name). Their pictures were posted in the same finding ad. McKenna is a little younger than Isabella. McKenna has the cutest hair! She is the calmest baby I have ever seen! And she is also the baby we almost were given by mistake so we will never forget her or her parents!

Last of the White Swan Room

2008-09-25T13:21:00.001-07:00

More of the Swan Room

2008-09-25T13:17:00.001-07:00

The Swan Room

2008-09-25T13:08:00.000-07:00

In the basement level of the White Swan Hotel is the best play room ever! The swan room has new soft plush carpet and is filled with fun Mattel toys. This room also has the best air conditioning. Isabella loved this room. Every time we took her, she took off and went to explore. We were able to meet and visit with other new adopting parents while she played. It was very relaxing. It was amazing to see all the families adopting. They just kept coming. The white swan is where all alot of us stay but there are also other nearby hotels too. Here a a ton of pictures of Isabella enjoying herself!!!

Pictures of Bella

2008-09-25T12:51:00.000-07:00

Bella is actually crawling around in our hotel room. She is finally starting to relax!

White Swan buffet

2008-09-25T12:49:00.000-07:00

We had an awesome breakfast buffet every morning while we stayed at the White Swan!
The french toast tasted like real American food!

Pictures at the Famous White Swan in Guangzhou, China

2008-09-25T12:21:00.000-07:00

Smoggy, Foggy View from our Hotel in Guangzhou

2008-09-25T12:12:00.000-07:00

Isabella's First Airplane Ride

2008-09-25T11:49:00.001-07:00

This was a close up picture of Isabella in our little van on the ride to the airport. We were a little worried about how she would do on the plane but worried for nothing. Isabella clapped when the airplane took off! She played with the seats and window the whole ride. We flew with China Southern Airline in a Boeing 737
and the total flight time was 1 hour! We landed in Guangzhou at 8:35 p.m.
When we stepped out of the airport and looked at the sky it was nowhere to be found. The air was thick with grey smog.

Pictures of Nanning Transportation

2008-09-25T11:45:00.000-07:00

The Final Day in Nanning, China

2008-09-25T11:27:00.000-07:00

Friday morning we all met in the downstairs lobby of our hotel for our last outing in Nanning. Judy took us to an outside market. We took a crazy fast taxi ride to the market. Drivers are crazy in China. I found it was best to look straight ahead and not watch all the other cars. So the market was interesting. All these people selling their wares in little outside stalls. We saw birds in cages and little mice in a big box for sale. Little animals in boxes everywhere. It was smelly and I did not like to see all those mice. Yuck!

I took these pictures of the twins in our group right before we left to the market. Very cute babies.!!!

My Visit to a Chinese Hair Salon

2008-09-25T11:08:00.000-07:00

After the zoo I took a trip to a hair salon. The hair dryers in the hotel were so wimpy. I just wanted someone to wash and DRY my hair for me. So our guide, Judy, told the hair lady to just wash my hair and dry it and nothing more in Chinese for me. So I sat down thinking that this would be simple and fast. Nope.
The hair stylist first got a bottle of very watered-down shampoo and squirted it all over my head. Then she very painfully raked her fingers started at my forehead down to the back of my neck. She did this over and over again. I really wanted to ask her to be more gentle but decided to tough it out since there was that language barrier. So then after the excruitiating pain of her finger-raking the shampoo on my head, she grabbed handfuls of the sudded shampoo and ran it back to the sink. She did this a few times until my hair was rung out. I was still trying to get over the painful finger-raking and very glad that part was done when she started the shampoo process all over again. This was done 3 TIMES! Finally she finished and had me come and rinse out in a sink and then put conditioner and rinsed that normal. Then I got a most cool back rub. She did do some weird slapping on my face and forehead though. I thought that was really uncalled for but I had made it this far so I decided to suck it up and stay. Then she finally dried my hair, which I did appreciate. I still tipped her because she probably doesn't make very much and I did get an experience that I will never forget from her. I hope to one day take Isabella back to China and have her visit a salon. If I close my eyes I can still the pain of the finger-raking on my head. Tomorrow we are off to the second part of the trip - Guangzhou, China!

To be continued as soon as possible. . .

