Happy New Year, from our crib to yours!

EDIT by Kevin: I rejected some comments by accident! If you made a comment within the last few hours and you don't see it please repost if you would like. Daddy doesn't seem to know how to moderate properly. :)

P.S. Miss Hannah slept through the fireworks without stirring a bit. She had just had her 9PM bottle and was very sleepy. For people paying attention to the audio, you may note that I start counting down about 5 seconds too late... The "Live" TV broadcast that we were watching must have been delayed!

AIT was very apologetic

This morning we got up, had a bottle and spit back most of the rice cereal made just with water (bad idea, Daddy), and videoed with the grandparents. "Ni Hao, Nana!"

Caution, poop story ahead. Don't worry, no photos of it!

Then Mama and Daddy took turns having breakfast while little girl snuggled and looked out the window at Taipei. Later in the morning she was really fussy. She had a bottle and that helped, but something just wasn't quite right. Mommy decided that it was about time Hannah pooped, as she didn't want to have to sand blast it out tomorrow. The pear juice in the morning and 2/3 a container of prunes yesterday just weren't cuttin' the mustard. While she screamed and cried big crocodile tears, Mama took care of the liquid glycerine suppository business. After about three minutes, a huge pile of clay like stinky tofu managed it's way out. Hannah turned back into a happy smiley baby about five minutes later. So, off with the Hello Kitty poopy clothes, hose her down, and she's a clean baby again. Ahhh. That's much better.

So, after the poop business we had to hurry up and get ready to take the taxi to AIT. Mama and Daddy took ALL of the copies of our documents, just in case. When we arrived, the man that interviewed us yesterday apologized to us several times for "dropping the ball." They found our packet on an employee's desk after we left yesterday. She left for vacation and didn't include it in our file. Oops. They understand that it was very stressful for me to have to leave, go to the hotel, and run back to take care of business. Wow, a government office that says they're sorry. Who woulda thunk it? Happy with the visa documents in hand, Daddy shed a few tears. So happy that we have everything we need so we can go home in a few days.

We went back to the hotel and played with the happy baby a little bit.

One of the Hyatt managers told me yesterday that the Chinese say that a baby with a dimple is a sign that she will be very popular. I think she's already pretty popular! She's so loved!




Then Daddy fed her some cod baby food that he purchased at the grocery store in the bottom of Taipei 101. Notice that you can see Taipei 101 out the window of this photo. Can we even buy COD BABY FOOD in the US? We smelled and tasted it... smells like tuna, but doesn't taste as strong. Fish was on a list of foods that came with Hannah, so we knew that it was okay for her to eat because she's had it before. Hannah didn't think so much of cod for lunch. That's okay, baby girl. Mama didn't think it smelled that great either.

Daddy and Hannah are having their afternoon naps now. Mommy thinks she needs one too. Someone woke her up four times last night with little "I'm in a strange place" whimpers, and needed her back patted a few times to go back to sleep.

AIT grumble grumble grumble...

This morning when we arrived at AIT for our visa interview, they had all of our documents ahead of time. We paid $50 to UPS AIT our I-864, DS-230, I-600, and last year's tax returns and W2s. When we arrived they asked me for our documents. I'm like... uh... you have those already. I UPSed them to you. The woman went through our file again and didn't see them. I even had the UPS tracking number and receipt to show them that they received them. I went through my big pink binder as I had backup copies of everything, or so I thought. I didn't make copies of the immigration forms, but I brought the tax records. I guess I didn't make copies because I knew they already had them. The woman left the window for about 10-15 minutes and came back with a supervisor. They could not find our mailing. Well, I had the files saved on my laptop back at the hotel. I left Kevin and Squirmy at AIT while I took a taxi by myself (Yes, by myself! I'm feeling like quite a city girl hailing my first cab. We don't have cabs in the cornfields where I come from.) back to the hotel, e-mailed the documents to AIT, and went to the business center at the hotel to print the documents out. I had a staffer help me save the documents on a USB thumb drive and then she could print them out for me. Well, wouldn't you know it... one of the PDF files wouldn't open on 3 of her computers, but it opened just fine on mine. After 20 minutes of trying to get this to work over and over, we decided to try another computer lab. We went to the one on the first floor and were able to open the file and print no problem. I was so stressed at this point! ACK!!!!!!! Anyway, I now had all of my documents, grabbed a cab back to AIT, went through security, checked my laptop at the door (can't bring it in... I might be a terrorist after all), walked back up to the third floor, and they saw me right away and motioned for us to come over. The supervisor got my e-mail, had printed everything out, had us resign all of our documents, and then we waited for our appointment. All were were asked was what we did for a living (uh, it's in the paperwork, dude) and how our daughter is doing. We had fun unzipping her jacket to show of her white tank top with red sparkling letters that says, "I love the USA." Aw... that got a chuckle out of the guy. He said that this is the best part of our job. AND... we're getting an IR-3, so Miss Hannah will become a US citizen when we land in Detroit. YAY! Anyway... lesson learned. Don't trust government offices. Even if you gave them everything they need, something will get screwed up and you'll need to provide it to them again while standing on one leg, rubbing you belly, and patting your head.

Hannah Claire photo extravaganza

I know... I know... I've been slow to post photos. Been busy figuring out how to change a diaper with Miss Squirmy, how to give a baby a bath (she loved playing in the ducky tub and splashing with some stacking cups), how to make a bottle REALLY fast when she's screaming a the top of her lungs today, and freaking out thinking I broke her when she has the hiccups from crying.

I learned a valuable lesson today. When air drying your baby's bottom after a really wet diaper, don't leave her on a hotel bed. I had Miss Hannah laying on her changing mat while sleeping and letting things air dry for a few minutes, when all of a sudden there was a huge fountain spurting into the air. It went all over her, down the changing mat, onto the nice swanky (our new favorite word from KB) Hyatt linens, and even soaked into the feather top mattress pad before Mommy could soak everything up with a towel. Mommy was all by herself and so upset, and Daddy returned shortly (thank, GOD!) helped the embarrassed Mommy call housekeeping to come save the day. I think the Hyatt will be ready for the dumb Hoosiers with a baby to go home in a few days.

Okay, okay, on to the photos!

Meeting our friend Amanda back at the hotel before leaving Tainan.


Aw... so sweet!


All prettied up for the train ride back to Taipei.

Thank you to the Flecks for the sweet comfortable outfit!


Mmmmm. I love keys. Can I borrow the car, Daddy?


When I want a bottle, I want it now.


Mmmmm. I love my bottles.












Daddy's ready to tell Hannah all about Taipei.


"Look there, Hannah. Taipei 101 is the largest building in the world... for now."


Hannah thinks the lights look pretty cool out her window.


"And they brought me to this nice hotel with such fresh sheets. I'd love to pee on these. I think I'll save that trick for Mommy tomorrow when Daddy's gone doing laundry. That will really freak her out."


"Yes, the camera loves me."




"Do you guys happen to have any rice crackers around here?"


"What? The baby nursery sent some Hello Kitty rice crackers with you? Sweet! Let's break them out."

