March 2

Aunt Kay was busy again today.  Addison and Tovin's cousin Mabel had a volleyball game this morning and then spent the lovely afternoon (sweatshirt weather in ND) walking the neighborhood selling Girl Scout cookies. We are under a winter weather advisory until Tuesday, hmmm.

We spent yesterday in route to Guangzhou arriving at the Garden Hotel around 9:30 last night.  We had to check out of our hotel room in Nanchang by noon and then we spent the rest of the day sitting in the lobby waiting for the bus to bring us to the airport, sitting in the airport waiting for the plane, sitting…waiting…

The Garden Hotel is a five star hotel, and it certainly is, you should look it up online, wow!

Today was Tovin’s medical check-up day.  We traveled with the other families from our adoption agency, which we hadn’t met until today, somewhere around 12 families in total staying in this same hotel.  We certainly aren’t alone as there are probably another 4 or 5 agencies with families here as well.  In addition, there are still other families from other agencies at different hotels throughout the city, as there were over 65 children that had the same check-up as Tovin did today, all taking place with a three hour span as the clinic is only open from 9am until noon on Saturday’s; adoption medical check-up day. 

We were somewhat concerned because of the chest cold Tovin has, not to mention his heart condition.  However, after we were cleared to leave the first room of three that we had to visit we were relieved that Tovin would be cleared for travel out of the country.  That is as long as his TB test comes back negative when the results come back tomorrow, for which we have no indications that it won’t. 

In that first room the doctor showed some concern after listening to Tovin’s heart; knowing that he had Tetrology of Fallot (Tetrology of Flow) the doctor seemed to show some concern with his heartbeat being stronger on the right side of his chest compared to where it normally should be.  He said that it might mean that Tovin’s heart is also turned 90 or 180 degrees or somewhere in-between.  However, he didn’t seem overly concerned that this would cause any further complications for our little guy; he just wanted us to know that this might be the case for when we visit with doctors back in the US. 

When we got back to the hotel, we had more paperwork to complete and to go through…that will continue tomorrow and next couple of day as well as more pictures to take and so on. 

Tovin continues to adapt, bond with us, giggle, and learn more and more every hour we’ve been together.  He’s even starting to show us how he reacts when he gets upset or frustrated as well as the fact that he knows when he’s either done something wrong or is about to be disciplined or to be told “no”.  If Jen or I say no to him and tell him to stop something, he quickly turns his head away from us and won’t look back at us, and he’s pretty forceful about it.  He doesn’t like it much when I try to make him confront the issue by looking at us – he knows he’s done something that he shouldn’t have and he doesn’t want to deal with getting in trouble.  However, he is quick to recover from this discipline after a short stint of sulking and is ready with a smile about as soon as he realizes that the world hasn’t come to an end and life, as he knows it, isn’t over.    

He continues to use the sign for more, completely on his own now, and he’s starting to babble a few more words.  He’s figured out some signs of his own, or I should say we’ve starting to figure out some of his signs for things.  He will point at stuff and then point to where he wants it or where he wants it moved too, it’s been fun watching him figure things out.  Like I said, he’s figured out what “no” means and in return is prompt with a shake of his head when he has that same to say to us, like when he’s done eating or isn’t interested in what we offer.  He’ll shake his head, push whatever it is away, then tilt his head back as far away as he is able, all with a little bit of an attitude and sometimes a grown or two.  Yep, I think that means “no” well enough!

Addison continues to surprise and impress us with her patience and caring about her brother.  What can we say other than she’s been her typical self this entire trip.  She seems to be handling everything in stride and is willing to just go with the flow.  She has started to ask about and say that she wants to go home, but that isn’t bad considering that we only have about five more days to go.  She entertained us today with a nine, that’s 9, song dance recital today.  After the first song was over we all clapped and then one of us asked if that was it, saying so kind of disappointed because of the big presentation she had in getting us all into one room, etc.  She quickly said, “No, there are eight more songs coming right up!” She was pretty proud of herself, and I should tell you that she went as far as pretending to have a custom change between each and every song.  Jen was in her glory!!!

Enjoy the pictures.

Good night from China,

Jason, Jen, Addison, and Tovin