2008-08-27T14:29:00.000-07:00

The Final Nanning Zoo Pictures

2008-08-27T13:26:00.001-07:00

More Pictures from the Nanning Zoo

2008-08-27T13:20:00.001-07:00

4th Day With Isabella

2008-08-27T12:50:00.000-07:00

Today we went to the Nanning Zoo with the gang and our wonderful guide, Judy. Chuck carried Isabella the whole time. It was very hot and probably not fun to carry her all that time. I was lucky and had free hands to take lots of pictures. We should have borrowed a stroller from the hotel, maybe next time.(j/k no next time for us!) The zoo was a beautiful big park with animals, amusement park type rides, stand-up aquarium tanks, and a big lake. There were some cool huge bubble-like containers that kids can get in and roll around in on the lake. People were selling turles and rabbits at the end of the zoo. The zoo was really pretty and quite interesting to see everything. I must say that the Nanning zoo trumps the Hogle Zoo by far!

Isabella's blog finally continues . . .

2008-08-27T12:49:00.001-07:00

4th day with Isabella

2008-07-24T05:36:00.000-07:00

I tickled Isabella this morning and she actually giggled just a little for me. She may like her daddy to hold her but I am the one getting the giggle and a few smiles. This is a big step for her I think. Yesterday I also strapped on the baby Bjorn and took Isabella for a walk around the hotel outside while her daddy ate. She loved it and babbled to me quite a bit. Of course once we got in the hotel again she cried and wanted her daddy back. She hates being inside the room and hotel still. She loves being outside and going out. I will post more after we are home from the zoo. Here is a view of Nanning from the 9th floor of our hotel. The buildings look old but its very clean here and pretty.

Playing Ball

2008-07-24T05:34:00.000-07:00

I actually got Isabella to roll the ball around with me tonight! (the 3rd night) She still prefers her daddy to hold her if he is around but we rolled the ball around on the floor for a few minutes.

The 3rd night with Isabella

2008-07-24T05:25:00.000-07:00

I have been really trying to get Isabella to warm up to me by being extra playful. I have tried lots of tricks and she always gives me this very serious stare like I am an alien. I swear I almost see a smile but she really tries to keep that look no matter what I do. I have tried juggling, throwing a beach ball, dancing, jumping, you name it. She gave me this stare and I was laughing so hard. She thought I was so weird I think and didn't even crack a smile. I think she should go into theatre. She is good at keeping a straight face. Here are the looks I was getting.

The Return to Nanning Walmart on 3rd Day

2008-07-24T05:16:00.000-07:00

We headed back to walmart for a water bottle and diaper run. We went upstairs this time and it was more like the walmarts at home but with chinese clothes, electronics, baby stuff,etc. Chuck got in trouble for trying to take pictures in walmart. We didn't know this wasn't allowed. You can't take pictures in McDonalds either. But he actually got one picture because he was so sly.

Tomorrow we are headed to the zoo and some different stores to look for some special items that are only made in this providence. We would like a few things to save for Isabella for her to have later from her providence. More to come soon!!!!!

Bella with her daddy

2008-07-24T05:13:00.000-07:00

Bella is all tuckered out here and of course on her favorite shoulder of her daddy!

Picture of Beth and her twins and Her mom,Linda.

2008-07-24T05:05:00.001-07:00

Beth and her mom have their hands full here. Beth's husband Mok is in charge of the architecture for building the arena for the New Jersey Nets and has a deadline for it to be completed this week sometime so is not here. So Linda, her mom, is helping out and a sister is coming to meet them in Guangzhou.

More Temple Pictures

2008-07-24T04:56:00.000-07:00

The people were lighting incense to bring and were praying.

Temple pictures from Qing Xiu Mountain

2008-07-24T04:50:00.000-07:00

At the top of the mountain was a big temple. There was some construction going on.

More pictures from Qing Xiu Mountain

2008-07-24T04:34:00.000-07:00

The second photo is of our group with Judy, our guide. The second to last photo is where I became famous! The last photo is a stand selling fish food.

