MUCH MUCH MUCH better today!!

Pictures will follow eventually. Sorry, I've gotten so behind... our last night in Nanjing we bought a DVD of the complete seasons 1-8 of Scrubs, our favorite show, so when the kids have gone off to bed we've been trying not to laugh too hard and wake them up!!

Today was SO much better with Jonah Tao Tao (JTT). He's making eye contact with me more and more, will happily let me feed him off my plate at breakfast, doesn't burst into tears the minute daddy leaves the room AND... drumroll please... he and I fed each other cheerios and some odd sort of bran stick things (stolen from the buffet) after dinner tonight!! I am soooo happy! And better yet, when we got home JTT and Noah took a bath together but poor little guy started getting cold so I fished him out of the giant whirlpool tub (explanation to follow) and bundled him up in a towel and cuddled him... all while Tom was in the other bathroom helping Joshua take a shower! Then I lotioned tiny little JTT all up and got him into his PJs with barely any fuss. Then I held him on my lap while he had his nightly bottle. He wouldn't let me hold the bottle, mind you, but he did happily stay mostly on my lap and hold it himself until it was all gone. I'm pretty sure he thinks if I hold it I'm going to take it away :( But all in all I would say it was a very successful day!

JTT also had his medical today... passed with flying colors, if you ignore the fact that he's nearly 2 and weighs 20.7lbs and is only 31.5 inches tall. That is how big Noah was at HIS physical... at 15 months old!! This guy is so incredibly skinny... he does a pretty good chicken impression when he's undressed! He eats virtually everything in sight, but he does eat very slow. I'm sure that is partly the reason for him being so tiny. Because he sure does like to pack away the food... it just takes a long time and that kind of time is just too much of a luxury in an orphanage when there are not enough hands and too much work to be done. When he walks he is a bit awkward partly because he is literally so top-heavy he unbalances easily. But his little calf muscles sure are sure bulking up with all the walking he's done in a week. I just hope the rest of him catches up soon, too.

So anyway, here we are in Guangzhou. We are staying at the Victory hotel (soooo much less expensive than the White Swan). We had booked a suite and lo and behold, when we showed up ALL the suites had been filled. I was really freaked to hear that, but instead of getting sent on our way, we got a free upgrade to the Victory Suite, which normally is about 4 times the price! I'm sure it helped that we had prepaid the room already (thanks to Lynn, whom we used last adoption when we were with Harrah's). Also I'll bet that having a guide assisting us with check-in and negotiate with the front desk (who barely speak any English) didn't hurt, either. I'm guessing it might have been quite a different story if we'd just showed up with reservations and gotten dropped off at the front door by a taxi... We've had to pay out of pocket for so many things that were included with our agency fees last time (which, btw, are also less than what our current agency charges - we compared notes with another Harrah's family at the medical appointment) but for stuff like this it has been really worth it. I needed to know that we would be met by an English-speaking person who would make sure we were taken care of, especially after a rough flight with small children! And last time when we arrived in Nanjing, not all of our luggage made it with us. Our agency-provided guide took care of all the paperwork for the lost luggage, which included coming up with a description (since it didn't match any of the check-boxes) of the giant box of cleft bottles that had disappeared along the way.

Anyway, our luxury suite has a jacuzzi tub, a personal sauna, a bar area (you know, in case the boys want to have their friends over to entertain...) and is HEEEUGE! But the downside is that it is so fancy that we have been more than a little nervous about having two small, not-always-very-cooperative boys here! Oh, and the tables are marble... quite difficult when it comes to rearranging the furniture in order to fit two cribs and a toddler tot :) And unfortunately the really spiffy really HEAVY electronic Mahjong table really was taking up way too much space so we had to push and shove it over to the wall which sorta kills the whole Mahjong potential. But it's not like we'd be learning to play, nevermind finding time TO play, with our three right now. We will be lucky if we get a chance to hit some of that Malibu Rum and orange juice we bought tonight...

And speaking of rum... well, there might not be pictures again tonight. We plan to celebrate the first night of having-nothing-planned-for-the-crack-of-dawn-the-following-day that we've had in two weeks!!

'till later ;)