One final post for now.... and THANK YOU!!

Well, so much for sleep…… :) We were kidding ourselves that somehow magically now that Zachary is home he would sleep like a champ through the night and we would all wake up refreshed. As it turned out, we were up many times with him, not sure why, perhaps the adjustment to an entirely new environment, is it too cold, too hot, too loud, not loud enough (!), too light, too dark, etc.??? On one hand, we got very little sleep; on the other hand, we got to spend more time with our son!! :) But, anyhow, nothing new, we are just parents!

But now that we are at home, we wanted to make one last post about this chapter of our wonderful journey picking up Zachary in Hanoi. It really is the culmination of such an amazing process and we cannot express how fortunate we have been to have had the fantastic support of PLAN, our friends, and our family. We will continue to post occasionally on this blog, but not with nearly the same consistency. We took over 4,000 pictures and 100’s of videos during our trip, which we hope to organize and make available soon, but in the meantime we have added a couple of new videos to the hosting-site (http://picasaweb.google.com/alyssahershman/Videos), and some pictures in this post. We are also going to excitedly be following any blogs of the families currently in Vietnam, or who will be there shortly. We are so happy for you all.

So, to summarize our last days in Hanoi... on Wednesday, 9/5/07, in Hanoi, Chad spent all day with Zachary at the hotel, while Alyssa spent the day with the Barans at Hoa Lu. Wednesday night was an early night for all of us once mommy came home.




We went back to the SOS on Thursday morning, 9/6/07, and had our final appointment with Dr. Soraya. She has been a great doctor and really took to Zachary. We were of course extremely relieved that she gave us the OK to fly on Friday!!!






During the day on Thursday, Chad took a final tour of the city with Thomas – who is a local resident that John and Jillian Weiss met while they were in Hanoi. They recommended meeting him for not only a tour of the important sites, but even better, some of the hidden gems. It was well worth it, because in spite of our attempts there were still a number of meaningful places to visit and history to learn. The tour included a drive around West Lake with stops at the Tran Quoc Pagoda, the One-Pillar Pagoda, the Ho Chi Minh Museum, the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, Hun Tiep Lake (where the downed U.S. B-52 still remains), and an actual residence in the Old Quarter.






The tour of the residence was easily the best part of the trip. It started with a walk into a standard shop, but then continued out the back of the shop into an entirely different world. In this particular residence, about 80 people (all family to some extent) lived together, sharing certain common areas but each having a room or two as their private living quarters. Stairs and hallways wound around and up in many directions, with a surprising number of passageways and doors leading to other private areas Chad could not even go into. In Hanoi, almost all the real estate is thin and deep, but Chad learned why during his trip – apparently real estate is taxed by the width of the frontage, not overall area. Interesting. This particular residence also had a private coffee-shop on the top floor, which offered a great view of Lake Hoan Kiem.

When Chad returned from his tour, Alyssa took a final shopping trip with Lisa, while Quan and Zach played together by the pool. That evening, Chad made one last excursion around Hanoi – this time on the back of a motorbike during rush hour, with a video-camera in hand. A portion of the wild video is now on the hosting-site too for anybody that might be curious. Later that evening, we met the Barans for a final farewell dinner together at a local Vietnamese restaurant, then afterwards took some special pictures in Vietnam t-shirts to really remember our trip. :) Saying goodbye to them was more of a see-you-later, as they live just down the road in Medford. We spent the rest of Thursday packing and getting ready for our trip home on Friday morning.

The trip home was for all intents and purposes pretty standard. Flights from Hanoi-Hong Kong, Hong Kong-L.A., immigration and customs at L.A.X., then L.A.-Boston. As we mentioned in the previous post, even though we arrived at 2:30am in Boston, we were enthusiastically greeted, and Zach got many, many hugs and kisses. At that moment, we let out such a huge sigh of relief and joy – back in Boston with our son!!!!!!

We have thoroughly enjoyed keeping this blog and we hope you have enjoyed reading it and following us on this journey of love. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!

