First Day

Today was Kingston's first day at daycare and he broke my heart. I told Ryan that I couldn't take him in for his first day. I didn't think I could leave him there. My baby is so fragile in so many ways and I didn't want to be the one responsible for breaking him. By pushing it on Ryan I remained innocent. I thought about him the entire day. I picked mr. slim pants up tonight and I think he was shocked to see me. I think he thought that daycare was his new orphanage and it made me so sad. I hate to put that pain on him. I believe is quite happy to be a Lentz and all I want is for him to feel secure and to know that he isn't leaving us. However, he is just too young to understand. Everest was old enough to get it even with the language barrier. We would point to a picture of home and say "1", then point to school and say "2" and then finally point to home again and say "3." He got our diluted way of telling him how his day would go and it just worked. Beebs is another story. He is just such a baby in so many ways. But he got through it and I got through it and here we are. 10:00 at night. I am exhausted. Good night.

Hanging in there

We are alive and well. A few days after we got home I was done. My body was done with me. My immune system said enough is enough of you. I gave you my all for two months. Done. I got sick. I had a fever for about 7 days that wouldn't break. In the middle of it all Ryan also got sick and missed his first day back to work. Thankfully the kids stayed healthy. Needless to say we've had issues just catching up with a life that is moving too fast. I started to feel better right before we hosted Thanksgiving dinner at our house. Luckily enough my dad handled the cooking and both my parents and Ryan's mom brought the side dishes. All I needed to do was buy the turkey and make some dips and instant mashed potatoes. Yesterday Ryan's mom and sister watched the kids while Ryan and I ran to Target to buy some much needed lamps for our living room. It was amazing to just get out of the house to do something for the house without bundling up two kids. It was easy. It made us feel normal. Today is the first day that we are really alone, both home with the kids and feeling ok. After waking up with Everest for a bit this morning I was able to go back to sleep until 10. Kingston luckily can log some hours in the sleep department if everything is quiet around him. It's just a struggle to keep things quiet until he decides to wake up. He usually wakes up completely soaked. Headed back to target today to figure out the diaper situation. Kingston is really quite proud of himself when he pees in his little baby toilet. He lets out a "YAAAAAY!" And there are high fives all around. The other day we were out and he went into the bathroom with me. He got very excited that I went pee in the toilet. He said, "YAAAAAY Momma!" and proceeded with giving me a high five. More later, off to conquer the day.

Home Sweet Home

So we're living a strange little existence here at the Lentz household. I think we would be having a pretty good time except for the fact that exhaustion set in and so did some viruses. I have run a fever for the past three days. Ryan has a sinus infection. The boys are fine except that they suffered from jet lag quite a bit. Kingston isn't sleeping through the night. Every couple of hours you'll hear his little cry. It's getting old. Our house is a complete disaster. Both Ryan and I were too sick yesterday to do anything. Today I was at the doctor's office and then in bed while Ryan was on Kingston duty. We have dishes piled up like we are in college. Then you can add in the laundry from the trip and it's a bit out of control. We have piles of clean clothes scattered throughout the house. At least it is clean. It would be embarrassing if I wasn't so sick. My mom is coming up tomorrow to help out. We also don't have daycare set up for Kingston yet. We've looked at some places and found a couple of them that we like but I want to be able to ease him into it. We have been unable to do so given that I haven't felt like I could stand up straight for more than a half an hour at a time. I am supposed to go back to work on Monday. I am thinking it will be Tuesday. I did not estimate sickness into the mix when scheduling my departure.

Kingston is a crack up. His little personality is showing through quite a bit. We will really need to work on language with this guy. I think a speech pathologist is in his future. He seems to understand what we are saying but he did not have a lot of mandarin language skills to begin so I think there is a bit of delay there. He kind of grunts and whines to get what he wants. I don't think I would want to learn to speak either. Again, it's getting a bit old. I think he has the smarts - he understands commands like, "take your shoes off" and "go wash your hands." It's just that he is lagging a bit. I think he will catch on but it will take time.

I am completely over the potty training thing. He knows when he has to go and he tells us he went after the fact. It's beyond annoying.

I am just crabby.
And tired.
And sick.