Meet Miss Hannah

I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him.---1 Samuel 1:27

Kevin and I couldn't be happier. We had a wonderful day today, and we're parents to a happy, smiley, outgoing, snuggly, and inquisitive baby we could ever had imagined. We're still a little clumsy at the bottle making and diaper changing, but she's sucking down our bottles like a champ and hasn't cried one tear. She was very curious on the train, wanting to look at everyone, looking at her reflection in the window, pressing buttons, REALLY wanting to get a hold of anything that's metal and shiny or that makes a crinkling sound. She babbles, can pull herself to a stand, and crawls like a champ on carpet. She REALLY likes Daddy's silly faces and when Mama kisses her toes and blows raspberries on her belly. We keep waiting for some "stinky tofu" to appear in the diaper, but that hasn't happened yet. The nursery says that she doesn't have a history of constipation, but I'll feel much better once I start seeing some evidence.

We're back at the Grand Hyatt now. We can see all of Taipei 101 from our room when we turn our head sideways, and it's going to be just fine to watch some awesome fireworks on New Year's Eve.

We videoed with both sets of our parents tonight, and there were lots of happy tears on the other side of the computer monitor.

Oh, and she really likes these keys. She's been playing with them all afternoon, chewing on them, and drooling a little bit. We're been listening to a lot of "dadada mamama uhuhuhuhuh ahahahaha." I'm looking in my travel book for a Mandarin translation... but can't seem to find it. (hahaha)

Enjoy a few pics... more later. Every moment with Hannah is precious right now, and we're got to get ourselves organized here in the hotel. We are to be at AIT for our visa appointment early tomorrow morning.

THE DAY - Psalms 118:24

This is THE DAY that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it." - Psalms 118:24

Oooh boy. I'm switching back and forth between periods of extreme nervousness and then for awhile it feels so surreal. This is it? Am I dreaming? We were so tired after days of travel (saw lots of bananas, pineapple, betelnut growing yesterday! ) that we slept well after packing last night. I think Kevin literally fell asleep about two minutes after his head hit the pillow. I most likely only took five minutes. I woke up about 6am this morning and instantly knew this was THE DAY... and that there was NO way I would be falling back asleep.

I felt like a really bad mommy last night because I didn't bring a blanket with me for her to Tainan. She has a coat, and we have my coat so she'll be plenty warm... no worries there, but I should have brought a blanket. There are two in our suitcase storied in Taipei. No time to run out to Carrefour on a taxi for one. I know we'll be okay... I just feel a little inadequate, but know that's normal right now. I couldn't find Snow formula at Carrefour either. Hummm. If you bought Snow formula on an adoption trip in Taipei recently, let me know where you bought yours as a comment on this post. Grandmas, no worries... the nursery will give us some formula. I just want to buy more so we can transition her to a new formula more slowly once we're at home. Oh yeah, I've never mixed formula for a bottle before, either. This will be interesting!

Prayer request: Prayers for Hannah Claire that she won't be really frightened of us today. Prayers for me that I won't be a crying emotional mess. Kevin? He's my rock. I know he'll be just fine.

quick note

It is Sunday morning... only one more sleep until THE day, the day that we've prayed for for so long!

Running around Tainan yesterday might just be one of the most interesting and fun days I've had in my life. We are so thankful for Amanda and Lawrence to show us around Tainan, as these experiences are an experience of a lifetime, ones which we will always have to share with our daughter. We explored temples, Banyan tree house, shopping on "old street," eating lot of "little eats" including stinky tofu... which smells like old sweaty gym socks but doesn't taste that bad at all. We uploaded our photos into our flickr account, but no time to work with them and organize them for a post. When you've had a go-go-go day... sleep and showers are valuable back at the hotel, so no time to blog.

We did talk to our families on the phone last night... and I think we woke up our friend Amy, Sedona's babydog sitter. Sedona's doing great, has had an exciting week with so many little kids' laps to sit on! I think she'll come home to us and think we're boring, wanting to go back to the house with all of the fun kids to play with.

Here's the link to our flickr account if you want to peek at photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/50157031@N00/. I can see that we're getting lots of hits, and from the town names on the hits I know that we're blessed to have so many of our friends, real life and adoptive families, following along.

Gotta get showered and get some breakfast here at the hotel before heading out on today's adventure. Bye!

Video: Riding the MRT

This video is a little long, but we wanted to show others that don't have lots of experience with mass transit how easy and NICE it is to ride the MRT subway system in Taipei. Everything is in Mandarin and English. Just look at the map, follow the signs, and you'll get to where you need to go quickly, easily, and very inexpensively.

Video: Din Tai Fung Dumplings

Here's a little video from our dumpling quest on Monday night. Enjoy!

Day 5: High Speed Rail trip to Tainan and meeting Amanda

This morning we slept in after our night market adventure that kept us out past midnight last night. It took a long time to organize our belongings and decide what stays in storage and what needs to go with us on the high speed train to Tainan. We took a taxi to the main train station, as it would be a pain to walk to the subway line with all our luggage. We had already purchased HSR tickets yesterday and went ahead to our gate to make sure that we could find it alright. They wouldn't let us into the gate area because we were too early. Only those with trains leaving in the next 30 minutes could enter the gated area. I found a spot to sit with all of our stuff while Kevin went up to level two and found us some lunch. He chose Burger King, as it's kinda hard for us to eat noodles with chop sticks and a spoon when we need to hurry up and get on a train. When entering the gated area, you put your ticket through a ticket reader, a lot like the ones at Walt Disney World. When the called for bording, we easily found car 4 and our reserved seats. One could purchase snacks and drinks on the HSR, and an attendant came by several times to collect our trash. Taking the train is so easy and you don't hare to worry about getting through security. I'd take a train like this instead of an airplane anyday! Kevin had his Garmin GPS out, and learned that we were travelings at speeds up to 180 miles per hour. Zoom! Once we arrived at the Tainan HSR station we followed the signs to the Taxi cab station. I handed a taxi card (piece of paper with the name and address of the hotel written in Mandarin Chinese that I had the front tesk staff made at our last stop) and we were on our way. I figure that it took 15-20 minutes to get to our hotel, the Tayih Landis.

We met up tonight Amanda, with a blogger that lives in Tainan. I'll post more later this weekend about that. When we were out and about tonight we went to Carrefour, which is some kind of a blend between Target and Wal-Mart. I really liked the sign in the first photo here, and took some photos with Kevin. We bought diapers, books in Mandarin and English for young children, and some snacks including our first taste of Taiwanese pineapple Yum!



Man... I wish we had some "stop crying toys" back at home in the US! (joke)


Here's Kevin with his prized Keyboard that has characters on it. He's been pumped about getting one of these for several weeks.


Ahhh... here's a stop crying toy, for real.

Day 4: Handicraft Mart and Shinlin Night Market

We spent Christmas morning relaxing and videoing via Microsoft Instant Messenger with our families. I took another bubble bath in the huge tub in our beautiful bathroom that has lots of marble. My feet were so dirty from all of the walking around on the tour in my clogs with no socks. My ankles were gray from all of it. Ew! Kevin went out and found some breakfast for us while I uploaded photos to our Flickr site and came back with “egg burger” (aka Egg McMuffin) meals with OJ from McDonalds at Taipei 101. Surprisingly, the McDonalds there wasn’t expensive at all. We figured that our meals totaled about $4.50 for both of us. We organized our belongings, had some snacks in the room, and set out for the day’s adventure.

