Apologies for not posting for the last couple of days. The battery on the laptop ran down, and we were having problems getting it recharged with our converter. We finally got the problem solved just in time to post today's exciting events. I will try to retroactively catch up on the posts for the rest of the Beijing trip in the next day or two.

After the last two years of waiting, the day was almost surreal. We arrived in Nanchang this afternoon around 2:30 pm local time, and the babies (10 in total) arrived around 4:00 pm. We all stood in the elevator bank of our floor as the babies were carried off by their caregivers. As they filed off, we were given an opportunity to try to locate our baby on our own. Although we recognized Katie almost right away, it also helped that each baby was wearing a name badge on a necklace with one of the photos from the first set we received.

When Katie's caregiver turned her over to me, I could see tears in the caregiver's eyes. It broke my heart to realize that today was the second time in Katie's young life that she is being turned over to a stranger by someone that she loves. At the same time, it was reassuring to know that she was loved and well-cared for over the past months. I wish I could have done more to reassure her caregiver that we would take good care of her, but, with the language barrier, all I could do was tell her "thank you" in Chinese and pat her arm.

Katie did cry at the moment she was handed over and on and off for about an hour and a half. We had an opportunity to take her back to our hotel room prior to dinner and get to know each other a bit.

Katie was immediately fascinated by Alex and followed him with her eyes around the room. He did his best to live up to his big brother duties by performing a song and dance routine and doing somersaults on the floor.

At first, she would only stop crying if Dan held her and walked with her, but by the end of the evening, we were all able to hold her while she remained relaxed.

Our big breakthrough came at dinner when she gulped down a pretty big bowl of congee (a watery rice pudding) mixed with steamed egg which is the standard meal for babies here. After that, we got quite a few smiles from her for the rest of the night. She also gulped down a full large bottle before we put her down for the night in less than five minutes.

So far we have discovered that she is very expressive and likes to have something in her hands most of the time. At dinner, she was trying to grab everything in sight. I have a feeling that we are going to need to keep our eyes on her when she gets more mobile. She fits in the 9-month sleeper that we brought, but the legs are almost too short. Other than her cheeks, she is not very chubby, but it seems like she is long.

We have not seen if she can crawl yet as she yelled at us every time we tried to put her on the floor of the hotel room. However, she can sit up on her own, stand if held, and her leg muscles seem strong. I am sure if she is not crawling that she will be soon unless she skips that stage completely.

Tomorrow we are completing some of the official steps to finalize the adoption. We will be going to the Civil Affairs office, notary office and public security office. We will be making a run to the local Wal-Mart to buy any supplies we need. Alex and Grandma Hale are going to have fun on their own rather than sit around hot offices with us.

I know you are all anxious to see photos, but I cannot seem to get them uploaded tonight, and I need to get some rest. I will try again tomorrow. We are looking forward to getting home so everyone can meet Katie in person soon!