Kids are eating McDonalds. That is showing that today I gave up. I couldn't even heat anything up.

The Last Few Days

The last day in Guangzhou was tough for me. I was so sad and I think the reasons behind it were many. I know a lot of adoptive parents are sad to leave their children’s birth country and I think that may have been part of it. I know that there is a certain sadness that comes with taking your children away from the only life they have ever known but in that respect that happened when we took Kingston out of the orphanage, a world away from the day-to-day lives of people in Beijing and Guangzhou. I think my sadness had to do with #1) We were leaving my “safe place.” I had no sadness upon leaving Beijing. We had been looking forward to leaving Beijing. Guangzhou was sunny, beautiful and warm. It had a pool for the kids to play in. We were as relaxed as one can be adopting a new child into our lives. I know that in parts of this blog I made this trip seem easy breezy. Adoption, even under the most ideal circumstances (which we had), is not at all easy. It was extremely hard. It was difficult for me to know that we were altering the happy family existence that we had for the unknown. We were taken out of a comfort level that was difficult for us to achieve as a family of three before we had potentially been ready to do so. Guangzhou put those difficulties and reservations on the back burner because it offered us a place to regroup from Beijing. It allowed us to put our defenses down and to take a breath. We were able to cross the street without completely fearing for our lives and the lives of our children. It allowed us to let our children run free just a little bit and play like children should be able to do. For me, Guangzhou will always hold a special place in my heart because it allowed me start to love Kingston and it allowed me to regain a level of patience with Everest. #2) I was extremely sad to say goodbye to our friends that we had grown so close to. After meeting Nancy, Tom, Betty and Eli in Beijing it was hard to say goodbye in Guangzhou. I couldn’t stop crying as it signified the end of our trip for me. Our friends were also our “safe place.” With them we were able to laugh and sometimes laughing is hard to come by when you are in China adopting a child. They just got it. It is hard to find people as good as they are. They were patient with us and they were patient with Everest. I know that we will remain close to them and we are looking forward to meeting the rest of their families in the hopefully near future. #3) Our adoption trip was done. We came, we saw, we did and we were leaving. And we were leaving with a child. We had faced the unknown and we persevered and we were moving on to face more unknowns. We will likely not adopt again. I know that we said that before and I will never say never but adoption at this point is extremely unlikely.

On our last day in Guangzhou, we woke up and had a relaxing breakfast with our friends. Kingston slept 15 hours so it was just Everest and I at breakfast. Everest has become a big boy who I actually allowed out of my sight to hit the buffet line on numerous occasions so that I could drink my coffee in relative peace. Our last day in Guangzhou was spent at a department store as it was raining. It was a tad bit of a sensory overload as is most experiences in China. We had to pick up toys and food for the trip home and as it was raining, what else is one going to do in China? We arrived back at the hotel to find out that we could board an earlier train so it was off to a quick McDonald’s lunch with our friends.

Getting the four of us checked out of the hotel was something of a fiasco. When we were just about packed up I asked Kingston if he had to “ney-neyo” knowing that he uses neyo-neyo interchangeably for #1 and #2. He looked right up at me and pushed some right on out. Great. So I started to change him and for some reason this time it made me dry heave. I was gagging and just about puking. Everest had never seen someone puke besides Kingston’s projectile vomit when we got him. He started bawling. I think he thought I was hurt. I was. That poop physically pained me. Two minutes after changing him, luggage in the doorway and he does it again. We can’t get out of the room because the kid kept pooping. We made it out of the room and checked out. The tears started as we were checking out. The receptionist asked if I was ok. Ryan told her that I was just so happy to be a Marriott Rewards Club member. We said our goodbyes. They were not fun for me as previously mentioned. We boarded our bus and waited at the train station for Kingston’s visa so that we could enter Hong Kong. We got on the later train so that all of us could sit together. We were traveling with another family and we made the two hour trek to HK. It was a long day for everybody. We arrived in HK around 7:00. Around 6:00 we thought we were there, packed up all of the kids’ toys, put Kingston in his carrier (not an easy task) and headed to the door. Someone who spoke English told us after the fact that we didn’t arrive until 7:00 so back we went. About halfway to HK we all realized we did not know where our hotel was in reference to the train station. After the two plus weeks we’d been through simple things had been forgotten and all rationality and common sense was long gone. We did manage to remember after a few minutes that we believed our hotel to be close to the train station. Luckily enough it was attached to the station. Oh and in the middle of all of this Ryan realized it was our anniversary. When we got to the hotel we ended up upgrading our room. We paid a fortune for it but the receptionist made it seem like a good idea. At that point anything sounded good but I could have slept in a suitcase and been fine. I really wanted Ryan to see some of HK so we dragged the kids out in the rain and found a restaurant. Everybody was exhausted but we managed to get a cab down to I don’t know where and found an Italian place. I went to the bathroom and a cook walked out without washing her hands. I ate anyway. I was too tired to complain. It was delicious. The kids ate like champs. It felt so good to be one step closer to home and to familiar food that wasn’t McDonalds.