3rd Day With Isabella

2008-07-24T02:44:00.000-07:00

Today our guide Judy arranged for us to go to Qing Xiu Mountain. Our group all went together in our van. Our group member were us, Beth and her Mom,and their twins, Elizabeth and Maxine, and Scott and Nicole with their little McKenna (there picture is the 3rd one down).
I am now posting the exciting pictures of our excursion. If you have any questions maybe you can email our guide. She is a fountain of information. Chuck carried Isabella the whole time so I was free to just move my arms about and roam. Chuck's arms are probably getting pretty sore. Mine feel fine. We went to a dock to feed the fish and it was amazing how many fish that were fighting for the food. And the most exciting moment for me was when a chinese woman ran up to me and put her arm around me and had her friend take a picture and all of sudden there were tons of more Chinese taking my picture with them. I was laughing my head off. Watch out for me in some chinese blogs. I think I have some new friends. I certainly felt famous for a few minutes.

2nd Day with Isabella

2008-07-21T21:00:00.000-07:00

This will just be a written post because we need to download more pictures. This computer is slow and its takes a long time to download. So last night Isabella screamed her head off for hours and finally we gave her some motrin and Chuck got her to sleep. She refused to go to me. He was able to put her in the crib and she slept 7:00 p.m.-3:00 a.m. She was so exhausted from crying that she was out! It was nice. Then we fed her some bottle and part of a banana and she went back to sleep. Oh and starting last night she would only go with Chuck. She is a daddy's girl. Just like Kristen. She gets mad most of the time if I try to hold her or Chuck needs to go to the bathroom. Its kind of funny. I am glad its not the other way around because that was how McKayla was for me. Sometimes if I take her outside she will be okay and let me carry her. She does not like being in the hotel room and wants to go go go. In fact her first word yesterday was "guy-guy"(sp?)-I spelled that like it sounds. It means shopping. So we took her to some hotel shops and she got very excited and said, "Guy-guy" over and over. We were told earlier that she likes to shop. And even though she is only 12 months she is very vocal and makes lots of noise. She does say Chinese words. I wonder if its easy for babies to say Chinese words. She also says something for eating and baby. And waves good-bye. She has 4 teeth, 2 up and 2 down and they are a pretty white. The pictures don't do her justice - she is so beautiful.
Today we went down to the hotel breakfast buffet. Its okay. They do make scrambled eggs and have some rolls. So thats what I eat. We fed Isabella some more congee and and some Chinese type roll. She also ate a few bites of noodles. She is a very good eater and so far eats whatever we give her. She is still on formula so we will try to wean her off when we get home. She loves the cheerios and the gerbers carrot wagon wheels. Chuck loves the food here and has tried all sorts of interesting foods. He really likes the beef noodle soup. And there is a Chinese restaurant next door to the hotel that we tried yesterday with the group. I will post a picture. The whole group is not in this photo. He got some spicy fish and rice. Oh and I tried some chicken congee and its yummy!
Isabella is taking a nap in her hotel crib right now and Chuck is asleep on the bed. We just got back from 2 interviews and lots of paper signing. The interviews were very interesting. Here is an example:
"Did your daughter stay over night with you last night?"
Yes(our answer)
"Do you like her?"
Yes
"Do you want to keep her?"
Yes
"Do you promise not to harm or hurt her and treat her like your other children?"
Yes
Than sign and fingerprint on a bunch of papers. Then wait for a long time in a hot room for everyone to get done. Then we went to another building and were notorized and got another of the same interview and more signing and waiting.
Isabella was crying in the morning after breakfast until we went to the van and took a ride to our appointments. She was happy to get out. We waited in a hot room but it has toys - a big ball and some rocking horse. There were also lots of other adopting couples that we met. So she gave us a shock and crawled around and played with the toys. She loved the ball. And can pull herself up to standing position with ease. It was nice to see this active side of her. She likes to watch the other kids was very content crawling back and forth between the toys. She was talking and making all these noises while she played. Then she finally got tired and fell asleep on the way back to the hotel. And she is now sleeping.
So we are on our own for the rest of the day and then meet again with our guide and group at dinner time. Yesterday we walked around the hotel. Its huge and has like 3 buildings. We are on the 9th floor of one of the buildings. On the first day we got here our guide brought us to the Nanning Walmart. It was so different than ours. Its on the second floor of a mall. There were so many people. The funniest thing I saw were these huge bins of raw chicken in piles of ice just sitting there. The chicken was not bagged or wrapped, just dumped in a pile of ice. I guess this way you can feel your raw chicken before you buy it? There were huge lines for the ducks that were roasting.(like the roasted chicken at Costco/sams club but ducks instead) The Walmart is mostly just food and nothing else. As we drive around to all these places we have gotten to see the crazy drivers and millions of people on bikes and mopeds. Its like a whole car lane of just bikes and mopeds and everyone everywhere is speeding around. I see a lot of mopeds with 2 parents and the mom in the back and she is just holding a small baby. No seat belt and the baby looks like she will fall off if the mom accidentally let go. And the mopeds are fast. Its crazy but interesting to see. I will try to get a picture. I will also attach the picture of us at dinner the night before with got Isabella. More to come later!

