Day Three: Beijing

We had a VERY full day yesterday and I conked last night. I'm so thankful, for the first night since we got here, that we actually sleep about seven hours. It's amazing what sleep deprivation can do you to you. However, I do want to say that as tired as I was yesterday... I did amazingly well with chopsticks. I'm not a master yet but I was able to manage getting my food in my mouth without having to resort to my technique titled the "grab and stab". Hey.. it worked :).

Yesterday, we had a two hour orientation where we met with all of the other Holt families that came to Beijing and were briefed on what the next process with geting our kiddos and all the massive amounts of paperwork following will look like. It was so helpful to hear other stories, especially from families that were back to adopt a second time. We also received an substantial update on Jesiah and got new pictures. My heart is absolutely yearning to get him. He sounds like he is an even more amazing kiddo than what we originally thought. I know we have challenges ahead and he will probably experience some grieving period. Who wouldn't? He will be leaving everything he knows and we are going to rely on God in this time, knowing that He led us this far and will continue to bless us. Patience, I suppose is the key (and lots of bribery :0).

After orientation, we had a great group lunch and continued on to TiAnmen Square. TiAnmen Square is where certain government officials used to work. It also is where the famous massacre occured in 1989. It was pretty impressive.

One of my paparazzi moments. 

After TiAnmen Square, we went to the Forbidden Palace which was just across the street. The Forbidden Palace was built in the 14th Century for the Emperors. It was massive and very impressive. Lots of gold. I told Nathan it's the type of house he will need to build me once we are done with our house "situation" :).

We finished up the night with a trip to the silk factory (sadly we didn't take any pictures.. I don't know how that happened.), a nice dinner with a few of our friends and a trip to the night market. The night market was... interesting :). I didn't have an appetite for what they were selling. Ugh. I suppose to each his own! Hope everyone has a good day. We leave on a plane for Guangzhou at 11:30 am (9:30 pm Misosuri time) and will meet Jesiah tomorrow. I will post again later tonight (tomorrow morning for you). Love you and please keep the prayers coming. Lots of emotions are filling us as we look to tomorrow!

Don't ask what they sold there unless you have a solid stomach. :)

Happy Birthday Mr. E!!!

A very HAPPY BIRTHDAY to our dear son Eli, who turns two today. We are sad not to be with him but knows he is having fun! We love you so much Eli and will talk to you soon!

What a day! We have received blessings so abundantly in the short time we have been here and while we are still exhausted, we are seeing God's hand in a mighty way and it's so amazing! Today we were able to visit the Great Wall and climbed to the top. What a priceless experience it was. Not only did we climb the Great Wall, but we did it during Beijing's first snow of the year!! Talk about slippery- eek! It was very cold and kind of scary at times but we made it up and back (with five minutes to spare before our bus left!). At the bottom, we were "attacked" by the Chinese paparazzi (that's right Gilmores, we were popular with the Chinese folk too!! They must have known we were friends since they seemed to like you guys too :). It was hilarious. I don't know how many pictures we were dragged into but they loved us. It was a nice ego booster, although I hope Nathan doesn't let it go to his head.

After the Great Wall, we had a nice lunch with out entire travel group from Holt and visited the jade museum. There are about 20 families with us and five families will continue on with us to Guangzhou on Sunday. We have already made some amazing friends are so thankful God has blessed us with such supportive and loving friends at home and here in China. It makes a world of difference.

After lunch, we continued on to the historic downtown in Beijing called Hutong Lane. We rode in rickshaws which were basically carts pulled by bikes. It was QUITE an adventure. The streets here are very narrow and weren't designed for cars (at least the ones that are more like alleys in Hutong). We had some close calls with anxious cars but our very overzealous driver made sure we received the right away. It reminded me of driving in a car with a certain Adele Hall :). (Love you, Adele)

Hutong Lane was really neat, but very eye opening. We are so blessed to live in a country where we have the freedoms to work and live nicely. It's amazing how much we take for granted. Tonight, we are so thankful to live with the physical blessings God has provided.



After the tour, we came back to the hotel and crashed. The sleep loss finally hit me and I barely made it to dinner. We went to a local dumpling place behind our hotel and ate an amazing dinner for seven dollars. YUM-O!

We just finished off the night with our friends, Susan, Erik and Gabriel. We celebrated Eli's birthday where we had a "cake" for him and celebrated China style. We ended the evening with prayer for their daughter Liana and Jesiah. What an amazing day. Soooo tired... I'm headed to bed here shortly. Tomorrow we will see the Forbidden Palace, TinAmen Square and we leave for Guangzhou Sunday morning. We meet Jesiah Monday. Please continue to pray that Jesiah makes a smooth transition and we are able to handle his transition into our family with ease and peace. I know God has blessed us this far and won't let us go. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELI!! WE LOVE YOU!!!

Whew! We Made It!

We are here in Beijing after twenty hours of flights! We flew from Kansas City to Minneapolis,

Minneaoplis to Seattle, and Seattle onto Beijing. We had about a forty minute van ride with another family (that is also adopting through Holt) to get to our hotel, the Novotel Peace Hotel. Because we were the last ones checked in, we got a free upgrade. It's a sweet room! Although I'm still on Missouri time, I think I will be able to sleep "tonight". We have an early morning tomorrow! We get to skype with K and E, then visit the Great Wall and Hutong Lane. Thank you for all your prayers for safety. We know God has been with us and will continue too. We have already met some great families and are excited to get to know them and support one another in the days ahead. My pictures are taking quite awhile to load so I will add them tomorrow. Love you all. Please continue to pray for Jesiah. We will meet him on Monday (Sunday late night or early morning Monday for you).  My thoughts will be a little clearer tomorrow and I will share some fun stories from the trip. We already look like Americans :)....

