This blog ain't workin

So says Susan for whom I (her sister) am posting. There are lots of things blocked from their current location. Please go to www.youbelong.net/everett. I don't think anything new is currently posted, but will be later. They have safely arrived in Nanjing and will be meeting Hallie in the afternoon today/tonight. This is apparently not a very progressive city, so hopefully they will be able to post through the other site.

Another "Magical" Day....

First, we wanted to show a picture of the infamous "crabby patty".

Second, in keeping our daily vigil of what's on the rotisserie at the hotel, David snapped a pic of "bird'n peppers". We hope to keep a segmen

t going of interesting foods, as we see them.

Now that we have taken care of the "food" business, let's move on.

Today, we spent our last day in Hong Kong at Disneyland again.

The kids had a blast as we rode on Space Mountain for the 4th and 5th time.

Enclosed is a picture of sidewalk art of Minnie M

ouse, done with water and a broom.

This was "painted" by a disney cast member. This type of art dates back many generations, as we learned on our trip to China 4 years ago. It was u

ndertaken by dissidents who would paint pictures or write in Chinese characters about their disagreement with the governance of China.

Since the water evaporated within minutes of being "painted" on the ground, there was no evidence of any crime, and no resulting punishment.

Jet lag, which could have been much worse, did catch up with the kids this afternoon.

We are all getting to bed early as we get ready for an early flight to Nanjing tomorrow morning. It's been fun so far, but we are all eagerly awaiting our real reason for this trip!

Our first day: Hong Kong Disneyland

We started the day after a great night of sleep and a breakfast buffet at the hotel.

I never thought I'd see Mary ella eat waffles, fruit and a bowl of rice noodles in chicken broth for breakfast. Jonathan also tried something new-looked like a cross between sushi and a cupcake. When asked what it tasted like, he said, "A Crabby Patty!" (?!!!). We didn't eat the cooked goose shown above, but Emily thought it was worthy of a photo.

We then took the MTR(rapid transit) to Disney Land Hong Kong, where we spent the day. It is just like Magic Kingdom, only a little smaller and less crowded. Because it was less crowded, the lines for rides were much shorter. Imagine the waiting less than 5 minutes to ride Space Mountain! Another difference between Disney Land Hong Kong and Disney World Florida was the food. Instead of people walking around snacking on oversized turkey legs, here they munch on grilled squid, which David and Hal enjoyed (Mary Ella and Jonathan politely ate one bite and declined another, Susan dutifully ate a smidge, and Emily simply rolled her eyes).

By 6:30 pm, we were completely exhausted, as jet lag set in.y

Tomorrow, we will play one more day, then fly to Nan Jing the following day. We can't wait!

We're Here!

We arrived in Hong Kong at 6pm (4 am Tyler time) last night. We are so glad to be here after 24 hours of travel!

The day began at 4 am with an early wake up and flight from DFW to San Francisco, with a short layover.

We then took the 14 hour flight, which had us sitting by two's on 3 successive rows in the middle of the middle section of the 747. I'm sure the passengers on either side of us got tired of getting up and down for bathroom breaks, but, hey, what can you do?!!

Susan and I are so proud of the children, as they tolerated the 24 hours of travel amazingly well. The TV attached on the back of each seat helped (just a tad...heh heh), as there was a great selection of kid-friendly movies to watch.

Today and tomorrow, we will remain in Hong Kong to acclimate to the 14 hour time change before traveling to NanJing to get Hallie. We are looking forward to getting out of the hotel and seeing Hong Kong, but the children are especially looking forward to visiting Hong Kong Disney Land. We'll catch up again soon! Thanks for all the support-- we have awesome friends and family!

We're headed to China!

Well, we finally received our travel approval last Monday, and it's been a crazy whirlwind of plans and packing since then! I tried to find the theme song from the "Beverly Hillbillies" to add to this post, since we've been saying that the "Clampetts are comin' to China", as they entire Everett crew will be going! We will be updating as we go... flying out tomorrow, December 9th and returning home Christmas Eve with our "present"!

Just Waiting for TA.....

Well, all paperwork is approved and waiting for the CCAA to send us Travel Approval. In the meantime, we are trying to be as organized and efficient as possible regarding readying ourselves for the trip... (is there anyone out there who knows me that is chuckling to themselves about now...). Seriously, Hal is planning a "dry run" for packing suitcases in the very near future and I'm just trying to make sure everyone has pants that fit and clean underwear.

Aside from trip preparations, Jonathan was "Special Kid" in his Kindergarten class last week. I don't think I will ever stop marveling at how special he really is... On Friday when we (his family) all came to his classroom, his teacher asked him several questions in front of the class. When she asked him, "Why are you special?", he sat there for a few seconds, then said: "Because I have my Daddy", pointing to Hal. Needless to say, Hal & I were both fighting back a tear! As everyone who meets him can attest, he is one big, happy blessing.... who am I, that God has given me the blessing of being his mother?

We have LOA!

For those of you who are familiar with foreign adoptions, you know generally what this means; for the others, you may have no idea what LOA is... even though we've done this once before, I keep having to explain (to myself and my family) what all these terms mean. It is confusing, but, basically, the LOA (letter of acceptance) is a letter from the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA) asking us if we do, indeed, understand FuBei's medical issues and that we are still willing to adopt her. Soooo, we will sign that tomorrow when it arrives via FedEx from our agency, then send it, along with another form (DS-230 or something) back to the agency. Also, I can now fill out my I-800 form for the National Benefits Center (Immigration office devoted to this kind of stuff...) to approve. They then send the approval to me and I send it to agency, who sends it to American Consulate in China, where they approve it and wire it to CCAA in Beijing, who THEN issue us travel approval (known as TA in adoption lingo). From there, our agency makes an appointment with the American Consulate, around which we will make our travel plan. My fingers hurt just typing it all, and I barely understand it, but all that to say, the paperwork should take about 1 month, when we should have our TA... then it is usually about 2 weeks until travel. Confused? Translation: we should travel AROUND 6 weeks from now, give or take any delays, distractions, blah, blah, blah, etc., etc. YIPPEE!

Hallie Ann Bei Everett

After much deliberation and thought, we have given our baby her new name!  Also, we got two new pictures of her, thanks to Ann, of Red Thread China. (Not sure about the usefulness of that first shot... but we'll take what we can get!)  She is sending Hallie Ann a "lovie" and a soft photo book with some pictures of herself and of us.  Hopefully she can become a little bit familiar with our faces before we arrive.  We are waiting on LOA now (letter of acceptance).  From there, it will probably be about 6 weeks or so until we travel (my guess-- could be longer, we'll see).

A New Adventure

The Lord has blessed us beyond measure with a referral:  Wu FuBei was born on January 11, 2008, in Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province, China.  She has a repaired cleft lip and a cleft palate, and she is beautiful and perfect.  Our agency says they expect we will travel in Oct/Nov.  We will see-- I'm thinking November, if nothing slows down!