Our goal for the day was to do some shopping at the Taiwan Handicraft Market. We walked several blocks to our MRT subway station, Taipei City Hall Station. We took the blue line to the main station, and then the red line to the National Taiwan University Hospital station. It was only about a two block walk to the Taiwan Handicraft Market and was very easy to get to. The Taiwan Handicraft Market is a store that has four floors of shopping. Rule of thumb would be to start in the basement and work your way up, as it gets more expensive as you go up. They do have shopping baskets, but the women working on each floor will want to hold your items for you until you are ready to pay. They don’t want you walking up and down and transporting merchandise from floor to floor. In the basement I found several cute things to share with our daughter as she grows older. I found a wooden puzzle of Taiwan on the left side when you go down the stairs. It looks like the pieces to the puzzle are the counties of Taiwan. It looks a lot like the state map puzzles that you can find here in the US. We also found marionettes of Chinese New Year dragons that were only about $15 and they’re pretty cute. There were several little things down here that one could turn into Christmas tree decorations. On the first floor, right when you come in to the left, there is a jewelry counter. To the back of the jewelry counter there is a section for having a chop made. There are several stones to choose from. We brought with us our daughter’s characters, and are having a chop made for her out of jade. You also choose font style for the stamp, and remember to buy some red ink for your chop stamp as well. The ladies working had great English skills, and were very happy to help us shop for the chop. They were a little confused why we wanted this name for the chop. They showed us a photo on a mug with a woman in Taiwanese history that has a very similar name. We explained that the shop was for someone else, a baby, and I guess that made sense to them now and we weren’t questioned any more about the name on our chop. It takes a few days to have the chop made, and they will have it delivered to your hotel. I’m really glad that my friend KB tipped us off to going early in our trip to have the chop made, so there would be plenty of time to have it completed before we head home. We did the bulk of our Christmas shopping here. There’s lots of jewelry to choose from in jade and Taiwanese coral, a great selection of tea sets, and artwork as well. Once again, this is a great place to shop BEFORE you meet your child. I wouldn’t want to be shopping for tea sets with a baby strapped to me or with a toddler that wants to run around and touch things. One of our favorite items was in the postcard area. There are postcards that open up like pop-up books on a spinner rack that are really cute.

With heavy bags in our hands, we walked to the Taipei main station as it wasn’t much further than the stop we originally got off on. We were in search of some good eats at the Breeze Food Court. The food court is on the second floor of the train station and is in a circle shape. It really reminds me of a food court in the mall back home in the US. I found a place to sit with our shopping bags while Kevin went in search of some good eats. He placed his order, and then they have an electronic sign board that calls out your number to let you know that your food is ready. He returned back with meals, both containing a kind of soup with noodles, beef, and a large vegetable, a side dish, and some kind of strange sweet juice. I didn’t care for the flavor of the soup with the huge chunks of beef, so Kevin let me trade him for the soup he had with the meat balls. It wasn’t expensive, maybe the equivalent of $10 US for the both of us to eat. We were sitting near an ice cream shop, and picked out some ice cream for dessert. Kevin picked out a scoop of green apple and a second scoop of Rum Raisin. Mmmm. After dinner we walked around the food court to see what else we could find. Lots of coffee places for sure. When I saw a Mr. Donut, I told Kevin that we just had to have some, as Sherry said that they were really good. I picked out four doughnuts to bring back to the hotel room for us. We enjoyed them later while organizing photos and working on blog posts, and called them our Christmas cakes. We really liked the chocolate darker doughnut filled with strawberry fluff. Mmmmm.

While we were at the train station, we bought our tickets to take the high speed train from Taipei to Tainan tomorrow. The ticket machines are very easy to use and clearly marked in English. We had a problem with one machine because it wouldn’t take our credit card. We went to another machine and it took cash just fine. I’m really surprised how inexpensive the high speed train is. Our tickets were $1145 NTD, which is about $37 US. This would be a really really really long way by car. Our drive from Taipei to TaiChung was about four hours on the highway, and I’m sure that a car ride to Tainan would take an hour or two more. The high speed train will get us to Tainan in one hour and forty five minutes. Amazing!

After taking our shopping bags back to the hotel room, we rested, called family members to wish them Merry Christmas, and then headed out in search of a night market. We decided to go to the Shilin Night Market instead of Snake Alley because it was closer to a subway station and our feet were pretty tired.

I’m sorry to say that going to this night market wasn’t as fun as I had hoped it would be. I think we were there at a really busy time, between 10pm until 11:30pm, and maybe that wasn’t such a good idea. It was crowded and hard to walk town the little streets with vendors having goods in the middle of the street. We didn’t take a copy of the Google Map of the market that we had online, and I wished we had that with us. I think we spent most of our time walking in the “fashion” area with lots of clothes, accessories, and shoes for sale. As it is winter time… there were lots scarves and little thin sweaters for sale. I had really hoped to find some things for Hannah here, but I didn’t find anything I wanted for her. I was looking for decorative traditional clothing and didn’t find much… and I liked things I found online and in Chicago’s Chinatown much better. There was much more and much cuter clothing for little dogs than for small children. The signs for the food vendors weren’t in English, so it was hard to figure out what the foods were. I had hoped to hop in a long time, assuming that the vendors with the longer lines had better food. Unfortunately, most food vendors didn’t have any line at all, so I couldn’t tell if what they had was good or not from the line. We did find a bit of a line at a place that has everything on a stick. You choose what you want, put it in a little basket, and then they cook it for you. The cooks were backed up, so we might have waited 20 minutes for our snack to cook. I chose four items: mushrooms, corn on the cob, green onions wrapped in bacon, and tofu. A woman at the next stall spoke English and helped us translate whether we’d like sesame seeds on the food, and how hot we’d like it. They fried the items, put a barbeque like sauce on them, and sprinkled them with the sesame seeds. I liked everything except the tofu was so-so. The bacon wrapped green onions were my favorite. The four items only cost us about $1.25 US. We also found some candied strawberries on a stick that were a lot like a candy apple that we’d find at a fair back home. I also bought a drink that was a lot like a lemon shake up, but made from cranberries instead. I think we might have smelled stinky tofu. There was a horrible smell coming from one of the vendor’s carts. It was pretty bad, for sure. I peeked at the cart but didn’t recognize it, so we didn’t stop. I couldn’t force myself to buy food when we had no idea what it was just because it smelled the worst.




This is one of my favorite photos. Seems like about a third of the people on the street wear face masks because of pollution. If I rode around on a moped all day long sniffing exhaust, I might want to wear one too. Miss Hannah already has a smog mask, thanks to Judy and her mom. Hannah's is yellow with a little bunny on it.










Once we arrived back at the hotel, it was after midnight. We were so tired from all the walking, and hit the sack right away. It’s Friday morning now. I’m writing this post while Kevin gets in a little more of his beauty sleep. We need to organize our things today to decide what goes to Tainan with us and what stays. We don’t need to bring too many baby items with us, as we’re be taking the train back to Taipei Monday after we pick up Hannah.

Wow… hard to believe that in just three days we’ll be leaving out hotel in Tainan, leaving to go meet our daughter. Can we just fast forward to that part???

Merry Christmas

The most beautiful gift
In all this world
Becomes dim in our sight
When placed beside
The gift of love
God gave us on Christmas night.