We got up at the crack of dawn after only a few hours of sleep and off we went. As we waited for the hotel shuttle one of the hotel workers were trying to get Everest off of the floor. I freaked out at them and after a few attempts to make Everest get up they left us alone. I think I looked deranged and you would have thought they would have taken one look at me and decided it would have been in their best interest to leave us alone. They did not.

At the airport we had more pooping issues. Twice for KT and once for Everest. I don’t know what all happened but at one point while I was spending the last of our HK dollars I came back and Ryan frantically said he needed money. I asked why and he replied that he needed to tip the janitor for wiping Everest’s ass. I handed him the rest of our HK dollars. About $7 in US. Usually I feel like Everest should pay us to wipe his butt so it was the least I could do for a complete stranger.

The airplane ride wasn’t too atrocious. It was the best it could be for 14 hours with two kids, which is not good and was not fun but we got through it. I am glad it is over. Then we followed the fun of the plane ride with a three hour bus ride. Good times. Danielle met us at Memorial Union and brought us home. Kingston wasn’t sure what to make out of the place and definitely was not sure what to make out of the cat. He is warming up to both. He finds it funny that the cat’s food is on the floor. At least I think he does because he calls me over to look at it, says, “Meow” and giggles.

Kingston was not a fan of his new bedroom and crawled in with Everest. After about 15 minutes of laughing, both kids were asleep. We managed to stay awake for pizza and then we were asleep as well.

Today is a new day. Kingston tried cereal for the first time. What kid isn’t going to like Lucky Charms?!? He is busy exploring his new house and surroundings. Not much to explore given our lack of furniture. All is well for the most part. Will we have difficulties? Yes. Will our children struggle with having lived in an institution for a portion of their childhood, yes, but do all kids struggle with something?

I don’t look at them and see challenge. I look at them and see unlimited potential. I look at how far Everest has come in two years time. I look at how far Everest has come in just 6 months time. Right now Kingston is chasing a remote control car and squealing. He has potential.

I can’t believe I have kids. The fact that it is plural is outrageous to me. How did I get to where I am today? How did this all happen so quickly? I look at my children and I know that miracles do happen. I look at them and know that God exists. I look at them and see the innocence that is too soon lost. I look at them and see hope, faith and goodness. I look at them and I know that Ryan and I made the right choices. Although our family is not a conventional family, our family is just that, our family. Although their eyes are not ours and you cannot see the resemblance of us in their smiles, you will see Ryan and me in their personalities. You will see us in their manners. You will see us in their morals. You will see us. They may not be from us but they are part of us nonetheless. My children are my joy, my inspiration and my future. They are Everest and Kingston Lentz.

It's Official - Kingston is stuck with us

It’s official. Kingston is our boy. We took our oath and our visa gets picks up tomorrow and our guide is meeting us at the train station with it. We take the train to Hong Kong with another family and we’ll spend the night in Hong Kong. We are somewhat wishing that we had an extra night in Hong Kong. We didn’t know this little trooper would be as easy as he is. We are also not excited about the long flight home. The past few days have been sunny and hot. Today is 85 degrees and we are heading out to the pool. Last time I checked we didn’t have one of those in our backyard and I’m guessing the weather is not going to be even remotely close to 85 degrees. Facing reality is what we are having an issue with. Going home, establishing a routine and living our lives. I think we will be ok but I think that there will obviously be unforeseen challenges. Things are easy where we are right now. Our every move is taken care of. Our guide tells us where to go and when. In a way we can be mindless and in most ways we are.

