Adoption Day

Here are some pictures from yesterday.  These are at the same office, the civil affairs office as the day before. 

 

Hopefully these download in the right order, if so, the first two pictures are of us signing the adoption papers and answering the questions of the notary.  We were asked our age, occupation, annual income, and if we promised to never abuse or abandon him.  Then we had to sign.  After that, Jian needed to answer questions and sign that he agreed he wanted to be adopted by us.  HA, could you imagine what would've happened if he changed his mind right then??  I didn't think of that until now! :)

 

The next picture is Jian with the orphanage director (in blue) and her boss.  Her boss (the lady in red) came to the adoption (my understanding is that this is not necessary or common) because she had a special friendship with Jian.  They gave us a gift of a small, framed tapestry that's an old type of weaving done here, we were very touched!   She also gave Jian 2 gifts: a necklace with a jade mouse (he was born in the year of the mouse), and a necklace with a stone and his name on it.  He was very excited about these.

 

Then a picture of the new proud parents! :) When we got into the van from leaving the civil affairs office, Jian clapped and jumped up and down and asked "I'm adopted, I'm adopted, I'm adopted????" It was so precious!

 

After the adoption, our guide brought us to a flea market to find some activities for the boys to do (Jian prefers the technology things, so, we needed to find some other activities as well).  We enjoyed walking around (where we were followed, stared at and had our pictures taken many times (because we're foreigners)), and finding some fun RC cars for the boys.  We also saw many different types of animals for sale (I think as pets, but, am not 100% sure), many rabbits, turtles, baby pigs, squirrels, chipmunks, puppies and more (all stuffed into very small cages :( ).  It was a very unique place to explore! 

 

We then went to a nice restaurant for lunch.  Our guide ordered for us and we all enjoyed celebrating the adoption!  We ate close to the tanks of eel, frogs, turtles, and fish, all available for order!

 

Afterwards, we did what the boys are most excited about....swimming!  I'm so thankful Jian loves swimming as much as Tanner!  It's a great way to get their energy out and something fun for them to do!

 

So, that was our day!!  As of yesterday morning, it is official, Qin, Jian Feng is now, Jian Feng Lee Bergeron! 

Attempt to add video

I don't know if this will work, but, I'm going to try to add a short video.  This is of yesterday, at the civil affairs office to officially complete the adoption.  (Sorry I didn't post again yesterday!  We had a busy day and I was too tired to post again). 

 

So, the interpretation of the video (if it shows up) is:

 

Tanner asking Jian "Do you want to join our family?"  Jian's response (in ASL), "I want, want, want"

 

Hopefully this works!

 

OK - it doesn't look like it will let me, the video is too big :( So, here's a picture from when Tanner was asking Jian.

Today is Adoption Day

Good morning from China!

 

We all slept well last night and feel refreshed this morning.  We've had breakfast together, and are getting ready to go to the civil affairs office to complete the adoption. 

 

Tanner woke up before Jian and really wanted to wake him up this morning.  Once he woke up, they played together for a long time hiding under the blankets and laughing, a joyous sound!

 

This morning at breakfast Tanner asked Jian "Do you want to go to my school, Henderson Elementary School?  We can put on our backpacks, walk to the street side by side, get on the bus and go to school together.  Do you want to????" 

 

We'll try to post more pictures of the day later!

 

Good night.

More pictures

 

More about today

Here are some more pictures of today, I will have to send them in 2 separate posts.

 

Jian is a very active boy - he loves technology (and checking out all technology we have in the room again and again).  He really loves the Walsh's iPad (thanks for letting us borrow it!!)  He's extremely curious and very smart.  He's good at communicating with writing (mostly this is how he communicated in the orphanage).  He's been writing with our guide for words we don't know, but, since they've been gone, we've been doing well figuring out with gesturing and looking things up in our Chinese sign language book.  We'd forgotten how slow that was!!  He has a fabulous laugh and had some questions about America (do we have a pool? do we have a car?) and understands that we're going there.  We've shown him a calendar about how long we'll be in China, when we go to another city and when we'll be flying to America.  He seems to understand that as well.  He's been having fun with Tanner, playing around and acting like a brother, and of course, Tanner is loving it as well.  Currently, Tanner is not feeling so well (hopefully all the excitement and lack of sleep is all), and so is sleeping (he didn't want to go eat) while I'm updating this.  Jon and Jian went to go walk around and find some dinner. 

 

Jian had a small bag with him with one shirt, a book of basketball players (he loves basketball and soccer, and doesn't like baseball :)), He also has 2 small books of pictures of himself at the orphanage and with some deaf friends over the years, we're so happy he has these.  He also had a file folder of the pictures and letter we sent to him a few weeks ago.  When we gave him the clothes we brought for him, he was excited about the shorts because he can use them to play basketball. 

 

With his paperwork today, we were given a newspaper ad with his picture and description to see if anyone would claim him from 2006.  There's also a copy of the original note that was left with him (apparently this is very unusual to have and to have his exact birthdate as well). Our guide explained it looked as if he was probably brought into Nanjing from a smaller, more rural town and was left at the train station, this was the type of characters used in the note.  We were sad when thinking of the emotions and how hard that must have been for his parents to have to leave such a precious boy because he was deaf. 

 

Jian loved looking at pictures on the computer.  He looked at pictures from today over and over and liked to zoom in to see things closely.  He likes the pictures of his bedroom in America, and looking at Hattie and Tanner's hamster. 

 

I'm not sure he believed or fully understood that Tanner was deaf.  He told me to be quiet when Tanner was sleeping, we explained he was deaf and Jon clapped loudly.  Then, Jian went over and clapped several times and laughed and laughed. 

 

Thank you for keeping up with us.  Tomorrow we will be going back to the civil affairs office in the morning to sign the actual adoption papers, he will then officially be our son.

 

What a full day we've had!  I hope this post wasn't too hard to follow!  Thank you so very much for your prayers, they were clearly answered and we had a great day.  When they left to go walk around, I was quite weepy, from all the emotion, the future, not enough sleep, etc.  I pray that we can daily honor God through these 2 special boys that he has entrusted to our care.