Wishing you the Gifts of Peace
and Happiness this Holiday Season
And throughout the Coming Year.

Kevin and Sarah

Sedona too.

Day 3: into the mountains

Today we stopped the town of Chi-Chi in Nantou county which was the epicenter of the September 21, 1999 earthquake that measured 7.3 on the Richter scale. The town has been pieced back together, but this temple has been left untouched as a monument to those who lost their lives in the earthquake.








We bought a few things at the market next to the temple, and the Taiwanese American family in our group bought bananas to share. The bananas are smaller and creamier than the bananas we buy at the grocery at home. We have several photos from this stop at the temple.




We drove up, up, up into the mountains. The scenery reminded me of our trip to the Alps in Germany and Austria, except that the little villages nestled in the valleys looked like Chinatown. In the valleys there were palm and banana leaf trees, but higher in the mountains there were some cedar trees. In the valley we stopped and bought some grapes at a roadside stand. These grapes are the best grapes I've ever had in my life. They have the flavor of grape jelly... just not so sugary sweet... but so juicy. I liked them so much I had a whole bunch, snacking on them all day in the van as we drove through the mountains. We also stopped at a "plum factory" where we bought plum candies and took a few photos of some plum trees and a few early plum blossoms.


best grapes I've ever had


plum blossom




We headed to YuShan (Jade Mountain) National Park (click for link). The Jade Mountain peak is the highest point in Taiwan. In the mountains we saw a few fiery red maples in the lush green forests. There were also huge poinsettia bushes growling along the roadside. We also saw monkeys along the road and fed them some bananas. I have video of this... and will try to upload this later. I'm posting a few of my favorite photos, and then there's the slideshow with the whole set.




Here's our tour group. Our guide is the man in the lower left.


This is Kevin looking cool infront of a tree that is over a thousand years old.


My favorite photo Kevin took of this tree in black and white.



Next our tour guide drove us to AliShan National Scenic Area (click for link) for more breathtaking views of the mountains. We walked through a cedar forest and were amazed at some of the giant trunks. We ate lunch in the AliShan, and were told that the foods were "wild," such as made from wild pigs. One of the dishes contained little spicy shrimps, and the shrimp were to be eaten whole with the shell on. Kevin ate several, while I had half of one just to say I tried it. There's something about eating shrimp whole that just doesn't settle right with me while trying to swallow. Sorry. I think the group enjoyed watching my face as I tried to swallow it down.

Our last stop of the day was at a place where you can taste test and purchase AliShan tea. We had a tea demonstration where we tried three kinds of tea, select tea, oolong tea, and high mountain oolong from the highest peaks. They said it was their very finest tea, and special as it could only be harvested two times per year.

We got back into Taipei really late, talked to family via web cam, and went to bed. Zzzzzz.

Chinese Pandas Arrive in Taipei

I've been asked if it's possible for us to see the pandas that just arrived at the Taipei Zoo. They'll be in quarantine for a month, so no one will be able to see them until at least Chinese New Year. When they are available for public display, I'm sure that the zoo will be crazy busy with so many Taiwanese wanting to see the pandas not only because they're so cute, but because of the HUGE political message they represent. The Pandas Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan's names together mean "united."

We have seen some signage around Taipei with two pandas and things for sale with two pandas. I didn't understand what it was all about until the day the pandas arrived and the Taiwanese Americans on our tour were talking about it with the tour guide.l

Day 2 - Puli and Sun Moon Lake

NOTE: MY PHOTOS ARE STILL UPLOADING INTO MY FLICKR ACCOUNT. I'LL GO BACK AND EDIT THIS POST TO INSERT PHOTOS LATER. Until then, you're welcome to go directly to my flickr account to check out photos from the day.

I’m writing this from our hotel in TaiChung. It’s supposed to be a nice international hotel, but it’s not. It’s old, the carpets in the hallway are all stained, and we could not figure out how to make the power go on and had to have someone from the front desk come to show us how to turn on the lights. We got into our hotel between 7-8pm and once we figured out the lights situation, talked to my mom and dad via video we were all ready to go to bed. I woke up about 3:30am, and it's time to start uploading photos off the cards and start blogging!

In the morning we indulged in the Grand Hyatt’s breakfast buffet once again. We’re going to have to quit going there, because I don’t think I’d fit into my pants anymore if we ate her every morning for a week. We hit up the pastries first off. There was honeycomb hanging in a contraption to allow the fresh honey to drizzle out and collect in a pan below. Mmmmm. We had some pastries and then checked out the Chinese section again. To our surprise, we'd missed half of the Chinese selection yesterday. There were six kinds of steamed dumplings and rolls, as well as all of this other stuff including Chinese pickles and the famous thousand year old egg. I've read about thousand year old egg and seen videos of it on travel shows and have been intrigued by it. Kevin plopped of these black eggs down on his plate right away. I passed. I'll post video later in a separate post about this experience.


We met our tour van driver David in the hotel lobby at 8:10am and we loaded up into a van to pick up the rest of our group. The others were staying at the Howard and Caesar Park. The first family is a Taiwanese American family from San Francisco, a mother and her college/late high school aged children. Interestingly, the mother's hometown is Tainan, where Hannah Claire lives! This is the first time these kids have been to Taiwan, and they just returned to Taipei from a trip to Tainan. The second family is an Asian American family from Los Angeles, a mother and son who's about 12 years old. After picking everyone up, we set out for our tour.


It was about a four hour drive down highway three to TaiChung and the over to Puli. On the way it was interesting to watch the land change. It went from metropolitan city life, to manufacturing, and then agricultural when we got off the highway and drove in the mountains. Our tour guide pointed out what was growing in the fields along the way. We saw rice, corn, tobacco, betelnut, sweet potato, strawberries, dragon fruit, sugar cane, and flowers.

I'd read about betelnut and the betelnut girls, but it still surprised me to see little glass boxed shacks with scantily clad women along the roadway, sometimes one on every block in towns. There are flashing lights outside drawing attention to the betelnut beauties. Click here for a link to a starting point to read about betelnut beauties. Our driver asked several times if Kevin could like to stop to buy some. I answered for him. NO. Kevin wouldn't want it anyway, but it is an interesting phenomenon.

Our driver stopped along the road to buy from an old man selling sugarcane and sugarcane juice. We bought a bag of sugarcane and tasted someone else's juice. The cane is pulpy and you suck the juice out of it. The street vendors give you lots of little plastic sacks with you big sack of sugar cane. I ate several bites, and then realized that the others were sucking out the sweet juice and then spitting out the sugarcane pulp into their little sacks. Ahh. That's what the little sacks are for!

Puli is in Nantou County. Our guide described this at the heart of Taiwan. Our guide said that Puli is famous for water, wine, women and weather, and that there are a lot of retired Japanese living there in the pristine mountainous area.

We stopped at a little shopping area for tourists that our guide described as a winery. There were several vendors that sold rice alcohol. We tasted a few samples, but didn't care for it. Some were very strong and others very bitter. There were gummies, preserved fruits, and all kinds of sweets. We did buy several boxed treats to take home.

