A Little More About SuSu

Each day we're seeing a little bit more of our SuSu's personality come through. It's been really amazing to see her begin to come out her shell a litte bit at a time, hour by hour, day by day. She's beginning to smile more readily and laugh while she's playing with Peanut and the other children. All in all, she's one of the more quiet children, with the softest little voice. She still becomes really timid when we leave the hotel, so we've tried to stay in our room, where she's definately the most comfortable.

She's still sleeping well, and likes to be up bright and early between 5:30 and 6am each day! But she sleeps all through the night without ever waking, so Mommy and Daddy can't complain.

The one thing that's very big for Maia is food. She loves to have her baggies with snacks with her all the time, everywhere we go. It really is her security, and so we try to be sure she has a little goodie bag all the time. Meals can be very interesting because she wants some of everything on her plate, even though she never actually eats that much. She seems to be understanding more and more that Mommy will fill her plate as soon as we sit down to eat, and that there's always some kind of food for her no matter where we go. The funny thing about her is that, as much as she likes collecting the food, she loves giving it away, too. She's continually giving away her snacks to all the other children in our group, which isn't what we expected at all.

Maia's had a few meltdowns for us, and mostly they come after we've been out somewhere and she seems overstimulated. When we get back to the hotel and rock her and hold her awhile, she seems so much more relaxed. One of the hardest things for us is seeing her cry and knowing how much she's hurting and not knowing the words to comfort her and soothe her. There are so many times when my heart just aches for her, but all I can do is hold her close.

What I never expected is how quickly the Mommy instincts would come about. I had no idea how it would feel to be given an instant three year old without knowing what she likes, what she doesn't like, what she needs, and then try to be her Mommy. But it's really coming much more quickly than I imagined. When I was rocking her to sleep last night, I felt like she's been mine far longer than four days. I know that there will be many rough days ahead, but God truly has given us what we need, at the times we need it, to love and comfort and care for her. I only wish I had had the chance to be her Mommy sooner!


In a few hours we'll fly to Guangzhou, where we'll wait for SuSu's visa to be processed. Guangzhou is supposedly beautiful and warm and has a lot more areas for the children to run and play. We sooo need that right about now! We're flying between 7pm and 9pm China time (7am-9am US time). Please pray for our safety and our sanity as we'll be traveling with all of our very young and scared children.

We love and miss all of you back home! We'll see in less than a week!