Well, yesterday was a big day for our family. Around 1:30 pm we received a phone call in our hotel room that Maia had arrived and was waiting for us downstairs. We quickly pulled ourselves together and went down the 14 floors to meet our daughter fot the first time. What an unreal feeling, meeting this little person who already has a definite personality and who knows nothing about us.
We had really prayed that the Lord would have prepared her for us and He really answered our prayers. She can hear quite a bit, much more than we wcpected, and she talks A LOT. She was very scared, though, when she first met us. She was dressed really warmly and carrying a big stuffed bunny and a water bottle.
My first thought was, she's not holding the toys we sent! And sure enough, we found outquickly that she had never received any of our packages. So she had never seen our pictures or known who we were.
They took us to a back room where we got acquainted a little. She wouldn't look us in the eyes or let us touch her. We tried to move really slow even though this was the moment we had waited 19 months for! She started to warm upp a little, and the lady from the orphanage who had brought her to us gave her a little pep talk, and we took her up to our room.
She warmed up quickly after that, especially to me. That was when we descovered she could, and did, talk. Within the first hour she had discovered her suitcase full of clothes and she and Alaina changed into matching dresses. We also gave her her backpack and her new baby doll. She hasn't let it out of her sight since then.
We decided she had had enough trauma for one day so Darryl went out and found a store where he bought us some noodle bowls that we ate in our hotel room. The girls had a bath togethere--so much splashing!--and got into their jammies and laid in bed playing games on their innotabs (best. purchase. ever.) and dropped off to sleep around 9:00.
I woke at 4:00 to the sound of crying, and she let me get in bed with her and comfort her. Poor thing, so many changes and so hard. She is really a trooper.
I didn't tell you the thing that happened in the morning yesterday before Maia arrived. We went out to have breakfast and had to cross several busy streets to get there and back (imagine playing frogger-and you are the frog.) As we were running through traffic Alaina started yelling and pulling me back. I realized she was saying "my hearing aid!) I realized it had gotten knowcked off her head and looked back just in time to see a taxi run right over it. Not thinking, I ran back and swiped it up off the street and ran back. I had a terrible sinking feeling in my stomach, but miraculously it still works!! It looks a little rougher than it did but I know God was protecting it. that was a bad moment.
Today we went theo the adoption office and signed the official paperwork. This afternoon we will go out to apply for the passport.
We really love the hotel we are staying at and have met some wonderful new friends, the Wessels, who also got their beautiful baby Kate yestereday. We are so glad to be on this journey with them.
Tonight we are going to venture out and find Wal Mart. We need some water bottles and Darryl has been craving peanut butter.
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