Everybody is headed to the Pearl Market. We are deciding against going. You know I love to shop but bargaining with two boys running around is not going to be a priority. The boys need to wear themselves out in the pool. I think tonight we will lay low. The boys need to get a good night’s sleep.

Kingston is continuing to crack us up. I think I may love him. I am not sure yet. He is a trouble maker but he is a cute trouble maker so it makes it a bit easier to handle. The poor dear has no clothes that fit so today I asked the concierge for scissors and I cut off his pants that we got him in Beijing into a pair of rag-tag cut-off shorts. They don’t look half-bad. Actually they don’t look half-good either. That action garnered a bit of attention. Speaking of attention, I don’t think I mentioned the other day when we were at the park feeding the boys oranges. Everest had taken off his shirt, Kingston’s clothes don’t fit and Ryan and I were sweating through our clothes. There were no less than 30 people gathered around us. I took video of them watching us and talking about us. I kind of love that. Just the strangeness that we are to them. The strangeness that we are to our own selves.

We’re heading off to the kid’s playground at the hotel and then on to the pool. There is a bar connected to the pool. It is only 10:30 in the morning. We’re totally ok with that.

Guangzhou's Finest

Today we were supposed to go to the Folk Museum and instead had a late breakfast and hit a park across the street. It is super hot here. The heat is intensified when you are lugging two kids around. We finally stumbled onto a mini-amusement park. As we are pushing the kids onto one of the rides, Ryan asks me, "Well...do you think it's safe?"

Everest decided it was prime time to decide he had to poop and had to poop bad and of course there is nothing in sight. The next forty minutes were dedicated to finding Everest a bathroom. During this time, Everest was picked up for most of the duration. I am not sure why - was the poop going to decide it didn't want to come out if carried? We finally found a squatty potty and Everest went in with Ryan. About 5 minutes later they came out, Ryan about gagging. Apparently it was the squatty potty that made the poop not want to come out. I don't blame it.

We decided it was time to hit the pool. The pool is awesome. We spent a ton of time there today and likely will tomorrow. It's just easy entertainment.

Tonight I went out without underwear on. I didn't have any left. I only felt somewhat less dirty than if I had gone out with dirty underwear on. We went out with our friends again tonight, this time to a Thai restaurant on Shamian Island. I wanted to tell them I wasn't wearing any underwear but decided it was inappropriate. It was only after I was back in the hotel room that I realized I could have worn my bikini bottoms. Oh well. The good news in all of this is that we picked up our laundry and our kids can stop wearing the same socks that they have worn for three days and I can stop being trampy and wear some clean undies.

Ryan headed out to 7-11 tonight to pick up some supplies (Tsingtao and pringles) and was approached numerous times by Guangzhou's finest ladies. He did pick up one of the finer ladies cards. Apparently her name is Anita as her card states and you will get a "Passionate Night" with her.
"You Want beautiful Young Chinese girls for sex? Yes, that's What we have. We are Provig dinProfessional service. Excellent quality Of our girls is guaranteed and fast delivery is our promise. We Will Assign girls according to your special requirements, your comfort, and Pleasure!Do not hesitate, call now! 24h serve the doorstep."

I can't wait until she gets here.

We are on Vacation

We landed in Guangzhou late last night. The kids were amazing for the most part. Kingston took his first airplane ride in stride. There was a lot for him to look at – his own little TV, headphones, magazines, he took it all in. Everest was happy that there was a game console on the TV. I was ok until Everest spilled his whole yogurt on the ground. It was the last straw in an already very stressful day. My eyes physically hurt. We didn’t get to sleep until around 1:00 am and we were up at 6:45. Plus, I had to sleep with Everest and he used me as a scratching post for his dry legs while he was sleeping. It was kind of like being humped by a dog.

We arrived at the China Hotel Marriott in Guangzhou and it was honestly such a relieving experience. We were so over Beijing and were beyond excited to land in warm weather. I was never a fan of the White Swan hotel that most adoptive parents stay at in Guangzhou. It is closed for rennovations and although we are not directly on Shamian Island, we are a short drive away and our hotel is super nice.

