We Meet Mia!

4-6-10
Matthew says: We met Mia today, she is sooo cute. Contrary to our expectations, she cried for less than a minute, before just sitting there in mom’s arms looking at all of our new faces with a confused look on her face. We are extremely happy to have her as a part of our family. Life just got very interesting and exciting, but there will be plenty of time to show her off and make visits to see all of you, because it has been such a long time since we have see you guys (and girls)! Right now I don’t really know how to describe Mia, but more will be coming along with as many pictures as we can.

Maria says: WE LOVE YOU MIA!!! These were the predominant thoughts and words that entered my mind and heart today. You know when you have a neworn baby and you just can't take your eyes off him/her because they are the most precious, beautiful thing you've ever seen? That was what it was like today.

We were ushered into an office building, brought up to the 6th floor, asked to go ahead and take a seat in this big room. We saw a beautiful little girl sitting on a woman's lap, and my mom said, I wonder if that's her. My sentiments exactly! Would someone please tell me if that is our Mia Qi Chen so we can start loving on her??!!A nod from our guide told us yes. From that moment on, precious Mia Qi Chen was ours! (Well not officially, since we were expected to be back in that same place in a couple of hours after some bonding time with her to decide if we wanted to make it official or not...?! Dale's comment at this point would be: does a pig have a tail?!)

Seriously though...after a few minutes of hugging and thanking, we were sent back to our hotel and asked to return in a couple of hours to sign some paperwork, get an official picture taken which would go in our "Red Book" which is our official adoption document, go to a notary office to pledge that we would care for her and never abandon her, and have an opportunity to talk with the orphanage director and director of care services staff and ask them any questions we wanted. Did I have any questions?!!! Those of you who know me know that I had endless questions. How many children live in the orphanage? What are the ages of the children? Did she have one caretaker or many? May I have the name of her primary caretaker? Would a visit to her caretaker be welcomed at a later date when she is older? (Needless to say, Dale had to nudge me to tell me that they seemed eager to return home and that I should let them go...)