Homecoming pictures

The happy American Baby!

Home sweet home at last!Loving the balloons my dear friend Lisa brought! don't I look cute after my bath?
Waiting from my hair bow....

My first ride in a grocery cart!
It's kinda fun but I prefer my Mom's hotsling wrap to this hard thing!
Me and my Papa Dave Me and my Grandma Hollie

Papa Dave loves to pick me up and was loving on me big time my first day home!
Grandma and Papa were there my first day home and helped my Mom a lot!
Waving hi with Grandma

They live a ways away from us so we're not sure when I'll get to see them again.
My grandma Bette trying to comfort me.
She does a pretty good job!

time for pictures

so excited to go to the pool!
hamming it up in my bikini!

Like my rolls?
swimming with the boys

Peace Ryker!
Love sucking on this thing
And again
The Stroller isn't too bad either!
Love my big brother!

Mathew and Molly resting after lots of shopping at Craftlink
the kids
the kids again NOT looking
Chilling in my floaty swimming with my brother

Jeff selling fruit on the street with Raven
Ryker in Horizon pool
Kieran trying to keep Paisley on the couch
Paisley sqeezing out of Mathews arms

Christian chilling by the pool in his cool outfit
Christian loving on his Mom
Paisley and her Daddy
Dads and babies
mom's and babies

Molly, Jeff and Christian
Santosh, Jenn, and Kieran. Not sure why I didn't get a picture of Brian, Toahn, and Leo!
The boys, (except Paisley!)
Every store we went into had their own alter with incense and Buddha for good luck.
Saw this guy a lot in stores too. Not sure what or who he is.

Our very helpful bag boys!
Our last dinner with our group. Ryker will miss the boys!
Highly recommend the Green Tangerine! Food was GREAT!
Paisley all content in Jeff's lap. He's had lots of practice with 5 kids of his own!
Mathew loved holding Paisley! She was happy too!

We're home, and tired!

We made it home last Thursday morning. My kids did great traveling! We almost missed the Hong Kong to LA flight! Had to RUN with baby in hotsling throught the airport but we made it. Then I had a bit of a break down and yelled at the guys before getting on the flight because they weren't going to let me take the water bottles for the baby. I freaked out. They said they could get me water on the plane! Ok but at my babies convenience? NO! They finally let me take it on. THANK god! Because the first 1 1/2 hrs we couldn't get out of our seats! So what if baby needed bottle then and I didn't have water? I would have been sol!
In LA it took longer than I expected through customs. My sister and niece were waiting for us and worried because our next flight left in 45 minutes and we had to recheck luggage. Luckily it was delayed an hour! We got really lucky there. I would have loved to have stayed in LA but I knew flight back home were not available without going standby for the whole weekend!

My dear friend Lisa treated us to mexican for lunch our first day back! She delivered it and I was so craving it! Jeff's parents were there to meet us and helped a lot that first day! As well as my Mom. I was in a fog that first day! Completely out of it. Us three girls layed down for a nap and I don't even remember it! Jeff woke us up when he got home from work at 6. We've been going to bed early. Last night was the best sleep so far but I feel even more tired today! Tried to keep Paisley Girl up more during the day yesterday and that worked. We went to buy her a few outfits yesterday. Plus school clothes for Raven. She had a skating party and LOVED skating.
I'll post pictures later!

the SCREAMING! OMG the SCREAMING!

Our girl has a scream! You know the kind....the blood curling, pop your knuckles, toe clenching SCREAM!!!
Ok she has attached. That is our goal right? We want the baby girl to attach to us. That's what you read about adopting right? How to help with attachment. I've read about it, I've followed the rules, so now comes the time where she won't let you put her down for 2 seconds???? Nobody explained that part! I usually take a couple of showers a day here. Not the relaxing, help you wake up and start your day kind of shower. No we do the 2 minute shower to get the sweat off you from the HEAT. Today baby girl sat in the stroller outside the glass shower door screaming her head off. It was a rough afternoon. She's fine most of the day when we are on the mov6e, but if I want to do laundry, go pee, you know the basic necessity stuff, she's not having any part of that. If I type this and it's all abreviated you know she's on my lap and I'm typing with one finger. Right now she's actually sleeping in her crib and I should be in bed while I can. I'm still hoping travel agent will email tonight saying we can get out tomorrow night. Doesn't look good. But oh well. There are actually still a few places I'd like to go. I have yet to go to a pogada and I want to hit a book store. I bought the cutest little kids books that are in both vietnamese and english and one all vietnamese for only 1.00 each and would like to get a few more. The shopping here is unbelievable! Molly and I went to a non profit shop today and shopped our little hearts out. Beautiful things for very cheap. I have birthday and Christmas gifts bought! I would have loved to have bought a few silk items for myself, like a jacket or blouse or skirt but Paisley is always attached to me sweating in the hotsling so there is no way I can try anything on. Those of you doing this on your own are VERY brave! I've only had to do it for 6 days and it has been very hard. Ryker has been a great help but it's not like an adult and he can barely hold our chubber chubbs! He certainly can't carry her down the street while shopping. I worry about him enough falling on the crappy sidewalks all on his own.

Tonight was our last meal together with the whole group. We really got lucky to have such great people in our group. All of us very different with very different professions and family lives but a great mix of really good people. I like good people! We ate the best restaurant so far, the Green Tangerine. It is french and so cute but the food is to die for! We ALL loved everything we had! We didn't have reservations and with our large group we had to sit out in the courtyard which was very nice besides not having air conditioning. Some are leaving tomorrow to visit the orphanage of one of their son's. Another couple leave tomorrow to go home. We are scheduled Wedesday and the other couple on Thursday. Funny how we all got different times we were supposed to book our return flights! Not suprising though! But everything in country ran so smoothly and our guy here, Quoc did a fantastic job of making sure of that. He is so humble and when I told him that replied, "That's my job!" How nice is that?!

