September 6,2009-Sunday-9:25pm
This won't be very long. I'm extremely tired. Jessica and I are trying to stay awake later tonight so we'll stop waking up at 4 in the morning. There is a stupid rooster that crows at like 3 something and sometimes he stops after awhile, sometimes he just keeps going. This morning he just kept crowing and crowing. I suppose I'll get used to him soon.

It's strange to me that when I wake up that early I'm wide awake. Back home, no matter what time I woke up, I could almost always go back to sleep. But here it's like impossible. It's annoying really.

I don't think I'll much of anything interesting to say everyday, since I do the same thing all day long. But for those of you that would like to hear about the babies... I'll let you know the cute stuff they do.
I have my favorite now. Mai Ya. And I also learned that when you're putting a Chinese name into English, it doesn't really matter how you spell it as long as it sounds out right. So her name has been spelled Mai Ya, Mei Ya, and even Mai Ja. Her American name (she's been named by her prospective adoptive parents already) is Emma. A cute name but I'll still probably call her Mai Ya as long as I'm here. She's about 6 weeks old, fairly light skinned, and likes to be rocked. Her favorite is to be laid in your lap while you're sitting down. With her head at your knees and her feet at your waist. She will fall asleep everytime. I like doing that with her cuz then I can hold another baby in my arms and it doesn't wake her up.
She will cry like she's gonna die if you don't give her a bottle, and then only drink half of it.
Today she fell asleep before naptime and we could not get her to wake up. We'd tickle her, pick her up and move her around, make noise... as soon as we stopped she'd fall right back asleep. It was kinda funny actually.
I don't know why she's my favorite. There are others cuter than her. Maybe cuz she's the youngest one besides James. But James has already been claimed by Jessica and no one dares take him away from her.
Anyway, for whatever reason, she's mine and she's the one I'll be the saddest about leaving.

This afternoon Jess and I took Daniel, Karson and Libby for a walk down to the lake. They have a park type area by it and there were a lot of people out there just hanging out. Feeding the ducks, riding bikes... There was a guy singing and playing guitar for money too. He was singing in Chinese but after we got there he sang a song in English! The only lineI heard was"Your sitting, waiting for your favorite song to come on the radio"... didn't know the song but it was cool!
EVERYONE stares as us! I think they think the babies are ours and they're wondering how two white girls ended up with 3 brown babies! Some of them try and talk to us but that never gets very far.
We stopped at one of the little stores and bought an "ice cream cone". It's more like a slush in a cone. Very good!!!! We're gonna try all the flavors while we're here, today's was strawberry.
It was just a lot of fun; pushing babies in a stroller, eating ice cream, listening to music in the park, surrounded by gorgeous scenery. I felt at home. Everything was ok. I haven't felt completely ok since coming here due to some different stuff. I've kinda missed home and people and some of the situations here have been awkward or even downright frustrating. Things I have no control over. So, it was nice to have that moment of sanity and "ok-ness".

Jessica almost bought Taiwan beer, because we can't read the labels on anything:)

Tomorrow Daniel's parents come in. They'll stay for a week before they take him home. I'm kind of sad but it's a good thing. We just wish someone would take our problems babies (Henry or Libby) instead of sweet Daniel.

But we get another baby tomorrow too. A 3 month old. He is his mothers 3rd child. She gave her first one up for adoption and he know lives in Joplin Missouri. The second she kept but it's now being raised by someone else in the village, and now she's giving up this one. She's in prison right now and apparently just isn't a good mother.
We're supposed to get a newborn here soon as well. I'm excited about that one!

I will try and get some pictures up soon.