Saturday Morning

We awoke early about 5 am and unable to go back to sleep. Our bodies are still adjusting to the time change. I had about 4-5 hours sleep. Our travel agent worked everything out (we'll know for sure at the airline). Apparently Delta never sent the confirmation codes to the various airlines. We are now in their computers and ready to fly.

In a short while we will meet our friend and go to lunch and visit down town Beijing.

Not much else to share since last night. Keep us in your prayers.
We spoke to the girls today and they are doing well. Thanks again to the many people caring for our children and pets.

Great Wall

I have had trouble getting on this site to post but finally go through. I need to type fast since it is not cheap to be on the internet at this hotel.

The flight went well from LAX to Beijing. We were able to sleep for part of the trip. It really was not a bad flight.

We arrived in Beijing at 6 am and were picked up by our guide Ben. He gave us an hour and half to "have bath and then go to Wall" "No sleep for you." He was a great guide and spoke wonderful English, a lot better than my broken phrases in chinese, though I would get polite laughs and then corrections on my tones.

The Great Wall was amazing. 20 yuears ago when I was on it I told Debbi I wanted to go back with her one day and we did. It was very cold, but as we walked we shed some layers and enjoyed the day. We also went to a jade factory, a silk store, where we got to stretch some silk fibers - whcih four ladies made look easy and made me look silly. We all laughed very much. We also went to a Cloisonae (I spelled that wrong) store and we saw how they made this amazing art.

We had a great lunch of Chinese fried dumplings and what we woudl call Kung Pao chicken - the best I have ever had.

We must some interesting travelers from America who sat near us at lunch and swapped some stories.

I am still up at almost midnight our time. I did fall asleep for about an hour. There have been some glitches that came up as we tried to confirm our flights in and out of China. Our wonderful travel agent is working on it as we speak. I am able to write so mcuh because I am waiting for her to let me know everything is ok.

We were very tired tonight - Debbi fell asleep quickly hours ago and is asleep as I type.

We made contact with our new friend, a former student from NC who is teaching English in China. We will meet tomorrow and visit and see more of Beijing.

Keep praying for our travel problems to work out so we can see our friend in Kunming.

We'll try to post again from Kunming. Just a few days until we meet AnGrace.

Travel Trauma

Today has been eventful but all in all things have gone well. Since we were such a rush ticket order there has been som confusion on each leg. The biggest snafu was that we were not confirmed on our trip from LAX to China. Even though we booked the flight yesterday we were still supposed to call 72 hours ahead of time to confirm the trip. HMMMM? Thankfully the flight was not full tonight. We are tired but plan to stay awake until a couple of hours into the flight. On Friday afternoon we are scheduled to see the Great Wall.

Please continue to pray that our travel goes smoother.

That is al for now. We are a bit weary and this machine in the airport is difficult to type on thus the spelling errors..

Departure Day

The good news is we should both be tired so we can sleep on some of the flights. We were up late making sure we had everything we could think of covered and it was not the most sound sleep ever. I imagined myself running through the airport like OJ of old trying to make all our connections. I am not sure why I thought that when we have an 8 hour lay over in Los Angeles. We could crawl on our hands and knees and make it in time.

As we send off the girls to school one by one the reality that we will not see them for over 2 weeks is setting in on my heart. I know they will be fine. But I know there will be times of sadness and that they will miss us and I will not be able to do anything to comfort them, but I can and I will be praying for them.

We are hoping that a life long friend of Debbi's can meet us at LAX for a brief visit before we head around the world. We will arrive in China 5:20 am their time. From the time we leave our home to the time we hit the ground in Beijing (assuming all flights are on time :) ) we will have been traveling for over 30 hours. It feels sort of like the Amazing Race but no fun detours, we hope.

Happy Birthday AnGrace

Thanks to our good friend Shirley Tucker, we had a birthday cake to celebrate AnGrace's second birthday. We will be with her in one week. I doubt any cake will be left but we may just have to bake another one and let her have her first birthday cake.

All Systems Go!!

The last 12 hours have been crazier than Mr. Toad's wild ride. All the pieces have been falling into place for us to leave on Thursday morning for China. We found out this morning that the tickets had increased by $1000 per person. Before we could become discouraged our fearless travel agent found us another flight for around what we had budgeted......but we leave tomorrow. We have been scurrying around all day trying to get things in order for us to take off. Ready or not we will be leaving tomorrow. We will be able to connect with our friend in Beijing and our friends in Kunming and see what life is like for them.

Debbi and I are both excited, overwhelmed, and sad. The first two are obvious but we are sad, since this is the longest we will have been away from our girls (2 1/2 weeks). We know we leave them in good hands and that they will have fun while we are away. Keep us and them in your prayers during our absence. Pray that we would all know the peace of God which transcends all understanding.

We will post as we are able in China.

Travel Date - Thursday?

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. At times it seems overwhelming but we are working hard to make it possible for us to leave for China this Thursday. In order for that to happen several things must fall into place. First, we must get our appointment at the American Consulate in Guangzhou. We cannot book our flights until that happens. Once that happens we will work on booking our flights. Pray that there would be tickets available and that they would not be exorbitant. We also need to have our "Travel Approval" document in our hands.

We are very thankful for the many people who have offered to help with watching our girls, our dog, our rabbit, and doing anything else we need. Be assured we will call you if and when we need something.

We will give you an update tomorrow.

Thanksgiving with Family

Over Thanksgiving Dan's side of the family meets at Rockbridge, a Young Life camp.
You can see from the picture why we meet at a camp. This year over 50 people gathered together to celebrate Thanksgiving and enjoy time with family. Yes, that is immediate family. All his brothers and sisters were there this year. Unfortunately, Dan's dad was sick and in the hospital this year so he and Joanne were unable to make it.

You can see the incredible number of children in the picture. AnGrace will be their 38th grandchild.

Thanksgiving

We have much to be thankful for this year. In January of 2006 we began our journey to adopt a little girl from China. In just a few days we will leave to meet our new daughter AnGrace in person. An in Chinese means peace. Grace and peace are two words used by the apostle Paul to summarize God's amazing work of salvation where God adopts us as his sons and daughters.

AnGrace is 12 months in this picture. She will turn two on November 27, 2007.