We went to a restaurant for a late lunch. Our guide told us at the end of the dinner that this was a meal specific to the Hakka people (see link to read about he Hakka). We had pork intestine, pork feet with mushrooms, tea served in Dixie cups, sticky rice, beef with green onions, a vegetable, a dish with fresh bamboo, a soup with pork, and orange slices for dessert. We tried everything and only used chopsticks. I surprised myself, and I'm really getting the hang of them... except for eating sticky rice when it's not so sticky. The pork intestine had the consistency of calamari. I think we limited ourselves to one bite of that. :)

After lunch we drove further into the mountains to go to Sun Moon Lake and visit several temples and a pagoda. There were a lot of tour buses.

Our first stop was the WenWu Temple (click link), which is very large and impressive with several halls, but very touristy. I have lots of photos from this temple, and the photos speak for themselves. You could buy wind chimes and have the temple workers pass them through incense smoke by temple workers. The chimes are hung and used to write their names and the contents of their wishes. You ring your chimes at the top of the steps and then go hang them next to the step of your Zodiac character.

I won't get into a discussion here about temples, except to say that I'm thankful that my God allows me to talk to him by prayer anytime, anywhere... without the need for burning paper money or buying wind chimes.

We drove around the lake to the pagoda that I really looked forward to seeing. We hiked up many, many, many, many steps to the top a mountain to the Ci En Pagoda (click link). I didn't think I'd make it, but after several rest stops and a couple hits off the albuterol inhaler, I did. I stayed at the bottom and enjoyed the view while Kevin hiked himself up the stairs to the very top of the pagoda to ring the bell. BONG!!! I'll post some video of Kevin's bell ringing later.

My favorite stop was at the Syuentzang Temple (click link) because of the beautiful gardens outside, and there were several monks and worshipers to people watch. Kevin rang a another big bell outside the temple. BONG!!! I've got video of that too, of course. A monk smiled very nice to me and motioned for me to come light some candles, but I respectfully declined. I'll just watch.

Outside the temple we bought tea eggs from an old woman. They were 8 New Taiwan dollars each. That's equivalent to 25 cents in the US. They taste like hard boiled eggs with a little tea, soy, and flavoring from star anise. They're pretty to look at, but not as strong as I expected them to be. I tried to make tea eggs before but used anise seed instead because I didn't know about star anise at that time. I guess I just expected them to be more flavorful. The eggs are stained brown and pretty, but really don't taste that much different.

Here's the posts where I tried to make tea eggs before at home:
Part 1
Part 2
Star anise does not equal anise seed

We drove about two hours back to TaiChung to spend the night. Our guide pointed out all of the restaurants that we could venture out into for noodles, dim sum, and hot pot... but we were so tired and just wanted to go to bed. It's 5:30am now and Kevin's still sleeping. I think he's got about 9 hours of sleep in him so far... and he's not moving... so I don't think he's ready to wake up any time soon. Heehee!

new Hannah Claire pic in my in-box makes my day

Redirect: Hello Kitty Baby Hospital

Isn't this super cute, or what?!?!? Hello Kitty Baby Hospital (click on link)

Day 1 - getting to know Taipei

Last night we didn't set the alarm clock and just slept in. When we woke up we looked out the window for a little while at the street scene below. Taipei looked really overcast and the streets were wet. Looks like it could be spitting rain. We got ourselves together and went downstairs to check out this breakfast buffet that we've heard so many rave about here at the Grand Hyatt Taipei. The buffet is in multiple sections scattered throughout the restaurant, and was a little confusing to us newbies. The section we checked out first contained Chinese food. We tried lots of little bites of about everything. I can't remember the names of the items, except giggling at omelets with black fungus (aka a mushroom omelet). We were served coffee (me) and tea (Kevin). Next we checked out the juice bar. I had carrot juice and Kevin had green starfruit juice, which we weren't too impressed with. Next we found the motherload of fruits, breads, specialty cheeses, cereals, nuts, and yogurts. I had my first taste of dragon fruit, and I looooooove it. Kinda like kiwi, but without so much acidic bite. We also found a section of buffet that would cater to guests from the UK and US with baked beans, scrambled eggs, omelets, eggs to order, toast, sausages, bacon, and ham. With full bellies, we were ready to start our day. But wait! As we were exiting the restaurant, we discovered that we missed a section of the buffet. There's another section with sweet breads. Darn. Oh well, that leaves something great to explore another day.



Even though it was still very overcast, we decided to check out Taipei 101 first as it's just across the street. The first several floors is like a luxury shopping mall with all sorts of designer stores that I've never seen in the US. Versase, Dolce and Gabbana, Louis Vuitton, etc. This is so totally not us... and I wasn't even interested in window shopping. We followed signs for the observation deck and bought our tickets. It's amazing how quick the elevators get you to the top of the tallest building in the world. I think I had to swallow three times on the way up and town to keep popping my ears. At the top we were given little headsets where we could listen to an English guided tour. We took all kinds of photos, and were surprised at how far we could see even on a bad weather day. Kevin my techo guru was very interested in the damper system that keeps this engineering marvel of a building up in the air.



Here's some photos of grocery items at Jason's market in the bottom of Taipei 101.



We got out our map and decided to walk to the yellow roofed Sun Yat-Sen Memorial Hall. It wasn't far at all. We were getting drizzled on a little bit, but it wasn't too bad. Once again, I'm really glad that I brought my trench coat to keep the water off me. I'd be pretty damp if I just had a sweatshirt on, even with my umbrella. It was cool and misty. In this humidity, my hair didn't stand a chance, and was a curly frizzy windblown mess all day. We arrived at Sun Yat-Sen just at the right time, and viewed a changing of the guard. We asked later, and learned that they do this ceremonial changing of the honor guard every hour on the hour. It was very impressive... and also quite long. After the changing of the guard we were approached by a young woman with a neon orange vest that identified her as an English speaking tour guide. She was very sweet, and welcomed us to the hall. She asked where we were from and we made some small talk. She gave us a little bag of chocolates to wish us "Happy Christmas." The tour guide asked if she could give us a tour. I respectfully declined as I wanted to poke around on my own. After she started to walk away, I realized that there weren't any other tour guides roaming about, and she was here just for us. Kevin caught up with her and told her that we'd like a tour after all. The young tour guide got really excited. "Really? You'd like a tour?" and her face was all lit up. She went on and on what a present it was for her to be able to give us a tour. Heehee. She showed us around the exhibits detailing Chinese revolutionist Sun Yat-Sen's life. We could understand about 80 percent of her tour while listening very intently.



Next we made our way to the MRT subway station to head to Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall. Down in the subway station we couldn't quite figure out on our own how the automatic machine worked to put money on a subway card. There was an information booth nearby, and Kevin went and purchased cards with 500 Taiwan Dollars each on them. The attendant explained that you press the card on the indicated area on a turnstile as you enter and when you leave, and the system takes money off your card. It shows how much money is left on the card every time you use it. We kept joking that we needed a Staples Easy Button to press. "That was easy!" Kevin's been studying the subway routes for awhile and we've been excited to use the MRT for transportation around Taipei. On the MRT they have blue seats that are reserved for the elderly, disabled, pregnant women, and women carrying children. You are allowed to sit in the blue seats, but if one of these categories of people get on the subway, you are to yield the blue seat to them. The MRT was really clean and nice. There are signs to tell you not to smoke, eat, or drink on the subway. The fine is about $50 US if you are caught doing this. There were electronic signboards above the doors as well as an announcement over the intercom that tell you what station is next in Mandarin as well as in English. Once again, "That was easy!" Here's a map below of the MRT lines.

