A Very Rough Day...

Today started out with a bang. At 3:00 am, Sawyer was up and ready to go. At 5:00 am, Saxton was up and ready to go. So we got ready, went to breakfast, then we prepared ourselves to go to the Orphanage.
Once we were on our way, the boys would not sit still in the van. Ya see in China, there is no law that the children have to be in a child seat, so the kids get to run around the vehicle (just like we did when we were kids). I just don't understand how we survived.

All the progress we had made with Saxton over the last few days was thrown out the window once we arrived at the Orphanage. His mood changed very dramatically from a happy little boy, to a confused and sad little boy.

Saxton was able say good-bye and get one last picture with his Nanny...
Then he got on last picture in his crib...

From this point on, we took two GIANT steps backwards. Saxton was not the happy little boy we had become accustomed to over the last few days. Once we left the room, Saxton started crying uncontrollably. He wanted to stay in the Orphanage and with his Nanny. He reverted back to the moment when we first saw him and I know he was saying to himself, "who are these people that are taking me away from the only life I have ever known?" But, how do you explain this to a two year old, who just met you three days ago, doesn't speak a lick of English and just saw the only people he has ever known for the last 26 months be taken from him? You do what you have to do. You hug him, you swing with him and you reassure him with the little Mandarin you know over and over again, "Wo ai ni, wo ai ni...(I love you, I love yo)." Then he would calm down, but only momentarily.

After the Orphanage, we went to the children's finding spots. Saxton was found at the Bing Wong Bus Station in Downtown Yiwu.

It was unclear in the documents we received from the Orphanage where Saxton was found exactly, so we took picture inside and out...













The same feeling came over me as a year ago when we saw Sawyer's finding spot. Even though this was a very loud and busy place, it was like someone turned the sound off. You could of been standing right next to me, yelling, and I would not of been able to hear you. I know that as Americans we can never really understand why people would abandon their children, but the only thing that kept running through my mind was, thank God that Saxton was abandoned in this busy bus station and not somewhere else where he might not of been found.

After Saxton's finding spot, we made the two hour ride back to the Hotel. This was NOT a pleasant journey. Saxton had his first major grieving meltdown. Understandably, he might of just realized that his life has changed forever and that he will never be going back to the life he has only known. For about an hour and fifteen minutes of the two hour drive, Saxton was grieving, again uncontrollably. Shelby did the only thing anyone can really do, let him grieve while reassuring him that we love him very much and that we will never let him go. After awhile, he finally calmed down and fell asleep for the rest of the ride.

After this very draining day, we did not feel like going anywhere. So, we just stayed in and played with the boys. Well, it was the boys who were mainly playing with each other.
Then just before we put the boys down for the night, we got the nicest surprise any parent could ask for... Tomorrow we head to Guangzhou, finally.

A Trip to the Temple...

Well, it's 2:30 in the morning and I can not sleep. So, what do most people do in this situation, they update the blog.

Yesterday, our group went to the HangZhou Lingyin Temple (also known as the Yunlin Temple). This Temple was first built in 326 AD by the Indian eminent monk Hui Li. Till this day, this temple has remained one of the largest Zen Buddhist Temples in all of China, with the Largest Statue of Buddha (over 81 feet tall) in the Center Hall. No pictures were allowed inside the Temple buildings.

As you walk up a path to this Temple, there is a stone cliff. Through out this stone cliff there are over 1000 different statues of Buddhas carved into the cliff wall.

The laughing Buddha is one of the most famous Buddhas in the world. The Chinese have really nice saying: "Tolerate the worldly unbearable things with a large belly, Laugh at any ridiculous mortal with the open mouth."

After walking through the beautiful area, we arrived at the Temple.

We walked through the buildings, marveling at the statues and admiring the scenery.

After the Temple, we went up the the Tea Village near by. Zhejiang Provence is World famous for their green tea. According the the tea expert, known the Americans as Dr. Tea, Starbucks comes to this village to get it's Green Tea. So we bought some tea, luckily we had a pot big enough to make it in.

After a long day, the boys we zonked out...
...and so are we. Good Night.

Pictures From Today...

Today we finalized Saxton's Adoption at the Civil Affairs Office in Hangzhou. Saxton is offically ours.

After the Civil Affairs Office, we went to the Police Station to start the process for Saxton's Passport. The we went to the West Lake for a boat tour of the islands. Here are some pictures from today.

We Made it through the first Night...

Here is the first picture of the boys sitting together. Sawyer might look angry, but at this point he was ready to go down for the night. Especially after a day that changed his life forever.

