Exhale

While visiting the zoo this morning, our guide received a call from his colleague to let him and us know that our paperwork "passed" the consulate. Now, I feel like I can truly exhale - my journey with adoption paperwork is, for the most part, over. Tomorrow we will travel to the consulate to take our oath and receive Jack's Chinese passport and the brown envelope.

We had trouble with our computer yesterday and couldn't post or answer e-mails, but with a little tinkering, my husband got it to work this a.m. Yesterday we visited a temple and witnessed monks and nuns doing some kind of ritual, as well as a monk leading a group of believers in a class. Interestingly enough, the monks have entered the 20th century - the monk leading the class was using powerpoint. We took the boys to a local park and to the Swan Room to play. They are getting along well, but I can tell that Sam is ready to go home. He misses his sisters. Jack, while sometimes mischievous, is adjusting well to his new family. We've had a few time outs, and he seems to be beginning to understand the concept. As with Jenna, Jack will need to learn volume control. He announces to the entire White Swan restaurant that he needs to go to the bathroom, usually to the accompaniment of light laughter of nearby people. He'll even wake up in the middle of the night and call it out. We've gotten used to it now, but the first night, it scared the life out of his sleeping family! We finished off the day with a little Papa John's Pizza - a little taste of home.

This will probably be the last post in China, unless Dan downloads some more pictures or can't sleep tonight and decides to blog. In any case, it will be my last post here. We are looking forward to getting home to the girls, but not to the travel. Hopefully, there will be no delays at the airports. Thanks for joining us - all of your comments have meant the world to us!