Meeting Family

We arrived in Jacksonville, FL late last night. Joy will be seeing the dermatologist tomorrow at 1:30 pm. Please pray he only has good news for us. While in Atlanta we were able to spend some wonderful time with all our family. At the Ivey family fish fry Joy was able to meet her Aunts and Uncles and lots of cousins. We also discovered she likes fried catfish. She is a southern girl at heart!! We were showered with gifts and well wishes by all. Thank you to everyone for sharing in our homecoming. We also had the blessing of going to church with Nana and Paps and personally thanking Providence United Methodist Church of Fayetteville, GA for their help and prayers in bringing our Joy home. While there, we were joined by Aunt Gail, Uncle Dennis, Aunt Denise and cousins Bella and Bailey. We shared a wonderful lunch of lasagna and a relaxing afternoon catching up and watching Joy explore and get to know the family.
Finally, we had a great meal with Grandpa and Gammie and said our goodbye's. We can't thank them enough for keeping our children safe and sound while we were away. Joy is doing wonderful and adjusting well. Her appetite has increased but her preferred food is RICE. Imagine that! She is enjoying playing with her cousin Rosemary as we are staying with my mother here in Jacksonville. If all goes well we will be returning home on Saturday, November
1st. Mark has a mid-term to complete so I will sign off and try to post tomorrow evening after our Dr. appointment.
Thank you to everyone for your prayers, love and support!

Home and Exhausted

Wow! Our homecoming was the best. Seeing our children's faces and their immediate love for Joy was amazing. We are entirely exhausted from our travel and are praying for a good night's rest. We received a special blessing when Andrew sang "You are my Sunshine" to Joy in Grandpa and Gammie's living room. We are too tired to post any more tonight, but will try to post more tomorrow.

Less than 24 hours to Go!

The red couch tradition


Yummy chicken congee

This afternoon we will be going to the US Consulate to pick up Joy's visa. Yeah! Our journey of adoption is near its end. Joy is coming out of her shell more every day and is smiling often. We really can not imagine our family without her. It is so hard to explain the plethra of emotions we have felt over the last 12 days. All we can say is that we serve an awesome God who has blessed us once again with the gift of a child. We can't wait for you all to meet her. Our bags are packed and we are counting the hours until takeoff. We will miss the dear friends we have made in our group and look forward to hearing in the future how everyone adapts once we arrive home. We feel so blessed to have shared this journey with each one of them!! Please pray for our safe arrival to the states and for patience with Joy on our lap for the trip!

GuangWOW, I mean Guangzhou!

Hello all. Guangzhou is very nice and the breakfast at the White Swan is unbelievable! The island (Shamain Island) where we are staying has a very European appearance and almost everyone speaks English. This is a nice little Oasis to visit prior to our trip home. We had dinner at an authentic Italian restaurant. No, not Olive Garden or Carrabbas, but what we used to eat when we were in Sicily. If you ever visit, I highly recommend the Italian place. The chef is even Italian!

Joy and Dad are making huge strides. She loves to eat meat, but she doesn't like sweets very much!?! She is smiling a lot more and is very vocal. She had her medical exam and we go to the American Consulate tomorrow. Everything is going smoothly. Please pray that it continues to go smoothly.

Guangzhou

We arrived this morning in Guangzhou at 9:20 am. After checking into the hotel we headed straight for Starbuck's. What a sight for sore eyes!! We feel like we have entered back into the real world. Shamain Island where our hotel is located in very European as many of the world's embassies are here. It is just beautiful. Our only issue is the internet is very expensive in our hotel so we will be posting from Starbuck's for our final days here in China. Off to shop!!!

Visit to Local Tower

Last night we were joined by a special visitor who has come to meet our little munchkin. She joined us on our tour of a special tower built to honor a famous local monk. We also visited a buddist temple which was very unsettling. Joy is doing well and only crying intermittently. She is allowing Dad to comfort her about half the time. We are so ready for our next stop which is Guangzhou and the American Embassy to obtain Joy's visa to come home. Honestly, we have found Nanning to be a bit boring and we are ready for a change in scenery. We leave in the early morning for Guangzhou and will be heading for home on Thursday the 23rd. We will be at the infamous White Swan hotel beginning tomorrow and hope to do some shopping while we are there.

Baby Steps with Dad

Fish head salad anyone??

Last night we stayed in our room and Mark went out and grabbed some KFC for us. When he returned Joy allowed him to feed her chicken (which she loves) and then we had a big break through as she played with us both on the bed for about 1 hour. She even stayed up late enough to let her brothers and sister get a glimpse of her personality via Skype. When she is ready to play she giggles and smiles and it just warms our hearts. At these moments we see especially how perfect she is for our family. God picked a lively girl to fit in with a lively family!! She is already learning the word no and seems to know the meaning of the word due to our tone. We already can't imagine life without her!

Fun at Grandpa's and Gammie's!!

Fortunately, it stopped raining in Georgia. The kids and grandparents took full advantage of the beautiful day.

PICS

Pics

Joy is grieving and crying a lot so I will make it short. I am dreaming of mashed potatoes, carrots, green beans and anything else home cooked! Mark is doing fine with the food and really likes roast duck. We went to a museum of sorts today that was suppose to teach us about the minorities of the area. We bought a few items for Joy to remember the province she was born in.

