It Takes a Village

So the highlight of the past few days has certainly been hanging with the new families who have just arrived in our city who are a part of our agency as well. There are 4 of us total; two families from AL, one from FL, and us. We've adopted two little boys and two little girls...all special needs children.

It has really been such a blessing to share our stories, go out around town together (zoo, etc), and pray for & encourage one another. Not to mention borrowing strollers, puffs, wipes, bottles, and everything else from each other!

Here's a group pic:

We also had the chance to hang out with Erin's cousin, Ryan, as well as her husband, daughter, and newly adopted son! They adopted a 5-year-old boy that they named Austin. Ryan took all the pics from that night, but we've got some great ones to share one day. It is just incredible that we were able to travel to China together to get our kiddos. What a great blessing! We'll see them more before we leave, but we are in different "tour groups" for our time here...so our schedules have been a little different.

We took a beautiful stroll in the gardens at our hotel. We are staying at THE Garden Hotel after all. Here's a few more shots of Campbell and the scenery:

You gotta wonder what's going on behind those gorgeous brown eyes...

Waterfall and lagoon

Feeding the goldfish

And just so you all know it's not all been a "walk in the park" (pun intended), I caught this big 'ole temper tantrum on camera as well. She didn't want to walk on the grass, but that is also very Chinese of her. They do NOT walk on the grass normally, and the signs everywhere remind you of that.

We'll be back tomorrow to post some pics of the Zoo and the River Cruise...but we are in our last days of this trip! We begin our journey home on Wednesday. Not a minute too soon. :-)