GOTCHA DAY

Feb. 13, 2017 - Thankfully, I'm pretty sure it had to do with all of our prayer warriors here at home but I slept the best I had since arriving to China on the night before Gotcha Day...that is only a God thing!

Our Gotcha Day was not scheduled until later on in the afternoon so we had a lot of time to burn...we walked around going the other way out of our hotel and that was so much more encouraging, we found some drug stores, some restaurants and a nice park. We paced holes in our hotel room floor and finally headed to the civil affairs office at 2 p.m. that afternoon. There was only one other couple with us and they were adopting a 13 year old. So we were hopeful it would be a calm setting as I've heard some can be overwhelming with lots of tears and mayhem.

 We got to drive to another part of Guiyang on our way and it was insane all the high rise buildings going up...all the little chantey houses being torn down to make room for them. Our guide had mixed feelings on all of this, he prefers the smaller buildings the more quiet setting for his family, he would like Indiana I think!

We went up to the 24th floor and waited!

Waiting

We hadn't been there that long and sure enough here he comes, walking in...not being carried but walking all on his own, big puffy coat and an uncertain look on his face. Not quite scared but a little unsure. He walked to stand beside me and he let me hold his hand. I didn't pick him up right away or scoop him away from his foster mom but just rubbed his back held his hand and then pulled out the big guns...suckers and my smart phone! Selfies are the way to any kiddos heart I am telling you. We soon had him laughing, making faces, eating snacks and sitting on my lap. I had the chance to talk to his foster mom just a little bit. They explained to me all the layers and his favorite foods. They explained he had had a "hair lip" corrected which we already knew and we believe she had only been his foster mom since right before we learned of him.

fingerprinting

We had to sign lots of papers, fingerprint all of our signatures, even Theo had to fingerprint some pages! While we were doing that his foster mom snuck out, he was none the wiser that she had left...we had no tears and he was ours! He let me carry him out of that office, sat on my lap in the van and that is that!

He loved the hotel I'm pretty sure he thought he was on vacation. He jumped on the bed and watched cartoons. He was a little unsure and we saw our first sadness when we tried to change his clothes but he felt the fuzzy goodness of his new jammies and cheered right up and believe it or not he slept that night!!

So grateful for such a positive and easy Gotcha Day!!