Saxton seems to be adjusting fairly well, so last evening we decided that we needed to get out of the Hotel and we went for a walk down to the West Lake. It is a beautiful, big lake with people all around. They had men along the shore trying to get you to take a ride in their water taxi, huge pagoda boats that will take you in Lake tours... .

and people all around wanting to take pictures with the Americans. It was a great experience and the people here are very nice. Of course, Sawyer fell asleep once we left to hotel because he really has not adjusted to the time change, yet.

Saxton fell asleep last night about 8:00 and slept through the night. Sawyer on the other hand woke up at midnight and did not want to go back to sleep until 3:00 am.

The only real concerns we have is that Saxton is really wobbly. He doesn't walk well, but he is getting used to not having so many clothes on. Today we finalize the adoption in the Provence and then go to the police station to get his passport paperwork started. Another busy day here in Hangzhou.

We have Saxton in our Arms...

Today we went to the Civil Affairs Office in Hangzhou and to our surprise, Saxton was already in the building waiting for us. Well, sort of. Ya see, we walked into this room where another couple, that is in our travel group, were handed their baby immediately. We were like, well where is Saxton. Come to find out, on the ride from Yiwu to Hangzhou, Saxton got car sick and threw up all over himself. Therefore, the nanny was in the bathroom cleaning him off.



We finally got Saxton at about 9:15 local time. We could not be any happier that this family just went from three to four. The cutest thing happened shortly afterwards. Saxton started to cry and Sawyer walked over to him and patted him on the head as to say, "it's going to be alright, I've been in your position."

Saxton did arrive in the famous split pants and wearing pink girl sandals. He was so cute.

All in all it was a unbelievably great day except we are having problems posting pictures. So, I will post more later.

We are in Hangzhou...

After about 24 hours of flying and three hours of driving from Shanghai to Hanzhou, we made it in at midnight local time. Of course we were very tired, but since Sawyer slept a lot on the planes, he was up all night. Therefore, we are even more tired. But we are very excited to be here.

We will post more once we get some rest. Talk to you all soon.

We Are Leaving Tomorrow...

Tomorrow we start our second journey to China to bring Saxton home. We are very excited and nervous at the same time. Thank goodness our friend Kim is coming along to help out.

So tomorrow we start our day at 4:00 am. We will leave for the airport at 5:00 am. After about 24 hours of flight, we will arrive in Shanghai. From there we will take a two hour van ride to our hotel in Hangzhou. We will have a day to get acclimated and then will meet Saxton for the first time on Monday the 10th.

Wish us luck and keep watching for daily updates.

Thanks
Scott, Shelby, Sawyer and soon Saxton

Less Than A Week....

We have less than a week to go before we leave to bring Saxton home. It really hit us today when we received our plane tickets in the mail. Are we really leaving on Friday, this Friday? No way!!

Well, since panic mode has set in, we pulled all of our luggage out of the cellar, went to Target to buy toys for the trip to keep Sawyer and Saxton busy on the plane rides, and started cleaning the house from top to bottom. It just seems like it is coming on so fast. How did we get through this the first time?

Our friend Kim will be coming down from Boston tomorrow to help us out this last week before our lives change, again. I would like to get as much done on the boys' room before we leave. Our friend Jim came over the other day and helped me get the new drywall on the ceiling of the boys room. I can tell you it is a lot easier when there is two people holding the drywall. The jack helped too. Thank you for your help Jim.

Last weekend we had a garage sale. We started pulling things out at 5:30 in the morning to get ready for the 8:00 am start. By 6:30 we had our first early birds. We sold more stuff by 8:30 am then we did the rest of the day. When we planned this sale, we had no idea the money raised would go to a new refrigerator since the old one died on us a day before. But, the good news is we bought a fridge big enough to store food for our two growing boys. BTW-Thank you Susan, Jon and Alice for bringing over the fresh doughnuts. Sawyer loved them, (so did I).

Today while Mommy was grocery shopping, Sawyer had some Daddy time. Isn't he cute?

It Has Finally Arrived!!!!

We have finally received our TA, TODAY!!! We have also confirmed our Consulate appointment for the 17th of September. We are in the process of finalizing the travel plans, but we are definitely leaving on the next Friday, September 7th.

Here we come Saxton!!! We can not wait to bring you home!!!

We also need to send out a Congratulations to our very good friends Mike, Nancy and Melanie who have received their referral for their second precious little daughter Harley. Here's to traveling soon!!!

A BIG THANK YOU!!!!!