The medical exam was today. The term medical exam shall be used loosely as it is a chaotic mess of screaming children and doctors doing the least amount of medical work possible. Wow, you would honestly not believe how crazy it is.

So KTL is not a happy camper today. He is not happy at all. He is in turn making the rest of us not happy. He is a screaming, bratty, typical 3 year old who did not get enough sleep. He is making my head hurt. I want to make his head hurt. He needs to go to sleep, like now.

So the other day I forgot to mention that Kingston got to ride in an elevator all by himself. Yes, we are already teaching the young lad independence. Actually, we are neglectful parents and we all got off the elevator without the poor dear. He rode down to the parking garage by himself while I frantically tried to follow in a separate elevator. Kingston arrived safely back to lobby by his lonesome and I followed shortly after. Everest was bawling his head off because he didn’t want to lose his brother. Meanwhile Ryan and I were cracking up at the debacle. We were wondering if it wouldn’t have been nice to lose him maybe just for an hour or two so that Ryan and I could grab happy hour in peace. Parents of the year.

Today we did some paperwork and we went and “sat” out at the pool. Kingston loves the water, as much as Everest but his body is just so skinny that he gets way too cold. The weather here is absolutely gorgeous and if we didn’t have a three year old crazed maniac with us we might actually say we are on a bit of a vacation for the next couple of days. We may venture out around the hotel tonight to check things out and then it is early to bed. Tomorrow we are supposed to go to a Folk Museum. I think I would rather not. I mean, me, Ryan, a 6 year old caged animal and a 3 year old beaver cannot do a museum without causing total havoc. Ub other news, we were called out today for ordering beer at lunch (I know folks, shocking). Meanwhile, we figure that they are probably hitting the mini-bar hard when they get back to the rooms.

We absolutely love the family we were with in Beijing. They took Everest to the pool today. Love them! They have been wonderful to both us and to Everest.

Packing Up

We're packing up today. We've classified our laundry into categories: #1) Very dirty #2) Dirty and wearable only after washing twice. Makes packing easy. Throw all clothes into suitcases.

My second child is fake crying in the bathtub. He is really good at that. They must do it at the orphanage to get attention. I walk in there and he smiles at me. I walk out and he starts at it again. This blog post has take a half an hour.

Everest and Ryan are "working out" in the gym. I am not sure how much "working out" Ryan is getting out of the experience.

Littlest man just got out of the bathtub and every time he is walking around naked I am reminded of just how small he is. There is a two and a half old with us (6 months younger than Mr. Tao) and he is 5 lbs heavier and shorter.

He just broke the clock in the room. I'm ok with it. It'll probably cost us $60 and is worth about $1.50.

The shaved hair on his forehead is growing back in little chunks and it looks like he has hairy growths on his forehead.

If he does not have a diaper on he tells us he has to neyo-neyo (pee). If the diaper is on he pees in it. I suppose I would too. I think he is scared of doing the lash in the toilet. He screams when we put him on it. He wants to sit on my lap as I am typing it (with his bare butt). As cute as it is, I am not having it.

I just noticed that he is really dry. Probably because of his love of the bathtub. I just introduced him to lotion. Of course we had to use the whole bottle - just as with food and drink we have to use all of it. Every last drop.

The Balloons are Deflating and the Wine is Depleting

We have no less than 5 balloons in our room. They are deflating. It is time to leave Beijing. The clothes are all dirty three (or five) times over. We are ready to be done. My wine is gone. We are ready to be done.

Today we went to the Summer Palace, which was quite beautiful. Things are hard to see when you are constantly wrangling and corralling two boys, one of which does not understand you and one of which pretends he doesn’t.

I don’t think Kingston really had any major outbursts today. The boys got 14 hours of sleep last night. They definitely needed it and we definitely needed them to have it. It did improve Everest’s disposition a little bit, Kingston’s was a ton better.

My back is killing me.

I am so tired of this hotel. There are dried noodles and crumbs all over because they don’t vacuum. I make the boys take off their shoes immediately upon entering the room. Why? It’s not like anyone else ever has.

