Update

Its been a crazy, but mostly wonderful, time period! Emma became sick last week, followed by Roger, then HongLi. So far, I have been blessed....however, I've started with a major deep chest cough tonight. Hopefully it will not turn into something more. We have been VERY sad to have not been able to return to church! We made it one Wednesday night before Emma got sick, so we are really hoping to make it this weekend. We miss our church family!

Can I just say that despite all of the sibling rivalry issues, and the increase in household busyness, I LOVE having 3 kids. I LOVE my 2 girls! Nina is SUCH a joy, and is NEVER in a bad mood, or uncooperative....ok, at least not for more than about 5 minutes! She started some tutoring today at Garden Springs (with the ESL teacher). She is going back to school for tutoring tomorrow, then we hope to enroll her to start next week. I'm more than a little worried...the poor thing will just have to sit there, not knowing anybody. I know that others have done it, but I'm planning on attending with her for a little while. Knowing her, it will only be a couple of hours before she is ready for me to go.

Enjoy the new pics!

Kris

Update

Hello to all! We have been hibernating over the last few days, so I haven't taken the time to update our blog. We arrived back in Lexington on time at 9:55 p.m. on Wednesday night. Just today are we starting to get back to feeling slightly normal. We were hit hard yesterday...as in feeling like we had been hit by a train! If you haven't been through an intense jetlag experience before, there is no way that I know of to explain it. Somewhere between getting hit by a massive flu and the feeling that you can get after pulling three allnighters in a row during college finals. Your entire body aches, you feel clammy and cold one minute, then are sweating bullets the next. Your stomach is upset, you are dizzy and all you want to do is sleep.....like for 12-16 hours. Like I said, that was our yesterday, but today we are feeling MUCH better! Thank you, Jesus!

Nina is doing so great! She is picking up some English, but still has far to go, understandably. Emma has been struggling. She is so jetlagged, and going to school as of Thursday. She has been experiencing more jealousy than I even expected her to experience. Today, it really does seem as if she is feeling better also. There has been no whining or jealous tantrums at all! The girls have loved each othe to death...Emma's absence has allowed both girls to "miss each other" during the day. Today, we all went to pick up Emma, and stayed after school for the book fair. Nina was able to see where she would go to school, and will finally understand where her sister is all day! Emma was proud of her school, and was able to show it off which made her feel very important. A win-win!

We are still battling with Nina's motion sickness issues. I have NEVER had motion sickness (other than from inner ear stuff), so I am NO help whatsoever as far as trying to make her feel better. Roger used to get sick when he was younger, but hasn't in a long time. We've finally stopped turning on movies, letting her read, or play video games while we are in the car, all of which have helped. If anyone has other advice, please let me know. I gave her a 1/2 of a Dramamine pill yesterday, and it put her to sleep before we could ever GET to the car...kind of defeats the purpose!

Here are some pictures not previously posted. We'll try to post a few more times before calling it quits with the blog. Thanks for "listening!"

Kris

At Nana and Papa's

Ready to Go Home!

Beautiful Girls and Beautiful Brides!

Red Couch Pics

Finally Pictures!

Ok, we should be able to post some pictures now from the U.S. Here are some of the pictures from the last few days events...enjoy!

We Made It!

Nina Faith HongLi is a new Meigua! We went through customs, and she became an automatic U.S. citizen when they stamped her paperwork!! What a thrill it was to tell her that she was no longer Chengua (Chinese), but American like the rest of the family. She's been playing this game with us where she asks us if she is Meigua or Chengua, and of course when we say Chengua, she says "no Meigua." Today, she was absolutely overjoyed when we gave her a big hug and told her that she was finally an American like us! All smiles and giggles!

The girls did GREAT on the flights....the prayers were all answered in the affirmative! They didn't sleep as much as we might have liked...a couple of hours on the first flight, and 1 1/2 hours on the second LONG flight...but they were well entertained with the t.v.'s in the back of their seats. They mostly played video games and watched t.v. shows and movies. We were seated together also, which was a huge blessing!

We left our guide, Siman, at the Guangzhou airport at 7:30 a.m., and arrived in San Francisco the same day at 10:30 a.m. Pretty wild! We also had some really, REALLY bad turbulence. We were not able to take our seatbelts offs, or move anywhere, from Tokyo until almost 3 hours into the trip. Believe it or not, that wasn't the worst of it. There must have been some severe air currents over this area, because on the way down at SFO we had the worst turbulence that I have ever experienced! Both girls were petrified, and Emma was crying and crying. It was VERY scary, even by Roger's standards. I've never seen a planes wings shake or bend like they did. I was praying out loud, and trying to get both girls to take deep breaths with me. It only lasted about 10 minutes, but that was long enough!

