Mei Lu joined our lives at 4:00pm Sunday 9/13!!!!! She is beautiful and scared and want's to be in one of our arms at all times and sleeps through the night and amazing!!! She's pretty healthy but has some bad diaper rash. One bad enough that if the antibiotic ointments don't work we may take her to see a doctor tomorrow. So she's a little uncomfortable but if you hold her tight she's quite content.

Sunday (9/13) right after we arrived at the hotel from the airport we called the orphanage and after trying to call fpr over three hours and getting no answer we decided to send our two interpreters to the orphanage who managed to track down the director. They called us about 25 minutes later and said they were sending over the driver to pick us up and bring us to the orphanage to pick up Mei Lu. You can imagine what the next few minutes were like, because we had resigned ourselves to the fact that we probably would not be getter her until the next day. We really weren't ready but managed to bring most everything we needed. The scene at the orphanage was a madhouse with four caregivers, one director, two interpreters and ourselves trying to quiet Mei Lu down
and ask questions of the care givers and understand the translations from the interpreters. The director needed us to get a photo of the three of us so we went across the street (which in any city in China is more difficult than it sounds) and got a picture taken but had to wait an hour for them to develop so we went to a Buddhist temple and wandered around there. It was quite peaceful and Mei Lu fell sound asleep while we were walking.

It is Monday 9/14 around noon, we applied for the passport and filled out all sorts of papers today at two different offices in the city.  Got back to the hotel around 10:30, fed her (she's Hungry!) and then she passed out. So with a few minutes to spare we thought we'd send a message.

Our trip over went very smoothly. The top deck of the 747 was luxurious. We slept, we watched videos on our personal video screens.  We drank, we had gourmet dinners it was decadent but we'd do it again in a minute. (Thanks Ting Pau and Suzana - Monique's brother and sister-in-law who donated frequent flyer miles to allow us to go by business class).

Beijing was busy. We had a great time on the tours. Saw the Forbidden City, Summer Palace, Temple of Heaven, Ming Tombs and the Great Wall.  Of course we stand out like sore thumbs so every peddler in China was trying to sell us stuff. We've gotten good at saying no in Chinese.

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Sunday 9/20. What a difference a week makes. Mei Lu went from being unable to leave our arms to playing by herself to crawling, to standing up and to moving along while holding on to things. She is a happy child. She laughs at the drop of a hat. We are in the business center at the White swan hotel, I'm typing and Monique is playing with Mei Lu on the floor. Mei Lu is crawling away and then Monique crawls over to get her and Mei Lu goes from a giggle to a laugh to a scream.  She makes us laugh every time she laughs so we're having a great time.  She goes into the snugli we've got and treks around town for hours and just loves every minute of it.

We couldn't be happier and Mei Lu is just amazing us every minute we're with her. She's been healthy except for some pretty bad diaper rash and some open sores but other than that seems to be fine. We also have been fine and healthy - enjoying lots of the local Chinese cuisine. Mei Lu eats lots of table food and so far just about anything. She's now about 28 inches (73 cm) and about 17-18 lbs and is fitting into the size 12 month clothes we brought. We expected her to be a little smaller and not so active yet so we're thrilled with her motor skills and her size.  Doesn't seem malnourished at all. Sleeps about 11-12 hours a day and usually a good long nap in the afternoon. Today she's amazed us with her discovery of her own voice. Babbling away and talking to herself.

All went well with the train ride to Hong Kong and the flight to LA the following day.   The guy behind us snoring made more noise than Mei Lu.  She played with none of the toys we brought (except the stacking cups) but loved the paper cups from the bathroom the safety cards and anything else she could get her hands on.  We spent a couple days in LA recovering and visiting Monique's sister Elisabeth. We were greeted by Elisabeth and Adrienne with balloons and signs and shouts and whistles!  They gave us a nice baby shower with great food and wonderful people.  We made it home on Sunday 9/28 at Midnight with a bottle of champagne from the flight attendants and welcomed home in Boston by Peter's brother, Mike and wife, Sara, tears and all.