The other day we recieved a very unexpected, but wonderful letter from a very special person:

"My name is J and I am on the Yiwu SWIgroup list. A couple of years ago our family traveled back to China with my now 12 year old daughter withOCDF Reunion tour. We had an opportunity to visit the orphanage and we wanted to start a medical fund to support some of the children who needed cleft lip surgeries. Through our Yiwu list we raised some money and sent it back for these children to get their surgeries. OCDF just sent me photos of the children that received urgeries. I looked at our list and your Ni Xia Wei(Saxton) was one of our children. I wanted you to see the photos before I sent them to the whole group thanking them for their support in helping 2 of the children. I don't know if you have any photos yet, but this is very special. I am not sure what your timeline is for adoption, but when I saw your names I just wanted to send these off to you first. What a beautiful child! Warm regards,J."


We can not express enough how this makes us feel. Thank you so much for helping Saxton obtain his surgery that he needed so much. It is truly astonishing that people, who are totally unknown to us, would help a child and a family they don't even know.

Thank you for such an amazing gift both to us and to our son.

New Song and New Picture of Saxton.... The Song says it all.....

Faith Hill's If My Heart Had Wings

BTW-We were told that our TA is on it's way!!! More detail to come after a word from our sponsor.

What do I do??

I know we've been through this once before, but it seems that you are never prepared enough for what is coming. That's right people, PANIC MODE has officially set in.

It happened yesterday when we were shopping for toys at Target for Sawyer and Saxton when Shelby said, "do you know where those travel size shampoos and stuff are?" I felt my stomach drop. All of a sudden I do not have enough time in the day to get everything thing I need to get prepared for the chaos that will soon be known as the S & S tag team champions of the world.

Last Thursday, I started the remodel on the boys' room. Not to my surprise, the was no insulation in the walls (just like our room). So, my mission is to get it insulated and drywalled by the end of the week. Hopefully, I can get this room completely redone before we leave for China in a few weeks.

Besides getting the room done, some of the other things I need to do are:
-Put all the new toys together that we will buy over the next few weeks.

-Clean the house from top to bottom, watch the dogs and Sawyer mess it all up the do it all over again. This will be a bi-weekly exercise until we leave.

-Make five trips to the dump, ten, no, fifteen trips to Home Depot and one trip to Lowes, all while finishing the boys' room. (I tend to forget a few things here and there; at least that is what I tell Shelby, I really like looking at the tools).

-Get the dogs baths, so they don't stink for the pet sitter.

-And finally, we will need to pack, then repack, then repack again, then repack again.... By the time we leave for China, we should have everything we need in our suitcases, but still feel like we do not have enough.

Have a good week.

PS-More picture of Sawyer will be posted shortly. I know that you sick people don't come here to look at what I have to write, but to see pictures of the little man. Well, I don't blame you one bit!!

It's day 85....

Shelby got a call this morning from our agency. On the other end of the phone was the Director, Kathy. At first, Shelby thought that there was nothing to do about nothing. Then from out of no where, like a sudden warm wind coming from the East, like the first ray of sunshine on your brow first thing in the morning, a sudden calm came over the telephone line...

WE GOT OUR LOA PEOPLE!!! YAHOOOOOOO!!!!

Now let the fun that is preparation begin....I will give more details as they become available. Stay tuned.

July 24th 2006....

On Tuesday of this past week, we celebrated Sawyer's Adoption Day. Over the past year, we have seen Sawyer blossom from the scared little boy in Kunming wondering who these people were and why they were taking him away from the only world he had ever known:

to an out going, handsome little man who loves to play with Mama, Baba and his dogs:

So, since I haven't done one of these in awhile, I thought I would do a top ten list of things I thought I would never know after having a child:

10. I can sing every line to the Wiggles Big Red Car: "Toot, toot, chugga, chugga, Big Red Car..."

9. Unless you want your kitchen walls painted by a two year artist, sit close by your child when he eats.

8. Elmo loves to be tickled.

7. Pop beads can entertain a child for hours on a long road trip. I never thought putting beads together then breaking them apart was so much fun.

6. The Doodlebops.

5. Stacking blocks are not only for stacking, they can be used as a throwing toys for the dogs, clothes softener (if you put them in the washing machine, your clothes will be beaten to a pulp by the blocks) or a Daddy ankle twisting tool (this is a sure fire way to get me to the floor where Sawyer can look me in the eye and say "let's play horsey"). Disclaimer: Sawyer is not talking yet, he says it in the only way he know how; by jumping up and down on my back as I am screaming in pain, holding my ankle.

4. Dogs love to be fed by a laughing little boy in a high chair.

3. Toilets are not only for going to the bathroom, they are also a poor kids swimming pool with many little water falls and a fresh water refill button.

2. Your bed must be able to fit Mom, Dad, Sawyer and the dogs when there is a thunder storm.

And Finally...

