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And we’re off!!

Insert Rocky theme music here.

We are heading for the airport in a couple hours and begin 29 hours of travel, so you won’t see anything else out of us until sometime Thursday. I hear the beds are horrifically hard at the hotel in Beijing, but I get the feeling we just won’t care. We are flying out a day early to help ourselves adjust to the time change. Then on Friday we have ourselves booked on a 12 hour tour to force ourselves onto China time. Then we tour all day Saturday with the rest of our travel group who should be arriving on Friday.

And Sunday we fly to Nanchang, Jiangxi to get the babies in the afternoon!! You know, the ACTUAL point of the trip. LOL.

We appreciate all the emails, phone calls and other messages we have received in the last couple days. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your prayers throughout our trip.

Love, Mike and Louanne

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Photos of Nadia’s room

Nadia_Room_03

Nadia’s room is complete (except for the painting from Aunt Tahni). Mike took some photos today since we have had many requests to see her room. Click the photo above to see all four photos.

We just love that it is so bright and cheerful. All we need is a BABY!!

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Thankful Thursday + 1

This is one day late because it’s been a crazy week of preparing for the trip.

o For this AWESOME outfit from Tiffany, Miyon and Marla at World Vision. I just started crying when I saw it. It’s the perfect gift for me because of how I adore my volunteer work for WV.

o For the willing volunteers from our church who will travel to Reynosa, Mexico on Saturday morning to spend a week with the Isaiah 55 ministries. They will be assisting the missionaries with the construction of the deaf school and part of the group will be leading VBS for the children down there. Mike and I desperately wanted to go on this trip becuase of the time we spent with the missionarys in January, but we will be praying for them.

o For all the people in the church who are not going, but who gave generously at the Silent Auction and raffle and garage sale to make this trip a possibility.

o For all the people who sponsored World Vision children from China who are sending gifts with us for their sponsored children. One sponsor got a shirt from the Stockyards and one from the Cowgirl Musuem. It’s so fun to think that these kids will get a Texas shirt from their Texas sponsors.

o For everything working out with booking our plane tickets, hotel, tours and more. It’s a relieft that we can just get on the plane and everything is done and paid for.

o For the girls at the Hurst Guaranty bank who have seen me about 12 times in the last week looking for “just a few more clean 100’s.”

o For all the support of the been there done that parents who have offered all sorts of entertaining and helpful advise about the trip.

o For the fact that we leave in just 4 days!!!!

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Have tickets – will fly

We got all of our travel arrangements done yesterday. What an adventure! So here you go:

    7/17 – Leave DFW at 7pm on Tuesday 7/17 (yes, that’s one week from today).
    Arrive at LAX at 8 pm.
    Leave LAX at 11:50 PM for China.
    7/19 – Arrive in Beijing at noon (lose a day to travel, transfer in Guangzhou, and the time difference). Pass out in hotel room.
    7/20 -7/21 Tour Beijing for 2 days and try to adjust to the time change.

    7/22 – Fly to Nanchang, Jiangxi Province. GET NADIA!

    7/23 – 7/26 Lots of paperwork and bonding time with baby.
    7/27 – Fly to Guangzhou to finish more paperwork.
    7/30 – American Consulate appointment (final official thing in China).
    7/31 – Leave GZ at 9 pm. Arrive in LAX at 7 pm…two hours earlier than we left China. This cracks me up.
    8/1 – Visit with Grandma Stephanie and fly home to DFW at 5 pm. Arrive back in Texas at 10 pm.

WOO HOO!!! We know we are going to be dead tired after those insane flights, but it’s worth it.

Thanks in advance to all who will be praying for us and Nadia during the trip. Thanks to those who are watching our house (and having fresh food available – bless you – I know I am going to be ready for a salad). Thanks to our “drivers” for the airport runs 🙂

I have already started packing which I know doesn’t surprise a single person who knows me. And we are feeling good that everything will be done in time for us to leave. In fact, if we had Nadia’s medicine, we could leave today.