puppy snuggles

how funny...

I just looked at our "waiting to adopt" ticker and noticed that we waited ONE year, ONE month, ONE week, and ONE day for BabySister's referral!

AND

Today AB is THREE years, TWO months, and ONE week old.

3-2-1... BABY SISTER! YAY!

REFERRAL!!!!

I can't believe it, I got my referral today!!!

And here she is...currently known as Tao Meng Na, born 2/5/07 in Hubei Province. Love that smile!
By seven months, she was sitting well unassisted (as you see here), crawling, and doing lots of other stuff that makes me think she might well be walking by now! What fun for her and AB! Can't wait to see them playing together!
She looks quite healthy and plump, but her weight was only about 13 pounds at 7 months. We'll see how big she really is in a few weeks (I hope! No idea at this point when we will be traveling.)
AngelBaby's first look at "Baby Sister"
holding up the pics for Mama to take a picture
she's so excited! She exclaimed, "I like Baby Sister!!!"
AB studying her sister's photos
a kiss for Mei-mei!
She's enchanted, and so am I! It's so exciting!

I read her development report today with my Chinese tutor. She has been in foster care from very early on and seems to really be thriving there. She was rolling over by four months, and crawling at six! She is quite a happy baby and is good at communicating her wants - at this age she will be receptive to learning signs, so AB and I will have fun teaching her some of those! She has quite a varied diet already and five teeth!!! So AB's wish to feed Baby Sister Cheerios when we first meet will be realized!

I'm expecting her transition into our family might be difficult for her since she has been in foster care. Sometimes they move the babies out of foster care for a couple of days or weeks before meeting the adoptive family. I don't know if that typically helps the transition to new family or just counts as another trauma for the little one... She seems like such a happy baby that I hope she will have a smooth transition. I think having a big sister may help a lot - I am so excited that she is already at a "fun age" from a big sister's standpoint!

I can't wait to go get her!!!! Yippee!!! I'm a mama again!

visiting Andreas and Cathrine in Beijing!

Temple of Heaven
a well-bundled little peanut
posing at the Temple of Heaven

a duck on the restaurant level of the Silk Street shopping center
and the chef from Patio Pizza

with Andreas and Cathrine, heading into the Acrobats show!
it was insane! I bought the DVD on the way out and AB asks for the "dancing and jumping show"



these gals are spinning four plates in each hand... and one of them actually dropped hers - maybe just to show us it was real!

do not try this at home

I have seen them practicing for this act on the street in Chengdu!

my little yogi

so far we have only made it to kids' yoga when there were no other kids there! I think having other kids there might keep AB more focused on the class. As it is, she spends a lot of time running around, staring at herself in the mirror, and trying to act cute (mostly quite successfully!).
When she does decide to actually follow the instructor, she is quite good at yoga!








love this - caught her mid-jump - love that hair!