Walmart

Our new friends
Bed Head
Downtown Nanning
Walmart
Coming to China just won't be complete without a trip to Walmart! It is 2 stories with food on one level and household/electronics on the other. Oh, the food-we could figure out what some delicacies were, but others remain a mystery. We haven't smelled anything quite like some of the items. When we return home, the deli area at the store will never quite be the same in our minds. We picked up some diapers and wipes and some training chopsticks for Joy and Andrew. Mark and I are feeling so much better, but our backs have a lot to say about these beds. Just imagine sleeping on only your box spring and that will give you an idea of the comfort level. Joy eat her first solid food last night at dinner. We have a Cantonese restaurant here in the hotel that is very good. We have enjoyed several meals with another family, the Georges (Janet and Kevin) who are residing across the hall from us. They are a lovely homeschooling family from Chicago who have adopted a precious little girl with an eye condition , Fu Xiang (Meghan) who is 6 years old. They brought their 3 children with them and we have enjoyed getting to know each of them. We are so thankful that we are traveling with 2 families who are like minded. Not to mention that the surgeon who specializes in Joy's condition is in Chicago. It is amazing how God sees to our every need! Back to Joy, she ate rice, some tender beef. This morning she dined on rice congee (I'm sorry, but YUCK!) and some watermelon. At lunch she really liked sharing fried chicken from KFC with Dad. Now, we know she really is an IVEY! We are just in love with her and enjoying every minute as we watch her blossom. We miss Matt, Grace and Andrew very much and are counting down the days until our entire family can be together.

Thank you to all who have prayed for us and sent their blessings by submitting comments to our blog!

It is Official!!!

Woohoo! She is ours! We had another exciting day as we met with the officials to officially complete our daughter's adoption. We did our interviews and were given some great pictures from the orphanage director. The pictures range from baby pictures to present. This is a real treasure. We also received her footprints from the day that she was admitted to the orphanage. We then came back to the room, took a rest and then went for a stroll in a nearby park. Before her nap she was a little sad and started crying out for someone. It broke our hearts. She is still completely attached to Mommy, but is unsure about this Daddy person. She is starting to warm up to Daddy. The park was very interesting and quite large. We enjoyed our stroll and Joy did too!

Getting Ready for Bed

Just a few pics of Joy after bath last night. She enjoys just sitting and looking at all her new toys. She is walking, but does not do it willingly. So she is content to sit and just look around except if Dad talks to her. We do not think she has ever been around men as she does the same thing when our guide talks to her.

She is in Our Arms!

First Glimpse

Special Delivery

Finally!!!

Leaving Civil Affairs.

Safe in Mama's Arms

We are a family! Joy was placed in our arms just over two hours ago at the civil affairs office. We unexpectedly caught our first glimpse her as we turned the corner after getting out of the elevator. She was and is beautiful and tiny. She was being held by her Nanny and made eye contact with both of us. We were elated. It was hard to wait the thirty minutes after seeing her. She was put into Mommy's arms by the director and stayed there comfortably. After a few minutes we spoke to the director and asked a few questions. She did not cry one bit......until Dad tried to hold her. Let's just say that for right now, she has taken to Mom quite a bit better. She does have a bit of a fever and a deep, croupy sounding cough. She loves books and seems to be extremely smart and willful. She walks like a 13 month old and we would be very surprised if she weighs more than 20 pounds. Please pray for her health and our attachment process. We will update more later. We thank the Lord for her and for the other families with us and their beautiful children.

Labor Pains of the Heart

1 hour until our lives are changed forever! We are shaking (literally) with excitement, anxiousness and nervousness. Our prayer is this:

Dear Heavenly Father,
Grant us peace as we wait to meet our precious Joy. Be with us and help us to meet her every need. Melt our hearts together as one as only You can. God we thank you for giving us the privilege to bring Joy into our family. May we always honor You and bring her up to know and love you.
In Holy Name of Jesus - Amen

Our Daughter's Province- Nanning

Just imagine being on board a hot, old plane with people who find it necessary to smoke in the bathroom during the flight- that was our flight to Nanning this morning. It took a little over 3 hours to land in what we are calling real china. "Mark we are not in Beijing anymore." Despite the less than ideal flight we couldn't help but cherish each glimpse of our daughter's province. The skies here are very smoggy, but the beauty of the lush mountains and farmlands was still evident as we descended into Nanning. After the modernness and we have to say beauty of Beijing, Nanning sits in contrast. It is a city of 6.5 million and no matter which way you look there are people, lots and lots of people. Already in our short time here, we have noticed differences in the stature and build of the inhabitants. The women are very, very petite which would fit in with Joy's measurements. Speaking of our sweet girl, we were told that we will not be meeting her until 3:30pm tomorrow. Which will be 3:30 am Monday morning for all of you. We were a bit disappointed, but still sooooooooooo excited. I will be busy unpacking and then packing the diaper bag for the big day tomorrow. I took a few pics of our hotel here in Nanning. It is four star here, but would be 2 star in the states.