Sunday, September 11, 2005 at about 1 pm Michigan time

It's now been over 2 weeks since we've been home and I'm finally, finally getting to making a new post. I had planned on doing this within a day or two after we returned, but that trip back really took a lot out of me and I couldn't get over the jet lag for a while. Of course, that doesn't explain why it took more than 2 weeks to do this - I guess my excuse is I'm back to work, the kids (other than Stacie) are back to school, etc.

Anyway, the trip back from Hong Kong to Chicago seemed to take forever. Stacie was actually quite good on the way back - she cried some but not much - but the 14 hour flight plus 1 hour delay on the tarmac beforehand wasn't too fun for me. We were sitting in coach class, of course, and for some reason I have a knack of sitting behind the first person in the plane that wants to recline his or her seat. Well, that was the case again, and leg room was terrible. Aside from dozing off for maybe 30 minutes or so at the most I wasn't able to sleep at all. The movies that were shown on the plane were not funny or interesting and so I couldn't make the time pass that way either.

Well, it's been so long ago and so I guess I don't need to explain more about the trip back, other than to say we ended up running through O'Hare airport to make our connecting flight to Grand Rapids. We thought we would miss the flight because our flight was an hour late, but fortunately our connecting flight was 1 1/2 hour late and so we made the flight to Grand Rapids.

It was good coming home, and we were met by relatives and friends at the airport. After spending some time there, we stopped at Taco Bell on the way home to satisfy Stephanie's cravings. We were met at home by some other friends, and we had a really enjoyable time. Another thing that was great is that almost all of our remodeling and redecorating at our home was completed while we were gone, and it looked great. Thanks to a lot of people that helped out in doing that!

Like I said before, I had a tough time with the jet lag coming back. We returned on Friday August 26 and I took 4 or 5 hour naps on Saturday and Sunday. By the middle of the next week, though, I was pretty much over it.

Since we've been home we've celebrated Stacie's first birthday (again) and Stephanie's 14th birthday and we've also been busy with typical school stuff: Stephanie started high school and is playing tennis, Sarah is busy starting Junior High, and Ryan started 5th grade and is busy with soccer. Sue is busy with Stacie at home and with the kids at school, and that keeps her busy. I returned back to work, of course, and so there's a lot of stuff going on.

The trip exceeded my (high) expectations. There were many things that happened that were such blessings. I could write a lot about these, but here's just some of them in no particular order:

• Sue injured her back just before we left. She could hardly lift her left leg. She took some muscle relaxers but that didn't help. She went to be prayed for at church on the Sunday before we left. Sue can tell you more about it, but the bottom line is that her back was healed and while we were in China Sue felt better health-wise than she has in years.
• Stacie is really a great baby and great to be around. She has bonded very well with Sue and the rest of the family. She is a joy. She will also keep us young because I think she will be an active child . . . . :)
• We had safe travel going both ways and Stacie did well on the return flight (better than I did!).
• The trip itself was great – not only were we able to do some cool stuff (see Tiananmen Square, climb the Great Wall, see Hong Kong, etc.), but in addition we were able to meet a Chinese Christian woman and attend her church. We were able to go out to the countryside and see how those in the country lived. We were able to see different parts of China (Beijing, Hunan province, Guangzhou and Hong Kong). We were able to have some authentic Chinese food (which wasn’t necessarily a favorite of ours, but it still was a good experience). Sue was able to talk with a lot of different people about adoption and why we are doing it. A lot of Chinese women were also very interested.
• We were hoping we wouldn't have to pull the kids out of school, and we didn't have to do so. Our local school district (Jenison) started school after Labor Day for the first time in years, which means that the kids had a week to recuperate before starting back to school. That was great.
• We had a really great group of people to travel with (10 other families). I hope that we're able to keep in touch with all of them by having a reunion from time to time.
• Stacie is having such a positive impact on our family. The kids really love her and she truly is a blessing.

There are many other things we could talk about as well - it was a very memorable time.

I've attached several pictures to this blog - pictures of us outside the Hong Kong airport, pictures of us inside the Hong Kong airport, a picture of us behind a banner welcoming Stacie in the Grand Rapids airport, a close up picture of Stacie, and a picture of Stacie resting on her Aunt Deb while on the grass at my parent's house.

Last but not least, even though I am delinquent in making this post, we're going to try to update the blog from time to time so please check back again! Thanks again for all of the prayers and support, and we look forward to seeing all of you.

Gord