Once again, we were on our way to Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall. The MRT stops right at it. We walked around and took some photos. I got a little emotional while we were there, as it felt like something... well, someone was missing. Hannah was missing. I so badly wanted to put down a blanket on the ground and take her photo with these beautiful buildings in the background. Okay, okay. No time for tears. We'll be back! Just hope that it's a prettier day next week. This spitting rain and cold weather is the pits for taking photos. I really really wanted to check out the pond and gardens next to the hall. I've wanted to take a photo of them ever since I followed Sherry's blog when she and her husband traveled to Taiwan for Kobi two years ago. Wow, it's amazing that it's been a whole two years since I was loving this post by Sherry... and decided that when we go to Taiwan, I've got to see this beautiful bridge.

By this time we were geting tired and cold. We took the MRT back to the stop near our hotel, and walked back to the Hyatt to freshen up and get ready for dinner.

Back at the hotel, we called up the couple that we were meeting for dinner. They are also in Taiwan as they just adopted their son from Cathwel. We confirmed our plans to meet up at Din Tai Fung in the SOGO department store for dinner. The MRT goes right to the store and you don't even have to go outside. While trying to figure out which set of stairs to take to get into the store, I heard my name. "Sarah! Sarah!" Well, there they were! Pretty funny... I never expected anyone to be yelling my name in a subway station in Taipei!

After spending PLENTY of time oohing over the baby, we made our way up into the department store and into the restaurant. I'm going to list what we had with some links so you can see photos:

• sugar pea shoot


• beef and noodle soup (Taiwan is famous for!)


• Kevin had hot and sour soup, his favorite


• a couple kinds of dumplings, but I don't remember what they were. Sorry! My favorite was really juicy inside. Mmmmmm.


• drunken chicken

After dinner we decided to head out to look for some dessert. We poked around the department store and I bought some pineapple cakes and moon cakes to take home with us. Our friends found some of their favorite Japanese gummy candies and gave us a bag. Kevin LOVES gummies, so he's in for a real treat. I was hoping for something traditional, and we found it. We found a place that had shaved ice. We got two kinds. Number one had red beans and gelatin. Number two had black boba (tapioca balls) and sweet potatoes. Both kinds had a syrup pored over the ice that tastes like brown sugar. I'm not a fan of the red beans, but everything else was great. The sweet potatoes were my favorite. I know, sounds strange... sweet potatoes on shaved ice, but the brown sugar syrup makes it work.

After dessert we said our goodbyes and headed back to the hotel. Kevin went to sleep, and I tried to talk via video with my mom and dad, but they kept loosing their internet connection so that didn't work out so well. It took forever to upload all of these photos from today to Flickr, and I haven't' attempted to do anything with the video yet.

Tomorrow we leave on a two day tour, so it may be awhile before I'm online again. Not sure if our hotel in the door will provide internet access.

Good night... from Taipei. Just one more week, and we'll be crazed new parents looking out the window at this.

Good Morning from Taipei

Good morning from Taipei! It's a wet day. We're getting ready to go get breakfast and start exploring. I'm glad that I brought a trench coat and an umbrella, as well as two rain ponchos. More later!

Yup, I couldn't help but laugh when I had to turn my head sideways to see the top of the 101 with my video camera. Here's what it looks like from below in a still shot.

Taipei - at last!

One little post before going to bed for our families so they know we're here. Kevin's snoring away already.


We were soooooo tired on the flight from Osaka to Taipei. We both put our chairs down flat and slept pretty much the whole way after a little dinner. This part of the post is for families that will be traveling to Taiwan... to reassure you that the Taipei airport is no stress. When arriving in Taipei, it was so easy to navigate the airport. Just follow the signs. First stop was the money exchange. Kevin handed them dollars and got Taiwanese dollars. At immigration we just filled out a little form to with our addresses, brought up our passports, and were asked two questions. "Is this your first time here?" "How long are you going to stay?" That's it! I'm sure that we'll be thoroughly interrogated when we re-enter the US. Then we followed the signs to baggage... saw our bags coming down the belt all together right away. Followed the signs to the taxi stand. We told the taxi stand that we wanted to go to the Hyatt, and the guy at the taxi stand told our driver (dressed in a suit and tie, driving a newer Toyota Camry with leather) where to take us. It took about 30 minutes to get to the hotel and ended up costing $1300 Taiwan dollars equivalent to $40 US.

It was dark so we couldn't see much on the drive to the hotel, but Kevin tracked where we were on the Garmin GPS the whole way so we knew where we were. The Hyatt is stunningly beautiful and I'm sure that we'll take lots of photos in the lobby tomorrow. The service is amazing at the front desk. While Kevin unpacked I took a bubble bath. Ahhhh!

Here's a link to Amy's blog so you can see what Sedona our babydog has been up to this weekend. She's in good hands!

in transit - hello from Osaka

Friday we were pretty worried about weather. We had an ice storm that coated everything with a thick layer of ice and knocked out power to many. The place that I work at didn't have power until after 1pm Friday, and we tried to keep ourselves busy in the dark with flashlights all morning. When I left work close to 3pm... we still didn't have phones yet either. Kevin and I kept checking the status of the airports we would be using and praying that the salt trucks and de-icing equipment could take care of things.

Saturday morning Sara S. took us to the airport. Suprisingly, we were all packed and ready to go... except for me trying to figure out my liquids. Does aerosol hairspray count as a liquid? Does chapstick count as a gel? After sorting through what's a vital liquid/gel and what's not... we were ready to go.

At the Fort Wayne airport we met a woman who had recently returned from Ethiopia to adopt her 18 month old son. He was pretty cute running around the airport and played a little peek-a-boo with us.

Our flights were pretty uneventful. Just long. Over fourteen hours in business class from Detroit to Osaka with Norwest was relatively nice. The seats could lay back at almost level with the feet really propped up. It was dark and people (mostly Japanese) were really quiet. We tried our best to sleep as much as possible. I know that Kevin's had me watch too much Star Trek since we've been married, as I thought that our seats looked like "pods," and I suggested that we should try and sleep and put our bodies into "stasis" so that we'd think the flight would go quicker.

Here in Osaka it is rainy and our flight is delayed 80 minutes. That's okay, as it gave us time to change clothes and freshen up. I was so happy to take a bath with wet wipes and brush my teeth!

Here's a couple of pics before we get ready to board to Taipei.

Here's us with our bags when we arrived at the airport Saturday morning. Kevin weighed these bags over and over redistributing weight so each bag would be under 50 pounds.

And here's one of me after my wet wipes bath and change of clothes. Ahh... much happier!

Next stop... Tapei!

two days... just two days...

Today someone asked me if I had my "I'm going to be a parent freak out moment" yet. Uh... I had it Tuesday night. Just sitting on the couch thinking what am I doing? I'm going to be a parent? I'm going to be responsible for a little someone else? What do I do with her? Made me feel a lot better to hear that other people have the same thoughts... the night before before they have their scheduled c-section, as they realize they're in labor for the first time, or as they prepare to travel to meet the child they are adopting for the first time.