Live from the Frammy

It is about 5AM EST on 9/8/07!! We are home!!! Zach was a trooper the entire long trip. We were greeted at the airport at about 3:30AM by Zachary's grandparents Ray and Pauline, with surprise visitors his uncle Adam, aunt Sarah, Sophie and Reba too!!!! Zach is now looking forward to meeting the rest of his friends and family, especially his grandma Ros and uncle Bradley. Much more to follow (including pix, so cute, of Zach with Sophie and Reba already), but now.... we are looking forward to.... sleep! Love, Chad & Alyssa & Zach.

Daddy Time!!

Hello everyone! It is about 10AM here in Hanoi on Wednesday, 9/5/07. We have not left yet - on advice of the doctor we are seeing here, we postponed flying with Zachary until Friday, 9/7/07 -- which is at least one day earlier than our original departure date, and gets us back to Boston on Saturday morning.

Chad is on daddy duty today while Alyssa enjoys a day trip with the Barans to Hoa Lu, Vietnam's ancient capital, which is about a 2-hour drive from Hanoi. We are using the same tour company for this day-trip that we used for the day-trip to Halong Bay - Buffalo Tours (http://www.buffalotours.com/), and we requested the same excellent guide - Ahn. For those of you traveling to Vietnam, we are happy to recommend this company if you wish to take any excursions in, and around, Hanoi.

We sadly said goodbye to two more of our of travel-group PLAN families between yesterday and today. Jessica and Kai Zedler, along with their travel friends Sandy and Mary-anne, all from Wisconsin, left yesterday evening. Eric, Nicole, and Grace Neri, plus Nicole's parents, all from the S.F. Bay area, left this morning. As you can imagine, it has been a very emotional experience for us here, and while we are sad to say goodbye, we are so HAPPY for the friends we have made and that we will all be able to experience the lives of our children, who share such a unique bond, growing up together. Gladly, we are already talking about our first reunion!

Well, because Alyssa has our camera with her today, I do not have any new pix to include in this post, so I have chosen to include a classic shot from the day we first met Zach! Even though it was only about 2 weeks ago, we feel like he has been in our hearts and our lives forever.

Hoping for the best...

It is now just after midnight on Tuesday, 9/4/07. As of now, we are scheduled to leave Vietnam in less than 36 hours..... but there is a chance we may need to stay here longer until Zachary is strong enough to fly. You see, our little guy has had a rough couple of days... and he is still recovering..... Chad represented Team Hershman in Halong Bay on Monday while Alyssa nursed our baby back to health....

Chad took loads of pix and video at Halong Bay to share with Alyssa and Zach (he has also uploaded a couple of videos to the video-hosting site). It was a worthwhile trip he said - highlighted by a tour through the Thien Cung Grotto, considered by some to be the most beautiful of all the grottoes in Halong Bay -- or so it said when we googled it. :) Unfortunately, the videos from inside the grotto are a little difficult to see (and can't even really do the place justice), but maybe with some fancy editing we can make them more viewable in the future.

If at our appointment at SOS on Tuesday the doctor recommends against Zachary flying on Wednesday morning, we will attempt to reschedule our flights again - this time from Wednesday back to as late as Saturday (our original departure date)..... We will be hoping Zachary gets a positive recommendation for flying home on Wednesday morning (we are really looking forward to getting home)..... if we have to stay, we will make the best of our additional time here, seeing some sites we still haven't gotten to, plus Alyssa will get to take a day trip on Thursday (to Hoa Lu, the ancient capital - often referred to as "the Ha Long Bay on land") while Chad takes care of Zachary at the hotel......

We will know much more later this morning...... everybody cross your fingers that Zachary will be o.k. to fly!!! Thank you.

A whole lotta' nuttin'...

Well, this picture basically sums up our day today. :) With Zachary in full-blown recovery, we stayed around the hotel all day with him, mostly in the room, but we did take a few walks around the grounds. And, so, with not much else going on, we decided to test the self-timer function on our camera here on the reflexology path at the hotel. Wow!