Beebs is Kingston’s new nickname for the time being. A little like Beaver but just a twist that makes Everest giggle uncontrollably. Hopefully we will think of a more suitable nickname soon.

Had braised tofu for dinner. Really good but now my stomach really hurts. I was supposed to have lost weight on this trip but of course I am gaining as I think I tend to eat when stressed and when the only safe choice is chocolate pocky sticks, pringles or mcdonalds. It is rather TBD on the braised tofu being safe.

Tomorrow we are off to Guangzhou. Our flight is at 6:00 at night and we are set to arrive at 9:00. It will be a late night for tweedle dee and tweedle dumb (I don’t know which is which). We join up with the other families and we are looking forward to seeing their children. We have really enjoyed our time with our Beijing travel partners. Nancy and Tom adopted Eli, a little guy who will likely need a portion of his leg amputated. They also brought Nancy’s twin sister, Betty with them. Last night when we were going to sleep Ryan said, “Melissa, it would hate it if you had a twin sister.” Thinking that was rather harsh I asked him why and said I thought it would be cool. He came back with the fact that he would be unable to fart in our hotel room. Very true. And I will leave you with that.

Zoo Day

My first born is driving me nuts. Completely nuts. I WANT TO SCREAM but my second born does enough of that for all of us. I am going to give Mr. E-V the benefit of the doubt for today's actions and will leave it out of this blog post because this should be more about door #2 than #1.

I have not lost it yet. But I am close.

Today I walked to the grocery store and back and I did not cry. It was two years ago where walking to the grocery store put me into tears. Our lives were forever altered and we came through stronger than we were before, stronger as a family and stronger than our individual parts. Our lives have changed yet again and this a scary thing for all of us, even those of us who don't choose to wear Spiderman shirts.

Mr. Kingston Tao is becoming quite the interesting little man. We can't quite figure him out. He keeps us on our toes as we are never quite sure when a fit will start but the fits are not too out of control. However, the poor little dear gets all red in the face, the screaming starts and he about hyperventilates. The first few times I thought he would puke.

Today we put Kingston on the scale and he weighed in at a whopping 24 lbs with all of his clothes and shoes on. This makes me so sad. There is no way a three year old should weigh 23 lbs. That is just sick. Hopefully it will not take long for Mr. Tao to put on the pounds as he is eating more than all of us put together. The only issue is that he likes to put it all in his mouth at once, realizes he cannot swallow or chew it all up and ends up looking for me to grab something to spit it out in. Classy little guy. Fits in well with us.

I think that the best part of the days are when we get back to our hotel room and we all run around, jump on the beds and wrestle. Kingston is a bit of a brute. He will fall and will get right back up to jump onto my unsuspecting back. He is a character and I am looking forward to introducing you all to him. He has a cute little smile and he knows how to charm like his brother. He is a tad shy around strangers and I think we are already seeing him shy away from Mandarin speakers. We are his safety net now, we are his food supply, his survival, his fun, his family.

We finally put them to bed around 5:00 this evening. Could turn out to be a very bad idea tomorrow morning around 5:00 am. Kingston is as Ryan just put it, "totally beavered out."

Heading to the Summer Palace tomorrow. Looking forward to it as we did not get a chance to see it last year. Hoping to also document some areas around the hotel for both Everest and Kingston's benefit as they grow older. As I walked to the grocery store today it hit me more than ever that this was their first home. This is their heritage before there was a family. This is the land of their first language, familiar food and like faces. Although I would not choose to live here, my children did not choose to leave here and I must respect the home they once knew. I must respect the chaos, the clutter, the beauty, the tradition. I also must not let them forget.

Another Day is Another Day is Another Day

Today was one of those "free days," which I think are designed to torture new parents. Luckily slim mcgee #1 and #2 woke up late. Success. We even relaxed in the room for awhile until King Tut decided that he needed to unleash one of his ear surgery temper tantrums, which I think was a result of Ryan or I doing something he deemed to be close to the end of the world.

I took Everest out of the room and the maid looked at me and stuck her fingers in her ears and shook her head. I nodded at her and made a motion like I was drinking as a result. Whatever.

