Christmas Morning

The swim team

Christmas morning ipad

Christmas Morning ipad

little swimmer

Christmas Morning

Christmas Day:

The kids and I woke up way too early, 2:30am too early.  Lily was the first one to start hunting for Christmas presents.  She found them on a chair by the door and squealed to her brother, “We both got ipads.”  Santa needed something easy to pack in carry-on luggage this year.  Jing Yi got a few items, backpack on wheels to store her stuff for the trip home, a white board and markers and colors and coloring book.  She immediately set off tracing the letters on the white board and moved on to coloring.  She loves to cut paper and generally can keep herself entertained drawing.  She puts away each crayon and picks up all the little pieces of paper from the floor, totally refreshing!

We were all really ready for breakfast at 6:30.  Afterwards we decided to venture to the pool.  There is a kiddie pool with warm water and the main pool is a constant 1.2 meters in depth.  Jing Yi headed straight for the big pool.  She knew how to put on goggles.  I steered her to the kiddie pool.  Both pools have dark blue painted bottoms and it is really hard to see a swimmer underwater.  Jing Yi loves the water.  Anytime she fell and went under she came up laughing.  She will lie on her back very relaxed with her head back.  This makes me think she has been in a pool before.

We ate Christmas dinner at the hotel buffet.  The food was good, but I missed a home cooked meal.  We decided to go for a walk after dinner.  Jing Yi really needs a new pair of shoes but the only stores we passed were construction material supply stores.  Each store is in a stall with open front and each specialized in some type of building material, one with faucets, another with toilets and on and on.  Kind of a Lowe’s divided into many little stores.

We hung out in the room for the rest of the afternoon and evening.  Luke is feeling better but is still under the weather.  He fell asleep around 6pm and there was no waking him.  Jing Yi watched her first movie, the Polar Express, and seemed to enjoy it.  She is also enjoying the ipads and big brother and sister have been very generous.  Jing Yi tends to be a mouth breather; I’m guessing that is due to her cleft lip and palate although repairs have been made.  Her little flat pug nose gets so dried out at times.  Unlike last night, she fell asleep in 5 minutes after kissing her new baby and carrying on a serious conversation with her.  We’ve rode through a couple of sad spells with her, but otherwise her personality is shining through.  She is very ticklish, independent, social and curious.  We have decided to take the deluxe tour of the orphanage, the one that we must pay for, but we will be given the opportunity to meet her foster mom and visit her house.  This may be the only chance to ever see where our daughter spent three years of her life.  This may be upsetting to Jing Yi; but many families say it has provided some closure for their little ones, seeing foster Mom give her blessing to adoptive parents can help straighten things out in their world of thinking.

Tomorrow we are going to some type of amusement park for kids.  Enjoy the photos!