Actually, we also took care of some business today, most importantly sussing out changing our return tickets from Saturday to Wednesday. We also rescheduled our Halong Bay trip to accommodate for the earlier flight, and picked up some new meds for Zachary. We know, very exciting stuff. :)

This evening while Alyssa napped with Zach, Chad took a walk with the Barans to a part of town we have not explored yet, a more southern part of the Hai Ba Trung District. There is a cool lake there called Thien Quang Lake, next to Thong Nhat Park, which looks to be the largest park in Hanoi.

Tomorrow is Vietnam National Day (sort of like Independence Day in the U.S.), the day when, in 1945, Vietnamese President Ho Chi Minh declared, right here in Hanoi's Ba Dinh Square, Veitnam's independence from France. So there are festivities scheduled throughout the City -- hopefully we will be able to venture out with Zach to check some of it out!

So much has happened since our last post!

Where to begin?! First, we got THE call on Thursday morning!!! Before heading over to the U.S. Embassy in the afternoon with Cherie's son, Brian, and the rest of the PLAN families, we spent the morning in the hotel playing with Zachary (and reading books and looking at pictures of Sophie and Reba!). The appointment was a pretty straightforward event - paid $380 / each for the U.S. Visas, then a quick window-meeting with the U.S. Embassy rep., signed one last form, got a receipt, and told to come back a day later to pick up the Passport with the Visa embedded. Outside the Embassy, we got a good group photo with all five of the PLAN families traveling together these weeks (l-r/t-b: Greg, Alivia, Mary, Alyssa, Zachary, Chad, Lisa, Quan, Shaun, Sandy, Nicole, Grace, Kai, Jessica, Eric). We were back at the hotel by about 3pm.

After the embassy appointment, we brought Zachary back to the S.O.S. clinic as a follow-up from Tuesday's appointment to see the resident pediatrician, and to get her opinion on some symptoms Zach had been showing for a couple of days. The pediatrician was excellent and after examining Zachary thought he might have bronchiolitis.

Thursday night, we met the rest of the PLAN families at the famous Thang Long Water Puppet Theater for a 6:30 show. The show was very unique, and well worth attending. Zachary loved it too, but only made it through about 2/3 of the way before getting so crabby that Alyssa had to take him out to the lobby so as not to disturb the other patrons. After the show, we jumped the first cab back the hotel to give Zach some food, a bath, then some shut-eye. Little did we know then what a long night we had ahead of us....

Poor little Zach did not have a good night. He exhibited many of the symptoms of bronchiolitis, including a slight fever. Now we know how hard it can be to be parents -- up all night with a crying baby and not being able to do anything to help, except hold him and soothe him and love him.

Because Zach is not feeling well, we have rescheduled our overnight trip to Halong Bay from this weekend to the beginning of next week. Halong Bay is an incredible natural wonder here in Vietnam and is a World Heritage Site. If you Google it you will be able to see how cool it looks. We are very excited to go, but we need our baby to get 100% better first.

This evening, we received Zach's Visa!!!! That means our paperwork here is officially complete, and we can try to get home earlier than next weekend. We will probably leave sometime during the middle of next week, so Zach can fully heal before we fly with him. Plus, we stil need some time to go to Halong Bay and finish visiting many sites here to remember Zachary's beautiful homeland!!

Tonight we said goodbye to our good friends Greg, Mary and Alivia Bailey from Colorado. They had to get home as soon as possible, so they left on Friday night. We will miss them, but hopefully we will always remain friends as our kids grow up.

OK, we are rambling - blame it on our lack of sleep. We will keep you posted about how Zach is feeling, hopefully only good news!

Waiting for the Call...

Now that we have received Zach's passport and had his medical, the next (and last!) step in the process is our second embassy appointment. That appointment could happen at any time, as early as today, but as late as next week. We were hoping it would happen today of course, so we waited by the phone in the hotel for most of the day.... but unfortunately the call never came. :(

So, at about 3PM, we decided to head out for a little shopping and sight-seeing. We started at a place called Craft Link, which is another non-profit organization in Hanoi that sells hand-made goods produced by local artisans - it was a great place to pick up some nice gifts.

