THIS IS IT!!!

In just 14 short hours we will start our journey to China! We had a conference call with our adoption agency yesterday with six other families who will be getting their babies too. This is our itinerary:

Dec. 7-9: Stay in Beijing at a REALLY NICE hotel. We were able to access it on the web. All the hotels we will be staying in are supposed to be 4 and 5 stars. While in Beijing, we will do alot of sightseeing (Tianamen Square, the Forbidden City, the Summer Palace, the Great Wall, a Chinese acrobatic show, and a famous Beijing Duck Dinner). We are able to go to a Christian church service on Sunday morning. It is specifically for foreigners. We have to show our passport when we go into the service because Chinese nationals are forbidden to attend. The service will be in Chinese and translated into English. I'm so excited to experience that!

Dec. 10-13: This is the point where all the families traveling together who all stayed in Beijing will scatter across China to different provinces to get their children. We are going to Nanjing in the Jiangsu Province. We will get Jonathan the afternoon of the 10th and spend a few days in Nanjing doing adoption paperwork, sight-seeing, and shopping.

Dec. 14-18: All the families meet up again in Guangzhou where Jonathan will have a medical exam, we will fill out Consulate forms so Jonathan can get his US visa, we will go to another church service for foreigners and pick up Jonathan's visa.

Dec. 19: We fly home!!!!

This is all a little surreal to us. We have spent the entire last week preparing. We packed yesterday (Scott and I are only allowed 44 pounds each in check-in baggage). One entire suitcase is filled with gifts for the orphanage, our guides, and Chinese officials we meet with throughout our stay. It is a Chinese custom to give small gifts. We collected a bunch of children's medication from our church family to take with us to the orphanage.

We have no idea how big Jonathan is, whether or not he's potty trained, or if he's still on formula. We are taking clothes of all sizes, diapers, pull-up, underwear, bottles, sippie cups, formula, and everything else he may need. Oh boy, this is exciting! We bought a digital video camera for the trip and will be able to capture the moment we see Jonathan for the first time. We have no idea how he will react to us. Kristen, the lady who is in charge of all of our travel arrangements, said that depending on what province we go to (if it is remote or not), most of the citizens may not have seen a Caucasian before. She told us to be prepared for a lot of staring and people wanting to take pictures with us. The adoption agency will give us card to give people written in Chinese explaining why we are there. This is going to be wild!!

Well, we still have some last-minute things to do, so I'm going to sign off. We will update the blog in China. Most of the hotels we are staying at have a 'business center' with computers and internet access. We will try to download pictures too. Please keep us in your prayers for safe travel, health, and a smooth transition for our son.

Thanks so much for all your prayer support! We could not do this without you.