The lists of to-dos have been narrowed down to only a few things. This is our last night with the babydog Sedona before we leave and she got a little cuddle time, but not as much as I'd like as I have some Christmas things to take care of before we go.

People ask a lot how long the flight is and if I'm nervous about international travel. I'm not thinking about that at all. Figuring out how comfort our little girl... working on getting her to trust and depend on us... that's what's important... and that's what my thoughts are centered around.

I think that this will be the last post before we leave. If I find internet access in the airports I'll post hello from there. We're flying Fort Wayne to Detroit, Detroit to Osaka (Japan), and Osaka to Taipei.

Saturday 12/20 - travel
Sunday 12/21 - arrive in Taipei and get some sleep
Monday 12/22 - try to recover from jet lag and explore Taipei, planning on meeting another adopting family for dinner at Din Tai Fung for dumplings
Tuesday 12/23 - leave on two day tour to Sun Moon Lake
Wednesday 12/24 - continue tour, return to Taipei
Thursday 12/25 - Christmas exploring Taipei
Friday 12/26 - travel to Tainan
Saturday 12/27 - explore Tainan
Sunday 12/28 - explore PingTung
Monday 12/29 - forever family day with Hannah Claire, return to Taipei via train
Tuesday 12/30 - AIT appointment
Wednesday 12/31 - pick up visa at AIT, hope to enjoy New Year's Eve fireworks
Thursday 1/1 - hope to explore Taipei a little with Hannah Claire
Friday 1/2 - the long journey home
Saturday 1/3 - sleep!
Sunday 1/4 - family Christmas

For while we're gone... time difference is 13 hours. Taiwan is 13 hours ahead of us in the Eastern time zone.

And finally... I'll leave you with a link to a little video Kevin's folks sent us today. I've been busting a gut laughing at it tonight!

an open thank you note to Grandma Marjorie

Dear Grandma Marjorie,

Thank you so much for the frozen meats that arrived at our door today. I'm especially looking forward to Kevin grilling us some steaks and pork chops when we get back from Taiwan. What a great present!

I took some photos tonight of Kevin for you. You know the story about giving a kid a really nice Christmas present and he spends all Christmas day playing with the box? Well... Kevin's been playing all night with the dry ice that the meats were packed in. He's had dry ice in water, pretending to drink dry ice, and putting the dry ice in a plastic pop bottle in water and watching it explode. Luckily he is smart enough to do the exploding part outside the front door, watching it from inside the safety of the house.

I'm a little frightened of the things that Kevin and his little sidekick will think up over the next several years. I'm considering having our TIVO block the TV show Mythbusters from being viewed in our home. What do you think?

Love, Sarah

last weekend at home without a kiddo

This was the last weekend we'll ever spend alone together at home without a kiddo for a long, long, long time. Woah! Some friends with kids suggested that we make whoopie in the kitchen and live it up. Uh... no whoopie in the kitchen. Sorry to disappoint. I think we did over 10 loads of laundry, washing everything that wasn't nailed down. Fridge cleaned out, floors vacuumed and mopped, bathrooms cleaned, humidifier running. My mom came over and helped on Sunday. She says that we passed Nana's inspection regarding our child safety except for some metal things and dragon toothpicks left over from Chinese new year that are on the bottom shelf in the kitchen bookcase. As long as Hannah doesn't like to eat large amounts of Sedona's dog food, we're good. I'm not sure how we could position the dog food where the 12 pound dog could get to it and the 15 pound baby could not. Oh well. What kid doesn't try eating the dog/cat food?

Here's a few photos of the disaster area that was the living room during all of the laundry sorting... and then the happiness in the dishwasher when we washed Hannah's baby spoons, plates, and sippy cups for the first time.

Here's Kevin's bag... all packed, zipped up, and ready to go.



Here's my bag: donations, gifts, travel books, Wendy's plastic utensils, and no clothes! I'm still deciding what to bring and how much. I'm thinking of bringing clothes for 5 days and having laundry done for us twice at the hotel in Taipei. I know it won't be cheap, but I want to leave room for other things in my bag. I'm bringing lots of underwear. I don't like the idea of strangers washing my underwear.




And then there's Hannah Claire's bag. I think I've been packing it for a month. Naturally, everything is all out Hannah.



Sedona thinks she needs a bag too. She says to throw in some treats and she's good to go.

I'm really pumped because another adopting family contacted us and we hope to have dinner together in Taipei. Woohoo! I'm thinkin' dumplings for our first night out.

Hope this work week goes by quickly. We leave for the airport at 8:30am this Saturday.

baby face

These photos are per Judy's request.

This gives new meaning to a man with a "baby face." Heh heh.

T minus 9 days and counting

Nope, we can't go yet. Hannah's pink suitcase is packed and ready to go (minus baby carrier, thermometer, baby hairbrush, fingernail clippers, bulb syringe, and inflatable bath tub)... but Mama and Daddy still have plenty to do.

recycle all of the cardboard in the garage check
make arrangements for someone to take us to the airport check (thanks Sara S.!)
find the misplaced baby carrier!!! check
exchange thermometer I purchased for one with batteries that work replaced battery-check
buy a baby hairbrush, baby fingernail clippers, bulb syringe, inflatable bath tub check
return clothing bought online and decided not to keep check
continue increasing my supply of individually wrapped disposable utensils from Wendy's check
pack scissors, duct tape, backpack check
buy and pack snacks for the trip check
buy dog food and treats for Sedona for while we are away check
finish our laundry check
lay out work clothes for next week and pack our clothes check
finish gift shopping, pack gift bags and tissue paper check
tidy up car and pack warm blanket with the car seat check
make copies of credit cards in case they are lost/stolen
hold mail check
wrap Christmas presents and take them over to Mom and Dad's house check
have a practice session with Mom and Dad's web cams check
call homestudy agency and schedule first post placement report (2, 4, and 6 months) check
change withholding from 2 to 3 check

I have the weekend off, but I'm working Monday through Friday next week... right up until the day we leave. Hopefully we'll be able to have most everything done this weekend.

Kevin showed up at work today to take me to visit the funeral home and was dressed in a suit and tie... and his goatee was gone! I hardly recognize him without the facial hair. We'd talked about not having facial hair when we go to St. Lucy's as Hannah Claire most likely hasn't spent much time around men, but I didn't expect to see him clean shaven and in a suit and tie all in one day.

T minus 10 days and counting

This afternoon we sat down and got all of our documents organized. Tomorrow Kevin will FedEx our I-600, DS-230, I-864, and 2007 federal tax return along with copies of W2s to AIT. It makes me nervous to check, recheck, and triple check that our address is spelled correctly and to make sure that we didn't miss any signatures. I treated myself to a little digiscrapping when we were finished. I haven't had a chance to do this for a little while.

Early this morning we got a little surprise. We received updated measurements for Hannah Claire. On 12/5/08 she weighed 14.5 pounds and was 25.4 inches long. Unfortunately, the message said also said that our pickup date was January 5th, 2009. WHAT?!?!!?! This mama went a little ballistic, as we planned on being home recovering from jet lag and playing peek-a-boo at home on January 5th. After several late night e-mails back and forth, it was determined that the pickup date is still planned for December 29th... but I'm still recovering from the panic attack that this incorrect date caused me.

