(One year ago this month, Pa and I made the trek to China to adopt our sweet Sister Susie. I am going to take the first seventeen days of February 2008 to revisit that trip. Hop in for the ride!)
Since Susie was doing such a fine job of inspecting her new parents, we decided that turnabout's fair play, and gave her her "first bath" in the hotel's rub-a-dub-tub.
And with utmost Parental Propriety, we checked with our very own eyes to be sure that all body parts were present and accounted for.
Because you just never know.
I mean, she could have been hiding an "I Climbed The Great Wall" tattoo under all those layers she was wearing. What did we know?
Don't get me wrong; we would have loved that tattoo.
Then I headed off with my babe to the Whoozy-Whatsy Office to request a passport for Sister Susie.
Since Susie was doing such a fine job of inspecting her new parents, we decided that turnabout's fair play, and gave her her "first bath" in the hotel's rub-a-dub-tub.
And with utmost Parental Propriety, we checked with our very own eyes to be sure that all body parts were present and accounted for.
Because you just never know.
I mean, she could have been hiding an "I Climbed The Great Wall" tattoo under all those layers she was wearing. What did we know?
Don't get me wrong; we would have loved that tattoo.
Then I headed off with my babe to the Whoozy-Whatsy Office to request a passport for Sister Susie.
Because, you see, she now had to Leave The Country, mmm-hmmm, with a Couple Of Dorks.
But her cuteness brought some much-needed balance to our family:
(Didn't REMOVE any of the dorkiness, mind you--just balanced it a bit.)
So while Sister and I were waiting in the Eternal Line For A Passport, Pa was off with the other half of the group, waiting in line to buy diapers and formula and whatever else I had written down on The List.
Which, as any man knows, is a Complete Mystery and should be handled only by The Creator And Interpretor of The List--namely--The Mom.
Because "diapers" to a mom means a certain brand, size, quantity, shape, price, smell, and cartoon character on the front.
To the dad, "diapers" could easily mean "Depends," especially if he found them on an end cap and next to the electronics and on sale.
But I must say! In this instance, Pa conquered the Stuff-Mart, even with the diaper sizes being in kilograms and the brand names in Chinese.
(I'm guessing he asked the other moms for help.)
And speaking of needing help, here is our babe, later in the day, getting an antibiotic through an IV:
IN HER HEAD, I might mention.
Oh? Did I forget to tell you???
Sister Susie came to us with pneumonia. Yep, that's right. Pneumonia. Same with four of the other babes. (There was a cold snap in that region right before we arrived.) So, we trekked to the orphanage clinic four mornings in a row to continue her treatment. (More on that later.)
And after all that waiting, shopping, and needling--we went to the hotel to crash.
More fun to come.
(Read the whole China story.)
