Another Day With Ava

Today was our second full day with Ava in Chongqing. She is just such a little honey. Full of smiles for everyone, although she’s starting to react to Scott and me better than for other people.

She’s so active – constantly exploring. She has to take everything in – when we were on the bus this morning she would whip her head to look outside, then whip her head to see if Scott was still there, and back again. Back and forth, back and forth – people laugh because it is so dramatic. She definitely keeps tabs on both of us at all times.

Just yesterday evening we saw her crawling skills – she finally felt comfortable going away from us a bit. She’s probably going to be walking quite soon, as she can walk holding one or two of our hands only for balance. Too funny – she looks way too tiny to be walking, but she almost is! She’s actually wearing 3-6 month overalls today, and they’re fitting perfectly.

She also seems as smart as all get-out. Scott did the “more” sign when feeding her, and after two takes she did it back with a big smile, although she hasn’t done it again since. We also waved goodbye to Scott when he was leaving on one of his many shopping excursions across the street for drinking water and the like, and the next time he said goodbye she waved before we did. Note to self – don’t do anything you don’t want Ava to learn!

Everyone comments on her hair, asking what we are fertilizing her with. She definitely has the most hair in the group. Actually, a couple of people have said that she has Scott’s haircut, which is pretty funny. Scott’s spiky hair, no gel necessary.

One thing that’s been hard is that she really resisted falling asleep last night and before naps. She’ll stay up until the last possible minute, rubbing her face and making little yippy shrieks until she basically passes out. We think that there are so many new things to take in, and that also she’s afraid that we’ll leave. She keeps trying to stay awake to keep an eye on everything. She just now went down for a nap at 3:30 p.m., and she normally has a nap at noon.

Also, last night it was obvious that she was wanting her normal caregivers and her normal routine. I’d hold her and she’d push away and be anxious, but if we put her in her crib she’d want up. I guess a lot of the babies had a more difficult time sleeping last night – hopefully it will be easier for her tonight. We just feel bad that she’s confused about the new situation. Hopefully the more she trusts us, the easier sleep will become. When she’s out, though, she’s definitely out – must be used to a lot of noise in the orphanage.

Today we had our first group outing after having a free day yesterday. We all boarded the bus to go to visit the Chongqing Zoo. We were a bit apprehensive about going out in public when she’s just getting to know us, but it worked out well and the zoo wasn’t busy. We strolled around, taking in the pandas and the local banyan trees. We also visited an art school at the edge of the zoo, and bought a few crafts to remember her town.

Right now I’m typing this as Ava is sleeping her long-awaited nap. Scott made a foray into town to take some photos with another dad, so we have a better sense of the city for Ava. We’re here for such a short amount of time – about two days less than typical – so we want to soak in the city as much as possible to tell Ava about it later.

Tomorrow morning we fly to Guangzhou. We actually need to have our bags ready for the bellboy at 5:15 and be in the lobby at 6:30 – ouch. This is quite the off-road adventure version of new parenting – how often do new parents have to board buses and planes just a few days after meeting their new baby? Not to mention starting out in a hotel room where you can’t get any sort of routine down and where you have to use bottled water. But we wouldn’t trade it for anything, because we have Ava!

By the way, if you have a moment take a look at the blogs of some of our fellow travel mates. You may spot us in some of the photos, and it’s a good way to better experience the journey all of us are making.
http://littlepinkboots.blogspot.com/
http://journey2china4gracie.blogspot.com/
Jim and Juleen at http://whallofchina.blogspot.com/ are currently in a different province, but we’ll be meeting up with them soon!

Well, it's 10 p.m. here, Ava is sleeping, and we have to get up at 4:45 a.m. tomorrow, and probably a few times during the night. No time to post pictures. As always, we do not know what the Internet situation will be like when we get to Guangzhou. Thank goodness our laptop has been working here and we've been able to post directly from our room during Ava naps.

Talk to you later, and thanks for all your comments.