WE ARE HOME AND IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT!!!

Hi all- I am so happy to tell you all we are safe and sound and resting in our own homes. This trip was literally the trip of our lifetime, and we are proud to tell you that CCAA has already asked us to host another camp!!!!

I am excited to get to work tomorrow and to begin finding homes for these children. Again, if you are interested in a particular child, please send Sara your family info sheet asap. We will begin going through everything tomorrow, sending medicals and "matching".

I also didn't previously announce this as I wasn't sure it would go through, but MAA, along with Bridge of Love Adoption Services (Travel and Translation part of CCAA) will be providing a unique opportunity for families to participate in a similar experience to what we just went through. No details yet, it will basically be a cultural/homeland/humanitarian tour. Like a regular cultural tour, there will be a fee per person, but you will receive a donation receipt for a portion of the cost(to write the cost off your taxes) for each person. Sound good? It gets better...

You will spend 1-2 days in a particular orphanage meeting the children, holding the babies, and doing some type of humanitarian project for the orphanage/orphans. This will be much like what you all just experienced through us. The orphanage will also prepare a show/activity to show you about them... Much like our talent show!!!

This trip will cater to those interested in adoption, those wishing to show their adopted children their homeland, humanitarian/religious groups, or just regular travellers. There will be a little for everyone. We are also looking at possibly doing breakout sessions... For example one day half of the people will go to CCAA, while those not interested in adoption can do another tour.

We are thrilled about this opportunity and being able to work with Bridge of Love and hope to give you all a taste of the most incredible experience of our lives!!!!

We are looking to set up these tours on an ongoing basis, but hope to do the first trip later this year. Please email me if you are interested and I promise to post more details soon.

I will be posting more about our trip and more children very soon. Just need to catch up on a little sleep right now. This was literally one of the busiest and best weeks of my life.

More soon!!!

Diana

Gary

Gary is 12 yeas old and is articulate and happy. Gary's SN is a cornea macular blockage in his left eye. Like Wayne, he has no problem getting around and taking care of himself. He loves to build and create things. He loves playing with legos and singing. He is a poet, and loves to memorize and recite ancient Chinese poems. You saw the stage in the room where we are, but what didnt see is the big screen behind it and the multi-media system including a karoake machine for the kids!!

Gary is a very good boy and is very neat. He prides himself on a tidy space and enjoys household chores. He wants to be a policeman when he grows up because he wants to help people.

Gary loves to be with his friends and said his best friend is Jimmy too. (About 5 kids named Jimmy as their best freind). He has a friend that was adopted by a US family, and asked me if I could find him a family too.

He is a sweet and kind boy who is easy going and laid back. He is so kind that he volunteered to by Tammy's dance partner when she couldn't find another girl. He is very thankful and constantly expressed gratitute to us for being there.

(These kids are all just amazing!)

Wayne

Wayne is a sweet and loving 11 year old boy whose SN is bilateral cataracts. Though his sight is impaired, it certainly doesn't stop him. He signs, dances, and is ALWAYS happy and smiling. He gets around by himself and does not seem impaired other than some squinting and looking at things closely. Other than the cataracts, he is completely healthy.

Wayne loves to play games. He loves to be with his friends. Although he is a bit shy, he makes friends very easily and would not fear a new environment. When asked if he wanted candy, toys, whatever, he would always ask for a few extra to share. His best friend is Jimmy, and you see the two together in the skit photo.

He likes school and is a diligent, obedient and enthusiastic student. He LOVES music. Sound too perfect??? He is... Please spread the word about Wayne.

Photos from Day 2

Hi all! It is Sunday morning here (5 am) and it is our last day in China. We will spend the last morning seeing some sights, then will be heading to the airport for our 5pm flight back to the US.

I have too many thoughts to summarize right now but plan to keep the blog going for a little while... I have so many photos and videos to share. Literally, we took over 1000 photos...

As for the post right now, I want to share pictures from Day 2. Here are some of the kids doing their craft projects and of the talent show. I will then make seperate posts featuring each child that needs a home, with their pictures, describing their personality, talents and what they said in their interview.

As for the MAA interviews we started on the way here, they kind of fell by the wasteside as we were all too emotional....

ANyway, please enjoy the photos of our children.

Love to all,
Diana

Day 2 Ox Camp

Words can never described what we just experienced in the last 48 hours...

As it is 11 pm and we just got back to our hotel in Beijing, I am going to try to quickly recap the events.

Yesterday, there was an opening ceremony where CCAA, Aleda, Civil Affairs officer, and the orphanage director all gave speeches. THen the kids all did a 1 minute intro about themselves. We knew then that we were in love with them all!!! After, Aleda (wiht translator) read them the book she wrote entitled "Our Two Cultures".
We then showed two movies about MAA children that were adopted. THANK YOU LISA AND CHRISTEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hey Christen- Chet asked if he could live in a house just like "Jacob's on the movie"!!!!

