He's ours!

Let me start with yesterday where I left off. We walked down to the beach, but stopped at the sand. Then we went and swam for a bit in the resort's pool. It was really nice. Then we walked to marble alley. Danang has marble mountains, where they mine marble and make sculptures. It's really amazing. This alley is a short walk from the resort and it leads up to the mountain. Down the alley, people are hand- and machine-carving the huge chunks of marble. The finished products are beautiful. After that, we had dinner then went to bed early. We figured it would be the last night for a while that we sleep through the night!

We woke up at 4am because we were so excited. We got the gifts ready for the orphanage caretakers, sorted out the diaper bag, ate breakfast, etc. At 9am, our driver came and took us to the orphanage. They were waiting outside with Dylan. Megan's baby was asleep inside. I got Dylan and he started crying! I suppose I would cry, too, if some stranger came and grabbed me away from the people I knew. I felt so bad for him. But apparently it was time to eat. This was interesting.

They brought out the bottle with a spoon attached to the end. They would squeeze out glue-looking stuff and shove it in his mouth, even through his cries. They sang to him and rocked him a lot. He eventually stopped crying, finished the whole bottle, and they handed him back to me. He was zonked out within seconds. They asked if I would change his clothes, which I was wanting to do, so I pulled out his outfit I got for the G&R. It was a 6-9 month outfit. It fell off of him. They just kept laughing about it, then got rubberbands and tied them through 2 beltloops on each side to help keep his pants up. After several minutes, they told us it was time to go. We weren't sure where we were going, as we thought the G&R was at the orphanage. They all said bye to the babies and it was so sad. The caretakers really love the babies and it shows. They didn't want him to go.

We went to the taxi and drove to their version of city hall. It was a conference room with one table and about 10 chairs. There was a man and woman that came in after us that were really dressed up. We thought they were the officials. Turns out they were a wedding couple. We sat there and watched them sign the marriage certificate. It was odd. Then we waited for about 45 minutes, sweating, nervous, no idea what was happening and no one to translate. People kept coming in and out, lots of paperwork was piling up, and it all looked very official. They asked for a document but we had no idea what they wanted. We finally figured it out and I accidentally gave them a copy. They said it wouldn't work, at which point my heart stopped. Then they said, "copy, copy", so I looked and sure enough, I still had the original. We went on to sign about 10 things each. I have NO idea what they said, but I wasn't about to question it!

Finally, at 11, THE official walked in. She was the one that would grant or deny the adoption. By this time, our facilitator was there, and he could translate. They called Chris and I up to the front of the room first and shook Chris' hand, and handed us a piece of paper. She was saying something, then Binh translated for us. He said the committee for the city of Danang had granted our request for adoption of Trung Vinh. They asked that we send regular updates to the city and visit if possible. We promised to send said updates, and they said congratulations, you're parents. At that point, I cried again. Of course. Then they did the same to the other lady that was with us. We then had to make a statement to the orphanage officials (thank you, you took great care of Vinh, he was loved very much, we promise to take care of him, etc.), then we left. We went to the grocery store for formula and diapers.

Dylan has not had any formula since the bottle during the ceremony. He's had two small bottles of breastmilk, which he seems to love. We haven't tried to nurse yet. He needs to spend more time with us first. Oh, and during the ceremony, he wet his diaper, so afterwards, while they were going through papers, I had to change him right there, for the first time ever, on a chair in front of some very important people. Talk about nervous! The whole experience was terrifying, honestly. I was emotionally exhausted afterwards and couldn't even get excited. I was just fried.

The first half hour in the hotel was rough. He was crying and wouldn't stop. He was dry and fed, so we just walked him around. We figure he'll have an adjustment period for a while. He fell asleep at the orphanage and woke up, never to see the only people he knew again (at least not for several months until we come back). Finally, though, he fell asleep. We laid him in his crib and he slept for about 45 minutes, then woke up. I got him up and laid him on my chest on the bed, and he fell right back asleep, so he went back to his crib. He slept a total of about 2.5 hours! Then we walked down to the beach together (with Daddy wearing the carrier!), then came back to the room. We've just been sitting on the floor together playing. Now he's asleep again. It's kind of early (6:45), but he'll be up soon. We have to meet Binh (facilitator's partner) in an hour. We have no idea why, and we're really nervous. Why would he come to the hotel at 8pm after telling us this afternoon he'd see us on Sunday? We're both very nervous, but I guess we'll find out in an hour!

I'll try to get more pictures loaded. I have lots of great ones now. You can view them at http://s133.photobucket.com/albums/q71/DylanAVWright/

It may be tomorrow before I get around to it. I'm exhausted!!