Thursday, May 14, 2009

Today is a “free day” before we fly out tomorrow morning. The one couple from our group Bob, Wen Xiu and little Rachel actually left yesterday after the United States Consulate visit. They were taking a train to Hong Kong and then flying out the next day. We were sad to see them leave. After getting back to the hotel after the consulate visit we also said goodbye to Lisa, Janine - her sister and little Lydia because they were flying out early Thursday morning. We were also sad to see them leave. We had an extra day in Guangzhou before we headed out. In the morning we had breakfast at the hotel and Hailee played with her napkin and enjoyed the goldfish in the pond for the last time.

After breakfast we ended up going to the park again to videotape all the activity, the singers, dancers, etc. Early afternoon we came back to the hotel. We all had colds by now and our adoption agency had a doctor make a house call to our hotel room. We didn’t want to get quarantined in China for 7 more days. During the doctor’s visit we found out that Hailee and I had mild temperatures…good thing we saw the doctor. We received a bunch of cold medicines and something for the fever to take a couple of hours before we went through security. Our day was fairly uneventful, Hailee took her afternoon nap and then we went out to the dinner to this great Italian Restaurant we had been to before. It was great to have a good meal and Hailee loves spaghetti. Again, Hailee was a hit with all the waitresses. We had to head out at 5:30 am to the airport so around 9 pm we put Hailee to bed and started to pack for our trip home.

Hailee did well in the airport and on the plane. We would be flying from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, have a layover in Hong Kong, then a 14 hour flight to Chicago, and then a 4 hour layover in Chicago followed by a short flight to Central WI Airport. Hailee enjoyed riding in the luggage cart…there was no place to put her legs though so she crossed her legs in the little basket and enjoyed being tooled around the different airports. As she was looking out one of the windows of the airport she saw a plane take off and into the sky…she thought that was cool.

During the long flight from Hong Kong to Chicago Hailee did fairly well. She would cry just a little bit just before she fell asleep. It was nice because in front of us was a couple who adopted a five year old Chinese girl who they named Jenna. And behind us was an American Chinese father with his 5 year old son. We were glad we were between two families that had children, especially when our little girl loved peeking over the seats, saying hello, and touching their hair and arms. The most eventful thing was when Hailee hit MaMa’s glass of water with her hand and got Mama soaked…Oh well.

When were finally arrived in Central Wisconsin it was around 9:30 pm on Friday, May 15th…we gained a whole day back but our internal time clocks were off. We were all dead tired. We ended up staying overnight at a hotel in Wausau. We went to bed at 11:30 pm but all three of us woke up around 3 am because it would have been around 3 pm in China. When we checked out in the morning the weather was cold…36 degrees Fahrenheit. So we came from 80 degree weather to upper 30 degree weather and snow. Hailee had never seen snow.

Well that’s all for now…Glad the plane rides are behind us! Until tomorrow. Love ~Jayne, Mike & Hailee