Truly, madly, deeply in love…

With this cold pizza. It is sooooo yummy. It’s 5am Wednesday morning and the lovelies are asleep. The last two days have been the most beautiful, wonderful moments of our lives. And it’s left me hungry for nasty, leftover, junk food!
Let me start with Monday, “Gotcha Day”. We left Beijing on a 3 hour flight to Guangzhou early in the morning. 15 families, eager, excited, dazed, ready. Hotel lobby, bus to the airport, check in everyone’s overweight luggage, take a few elbows pushing our way to the gate, tram to the plane, load the plane, air traffic jam, three hour flight with a mystery snack, we’re in Guangzhou.
I have all of half an hour to doll myself up to go and meet the girls. Strangely enough, I want to look pretty for them. I think I caught Cameron checking himself in the mirror to make sure his outfit matched.
We make it to the Civil Affairs Office. Haven’t seen our babies yet, but several of us mommies were tearing up already. The daddies all had their heads down… “getting their cameras ready.” One by one they call our family names.
Oops, commercial break…Shayne’s now sitting on my lap with a bottle. 6am, on the dot…her wake up time.
Ok, one by one, our names are called and nannies walk in with gorgeous babies. Some crying, some still. Norah is asleep in her nannies arms. Shayne is awake, peering in every direction, turning her head towards noise. They’re dressed in matching pink outfits, small nametag attached, so as not to confuse one for the other, though they’re so different in appearance, it would be impossible. Shoes are pink and gold patent leather. They’ve obviously had more time to get dolled up than I did! Nannies hand over the girls. We get out of the way for other families and run to our corner with treasures in hand. Cameron and I can’t stop smiling and laughing. They’re precious. Moments later, we have a chance to speak with the nannies - it’s amazing that I didn’t need a translator. The nanny, Ms. Li spoke to me in Mandarin, heavily accented by her local dialect. I spoke to her in my obviously-didn’t-go-to-Chinese-school Chinese. It was easy to see how fond she was of them, referring to Norah as Tuan Tuan and Shayne as Yuan Yuan. She was eager to tell me what the girls like to do, about what makes them laugh, how they like to take their food, how beautiful they are. I emphasized our gratefulness for their good care – how it was obvious that the girls were loved. At the end of our conversation, she gave me her business card with her email address. She asked several times that I send her pictures of the girls growing up. At that moment, the girls were quiet and comfortable in our arms. It was heart-breaking for me to see Ms. Li go. For the girls, it will be a process for them, I’m sure, to realize that this was possibly the last time they saw the loving, caring mother they’ve known for the last 13 months.
We were told that Norah is quiet and gentle, likes playing with friends, loves sun-bathing and walking hand-in-hand with her caretaker. Sounds like someone mommy can get along with wellJ
Shayne is wide awake, peering in every direction. The paperwork we received months ago tell us that Shayne is active, likes to play with friends and loves the outdoors. Sounds like daddy’s little girl.
Interestingly, Shayne’s a bit more attached to mommy at this point and Norah is always looking for daddy!