37 pictures for you

Saturday, Sept. 25th

I haven't had a chance to post over the last couple of days so I will
try to catch up. We have done several fun things.

On Wednesday, the six of us walked to Starbucks and had breakfast. I
had a wonderful creme brulee machiatto. Then we walked around the city
looking at all the statues. We stopped at a playground and watched the
kids play for awhile. A few people stopped to take pictures. We then
walked on the path by the river back to the hotel. Today was the Fall
Moon Festival so the next three days are a holiday. We met Yu Chuan
back at the hotel and had a huge lunch at a local chinese restaurant.
Baishi wanted roasted pigeon...he and George ate the entire head..beak
and all! :( Li-Li wanted one also but I told her next time. Wednesday
night we ate moon cakes to celebrate the Moon Festival. Unfortunately,
it rained that night so we were unable to see the moon.

On Thursday, we spent over an hour looking for the place where Baishi
was found by a local police officer when he was 4 years old. So many
new buildings have been built since then, therefore, we were unable to
find the exact location. Baishi gets extremely car sick, just not
feeling well, due to the diesel fumes so we had to stop a couple of
times. Then we headed to the Yun Tai Garden. It is a beautiful park
(flowers i posted are from there) with many trees, flowers and
colorful statues. After lunch we went to a CRAZY, busy shopping mall.
It has been raining a lot due to the typhoon so we got caught in a
lightening storm. We went to one more mall. They were having a sale
where if you buy certain things that are on certain racks..you can
spend 1000 yuan for only 360 yuan. 100 yuan is roughly 15 dollars. We
bought Baishi a pair of tennis shoes, back pack, 2 shirts, one pair of
shorts, one pair of pajamas...for 360 yuan (about 53 US dollars).
Since we were late getting back to the hotel, we ate at the White Swan
Deli.

On Friday, after breakfast, we headed to the swimming pool. This was
Baishi's second time ever in a pool and the first time that he ever
put his face in the water. All the kids did great and listened very
well. They had a GREAT time. We went to the Orient GArden, a French
restaurant, for lunch. It was very good but was pretty slow. We spent
about 2 hours there. Yu Chuan kept all 4 kids from 4:30-6:45 so George
and I could go shopping. We bought a jewelry box for Li-Li (for her
birthday), silk paintings (two for Li-Li's room and three for the hall
near their bedroom), two paintings for the guest bedroom, and some
necklaces (very unique but hard to explain). We found a store run by a
Christian. She was so nice...we talked to her for about 30 minutes
about their work. They support an orphanage for disabled orphans who
have aged out. The paintings in her store are done by the orphans..one
who has no arms and paints with his mouth and feet. It was amazing.
She also had photo albums of the kids in the orphanage, as well as, of
their work. Then George and I had a margarita at the White Swan bar.
When we got back to the room, we ordered Papa Johns pizza for dinner.
It was very thin crust but tasted different...maybe different
cheese....not sure.

On another note, we got an offer on our house. Not a good offer, but
an offer nonetheless :) We have counter offered and hopefully they
will accept.

The kids have done exceptionally well after getting over jet lag. It
has been hardest on Bella but that is to be expected since she is so
young. I am really impressed with how all the kids will try ANYTHING
to eat.

Some things about our son:
Birhday: July 3, 2000
He is kind, very affectionate and thinks of others first. He has a
sense of humor and likes being the class clown. He is very excited
about coming to America and is asking Yu Chuan many questons about his
school schedule, etc. He wanted to know how many square feet his room
was?? He is used to being on a schedule. He wakes up and immediately
wants to shower and get dressed. We have been able to communicate
fairly well when Yu Chuan has not been around. It has been much easier
so far than we expected.

Please leave a comment after reading, since we are translating the
commemts to him in Mandarin. I will post again soon! Love to all!

The Thornley Family
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