We went back to the Temple of Heaven again today and ran the kids. Ran and ran and ran the kids. And ran them yet some more. We also went to the Pearl Market again - the Pearl Market has pearls I think but we never make it past the second floor where all of the knock-off merchandise is. We promised Everest a spiderman t-shirt and we picked up Mr. Crazy #2 a pair of pants and a couple of "polo" shirts. Kid will be decked out tomorrow. We got Kingston a pair of pants the other day out of desperation because he only fits into one of the pairs we got him. We couldn't find him anything that resembled normal. We finally found one pair of pants that has writing all over it. Jibberish English. One of the phrases is, "eye ohio." Again, whatever.

We were ripped off by a rickshaw driver today. I wanted to punch him in the face but I did not. Everest afterwards said, "Ma, what does putting the smack down mean?"

We had a new family come into Beijing today. They adopted a little guy from a neighboring province. We went to the Chinese restaurant with them tonight and ate way too much yet again.

Things about China that I like:
My children (well at least one of them so far)
Scales in bathrooms - why doesn't the US do this?
Noodles, rice, noodles, rice oh and dumplings
Tsingtao
Cheap Coke and water
Pocky sticks and Pretz
The Great Wall
The kindness of people

Things I can do without:
Squatty potties
Can't find hand sanitizers to buy
Can't drink the water or eat raw veggies (no salads)
Feeling dirty but not necessarily all China's fault. No clean clothes has something to do with it.
No time to put on makeup or workout.
Hard beds (but that is growing on me)
Rickshaw drivers
Pollution
Why do they only give us two towels every morning although they know there are four of us?
Why are they not changing our bed sheets - again feeling really dirty.
Need to wear swim caps in pool even with shaved heads - but good for a laugh

Tomorrow it is off to the zoo with our new travel partners. I am nervous that they will think the beaver is one of the animals. In all honesty, the resemblence between the two kids is striking to me at times and strangers and our travel partners alike have made the call without our prompting that the two look like brothers. There are times when their actions are startling similar. Their laugh is a key indicator - in addition Everest does this fake cry that sounds very, very real. He had not done it in front of Kingston and today Kingston started to do it. It sounded just like Everest complete with a laugh afterwards, very proud of himself. Then Everest started to do it and we had two fake crying and then giggling boys who thought very highly of themselves. Both boys also have a bluish mark between their eyes. Although very similar, Kingston is coming into his own.

He is officially ours (we think)

Yesterday we went to the notary, the civil affairs office and to get passport pictures taken (I think but really I have no idea). We put our red fingerprints on our signatures and I think that means that what they call our "harmonious period" is over. Ha, harmonious period my ass. At what I think was the notary Kingston decided to have his first full on fit. Screaming at the top of his lungs like I have never heard screaming before. Ear piercing. Pinching (I have a welt), a few spits, kicks and hits. I think we just went with it. I know I did. I sat there and said, "We handled Everest, we can handle this fit." Our guide who has obviously seen it all in terms of adoptions said that it was a good thing that he was acting out. It shows personality. I don't know what kind of personality. Jeesh. It was good though to see that he wasn't the happy go lucky kid that he seems to be and that he has some spunk and fight in him like his brother.

The rest of the day was great. We actually hung out in our room quite a bit, which is nice to be able to do. With Everest we could only go to sleep in our room. Now mind you, our room is not nice. It is littered with cracker crumbs, and an ever-growing mountain of dirty clothes that I cannot bear to put on my body after knowing what it has been through. Poor Everest has not had clean pants in three days. Underwear is clean though. Brought a lot of super heroes.

Kingston's clothes don't fit so we have been buying him a few odds and ends to get us by. Hoping to get some laundry done in our bathtub tonight. Seriously.

We went out for dinner at Tim's BBQ again and they had a Halloween party. It was great for Everest because they gave him candy. They took their picture with him and then took one of our table. We figure we'll be on their wall. It was pretty good.

I had to take a break because there was some diaper issues. Kid tells you as he is going poop, not before. He yells Momma and get this look on his face that can only be describes as, well, like he is going poop.

Heading down for breakfast as the crew is getting antsy.

More later tonight.