September 20, 2006 We have had a much better day today.  Mary Joyce is back to her happy, playful self.  She is still teething, of course, but overall, things have gone much more smoothly.  She did not want to go to sleep until 10:00 or so last night, and we had to wake her up at 8:30 this morning so that we could eat breakfast before having to come back to our room. Under the window in our room is a mirror, right at floor level.  Mary Joyce had a great time this morning playing with the “other” baby that she saw in the mirror.  It was too adorable! :-) This morning was our Consulate Appointment, which is the big reason for coming here to Guangzhou before returning home.  Our facilitators, Li Ping and Li, went to take our paperwork to the US Consulate, and we had to remain in our rooms from 10:30 until 12:30 so that any mistakes with our paperwork could be corrected.  At 12:30 we got the “all-clear” call, and then went down to Li Ping’s room to pick up our paperwork.  Then we headed out for lunch at Lucy’s with Marsha, Jeremy, and Aidyn.  (I don’t know if we mentioned Lucy’s yesterday, but it is a well-known little café in the China adoption community where they have a menu that is a combination of Chinese and American dishes.  Mary Joyce is a huge fan of the mashed potatoes.) Yesterday, we dropped a huge bag of laundry by Jennifer’s, one of the stores here, and we picked them up this afternoon.  We would highly recommend this place to other families who are coming through.  The entire load only cost us 150 RMB, which is a little less than $19.  They did a good job with the clothes, too. While we were at Lucy’s, the sky was getting darker and darker.  We thought for sure that we were going to get caught in a rainstorm, but it was actually just a pleasant rain.  It was nice until the rain stopped, and then it was just plain humid.  The weather here is very comparable to south Georgia or anywhere in Louisiana.  We had planned an afternoon of shopping and possibly a trip to the hotel pool.  We were still able to get our shopping in, but skipped the pool for today.  Maybe the weather will be better tomorrow, and we will be able to take Mary Joyce for her first dip.  She loves her bath, so we think she will really like the pool. We had a good time this afternoon shopping for gifts for family and friends.  We have also gotten Mary Joyce traditional Chinese dresses to wear for special occasions in the coming years.  We actually had to go and get one more for our group’s red couch picture tonight because the one we had thought was the smallest size (size 1), we had accidentally bought in the next size up.  I guess we will have two to choose from when she gets to that point.  The dresses were 30 RMB each, which is a little less than $4 US.  The prices here are pretty remarkable.  (For those that are coming later and are wondering, we found the dresses for that price at Jenny’s and the Ladybug Corner next to the 7-11.  The Ladybug Corner is also the only place we’ve been able to find small-sized baby clothes.  Everything else has been larger sizes.) Tonight we go through that famous China adoption experience, the Red Couch picture.  We will sit 8 babies in Chinese dresses on one of the couches in the White Swan lobby and pray that there isn’t a major meltdown while all of us snap photos.  It should be quite an event.  I will add a little more to this post after we are done. After the Red Couch… What a hilarious experience, and guess whose baby put on the show?  Hmmm…I wonder…  If you guessed Mary Joyce, then you are absolutely correct.  We got all of the babies placed on the couch, and one of the first things Mary Joyce did was to reach over and snatch Aidyn’s shoe right off of her foot.  Then Mary Joyce ended up going after Ella.  Mary Joyce is fascinated by the other babies, but she hasn’t quite figured out how to play with the other girls without using them as her toys.  Of course, our child is also the one that got so carried away with the events of the evening that she almost rolled off the couch.  Thankfully, there were lots of moms on duty, and she was caught by 3 or 4 of us all at once.  (Jeremy has all of this on video, and we are chomping at the bit to see the replay.) The still pictures are below.   Multi-Tasking     View from Our Window   Who is this kid? She's pretty fun!     Playing with Daddy's Shoe     What's in here?   Happy Girl!     More sleeping in the Snugli...     Posing with the Adoptive Family Statues   Daddy/Daughter Time     Mary Joyce on the Red Couch     117b Girls (Note Aidyn's shoe in Mary Joyce's hand.)   Alivia, Isabelle, Sasha, Rachel, Jaiden, Mary Joyce, Ella, & Aidyn     Family Red Couch Photo           This page hosted by