After that, we went to the Temple of Literature / First National University, another "must-see" in Hanoi. It is the beautifully maintained grounds of Vietnam's oldest national university, originally created to study the teaching of Confucius. In the midst of a bustling section of the city, the site is a haven for people to relax and enjoy a historically prominent facility. We thought it was a very interesting place and we took a lot of pictures - there were wonderful buildings and some cool trees!

Then, back to the hotel to put Zach down for a nap - it was another hot day and he was a tired and sweaty boy.

We will wait for the embassy-call again tomorrow. Hopefully we get our appointment this week, because there are two holidays next week when the U.S. embassy is closed - one is Vietnam's revolution day (similar to our independence day), plus Labor Day.

And, we added Adam and Sarah's video to our video-link page. It is so cute - and easy to see why Zachary loves it so much.

A very special day

We'll start with last night, when we had a casual dinner ordering-in at the hotel with the Baileys. The kids (Zachary and Alivia) played together and the adults ate pizza (Hawaiian) and watched a movie (Bourne Ultimatum). Another opportunity to spend time together with other families, which is always fun!

Today, though, much happened. The morning started with a return visit to the immigration office in Hanoi, where Chad picked up Zachary's passport!!!

Then, we took in a tour of the Hoa Lo Prison (aka, Hanoi Hilton), which is a famous site here in Hanoi, and located right next to the hotel. Actually, only a portion of the original prison even exits today, because a majority was razed, to make room for the hotel where we are currently staying. It does not seem altogether that unusual, considering how fast Hanoi seems to be growing, with high rises being built at many locations. The prison itself was originally constructed by the French in the late 1800's to house Vietnamese political prisoners, but was later used by the Vietnamese to house captured U.S. soldiers (like John McCain, for example) during the U.S.-Vietnam conflict. Like a visit to Alcatraz, a visit to the Hanoi Hilton is a way to see the horrors of prisons in general and the hell experienced there by the prisoners.

After lunch, we took Zachary to his final medical appointment as a prerequisite for obtaining his Visa. We got to spend time with Cherie at the medical clinic, which is always nice. The doctor that checked Zachary out told us that he is in good overall health (still with a lingering congestion issue, which we are treating with a prescription inhaler now). His vitals: he is a little over 2 feet tall, and weights just over 14 pounds! He has gained a little under half a pound since a week ago!

With Chad fighting a little head-cold himself, we played it very casual tonight at the hotel, and are looking forward to going to bed early. Zachary is sleeping for 2-4 hour stints, and falls back asleep quite quickly after his nighttime bottles.

OK, hope this hasn't been too boring - but as we are teaching Zachary, sharing is fun! :)

Lazy Sunday... busy Monday...

It is a little after 5pm here in Hanoi on Monday, 8/27/07, which means it is just about 6am in Boston. We just got back from an afternoon wandering around the Old Quarter. We know it is time to come back to the hotel after being out when our shirts are entirely soaked through. :) Zachary was a champ this afternoon, staying awake most of the time, and snoozing for small intervals when he had seen enough. The Old Quarter of Hanoi is a trip; thousands of tiny streets and alleys, crammed with people and shops, and, of course, motorbikes with their horns blaring at all times. One would think that with the narrowness of the streets, the amount of pedestrian and motorbike traffic, and lack of traffic signals, there would be loads of accidents, but surprisingly there are almost none. In fact, we have seen but one minor fender-bender in the entire time we have been here, and that was on the way into town from the airport on the day we arrived. Somehow, everybody here just understands the unwritten rules of the streets and everything seems to move along just fine. We have attached a couple of pictures of the Old Quarter (one of a very cool bayan tree that is apparently 1000's of years old, but still thriving, even now being surrounded by modern buildings), but really the pictures don't do the area justice - we took a couple of videos, so check out the video-hosting site and you might just get lucky. While there, you may see the cute video of Zachary watching an adorable video that his uncle Adam and aunt Sarah made for him. If Zach is every crabby and starting to cry, we just pop on the video and he is all smiles!


We got a call from Cherie's son Brian today, informing us that we have a couple of appointments tomorrow - in the morning we are supposed to pick up Zach's passport, then in the afternoon we have our medical appointments. Things are moving very quickly!!!!

