Day 6 She is our daughter now.

Maria slept all night and got up happy this morning. She loves to eat and is not very picky. After breakfast we had to go back to the Cival Affairs office to sign all the documents and pick up our adoption decree. She is officially our daughter now. We then went to the notary office to get documents sealed. Then off to some shopping.

Maria is a stubborn little girl. She wants to walk on her own and gets mad some times when we pick her up. However we are already seeing improvement and a few times she has reached for us today. She did not like riding in the shopping cart or the stroller but she walks so slow we had to put her in something.

She is doing a good job of repeating English words to us. Her words are getting more clear and communication is getting easier already.

She has not had any melt downs today and is really taking to us all. We spent the afternoon in the room and then out for a simple Chinese dinner. Overall a very good day. The only melt downs have been Shiyan. She is so tired and so jealous. This evening has been better but she is having to adjust to not being the baby any more and has acted out a bit. Pray for her to step into the role of older sister and helper to Maria.

Tomorrow we make the 3 hour drive to Louyang which is Maria’s home town. We had originally said we were not going to make that trip but after more thought we really want to see the town where she spent the first 3.5 years of her life. We pray that she does well on this trip. She does love being out and in the car and wants to be where she can see outside.
That’s all for today. I have added more photos to the link at the top of the page.