            

Our Thanksgiving

We are so blessed; beyond measure. In our home we have a "blessings wall" that we use as a family devotion. In times of trials, the wall really is a huge strength as we are able to look back and see how God has blessed us. God has, this year alone, blessed us with health (especially Eli), our home and reassurance that He is in control of ALL things, a peace that definitely passed all understanding, an endurance to run the good race and continue to persevere regardless of (as Kaylee says) the times that "stinky devil" tries to get us down, He has blessed us in the area of vehicles and will continue to. He has blessed our family with a strength and cohesiveness that has enabled us to become a better family; a more loving family. We are, and continue to be blessed with, an amazing church family that has stood by us and has supported us through our journey to bring Jesiah home. He has blessed us with "strangers" becoming dear friends, as they labor with us for Jesiah and work so very selflessly to give what they have been blessed with. This year has been tough but through it all, I am humbled and in awe. God is good. We are giving thanks.

We leave on Wednesday, November 30th, so we have three days. I know God is in control and I need to remember who He is and how He blessed us thus far. Please pray for our journey, but especially pray for Jesiah.

I'm thankful for each one of you and the support and love you have shown throughout the entire journey. God has picked out the perfect child for our family an we know that He will continue to provide as we need.

Love you all! 

:) Phillipians 4: 13

Our Tickets are Booked!

I was beginning to think this day would never come and so far, it's been such a whirlwind that I almost forgot to blog about it! We leave November 30th and will be headed to Beijing for four days. After this, we will fly to Guangzhou in the Guangdong province (December 4th) where will meet Jesiah (December 5th) and tackle all of the crazy paperwork to get things final and receive his visa. We will fly home December 16th  from Hong Kong and will arrive at MCI at 4:57 PM (details to come). You are all encouraged to come and welcome us home!

Please keep us in your prayers and we continue to plan travel, prepare physically to go, try to make sure we have everything :), prepare to leave our two "homegrown" kiddos here for many days (which I'm struggling with) and finish up all of our lose ends.

Here's a map to show you where we will be going first:

After Beijing, here is where we will be traveling (with MUCH warmer temps!!!):

As you can see, we are traveling quite a ways south. Jesiah is from the Shenzhen area which is about an hour  and a half away from the city we will be staying in. Although Jesiah will come to us in Guangzhou, we are hoping to be able to travel to the SWI (social welfare institute) that he stayed in for some time.

We have waited fourteen months for this time and know God has prepared the way. Please pray Jesiah's heart is able to heal from any grief he may be feeling. Although we have been so excited and have prepared for this day, we also realize he is leaving everything he has known his entire life behind. We know he is coming into a great and loving family, yet we are preparing for an adjustment. We would appreciate prayers that God allows us the discernment to know what he needs and how we can best make his adjustment smoother. We know Jesiah is such a special little boy and we cannot wait to hold him in our arms!!

We have had so much love and support to get this far. Please know it is appreciated beyond words. We love you all and have been humbled at how God has worked to make this journey possible!!! Stay tuned! I will give you more detailed itinerary info. and we will definitely be blogging as we are on our trip (hopefully daily). We'd love for you to follow along!!!

Proverbs 3:5-6

One of the biggest issues families have with adoption (domestic or international) is money. They hear or see how much it costs and quickly drop the idea. Adoption is expensive-very. Ours will cost approximately $25,000 (give or take) when it is all said and done. I have wished many times we had that sitting in the bank. Some families are blessed with that opportunity and that's amazing- others aren't. I don't feel money should stand in the way of a family opening themselves up to grow through adoption. To me, it doesn't matter if it is your first child or your sixth, if God has led you to take this journey- He will certainly provide all the means to do so. While there are many times I've complained that it would be so much easier to write the check and not have to wait a few weeks until the money came in, there have also been such a huge blessings that come as a result of the waiting.  Without the need to rely on God and Him working through others, we would have missed SO many of the amazing testimonies God has placed before us. This isn't to say that no fundraising = no blessings! It's just a different perspective and we have chosen to find joy in the journey we are in, regardless of it being frustrating sometimes. When Jesiah comes home, so many people know they personally took responsibility for helping him come home. I'm so grateful. Please know that. We have been so blessed with encouragement, physical help, emotional and spiritual support, and friendships halfway across the country that have all pitched in, selflessly to do whatever they can. I continue to be humbled and rest in the fact that God will continue to provide.

Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world. 

                            James 1:27

  

Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

Proverbs 3:5-6

He's Getting So Big!

We were blessed immensely with new pictures and an update of Jesiah a few days ago. I'm sorry it's taken me a few days to post them!  We found out Jesiah's foster brother is being adopted into the United States as well which is extremely valuable information. We are praying that God opens the doors so that we might be able to find his adoptive parents and maintain contact with them.  It is so exciting to be getting closer and closer to being able to hold him in our arms and take care of him. We are waiting on our "Article 5" which is just another approval in a long process of approvals. We should have that in a week or two and then, hopefully our travel approval will follow shortly. We are still holding out for the end of November but it may be the beginning of December before we go. Either way- we are coming shortly Jesiah!!

He definitely looks like he fits into our family well (especially those of you that know Eli and his passion for sports! :). Thank you for your continued love and support. We'd love prayers, in the upcoming weeks, specifically for:  our "homegrown" kiddos as we prepare to leave and while we are gone, Jesiah and his preparation to meet us, his loving foster family and their transition as he leaves them and travels to the orphanage before we arrive, his foster brother and his adoptive parents that they may be blessed, continued financial blessings as we near travel and still have a ways to go.

Side note: Our house situation has been resolved in part and things will be okay. Thank you for your prayers. God is good and merciful. He REALLY DOES MOVE MOUNTAINS!!