One week and counting...

Well, we have been here one full week. With no real agenda today, we set out on foot with the Barans towards the French Quarter to check out a couple of sites. After a stop by a nearby larger grocery-store (where we bought Zach some more baby food that wasn't available at the smaller grocery store at our hotel - we needed it because when we gave him peas this morning for the first time this morning, he told us "politely" in not so many words, "I don't like peas."), then a quick lunch at Restaurant Bobby Chinn (just average, but we didn't try the famous mac-n-cheese...), we headed over to the Hanoi Opera House, which is beautiful from the outside and supposed to be even more spectacular inside - unfortunately, though, it was closed to visitors today, so we will have to return sometime in the next couple of weeks. We ventured further to the Vietnam Revolutionary Museum, which provides a historical perspective of, well, you probably guessed, Vietnam's many revolutions. It was an interesting museum, but really, Zachary mostly enjoyed the big globe ("look mommy, I'm on top of the world!!"). After that, on account of the continued extreme heat, we were pretty tired, so we came back to the hotel for a little attempted shut-eye; but Zach would have none of that. We played in the room for a while, then met Greg, Mary and Alivia Bailey for dinner at the hotel restaurant (they recently relocated from the Lucky Star to the Somerset). The Baileys are a very sweet couple from Denver, and their daughter, Alivia, is beautiful. She is just about the same age as Zachary, having been born on 2/16/07.

Zach had a couple of "firsts" today. For one, he drank water directly from a water bottle. Very cute, especially when he reached for more after each sip. Second, he giggled up a storm at dinner. Despite the bad lighting, there is a pretty funny video that we have uploaded to the site (see the link below).

We hope everybody reading this blog is doing well.

Happy Birthday Mommy!!!

Today was Alyssa's birthday!! Zachary gave her a special birthday gift, his precious smile. He wore his 'I love Mommy' onesie and was such a good boy all day.










One of the highlights of today -- besides the lunch buffet at the hotel :) -- was our trip to a shop called Vietnam Quilts (http://www.vietnam-quilts.org/), which is a non-profit company that hires local women to create beautiful quilts. With very reasonable prices and a broad selection, we were able to find Zachary some special quilts for him to have in his room growing up - just some of the many local items we hope to get for him while we are here!










Also, we think we have learned how to post video to an external hosting source. Check out:

http://picasaweb.google.com/alyssahershman/Videos.

So far, we have had a chance to add just three videos: 1. Zach's pooping video from today-- :); 2. from the pool earlier this week; and 3. a special video from the day we first met Zachary at Ba Vi. In that special video, the nanny that is holding him was the nanny that cared for him most at Ba Vi, and she obviously had a deep bond with him (just remembering her sadness and joy as we left Ba Vi that day brings tears to our eyes immediately). She, and all of Zach's nannies, will always have a very, very special place in our hearts. We hope to be adding more videos as soon as we can...

Nothing too exciting.... except everything!!!

Today was our first day in Hanoi without any official business. We played it pretty casual. We began our day with a long walk around the lake again, this time doing a full loop and visiting the Ngoc Son pagoda and the Bridge of the Rising Sun. Because it was so hot and humid again, by the time we were done our long walk, we were the definition of fat, sweaty Americans. :)

We got back to the hotel and within a minute got a call from our friends Lisa, Shaun and Quan, who reminded us of the hotel's free shuttle on Thursdays to the Big-C, Vietnam's version of super-Target. So, we quickly loaded up and headed out again, arriving in the lobby just in time for the shuttle with some other folks also looking to do a little shopping. On the way, we got to see something very rare and interesting - a Vietnamese funeral procession. We were on a small side-road and the procession was walking. We saw the casket in the back of a van decorated with flowers and the family holding a picture and walking right behind it. All of the people in the procession were dressed in traditional garb. Out of respect, we did not take any pictures.

The Big-C was relatively uneventful - we picked up an inexpensive stroller to have with us here and to use in the airports on the way home, some baby food, throw-away sneaks, etc. Like I said, nothing too major. But, we would recommend the easy trip to any new families coming to Hanoi, because it is a place where you can pick up whatever you might need while here.

