The Road Home

In just a couple of hours, Eden boards her first-ever plane to make the long trek to her new home. We pray it will feel like home very quickly.

Every day we learn more and more about Eden's personality, wants, likes and dislikes. She's usually the loudest person in the room, limiting us to busy, loud restaurants where we can sort of blend in. She gets a lot of looks of "you're so cute" while Eliza and I get the "do you know what you're doing?" glances. It probably has to do with our very non-Chinese ways of feeding and caring for her.

Last night she bumped her head on a column at a restaurant and she started to sob in pain. She ran over to me for comfort. We took that as a good sign, perhaps the first marker on the road to developing a secure sense of belonging in a permanent family.

It's been a long and exhausting trip. That being said, we won't soon forget this experience. There were two moments when I got unexpectedly emotional. The first was the first time all 15 families with our agency gathered together after we all got our adopted children. Around the room were beautiful kids, ranging in age from 1 to 12 and from many different provinces. Many, if not most most of them, had special needs - spina bifida, cerebral palsy, severe cleft palate, missing hand, deafness... I was just moved in that moment at the way the lives of these kids would profoundly change... and just praying that the adjustments to new families and new homes in places as far-flung as Nebraska, Iowa, Georgia and California would go smoothly.

The second was during our oath-taking ceremony at the US Consulate. Eliza thought it was a unremarkable event, but for some reason, it got me choked up. Maybe it was the official setting and the large room full of adoptive families and the moment to pause and consider the seriousness of the commitment we all were making. It was the culmination of a long process that officially began in 2008... but the seeds of it began long before that.

While in China, we couldn't view our blog (just email post only) so have not been able to read everyone's comments, but we are so grateful for the many wonderful expressions of encouragement from so many friends and family members... and for the prayers especially. We have been so strengthened and supported by you all. On the subway back from the US Consulate, one of the adoptive dads exclaimed, "The adoption journey now ends!" Almost as soon as those words came out of his mouth, we both exchanged knowing looks to each other... this brief 2-week sojourn to China may be ending, but the real journey is actually just beginning.

Welcome home, Eden Qinying. You are a part of our little family now... and through all the future joys and sorrows, through all the ups and downs of discovering your sense of identity as an adopted child... We promise to love you with our whole hearts.