We made it!

We are here in Beijing, China. We are so happy to have arrived safely. The girls were so exceptionally good on the plane. I was not sure what to expect with them, but they were such troopers! We experienced a couple of meltdowns due to fatigue, but we were able to quiet them down fairly quickly.

We arrived at 4:30 am Beijing time. All of our bags made it! Praise the Lord! I don't know how I would have replaced all the gifts we bought for everyone here. Everything is Texas related. We had a nice long nap in the morning, then met our guide after lunch (in which Abby looked around and announced loudly that she had just seen a Chinese girl) and went to the Forbidden City. It was amazing to see it in person. We were happy the girls had rested well and were up for going. I would have been sad to miss it. The funniest part was that little miss Madeline was a mini-celebrity. The Forbidden City was extremely crowded because it is a national holiday today, but most of the Chinese that were there were taking pictures of the girls, especially Madeline because of her blonde hair and blue eyes. It was so funny! The Chinese nationals wanted to take pictures with her-they were so sweet. Some of them allowed us to take pictures of them as well, I have included some of the pics here. I remember this reaction with my sister when we lived in South Korea. She had blue eyes and very light hair and was given much attention for it. By the time we left the Forbidden City, Madeline had passed out on Jason's shoulder...as you can see below.

Tomorrow we head to to Harmony House to get Max. I am a mix of emotions right now. I am so excited, but for the first time I am nervous. I have been so prepared for each step of this journey, knowing what paperwork had to be turned in when and what step would follow, but tomorrow we take a giant step of faith off of the cliff of the unknown. But as I work to be calm, I remind myself that God Almighty has brought us here and will carry us as we step off....I have no idea what to expect tomorrow (except that I will be crying!) but I am hopefuly that Max will respond well to us. We feel that he has received a lot of preparation for tomorrow. It almost feels surreal to be here. We have waited so long for this-and now it's actually happening. Wow! Pray for us as we go from a family of four to a family of five tomorrow!

I will post again tomorrow with pictures of our sweet boy!