Later that day, Zachary met his first "relative"! Alyssa's uncle's girlfriend's brother! In other words, Neil's girlfriend Kimmie's brother, Dr. Kim, who happens to be a doctor in, of all places, Hanoi. Before we left the U.S., Kimmie let him know we were coming here, and we contacted him when we arrived. We spoke with him in the morning and he agreed to meet us at our hotel in the evening. Dr. Kim is an amazing man - he runs a medical clinic in a very poor and rural part of Hanoi, about an hour from where we are staying. He said that he treats people with many ailments, and even travels at times with his staff to the most isolated villages to treat people that are unable to get to his clinic. He told us he had a long day, so we were unable to visit with him that long, but we excitedly made plans to hopefully visit with him at his clinic later during our trip.

For dinner, we met up with John, Jillian and Savannah Weiss, one of the three families leaving this weekend. They brought us to a restaurant they enjoyed and gave us some last minute tips for the rest of our stay. We enjoy them (also, you may recognize Savannah from an earlier post when they were both at Ba Vi).

Hi everyone. We are truly and thoroughly enjoying our experience here so far. After the months of paperwork and preparations, to be able to spend all of our time with our son in his home country is something we cherish and will of course never forget. We also can't say enough good things about our adoption agency - PLAN. Both the U.S.-based and in-country staff are extremely supportive and knowledgeable, and always have the best interest of the babies as their highest priority. We would recommend PLAN to anybody considering adopting from Vietnam.

Anticipating that today was going to be another scorcher, we took advantage of being up early with Zach to take a walk in the city together to nearby Lake Hoan Kiem, where many people were also up and some practicing tai chi by the water. While walking by the lake, as happens at most times when we are out with Zach (as well as other families with their babies), people love to touch and talk to him (and, especially the older women, give thier advice how to hold him) - babies are treated especially importantly in Vietnam, and it is nice to see them light up when Zachary flashes his engaging smile.

After our walk, we expected to try to get a little rest in the morning (Zach did not sleep particularly well last night), then spend some more time in the Old Quarter. Just minutes before we were ready to leave for lunch at about 1, though, Cherie called our hotel room and told us that the U.S. Embassy could perform two first interviews today, and that since we were in the room to receive her call and available, we told her that yes, of course, we could be ready to meet our PLAN rep. in the lobby at 2. After the short drive to the Embassy with one other family, we had our interview, which is really more for administrative than personal purposes. The official (a young American) simply wanted to know things like what information we received about Zachary before traveling, how the process was going, when we arrived, how our agency was performing, etc. Now that we have completed our first interview, there is about a 5-8 day process to finalize the passport and Visa before the second interview and his final medical exam, so I think we will have some days now to get out and do some stuff.

This afternoon, we took Zach to the pool for his first swim. He is such a cutie and he loved the water!!

We love sharing this experience with all of you, and really appreciate all of the wonderful comments and emails we have received. We cannot wait for Zach to share his love with all of you that he has been sharing with us!

The process continues....

We had another very eventful day in Hanoi today! We started this morning by taking Zach to the local SOS clinic to have a doc check out a little rash he has behind his ears, and also because he has been congested and coughing quite a bit. We were very impressed with the facility and the medical staff, and got some medications for his ailments. We are glad we went in, especially because the doctor said that his congestion/cough is now only an upper respiratory infection but if not treated would only get worse. Also, this morning, Chad went with representatives from the other four families in the process with us, and a PLAN representative, to the local immigration office to apply for Zachary's passport. They had originally gone there yesterday, but the office was unexpectedly closed due to some sort of local holiday. So, this morning, it was extremely crowded - but after a couple of hours they were finished and came home. By that time, Alyssa was back from the SOS clinic and Zach had come back to our room from his first play date - with Quan, the son of Lisa and Sean, who live in Medford, MA. Considering how close we live to them, we are hoping they will end up being life-long friends! We spent the rest of the day resting at the hotel, then ventured out in the early evening to the old quarter of Hanoi to have dinner with all the PLAN families currently in Hanoi - both the group of 3 families that are closing out their 3-weeks here, and the 5 families, like us, that have just started. It was a very nice dinner and a rare opportunity for all the babies to be together again since they were previously together at Ba Vi. Tomorrow I think will be our first day without any currenty scheduled appointments, although we are always on-call for our first embassy appointment, which could happen sometime this week. It rained hard tonight for the first time since we have been here, and it looks like it might cool down (to the low 90's) later in the week, which should make it a little easier to trek around the city with Zach. We are looking forward to exploring the city and immersing ourselves in this special culture.

