The Zoo

Original Entry Posted on February 2, 2010

Today we did not start out on a good foot. Madelyn woke up with a low grade fever. I assume this was a side affect of the shots she received yesterday. One dose of motrin and she was on the mend. Our adoption agency arranged for a trip to the Safari (the Zoo) in Guangzhou so we went along with several other families. What an experience. Keith and I have traveled many places and have visited many amazing zoo's in the US - San Diego being one of the top ones. This zoo was absolutely the best ever! The weather was beautiful and the temperature perfect at around 75 degrees. Unlike zoo's in the US, this zoo had minimal enclosures for the animals so they were very accessible and easy to look at. I got to hold a toucan on my arm, Keith got to bottle feed a baby white tiger (how cool) and Maddie and Keith feed banana's to the elephants. They even had a baby elephant that you could pet and feed up close and personal. You could even feed the Giraffe's - they would stretch their long necks close to you and pull the tree branches from you. It was really cool! The highlight of this trip was the Panda exhibit. There have only been a few zoo's that I have been to that have Panda Bear Exhibits and only have a couple of pandas on display. This exhibit has MANY and they roamed around, ate and climbed trees all within a arm stretch of where we were standing. Maddie had a great time! She loved looking at all of the animals and even called some by name. She ate a hot dog on a stick, ran around and just had a great time with us. What a perfect day! Tonight we had dinner at an Italian restaurant on the island and it was ok. It was nice to have a break from Chinese food. Boy am I ready for some good home cooking! Today our representative from Holt took our documents down to the US Consulate on our behalf. We have not heard anything back, which is a good thing. Tomorrow we have an Exit meeting with Holt to discuss our travel arrangements THEN - we go to the Consulate for an Oath Swearing Ceremony and Visa Issuance!!! Yeah!!!! We cannot take pictures at the consulate - unfortunately. I will etch that moment into my mind forever! Maddie is getting better every day! She calls Keith and I by Momma and Daddy now. She is freely giving kisses to both of us and has a sweet endearing face when she does this. She has learned that she can stay up a little later and avoid going to sleep if she continues to give us kisses. If the kisses keep coming we keep talking and somehow forget to make her lay down - lol. She is smart as a whip and figures things out very quickly. She will be ruling the roost when we get home - lol. Her vocabulary is expanding each day. It will be no time before she will be fluent in English. She is a little parrot and will mimick anything I say. She has mastered our names, the kids names, the grandparents and the aunts names. She can identify and say where her eyes, nose, mouth and ears are. She picks things up so quickly! I love you all - thanks so much for being so supportive in our journey to Madelyn. She is a fantastic little girl and I feel truly blessed to have her in my life! I can't wait for all to meet her! See you soon my friends!