Ann picked us up at the airport, and we came to Nana and Papa's house in Lafayette. Both girls were sound asleep by the time that we arrived, but it didn't take long to cheer them up. Roger's great aunt, Elsie, is visiting also so it was a great reunion for all! I fell asleep right after lunch, and everyone else joined me later. We woke up at about 7:30 p.m., and had a delicious dinner waiting for us. HongLi has done wonderfully...we are both still amazed at how this adorable little child has experienced a life completely turned upside down, and she stills seems to be having a blast! She had lots of hugs and kisses for all of the new relatives, she ate well, and she and Emma just went to bed about 30 minutes ago.

I wasn't able to post pictures on the last day....stupid firewall! ;) I will definitely try to post some while we are here. Oh yeah, and I just called Parker thinking that it was 4:30 p.m....it was 4:30 a.m. He was not at all thrilled to hear from me! That's how messed up we are with four different time zones right now!! Sorry Parker!!

We are going to enjoy some "In and Out" burgers tomorrow, and maybe go see Aiyi's horse. We are planning on taking it a little easier tomorrow to give ourselves a chance to recover from our jetlag. On Monday, we may go into the city depending upon how Nina appears to be doing.

We love you guys, and cannot wait to introduce our newest addition to you!

Talk to you again soon!

Kris

Trying One Last Time!

Signing Off From China

Well, today is the last hurrah!! We are headed out at 6:30 a.m. for our 9:10 a.m. flight to Tokyo. From there, we head to San Francisco, to arrive at 10:30 a.m. SFO time, and 1:30 a.m. China time for us! I'm sure that we will be exhausted!! We are hoping to sleep some on the plane,but you never know what will happen with 2 little ones along! Please pray for smooth, pleasant flights, along with our seating assignments. We are together on the way to Tokyo, but have NO seat assignments to San Francisco (the BIG flight!). Please pray that we can somehow end up together.

I am missing Parker EXTREMELY badly!! I cannot wait to see him on Tuesday!! :)

We've had a great trip, and God has been SO good to us! We love you all! We will post some final pictures from our day, including our red couch photos! We are hoping to continue to post from SF, but we will see how it goes!

Love to all!

Kris, Roger, Emma and Nina/Hong Li

Bubbles

New Nails!

It's Working!!

Trying Pics Again

Yahoo has been giving us fits today!  We're trying again!

Trying to Attach Pics

Ok, I've tried to post new pictures about 10 times, and somethings not working. I'll try again. If it doesn't work, Roger will try to post some video for you guys!

Kris

It's Official!!!!

We took the oath this morning at the U.S. Consulate's office!! Nina is OFFICIALLY ours in the eyes of the Chinese and United States governments. When we go through customs in San Francisco, she will be a U.S. citizen!! The lady at the consulate was really sweet, and seems genuinely excited for each family adopting. It was quite a bit different than the first time around, when we were herded into a room of crowded families...THIS time, there was only one family besides us, and the woman was behind a glass window at a walk up counter! Very casual, but meaningful nonetheless.

Unfortunately, our joy was cut short on the cab ride home. Nina looked a little sick and complained of a tummy ache right before we got the Westin hotel this morning where we met our guide. On the way home, she had a definite bout of car sickness, and threw up her breakfast all over herself and the cab. The driver was REALLY unhappy with us. Actually, he wasn't very nice to begin with and drove horribly....God forgive me, but if she HAD to throw up somewhere, she picked the right driver! ;) Anyway, the fare was 38 Yuan, and Roger gave him 100 Yuan to try to make up for it. When we got back to the hotel, she decorated the sidewalk and some bushes as well. Poor baby! She was green! Anyway, the hotel people were really sweet about it, and when we tried to clean it up, they sent us up to the room and said that it was fine. We gave her a bath, and redressed her, and she was in a great mood by the time that we put into bed for a little nap. We
figured she needed it!

We are not allowed to take pictures at the Consulate's office, so here are some pictures from yesterday. New nails, blowing bubbles, and some of the photography going on yesterday.

Love to all!

Kris

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