May 11th, 2009

Nee How! (That is supposed to mean hello although I am sure it is spelled wrong.)

Cris is going to be a guest blog writer today because Kelly is not able to make it to the computer. I'll explain more at in a minute.

Anyway, yesterday (May 10th) was the day we got to meet hope and bring her into our family! Gods timing of our getting Hope was really special because the it was Mothers Day! Our busy day was suppoesed to get started at 4:30AM when we were to get our wake up call but Kelly and I were up at 2:30AM (part jet lag, part nerves) so Kelly and I prayed and read scripture together on the floor of the bathroom (we didn't want to wake everyone else). It was a good way to start a very special day.

When it was time to go we got the Nelson entourage together (Cris, Kelly, Hannah, Thomas, Rachel and Grandpa Rich) and left Beijing for Xi'an which is in the Chinese province of Shaanxi where Hope is from. On the way to the airport we all surprised Kelly with Mothers day cards.

After getting into Xi'an we had a quick lunch and then had our guide bring us to the government affairs building. The kids were pretty excited. Hannah expressed that she was really nervous and Thomas said "Dad - I have butterflys in my stomach!" It was cool to see them so excited!

Then it was kind of surreal. We walked out of the elevator on the 6th floor of the government building and while we were still in the hallway, the orphanage staff came walking up with this little girl that looked a lot like the pictures of this little Chinese girl we have all over our house. Sure enough it was Hope! Her foster mother was not there but she was being held by one of the orphanage staff women that knew her pretty well. Once Jing Fang (Hope) got the idea that she was supposed to go with these weird white people she kind of freaked. She didn't stop crying for a long time and while I was standing there filming I was really wondering what we had just gotten ourselves into!

But Kelly was awesome. She was so loving and so patient that eventually Hope settled down. Although she wanted nothing to do with the rest of us Nelson's. That was a little hard for the kids to understand. I told them that we have been making a place for Hope in our hearts for nearly 3 years but this is the first time Hope has heard about those plans. We need to give her some time to get used to us.

So today (May 11th) we spent the day going back and forth to different government buildings and signing papers that I could not read. But Hope has definately warmed up to Kelly. In fact Hope cannot be apart from Kelly for even a second (or we go back to the freaking out thing.) Today Kelly was so exhausted that she fell asleep on the couch while Hope stood next to her and held her hand just watching her.

She did warm up to the kids a little as they all played a little game of kickball in our room and we were priveledged enough to see her smile. Well actually I didnt see it because I was in the bathroom but they showed me pictures!

So thats the gist of it. Sorry no pictures to post yet. We have lots of pictures taken just not downloaded yet. See you tomorrow!