back to Daddy

back to Ross again.  we are turning many corners with Lizzie these last 2 days.  she has gone from only being happy when she is in direct contact with anne and no one else, to walking and crawling around the hotel room and playing with the boys as long as anne is in it, to now being carried around by either Anne or Ross and loving to walk all over creation with the boys.  It has been quite a transformation to watch.  to have admired and loved her the last few days and to now be allowed to pick her up and snuggle a bit is almost more than any man can take.  she is so full of personality and she is really starting to let it all show... even a few tantrums which for now are just funny to mom and dad, though a little concerning to her older brothers who have not had the benefit of really knowing what throwing a fit looks like.  you'd think they would know from watching the video of themselves as toddlers!  as you can see from the photos, she comes more and more alive every day.  one of the incredible things we got from her orphanage was a journal that the ladies in the orphanage started for her from the time she came into the orphanage to the time she left for foster care.   her foster mother the continued the journal during the 3 months she was there, having entries every week with her foster mother describing what Lizzie was like, how she was growing, her operation for her cleft lip and how, after the operation, her foster mother held her until 2:30 in the morning when lizzie finally stopped crying and fell asleep, even, though they knew it was the best thing for her, how sad they were that she had to leave them to come to us.  our translator, Helen (see photo), helped me translate it from Mandarin into english and it was quite emotional for both of us as we learned just how well Lizzie was loved and cared for by her foster parents.  Helen said she had never seen such a diary of an orphan's life kept so well.   we are so grateful for all the ways Lizzie was watched over before we got her into our lives.  

we flew down to Guangzhou today which is where we will be getting her visa to fly back to the USA.  this was Lizzie's first plane ride and she did very well... it gives us hope for the longer plane ride we will have to take in a few days from tokyo to minneapolis.   we were fortunate enough to once again have my brother Kent and his family, Ann, Jessa and Emma, come down from Shanghai to meet Lizzie and spend today and tomorrow with us before they have to fly back on sunday night.  it was great to see them again and to have them be the first of the family to meet lizzie.  Lizzie is really starting to show her true colors as an obligate extrovert, and she has been having a good time meeting her larger family.   you can tell just by  how exhausted she is at the end of the day.   we are looking forward to having her meet much of the rest of the family, if only for a few hours, when we go through minnesota on the way back home to colorado.  

thanks again to everyone for participating with us on this journey.  our love to all.  more to come when it happens.

The Kedls.