Isabella playing in the Hotel

2008-07-21T00:11:00.000-07:00

Our first pictures of Isabella on Gotcha Day!!!

2008-07-21T00:00:00.000-07:00

The top picture is us in the hot Gotcha meeting room with Isabella's caretakers and the orphanage assistant director. We don't get to meet her foster mom. We are also not allowed to go to her orphanage. No outside people are allowed to go there right now. We are also not allowed to ask any questions about her orphanage. We can only ask questions about Isabella.
The next pictures are of Chuck and Isabella watching a short clip of Kai lan.
I will add more soon!

Isabella's GOTCHA DAY -July 21,2008

2008-07-20T23:23:00.000-07:00

After a long long time on the airplanes (19 hours total)and waiting in long lines at the Chinese airports. . . .we arrived in China. . . we have Isabella now! We were brought to another large hotel that is about 10 minutes from our hotel. And brought up to a small meeting room. This room had no air conditioning. I had my makeup and hair done nice but after 5 minutes in this room we were all drenched in sweat. Its so humid here that my hair just gets frizzy and curly and shorter. But enough about me(more later):)So focus on the pictures of Isabella not me here.

We were first led to a cute tiny baby with a longer face. (I thought, wow she totally doesn't look like her pictures? But we will take her - didn't want to be picky and complain) So I picked her up and Chuck started filming with the movie camera. Then a minute later we were told we had the wrong baby. I was glad because she totally didn't look like Isabella. Then we were pointed to the crying one that the orphange caretaker was holding. Of course the only baby crying in the room would be Isabella. I should have walked straight over there when we got there. So We had to practically pry her away from her caretaker and she screamed the whole time we were there in the room. We then gave our red gift bags we brought to all the orphanage helpers and took pictures. Then we went back to the hotel. She finally calmed down on the drive and loved the big water fountain in the hotel foyer. She even pointed at it a few times. Then we changed and fed her some cheerios(she loves these) and then a bottle and she played. We tried to sit her on the potty to go poo poo but no poo poo(they called it this- more about that later). We were told to try. Did not work, she screamed. So put her in a clean diaper and tried to get her to sleep. I had to pat her bum and wrap her in a blanket to get her to take a nap. She is still sleeping now. She had done a lot of crying so we know she was very attached to her foster mom. All the babies were brought to the Nanning Orphanage from Guiping (3-4 hour drive) a day ago and they slept last night at that orphanage. So she has had a few crazy days to make her very emotional. The other 3 babies in our group were calm as can be and sucking their thumbs. I must say we were quite jealous. Down the hall were other older kids that were screaming their heads off. Isabella and I walked to that room and checked everyone out because we felt more at home with them. Quite a few other couples were also adopting.
So Isabella is very very pretty and small but has chubby legs. So I think she has been well fed. We were told that her foster mom really spoiled her. We are glad she was well taken care of and made an attachment. Now we just need her to attach to us! Chuck has actually been speaking a little Chinese to her. Mostly when others are not around though. But I will take what I can get.
This whole experience has been so surreal(sp?). Its amazing that we get to take such a cute baby home. I am so excited for our other kids to meet her. We were told that she likes older children and to watch them dance. So as soon as we get home I will throw on some music and we will all dance for Isabella.
Its so sad to see her cry. I am so glad I brought the cheerios. Who would have known that cheerios would save the day. She was able to calm down and play a little on the bed and even made quite a few noises. Still no smile. We have another meeting today at 4:30p.m. We have more papers to sign. Tomorrow we have an interview and tell them we would like to keep her. So really she is only on loan tonight. We were told she is not ours until we sign tomorrow. I will write more later. She is so cute when she sleeps!)

Bella

2008-07-18T13:16:00.001-07:00