The First of Many

Parenting mistakes, that is. Last night after supper as I was holding Selah to get her to sleep, she threw up all over herself and me. We had given her too much to eat yesterday! Our agency told us that many times the babies eat a lot and that is a normal part of their transition. So yesterday I gave her 3 bottles (anxious to get her on formula) instead of her one bottle, some cherry juice, goldfish crackers, rice cereal, and when Shawn and I were eating our room service supper Selah really wanted more noodles-so she ate a bunch of them too. Not a good plan. The good news is that she fell asleep right after she threw up. The bad news was that we had to clean up the chair, carpet, and I did laundry in the bathtub last night (so glad I brought some Tide along). I'm not sure the clothes and blanket are going to dry before we fly to Guangzhou tomorrow. It is very humid here.

One thing I wanted to say about the past couple of days but forgot to say is how kind the orphanage directors seemed. They were so sincerely happy for these girls to be with their new families. They were as giddy as us parents. It was touching to me. You could tell they loved the girls too.

Selah is so much bigger than the others. I thought maybe she was older than 10 months old. But I learned that their birthdays can be pretty accurately guessed by looking at their umbilical cord when they are found. Her estimated birthday is January 8th.

This morning we went to a beautiful park in the city. It reminded me of Central Park NYC, but the trees were more beautifully shaped and the flowers were vibrant in color. We walked around and one of our moms was busted by the "clothing police". That is, an elderly woman came up and pulled down her daughter's pants so the 1/2 inch of skin between her pants and socks weren't showing and put her blanket around head. Chinese women especially believe in bundling babies with multiple layers of clothing. We had been warned of this. One Chinese woman stopped one of the mom's wearing shorts and was talking to her in Chinese about wearing shorts. The mom, not the baby was wearing the shorts. Some older Chinese men and women had an electronic keyboard with microphone on one of the covered bridges. When we came by they started playing and singing "O Suzanna" in Chinese. They encouraged us to sing it in English. It was a fun time.

It was so neat to see so many of the retired community out exercising, dancing, singing, walking, and enjoying community with one another. You don't see this in America outside of a retirement home or nursing home. Not on an ordinary Thursday morning. Once we are too old to drive our cars we lose so much community with one another. Just thinking out loud.

At the park was that we saw many little toddlers out with their grandparents and parents. The sad part is that we saw twice as many boys as we saw girls. We walked a long way before we even saw one little girl. We had them!

Tonight we go to Pizza Hut for our Thanksgiving meal. It has been fun to be around the other families. I had expected most of the families to be from broadly evangelical churches, but our group is very diverse with Methodists, Missouri Synod Lutheran, PCA, Christian, etc. Another thing that has surprised us is that we expected most families to be from the upper middle class, with the high cost of adoption. But that is definitely not the case. Most are here with their church's support, savings emptied, and garage sale find clothing for the girls.

Last Sunday we were able to worship at an international Christian Church in Beijing. We had to have our passport to get in. It was only for foreigners. It was so moving to worship with about 600 people from literally all over the world. It was emotional to see a picture of what our eternal home will be like. We were able to pray with an Indian woman and her daughter sitting next to us in worship. I loved it that when we said goodbye to her I knew it was only temporary. Even though we only got 10 minutes to talk and pray with this woman, we will see her again. The goodbye really felt like a "see you later".

The sermon was more like teaching than preaching, but the blood of Christ being shed for us poor sinners to make payment for our sin against God was included in the sermon. The teaching itself wasn't bad. The pastor preached on Acts 4:32 "No one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but shared everything they had." How this passage made me miss being with our church family. How good God has been to us to place us among you at Heritage. We have been on the receiving end of this passage from our church family and biological families. It's overwhelming that all of you have loved Selah before even seeing her. How blessed is she that so many have been involved in bringing her home. We can hardly wait for her baptism. I can't tell you how many times I have looked at her and heard in my mind the words, "Selah Anne Young, daughter of the covenant, I baptize you in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, sealed with Christ forever."

Selah is doing well again today. She is playful and cuddly. We gave her a pacifier today. I think she liked it. At least she sucked on it for awhile. She loves to tear up paper and play peekaboo. She is fighting a bit of a cold but I think all the babies are. She loves watermelon. It is a hit among all the girls. It's really sweet here.
Time to go eat our Supreme Pan pizza. The Chinese eat just about everything that can possibly be eaten. But no turkey. Our guides checked all over to try and find any form of turkey meat. Nothing. Happy Thanksgiving all! Grandma Young, put some leftovers in the freezer for us! :)