Any advice on the attachment thing please leave comment. I've never heard a baby scream so mad in my life before. So if you want to share that you went through this as well and how long it took, please let me know!

sorry can't post pictures

I'm bummed I lost the little adapter to put card into other camera to get onto computer! Long story but I have the cutest pictures of Paisley at the pool with her brother in her floaty thing that she just loves! One day it was later so no sun but yesterday we were in the sun so she had on a hat and it was so cute! Just a teaser for when I can post pictures.
Jeff and Raven on home safe and sound. Going to bed VERY early and getting up VERY early. At least it's that way so Jeff would be up and ready for work on Monday!
Still trying to get flights out Tuesday night. Todd said nothing as of right now but will try again so it could be last minute like it was with Jeff and Raven. Then our flight out of LA is late Wednesday night. So we'll still be home Thursday morning as of the latest.

I have an artist sketching pictures of all three kids seperately and pick it up on Tuesday. His work is incredible. Hope they all turn out though because the pictures printed very small at the business center here and that's what he does it by.

Today we're going to make it a full day and do everything we haven't done yet. Cyclo ride, ice cream by the lake, koto restaurant that an Aussie started to help out street kids. Book store, and tonight our whole group is getting together for our last dinner out.

Paisley is so attached to me now that she has screaming fits if I walk out of her sight or lay her down. Very exhausting and I'll be happy to get home and into a routine. That girl can scream too! She does best when she is in the hotsling and stuck right on me. Sometimes hard to get things done though. Right now she is watching her brother play gameboy but that won't last long! We will get her visa today so can officially take her out of the country. This has been a great experience. I've never been away from home for almost 3 weeks so now I'm ready to get home!

they made it safely

Jeff and Raven made it to LA and had to get hotel. Raven slept 10 hours on the long flight!

Ryker and I had fun sleeping in! Till 10:15! missed breakfast but we ordered room service and then went to the market and then a jewelry store. It was HOT! We wanted to have foot massages after having dinner with everyone but they didn't have 2 people to do it so we're going tonight! fun! Ryker said he needs it because his feet hurt from all the walking!

We're trying to change our flights but it's booked right now!

baby crying........

things are moving along here

Today we had fun in Hanoi. We got to breakfast late today. Paisley decided to get up at 4:30 and wouldn't go back to sleep! We tried and tried and then of course barely fell asleep when we knew we better get downstairs before the buffet breakfast was over and it was lunch time! We got an early morning call from Todd our travel agent who has been working very hard all week trying to get Jeff and Raven tickets out of here. They left tonight (Thursday night) but have to do an over night in LA and not leaving till that afternoon. So they arrive home Friday night. I hope they can get some good sleep. Raven was so tried today and had a bit of stomach issues again. She's like me, we'll try anything and then we pay for it later. All she wanted to do this last day is hit the pool but I wanted Jeff to see some of Hanoi while he was here so we went by the lake and the old quarter. We picked out the most beautiful shade of purple vietnamese traditional dress for Raven and are having a matching one made for Paisley. They custom make them right there and are very nice quality yet reasonable. We also went to the world game store that Laurie told us about and were negotiating on 5 game boy games but they wouldn't come down in price like they did for Laurie. I even said a friend sent me in there and they kept mixing up the prices and then the price they would show me on the calculator would be more! So we walked out. Ryker was upset but I promised him we'd find some another place or at least go back and buy one. They are faux pokeman and are only 9.00 but I wanted for 7!

We ate at Little Hanoi and it was very good. We had the banana salad which I love, tomato soup and grilled cheese which was great. Raven loved the garlic shrimp pasta dish. I'm finding out we just love to find American food that's good here. Sorry but some of the vietnamese food I just don't like and my stomach can't tolerate. I do not like the meat hear. That's why Jeff had such a hard time and was always hungry!

Tonight Joanne took us to a really nice atmosphere at Brothers Cafe for a Vienamese buffet. But it was soooo hot in there. Baby was so tired and hot and just dripping on me. Ryker and I weren't thrilled with the food, but again it was traditional. Then we went to the water puppet show at 9:00! I was dying of exhaustion by then. The show was nice but Miss Paisley had enough of the loud noise and decided to scream her blood curling scream in the middle of it then 2 seconds later went to sleep only to wake up again screaming! Joanne had me pass her down and she took her out. We got a few stares! You really have to get used to people looking and pointing at you and talking about you while pointing here! Especially tonight when we had a whole group of Americans with Vietnamese babies! We had dinner with Joannes sons and Carls son tonight for the last time. They leave early in the morning. They are such nice boys and our kids love it when they are around.

Tomorrow is our 2nd CIS interview. The the babies Visa is issued the next business day, so Monday. If there are seats available we may get to leave Monday night or Tuesday night. I really want an over night in LA to see the family so keep your fingers crossed that Todd can work his magic!

Banana throw up and more....

Tonight I got thrown up on! I was giving her baby food banana's for the first time and she wasn't too thrilled but kept slowly eatting them. Then came bottle then tylonel because she has been very fussy and we think it's the sore boils in the back of her head. She has a new one. Those things hurt! Like a big deep zit! I actually put some zit cream on the tonight. Anyway after giving medicine she coughed a bit then looked like she was choking and I knew something was wrong by the look on her face.....out shot all the banana food and her bottle. A MESS! Poor thing. We survived and I'm grateful her dad is still here to help in this time of need. lol!

Scroll down to see pictures from this week and after pictures I posted an update.

spa day pics