Beijing Pollution, I didn't miss you...

Thankfully, the morning we arrived in Beijing wasn't so bad. It wasn't a "blue sky day" as we used to call good air days, but it wasn't horrible. Quickly though, the pollution go out of control. There are parts about China that we love and miss, but I'm so thankful we don't have to deal with this anymore.  

Saturday night. Thanks for the mask Helena and Jarter!! 

Anticipation...

Yesterday was a challenging day for me. We arrived in Kunming safely and actually had a rather enjoyable flight with China Sourthern. Our guide, David, picked us up at the airport and my expectations were possibly too high. I have read hundreds of blogs about people's time in China and a common theme was that the guides were incredibly. So sweet, helpful, encouraging, etc. Well, I'm hoping ours was just having a bad day because he had no interest in who we are. There was nothing personal about how he talks to us...no questions (or interest when I mentioned it) about our family, the fact that we lived in China, about Priscilla, nothing. He gave us our schedule, took us to the hotel and that was the end of it. On our schedule we were supposed to "go shopping" 2 hours before we received Priscilla today. By shopping, it means go to Walmart and buy food and diapers that you need. Walmart is stressful enough in the U.S., in China is a whole other can of worms. It's packed, loud, chaotic and stressful. There is NO way I wanted to go to Walmart right before we picked up Priscilla so I asked if we could go to Walmart on Sunday. At first he said sure, but then changed his mind and gave us (super crappy) directions to go ourselves. Fine. We could do that. 

This is in the baby section at Walmart. I opted not to buy it.  

We checked into our hotel and were extremely disappointed. We were told we'd be staying in nice hotels, Western (ish) and good quality on China standards. Well our hotel is far below that...think Super 8 equivalent. Ok fine, we aren't here for the hotel...but it would be nice to be able to sit on the floor and play with Priscilla. Our carpet is gross, there is mold in the bathroom and the room is pretty dingy. Not quite the "welcome to your new life with us" I was envisioning.  

We were also told by David yesterday that there is another family from a different agency that will be with us all week. For every step. They are here from Georgia adopting a 7yr old girl from Kunming. I don't really want to be sharing our experience with another family. I don't want to be sharing our car and our guide, but maybe it'll be a blessing in disguise. Maybe there is a reason God put us together. We haven't met them yet, but I'm trying to be a little more open minded about it and I'm doing a lot of praying. 😉

last night before I went to bed, I decided that I'm being a bit of a dork with my aggravations. I need to be positive and enjoy it for what it is. I did a lot of praying for my attitude towards David. He doesn't need to be my friend and I need to be thankful that he is handling the legal bits of this.  

I also spent quite a bit of time trying to make our room feel more homey. Lisa had told us before we left to unpack our things (put clothes into the dresser...meiyou 😂 we don't have one) and to get as comfortable as you can. So I improvised and decided it'll be fine. 

Priscilla's toys

Most of this we brought, but we did get a few of our kids favorite snacks (from China) too.  

I even decided to do some laundry. We found Tide at Walmart!! Crazy! They didn't have that at the non-import stores when we lived here.

Today at 2:30pm we meet David and the family from Georgia in the lobby. We will drive together to the Civila Affairs office and meet Priscilla. I have been envisioning and praying for this moment for months, but I'm SO nervous. I know God has us all in this, but it's still hard. It's finally really here. I will have her in my arms TODAY! I just hope I can comfort her pain of being away from her home. I hope we can connect so she isn't terrified of us for very long. I hope that our attachment to each other starts to grow quickly. I love this little girl so much and yet know nothing about her. I love her because God loves her. He chose us to all be together and I am so humbled by this. He wants me to be her mama. How incredible is that??! God is so much more amazing than I can even begin to imagine.  

Day 3 - Final day in Beijing

Our last day in Beijing was a lot of fun! After breakfast we walked to the "American Girl Doll Store". It's about the size of Adeline's bedroom at home and packed full of dolls, clothes and accessories. Most items are completely authentic and if they do have a flaw, it's only minor and most of the time you can't notice. The lady who runs the store is super sweet and even remembered me from when we lived here. 😂 Mitchell said I made an impression from being nice or buying way too much...lets go with the first option!  

After that excitement, we headed to Hongquo (Pearl Market) for a couple must needed stops. First stop was Po and Liz, our electronics supply source. We topped up new iPad/iPhone cords and a few Christmas presents. After this we navigated our way to the new LuLu location, as she had moved since I was last here. After talking to three different friends, trying a couple of wrong buildings and then finally calling my lady, we made it. 😊 it was fantastic and I got a few treasures!! Such fun!

After our shopping excursion, I took Mitchell to my favorite foot massage place, Bodhi Sense. We had 80 min of complete relaxation, it was such a huge treat!!  

We met Jarter and Helena for dinner at Bao Yuan Dumplings and then went back to Jarter's for a super fun and intense game of Settler's of Catan. It was a late night and we only got 3 hours of sleep. Oops!! ​

This was in the lobby of our hotel. I thought it was beautiful.  

Jet lag - 1, Jess - 0

We thought we were doing pretty good adjusting to the time change. We did everything right, starting on Beijing time as soon as we landed (at 9am) Thursday. However, sometimes even the "fail proof plan" doesn't work. Last night I woke up at 2:54am. Wide awake. Hopefully it gets better before we get Priscilla on Monday!!