Following Where He Leads...: Lily Kay

(Our internet connection has been acting squirrelly for the past 24 hours, so I'll give this a shot - but I can't make any promises. I have about 15 pictures to upload, so if they're not all here yet, check back!)

Zibing is settling in so nicely and easily now. Having a rough start makes this place that we've come to seem even sweeter. I know we're not there yet (not by a long shot), but we are much further along than I had hoped for at this point.

After our TB test checks this morning (everyone was fine, thank you Jesus), our group toured a Folk Arts Museum, another Buddhist temple, had lunch at Papa John's, and then shopped around CarreFour (kind of like a Walmart). The museum had beautiful things on display (and for sale). At the temple we could “get the babies blessed” by a Buddhist monk (as far as I know, no families took our guide up on this offer). We found some neat Spring Festival (New Year) decorations for our house at CarreFour – and just had a fun time walking around and looking at the other things the store had to offer. Oh, and Elisabeth got a doll (like a Barbie) that she loves!

Here are some other assorted tidbits about our Zibing that I've been meaning to share:

- Zibing is laughing a whole lot more now. And boy does it sound beautiful! It is usually in response to playing and wrestling with Jas. But she and Elisabeth can get into some silly games and both just howl and it. is. adorable.

-As soon as we step foot outside our hotel room, Zibing wants me to hold her – I mean she gets right in front of me, blocking my path, with her arms straight up in the air. When mama's arms need a break, she will allow me to pass her to Jas. And we borrowed a stroller from one of the shops here on Shamian Island (they all cater to adoptive families) and she likes the stroller too, thankfully.

-When we're in the room, she is usually sitting in my lap - sometimes at my prompting, sometimes all on her own.

-She loves our “books before sleeping” routine, and she will go and get the books all on her own and climb into my lap for us to read them before nap and bedtime.

-The poor thing is going to be shocked when we get home... and stay home...and eat all our meals there. As soon as we get up in the morning, or get back into our room, she says “Wo men zou?” (“We go?”) When we're awake, we're out doing something, and of course, going to three different places a day to eat our meals. I wish I'd thought to wear a pedometer during our trip – I would love to know just how much walking we've done!

-Zibing is not quite as crazy a sleeper anymore. Of course, maybe she's just figured out she doesn't have room to be too crazy. She rolled out of the bed one time a few nights ago, and now remains oriented pretty much the right way in the bed. The beds that we're sleeping on are just a little bit wider than twin beds, and E and Z are sharing one...it will be interesting to see how she does when we get home and she has a twin bed to herself.

-This girl loves fruit! When we go to the breakfast buffet, she wants to pile her plate with litchi nuts, (asian) pears, watermelon, and this little green fruit (I've got a picture on the side bar). (We tried to ask Jessie last week what these fruits are. She didn't know the English name and looked it up in her little handheld translator thingy. It said it was a “Greengage” and she said it was a combination of a peach and a plum. We just smiled and thanked her, but it is nothing like either one of those fruits...it's more like a combination of an apple and a pear) We found a package of 15 of these green fruits the other day and bought them to have in our room – she's the only one eating them and they're 2/3 gone now. We wanted to have food available all the time, so she could eat whenever she is hungry – and know that she will always have access to food when she is hungry. (I'm trying to figure out what food I will have available for her at home!)

-Zibing also loves tomatoes (I guess I technically should have included this in the “fruits” point above) and corn on the cob. She eats a tomato like an apple. When we saw corn on the cob on the breakfast buffet a few days ago (yes, the breakfast buffet) she actually jumped up and down!

-Zibing doesn't love Papa John's pepperoni pizza – although she will take all the pepperonis off and just eat those.

-She is now learning that trash goes in the trashcan. Until the last few days, whenever she had trash (food or otherwise) wherever we were (outside or inside) she would just chuck it on the floor. And she's so quick about it we were missing it at first. The other morning I just happened to look down and saw the empty cob from the aforementioned corn on the cob under our breakfast table! But like I said, we've been working on this, and now she will either go throw something away on her own, or at least bring it to us, and we'll point her to the nearest trashcan.

-When we're in our room, she will call out intermittently (almost yelling), “Baba!” (Daddy). To which Jas will call back (almost yelling) “Zibing!” Is she just making sure he will still answer? I don't know, but it is very cute.

Our group's “Red Couch” photos will be taken in the morning. This is a White Swan tradition – every travel group that comes through here has to meet at a red couch (I didn't figure out until our 2nd trip that there are actually many red couches here at the White Swan) and take a picture of all the children together. The children are usually (although not always) wearing traditional Chinese clothing in the pictures. So we just had to go out and buy the girls a couple of matching outfits tonight – so cute!

Sleeping with jie jie...oh, what a difference a week makes!