When sombody loved me…

Hello Everyone!

Today was Chaeli’s medical exam and she did great. We found out that her weight was 16.8 pounds. She really is a little baby still. I just love how tiny she is. The doctors said she was healthy and her little chubby cheeks, arms and legs display that well. If you could all remember to pray for Chaeli’s little cough. Last night she started coughing a croupy cough (it was the first time we had heard it). The pollution in the air here is really bad. You can see it hanging thick like smog. We tried to keep Chaeli indoors for most of the day, and headed for a local mall here in Guangzhou. Dan has made a post below about our day.

Chaeli continues to convince me that I have been given the best, happiest, cutest, most cuddly baby in all of Asia. Spending time with Chaeli is like playing with a favorite doll that you can’t put down. I cannot get enough of her.

We love and miss you all very much!

Sheila.
xoxoxo

Internet access was down for the last 18 hours so we are delayed in posting for today. We have had some downtime today and took the opportunity to go, where else? Shopping! Sheila had her toes done and we enjoyed a good cup of coffee at Starbucks at the 6 floor fashion mall in downtown Guangzhou. When you go in to get a pedicure here, you really get a pedicure. There was a very talented male nail artist there who painstakingly painted delicate beautiful flowers onto Sheila’s toes. She said it was the most beautiful art work she had ever seen on a pair of toes! She can’t stop looking down at them (and neither can Chaeli…she is already a girly girl).

China is changing so fast you can tell by the mingling of the ancient with the modern. Here in Guangzhou buildings are springing up everywhere along with businesses to support the masses of people that live in this city. Almost 10 million people live in this city. Traffic is not so bad here as cars are not as abundant as bicycles, though I suspect that is changing fast as a new middle class is emerging and the standard of living is increasing. They recently passed a law forbidding motorcycles from entering the city because of the traffic problems they caused by careless drivers.

There is a craving for everything Western here, from fashion to technology to even fast food. Ask most of the local Chinese and they would tell you they’d rather go to KFC or McDonalds than eat traditional Chinese food, even at the expense of a weeks wages. It seems to me the US has been successful in exporting its culture for China is eating it up as fast as they possibly can. I just hope the Chinese culture, which has survived for almost 5 thousand years, will not dissapear through this process.

The English language is triumphed as the language to learn in order to have the competitive edge in the job market here. They even have a game show on Chinese Television that judges contestants who speak the best English, and awards them with prizes and gifts. I have to admit that it is pretty humorous to listen to some of the contestants structure their sentences. I’m sure the locals feel the same way about me as I try to utter a jibberish thank you in Chinese by saying, “Shea Shea.”

Sheila and I have become more and more bonded with Chaeli everyday. It’s as if she has always been our daughter. Words cannot express the joy we feel to hold this child in our arms. If you have been following the blog and looking at the pictures you can see that in Sheila’s face. You can’t fake this kind of love or joy. It comes from deep inside of you. I can’t wait for Chaeli to meet her 3 older brothers. She will have a life changing impact on their lives, and they will have the same on hers. It is going to be a wonderful life with all 6 of us together.

When we were out shopping today, Chaeli (in typical fashion) managed to attract a crowd of Chinese women (old and young alike) who come up to us cooing and giggling over our daughter, asking us if they could hold her and parade her around. You’d think she was their daughter. In a matter of speaking I guess she is, as she represents the very best that China has given us. It makes us feel good though when she turns to us and puts out her hands for us to take her back. Sheila especially loves this.

One of the pleasures I have while feeding Chaeli is the way she looks up to you with her big dark pearl eyes and stares at you, really studying your face.

Chaeli has really begun to like her baths. When Sheila first put her in the bathtub with her, she wasn’t used to it, but now she quietly lets us submerge her in the warm water without any fussing. The best part is when I get to cuddle her up in a white fluffy towel afterwards. She then takes a piece of the towel into her mouth and chews on the corner.