One year anniversary!

Here's my post from one year ago today (I think the first photo says it all!)...

What a day it was today! Our "gotcha" moment was pretty tuff...screaming, arching back, kicking...the whole nine yards.


She loves her caregivers and wanted them so badly it broke my heart. We stuck with it and after a while (a long while) she calmed down and we actually had some smiles!


When we left the building to board the bus she had a major meltdown while I was carrying her out...it was quite the scene. We're in the middle of the busy Guangzhou street waiting for the bus and here I am, an American, holding a Chinese baby who is screaming on top of her lungs while kicking me and trying to push me away. I could barely keep hold of her...I just held on as tight as possible and finally the bus showed up. On the way back to the hotel, she feel asleep from sheer exhaustion.


Once at the hotel, we had just enough time to change her diaper before we had to go to dinner. She was screaming and kicking her legs uncontrollaby, which made the diaper change quite interesting. She had a great appetite at dinner and we got lots of smiles.


Once back in the room, she was quite upset again. She is just very confused and doesn't understand what's going on. She was brought to a strange building, handed off to strangers and everything she knew was gone in a flash. I can see her frustration when she's crying. She doesn't know what to do...she's both pushed me to get away, but when I put her down she's grabbing on. She's SO confused and upset...it's very hard to watch. You feel like someone is ripping your heart out because you can't just fix this for her.

Right now she is sleeping...she's been down for over an hour. She's just so peaceful and sucking her thumb.

You can check out all our pics here.

That was the day our lives changed for ever. We became parents at the blink of an eye, and it was both the hardest and the best day of our lives.

It breaks my heart to look back on the photos from the first week or so. I can see the pain in her eyes that I couldn't see back then. The pain of a child who, after 21 months with her nannies, had her whole world turned upside down.

Now, a year later and almost three years old, she has blossomed into a sweet, happy, spirited, loving and smart little girl who loves bath time, books, riding her tri-cycle, dancing, playing at the park, visits with family and snuggle time with her momma and baba. The transition she has made over the past year is nothing short of incredible and the first four months I spent with her full-time while on maternity leave were priceless. She is our life and we love her unconditionally and that is exactly what she deserves.