Then and Now...

I was looking back over my orphanage trip photos from the past six years, and I thought it would be fun to post some "then and now" photos.

2008:

 2012

 2008

 2012

2008

 2012

 2007

 2012

2007

 2012

2007

 2012

2012

2008

 2012

2007

 2012

As you can see, many of the children are better off now; some are not. I leave you with one wonderful update though.  Here is Min Bo in 2008, when our team member Jake took him under his wing...

After receiving a wonderful update on him through the LIGHT physical therapist who works with him in his Chinese foster home, here he is today...

He has been a light to his foster family and a beacon to his community. It is amazing how orphans can be used to touch lives in ways that we cannot even imagine. I was so thrilled to hear this amazing update. It encourages me to continue on...

Fourth Festivities...

Josh and I have been home nearly a week now, and we feel we have come out of our fog. We have had out of town company since Tuesday, so that forced me to get back into the routine sooner than my lazy body probably would have done on its own! We watched the parade, went to the carnival, the park, the beach, and endless time on the trampoline and the front yard.  We are so fortunate the weather turned more cooperative for us to enjoy the outdoors. I hate to complain about the cool weather though, as the rest of the country seems to be burning up right now. I love our own little eco system up here in the PNW!

As we ran into another friend at the carnival, the four girls had a blast together. My favorite comment of the day came from Kaia, as she exclaimed "We are all adopted!" with such enthusiasm as she pointed to her group of friends. I hope she always feels this good about how she came into our family.

 Not a bad photo, just Jaelyn pretending to fall asleep on me. In reality, it was me who could've closed their eyes and rested:)

I loved the teamwork to haul the kelp up the beach! Three determined young ladies, and yes, they did manage to move it up to the rocks.

Chaoyang Video

One of our team members made this video of our trip. He had his iPad with him, so was able to have it completed before we even touched ground in the states! What makes it fun is that he has a lot of video incorporated into it, so the 10 minutes of your day is worth it; I guarantee it will make you smile!

Propoganda Production....

What I thought was going to be a simple ceremony turned out to be quite the propaganda production.  Let's just say there was lots of clapping, beautiful flowers, girls in traditional dresses, tv cameras, etc., all put together in less than 24 hours. The speakers before and after me gave quite lengthy speeches, but as you can see, I kept it short and sweet. I was so nervous and sweating, afraid I would say something offensive. I told Ying, who was interpreting for me, that if I said anything wrong, he was to correct it as he interpreted! Later the director told me I did a good job, and that it was to the point. I think that was supposed to be a compliment:) I was thankful for this part of the trip to be over with.

Birthdays, Bye-Byes, and back to Beijing...

I will apologize up front for any typos in this post, as our plane back from China landed at 4:55 am this morning and I am trying to stay up until I normally would so that I can get onto the right sleep pattern as soon as possible. With that said, I realize I may not make sense at times, but wanted to post about the last day of the trip before my memory faded even more than the current state I am in!

For some reason we had a different bus on the trip to the orphanage today. I'm guessing maybe because we had to check out of the hotel and have all of our gear loaded before we left in the morning, so we needed a bigger bus. This was the fanciest bus I have ever seen in China; brand new inside, two microwaves, and two couches that fold down to beds. As much as I enjoyed it, I have to say I felt guilty driving around in it as we passed the poorer regions in Chaoyang as we approached the orphanage. As we pulled up, I wanted to grab the kids and take them for a cruise around the city!

It was fun to see some of the children dressed in their tutus for our annual birthday party. Before the festivities began though, many of us wanted to hang out with the children upstairs one last time, as we knew they would not be coming to the celebration. Josh snapped lots of scenic photos out of the third and fourth story windows, so you can see the beautiful farmlands around the facilities.

Lychee fruit, bananas, nectarines, watermelon, etc., were brought out in plenty to begin the celebration. We sang "Happy Birthday" to all the children and then ate the elaborately decorated cake. They even had such details as "AWAA" written on a white piece of chocolate, in honor of America World Adoption Association, which Visiting Orphans is a branch off of. My birthday wish was that these children have access to this amount and type of food everyday (well, minus the cake). They were so enthusiastic about all of it. Some ate until we thought they would pop!

We did things a bit backwards today, as after we ate cake, we went with the nannies to prepare dumplings for lunch. This year the new administrative director joined in the fun, and created some unique dumplings that demonstrated he is a "master chef!"

I was pleased to be able to hang out with Flower for a bit. I first met her back in 2007, and she now attends a massage school, but is back to the orphanage for the summer. As we said our goodbyes, some of the nannies handed out gifts of bracelets and necklaces. Saying goodbye is never easy, but it is through this experience where I truly feel like we mean something to the nannies.

I am excited to say we will be joining up with LIGHT to provide extra nutrition and protein to the children at Chaoyang, particularly those in the upstairs rooms that don't get much. They have a program that has been up and running, but the funds were running out, so was good timing for us to step in. I am hoping we can partner with this group even more in the near future. I have a few more specific stories I want to blog more about later, but for now I must get some sleep. Thanks for all the prayers that went up to make this trip so successful.

*A special thanks to my husband and to Liz Gividen for updating posts in my absence!

Tutus Anyone?

In the News...........

This morning we were in two local papers. I posted a photo of one that had multiple pictures. It was of the morning we spent at the park with the kids, and once again the headline lauded us as "golden haired, blue eyed," which really only describes three of us on the team. Today was also tutu day at the orphanage! As you can see from the photos, we had a lot of fun making/wearing them with the children. Even some nannies got in on it. We also spent a lot of time with the children upstairs, playing, singing, even reading scriptures to some of them. It warms the heart to see them settle down with a song or just begin to relax in our presence. It takes such little effort to make them smile, yet it goes a long way!

Looks like the elevator will not be finished before we leave, which is too bad. Most construction seems to go slowly here for some reason. I am sure that part of the reason is that everything is done the old fashioned way, by hand. The canteen (cafeteria) next door that was halfway finished last year seems to be no further along this year.

Today was our last full day here, so we enjoyed a hot pot meal and went out to the square one last time. We handed out glow sticks and glow balloons, and once again had a following. I think it will be good to get back somewhere where I won't stick out in a crowd so much, but then again, I think we will all miss that part a bit:) Tomorrow morning we will be back to the orphanage for what will most likely be a tearful goodbye. We then head to the airport for a short flight to Beijing. We are hoping it is our first flight to actually be start to finish on time. I am not sure whether or not I will get a chance to blog before our early Sunday morning flight, but I will try to check in.