1. No matter what the boy does (ie: stick his building blocks behind the refrigerator; play in the dogs' water bowl as if it where his own personal water basin; takes his beach ball, puts it under Daddy's feet as he is carrying a load of laundry up the stairs and laughs as he watches Daddy fall down the stairs and crash through the safety gate), he is always going to be one of the two cutest boys in whole world.

BRING ON SAXTON!!!!

Happy Birthday Saxton!!!

Today is Saxton's Second Birthday. My only wish is that we could have spent it with him, but we all will be together soon. So, HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAXTON!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We will be there before you know it!!!

On a side note, exactly one year ago today, we received our TA (Travel Authorization) for Sawyer). Today we are on day 66 of our wait for Saxton's.

Day 51...

We are on Day 51 of out wait for our LOA for Saxton. So what has been going on this last couple of weeks to keep us busy? Well...A LOT!!

I have been finishing up the master bedroom and getting ready to redo the boys' room. Hopefully, I can get it done before we have to leave for Saxton.

Last week, we had our first appointment with the Cranial Facial team Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). To be honest, we miss the team in Seattle. They tended to be more progressive then the team at CHOP.

Furthermore, on Monday of last week, we took Sawyer to a Developmental Neurologist. She found that Sawyer tested on the spectrum for Autism. This will open a lot of doors for treatment for Sawyer.

While his developmental skills are progressing at a fast pace, his speech has not. We can not tell him to come here and sit down, or to go pick up a ball and bring it to daddy. He will, on occasion, listen to us and do what we ask, but it is not a consistent basis. I would point out that it has taken us 11 months and numerous visits with multiple doctors to get Sawyer officially diagnosed. This is not something that can be diagnosed in one visit or over the phone (as has happened on numerous occasions within the adoptive community). And even after all the work that led up to Sawyer's diagnosis, the doctors are still not convinced that Sawyer does indeed have "organic autism" and that he may just be significantly delayed due to "institutional autism." Regardless, Sawyer has been progressing and thriving with his increased level of therapy. And we hope that within the next few years, he will be at a point where he can enter mainstream kindergarten/elementary school. Although I don't want to gloss this over, I do have to say that Sawyer is resilient and with effort on our part, will most likely lead a"normal" and "productive" life.

We knew in China that Sawyer was not where he was supposed to be developmentally and that he had behaviors that have been discussed with some frequency on other blogs discussing autism, PDD and disruption. However, we made a commitment to Sawyer and although we were scared with what life might hold for us all, we chose the only "choice" we had - to bring Sawyer home as our son. Neither one of us is perfect and we would never expect our child to live up to expectations we (or anyone else for that matter) could not ever meet. More importantly, Sawyer has been a blessing beyond words - he is truly an amazing individual with the most generous and loving spirit I have ever encountered. His life would have been tough had we chose to disrupt in China, but our lives would have been hollow and unfulfilled without him. I can not even imagine not waking up to see his smile everyday. And although both Shelby and I sometimes long to hear him call us Mama and Baba, we have been rewarded instead with a child who makes us laugh, gives us hugs and kisses, and loves us each in his own way.

In summary, adoption is not always rainbows and lady bugs. Although most children do adjust quickly to their new parents and new life, some children take months; it took Sawyer six months to even look me in the eyes or trust me when he had a boo boo. From my research and from talking to other parents in the adoption community, my story is NOT unusual. Many children have had the same behaviors and responses that Sawyer has or had while in China and at home . We are getting help through the county we live in via Early Intervention (EI) and through CHOP. Most of them DO NOT cost anything extra than what we would have had to pay if we had a perfectly health boy. Instead of taking him to the doctor for a bumped knee, we take him to the doctor or therapist for speech therapy and PT/OT.

Now, if only he would stop playing kissy face with the little red-headed cutie at daycare...I swear Shelby is going to have a breakdown if we get one more report that "her baby boy" has a girlfriend. I keep telling her that Sawyer can't help it - he's just too darn cute!!!!!!

By the way:

Happy Father's Day

Today was a great day. We went out to Point Pleasent on the Jersey Shore - which is less than an hour from where we live. Sawyer had a great time being on the beach and feeling the waves splash against him.

The funny thing is, he would not walk on the beach, or in the water. He only wanted to sit on our laps and watch the wave come in.

After the beach, we walked on the board walk and Sawyer ate his first ice cream cone all by himself.

The only thing that could of made this one better is if Saxton was here to enjoy it with his big brother, his Mother and me. So, on this day 35 of our wait for our LOA for Saxton, I hope every father out there in Bloggerland had a great Father's Day.

UPDATE!!!!!!!!!!!!

We are officially logged in as of May 14th, 2007!!! Let the waiting game begin.