It's Official

Today we had our Giving and Receiving Ceremony which means that Zachary is officially ours. The adoption is final on the Vietnam side and now we wait for our U.S. Embassy appointments so we can bring him home. The ceremony was simple and sweet. We were in a room with all of the other families in our group. We each had to sign in a book and a few other documents. We had to promise to take good care of him and send reports back to Vietnam until he is 18 years old. As soon as it was official, Zachary projectile vomited all over Chad. It was priceless. Happy birthday to daddy!! Speaking of Chad's birthday, we got flowers in our room today from the staff of the hotel. So sweet.

Zachary continues to be a very chill baby. He slept well last night and takes many small cat naps throughout the day. We are still waiting for a poop. Not sure what to do about that :) He is full of smiles and really only cries when he is tired or hungry. I have to admit that his cry is the cutest I have ever heard and I often giggle when I hear it. Someone from our agency brought us a walker and stroller today. So nice! He enjoys the walker and we have yet to try the stroller. I turned on the TV today and he couldn't take his eyes away from it. Chad made me turn it off. Now we know what we'll do when daddy's not home!

At Last

Today was the happiest day of our lives. We went to the orphanage and got to hold our baby for the first time. We were asked to pick him out of a room with a few cribs with one baby in each. I walked right by him because he was wearing a pink shirt with flowers :) Apparently they do not care about gender specific clothing at the orphanage. As soon as I saw him, he gave me a big smile! I scooped him right up and we were in love. Soon after we arrived, a nanny changed Zach into the outfit we brought for him. He looked so cute-everyone loved his outfit and he got lots of laughs from the nannies. We spent a good hour and a half at the orphanage with the four other families in our group. It was wonderful. The nannies take such amazing care of the babies and we could all tell how much they love each of them. The orphanage was super clean, with many cribs, some toys and a few bouncy seats. All of the babies responded very well to their parents.

Back at the hotel, Zach got his first bath. He loved it until I poured water over his head. He wasn't happy about that. He has had a few bottles and even a little cereal. Zach seems to be very chill and happy. He is full of smiles for us! He is able to roll from his back to his tummy and he seems to really like tummy time for short periods of time. Now he is asleep. We'll see how long that lasts.

Enjoy the pictures!

We Arrived!

Well, we arrived in Hanoi on Saturday at 10am as planned. Our flights were mostly uneventful and all on time for the most part. Even our 14 hour flight seemed to go by without a hitch. We even received all of our bags in Vietnam. We were placing bets on how many bags we would actually get at the baggage claim and were very surprised and thrilled to get them.

Our ride to the hotel was an adventure. It is hard to imagine until you are here, but there are people everywhere. Most people drive motorcycles, bikes and some cars. There is constant honking, as it is used to communicate with the other drivers, not as an aggressive statement like in the US. Although there is a system, it seemed to me that people were driving and walking in any direction, whenever and wherever they wanted. We did feel safe the entire drive.

Our hotel is beautiful. Way too nice for us but we are staying for 21 nights, so we figured it would be best to be comfortable. Our unit is an apartment with two bedrooms, two bathrooms, one big common room and a kitchen with a washing machine. It also has a pool, gym, playground and a mall in the lower level. All the people are so nice. We already love it here.

We got the great news that we will be picking Zach up on Sunday morning. We are to meet with the other families in our hotel lobby at 9am and we will be picked up soon after. It is an hour and a half drive to the orphanage. Next time I post, we should have our son with us!!
The pictures I have included are the view from our hotel room. Enjoy!