Is it time to go yet?

something to smile about

You know that you're loved and your baby is loved when the dentist and his staff send flowers. :) Thanks Dr. A and staff! This was so unexpected and sweet!

Speaking of dentists... I wonder if Hannah has any teeth yet. I googled "baby teeth" to find out when baby teeth come in. She's 7.5 months adjusted age right now.
I wanted to grow Sedona's hair out again so she would have enough hair on top for a top knot again for pretty photos with Hannah Claire. This isn't working out. Sedona hates top knots and tries to start scratching them out about five minutes after I put them in. I can't keep up with the brushing, and she has some mats on one leg and behind one ear that I can't get out. Sigh. If I don't have time to keep her with long hair now, there's no way that I'm going to be able to do this once Hannah comes home. Babydog, looks like you'll be getting a short trim when you go back to the doggie day spa (aka the groomer). I think we'll both be happier with this arrangement.

showered with love - part 2

Sunday at work I was told that we couldn't go in the back room. Apparently the district manager had been in this past week and said that the back room looked like "crap." Another employee was spending the day organizing and would have stuff all over, and we weren't supposed to go back there. I asked two of my co-workers a couple of times what the district manager didn't like. I think we have a well organized and less cluttered back room compared with many other area locations. Did the district manager think it was messy or dirty? I never got an answer. Oh well. Not my problem... and believe me, I've got plenty of things to worry about at work and what the district manager didn't like about the back room isn't one of them. Sorry, dude. There was a lot of whispering going on too, but that's the norm when you work with a lot of women. Come on girls, let's get on with it and get working!

As we were closing up, Kevin shows up unexpectedly and said that he wanted to go out to dinner. "Okay. Sure. Where do you want to go? But before we leave I really have to go pee. I'll be right back." And off I go out the back door into the back room to lock up. As I go into the back room there's pretty much all of my co-workers that shout "surprise!" There's pink streamers, pink table cloths, pink plates and utensils... and I'm handed a pink Santa hat to put on my head. I'm so totally surprised! And now I REALLY have to pee!

After a brief trip to the bathroom where I can't stop laughing... the party starts. My co-workers brought in all sorts of yummy foods to share and we played a game with how many words can you make out of the letters in the name HANNAH CLAIRE. I can't believe that D could make 33 words. That woman has amazing scrabble skills, and her chipped beef cheese ball is divine. Hannah got some fun toys (which Sedona is frightened of), soft fuzzy jammies, some cutie clothes, blankets, her first bathtub toys, dolls, and her first Christmas ornament. A added a very thoughtful gift, a donation for the orphanage that taken such good care of our little one. We plan on bringing donations of diapers and babyfood with us on the day we meet our daughter. To my co-workers, thank you so much for joining in the celebration of adding Hannah Claire to our family. We feel very loved by you all.

Only 12 days until we leave for Taiwan. Yippie!

Oh, and if you like Asian inspired clothes for little kids... the fall line of Tea is up to 40% off now. I'm holding back, but it was hard to do that. I'll pass the sale along to you if you need a little retail therapy.

from Tisra: "the baby bird is coming home"

Above Hannah Claire's closet, there lives two bluebirds on a plum blossom branch above their empty nest.

Today we received a little package from Tisra with a few of her creations... and the sweetest little photo on her notecard. We taped the photo of this baby bird up into the nest on Hannah Claire's wall. It's still a little surreal that she's coming home soon.

babydog had a playdate

I didn't get quite everything done on my list today, but made a good effort. It was decided that my babydog Sedona needed to have a playdate tonight to meet Wrigley, the sweet beta-dog ruled by an alpha-cat at my friend Amy's house. We're pleased to report that both beta-dog Sedona and beta-dog Wrigley got along quite well during two hours of butt sniffing, chasing, jumping, and a little barking on Sedona's part. My favorite scene of the evening was the choo-choo-train of animals: Sedona following the cat sniffing feline rear with Wrigley following Sedona still checking out her tail end. Amy's kids were so cute in their jammies right before bed, and very excited to have Sedona stay at their house while we are in Taiwan. I have a feeling that Sedona's going to have a LOT of fun while we're away, and she'll need lots of sleep at night after those kiddos go to bed.

I heart the hungry girl.

I commented a few days ago... saying, "I heart Google Maps too, Amanda!" Well, I heart Google maps even more now. I'm a fan of the blog "A Hungry Girl's Guide to Taipei" as I like to check out the Taiwanese dishes she's eating and where she's been. Tonight I discovered that she has a Google map HERE where she shows the locations of her favorite restaurants in Taipei. Cha-ching! Kevin's really gonna like this.

I'm not having much luck with trying to book tour guides online, so we'll just make arrangements when we're in Taipei. We've made reservations to stay at the Grant Hyatt for the first and third legs of our trip. I'll just have the concierge desk help me figure it out, I guess. That's what they're there for. I really want to see Sun and Moon Lake (very pretty web site) and the Taroko Gorge.

I have the day off Wednesday. Lots of things to do! My list:

• Complete immigration paperwork and send it to AIT. check
• Finish writing thank you notes.
• Finish Christmas cards. (I addressed them a month or two ago when I had nothing to do. Just gotta get insert the photos of HC and get them in the mail.) check
• Mail pendants to Rebecca. check
• Mail Christmas gift to a very special niece! check
• Talk to human resources at work to see what they need to add HC to my insurance. check
• Tell family that we'll be bringing home Christmas presents for you from Taiwan... so there won't be things here for most of you before we go. (Oh, that's right! You all read the blog. Well, here's your notice!) check
• Call credit card company so they don't freak out about charges on the card from Taiwan. (It would be very bad if they cut us off right now because they thought the card was stolen.) check
• Figure out what secondary credit cards are still active. (Lots of inactive credit cards are being canceled with the current financial crisis. It would be bad not to have a credit card that works while in Taiwan!)
• Make a hair appointment for both of us. check
• Make Sedona a doggie day spa appointment for before we leave. (The dog groomer seriously calls her business a doggie day spa. I don't make this stuff up.) check

Okay. Gotta go to bed. Gotta be productive tomorrow. No hanging out in the robe wasting time boo-hooing in Hannah's room. Night night.

Taiwan Map Reading

Now that we are getting very close to our trip to Taiwan to pick up our daughter we are trying to compile a list of tourist places to visit before Gotcha! day and practical locations after.
I am experienced with travel and I can usually get around foreign locations without problems as I make sure to have current maps of the area I am visiting.
My problem I am encountering now is I'm not understanding the logic of Taiwan's road naming and address system. There are several variations of translated names for roads (Some maps will label a road Da-An, Daan or Da An; Jhongsiao or Zhongxiao). Toss in the seemingly endless occurrences of alley's, sections and lanes and I am officially confused.
If anyone knows of a place where I can learn how to navigate using the Taiwan address system I would appreciate some info. I have also made a "Google Maps" pincusion style map that can be edited online. If you know of a good spot to eat, shop or otherwise hang out, feel free to add it to the list. It can be found HERE. If we get enough people sharing I plan on making the map available to anyone adopting from Taiwan.

Added by Sarah at 9:11pm:
I heart Google maps too, Amanda! My innovative husband found us a Google map of the Shilin Night Market that is pretty aewsome. Here's a YouTube video for this night market. Bring on the stinky tofu.