We then answered questions and the kids did a talent show in the afternoon. We then dressed up as clowns and played games with the children. We had a ball. All the kids loved us but one... Poor little Gretchen was terrified!!!!!!!!!

After camp, we interviewed the children who travelled from Guangdong at our hotel. (Martina, Blake, Lorie, Amy, and Zack) They were right down the hall from us!!! Martina is a tiny, sweet, gentle angel. She really got to all of us. Amy is a FIREBALL! The biggest ham Ive ever seen. I think that girl is going to be the next American idol! She loves the stage and is an incredible dancer!!! She is a total cuddle bug and LOVES having her photo taken. She is always jumping in front of the camera. (Quiet families BEWARE!!!) Blake and Zack are peas in a pod. They are always together. Both are sweet, outgoing, kind and extremely loving toward each other, their nannies and the girls. Lorie is shy and first and quickly warms up. She is sweet and kind. She also loves to dance and perform and takes Amy's lead often, while Martina quietly watches and smiles for a while before then joining in as well.. You really should all see the dance routine they did. It was amazing.

Today- we did interviews with the kids all morning, while they did arts and crafts we brought. They painted masks, painted their own jewelry boxes, made jewelry, and played with play-doh. They loved it! The interviews were extremely emotion and we had to take a few breaks to compose ourselves... Basically, EVERY child asked for a family of their own, Toby asked me to "promise" and "guarantee" that I would find a "family to love him", and Kenny asked me if I had any children... This led to a conversation where I showed him pictures of my Charlie and Dani. After studying the photos for over a minute quietly, he asked me if they could be his brother and sister... THAT IS WHEN I TOTALLY LOST IT...

Aleda, Ali and I all say this is one of the most incredible and emotional experiences of our life. Just so you all know, we made only one promise to each and every child... That we would share with our families how wonderful they all are and try our best and our hardest to find them the family they deserve.

I will talk about some more kids each day becuase I have so much to say about every one. Also, instead of 39, we had 42. We had the two 12 year old girls I told you about and another little boy (already with an American name) called Caleb. He just turned 7, is adorable and smart as a whip. He also speaks some English and yelled at the translator's help at times. His SN is he is missing most of his left hand. You would never know it though... Like most limb difference children, they know no better and simply adjust. He is a gift and I am attaching some photos of him.

We are so filled with so many emotions... In a word, these children are simply amazing. The whole time, we would forget that they are children with special needs and we would just see happy, beautiful, smiling, playing, well adjusted, incredible children. These kids get around by themselves, take care of themselves... I have to tell you, I was really scared at first as these needs seemed so overwhelming, and our staff was wondering how we would ever find them families. I am convinced now that when people see these children playing and talking and dancing and running, you will realize that there is nothing to fear. I think these children are an incredible gift to anyone who is lucky enough to adopt them.

I ask anyone considering adoption to just take a look at these kids. You never know... Aleda and I will be happy to talk to you about questions... We will be writing up summaries of our observations, and I have already gotten a lot of paper medicals from CCAA. I also have tons of photo and video on each child so you may see for yourself what we see.

Please forgive me if I am all over the place, but my eyes are literally crossing as I type. I haven't slept more than 3-4 hours a night since I got here. Now that it is over, my thoughts keep racing.. "Who do I know that may love this child???"

I am going to go now, brush my toofers, and pray for these children and for us to find their families. Please take a look at our angels... You never know...

XOXO
Diana

Ali's Post

Hi Everyone!
As Diana has said, our schedule has been VERY busy, but the excitement and thought of seeing the children keep us going! So far, this experience has been one of the best of my entire life. A few post ago you read about Lu Lu, the little girl with down syndrome. I can honestly say that when she wrapped her arms around me the amount of emotions that ran through my body was something I've never experienced. I was scared, happy, sad, excited, nervous etc. all that the same time! It was INCREDIBLE and she instantly had my heart. Needless to say we were only there five minutes and I was already hysterical!

As for the children in Camp Ox, they are also soo amazing! These children are very well cared for and it shows. As a nanny myself, I can understand and appreciate the amount of time and effort that goes into loving a child that is not your own. I admire these nannies so much and they are the ones we especially need to thank for taking such good care of these children!

As, Diana said we have TONS of pictures and can't wait to share them with you all!
Keep reading and keep spreading the word about these children. I hope all of you are falling in love with them just as I am!

-Ali

My girls...

Please pass the word about these beautiful girls... No time but I have TONS of photos..