Here, In China - Our Journey Begins For Real

So today is Thanksgiving Day.  Our day is done, and my favorite boys are asleep in the bed next to me as I sit here and try to process the Wonder of our God.  Honestly, I really think that is an exercise in futility, as once again, He proves that his ways are so much higher, and His love is so much deeper and wider than we can begin to comprehend.  But, even so, who am I not to take a moment and revel is all His goodness, especially on this day of Thanksgiving.

Today was a very emotional day for me.  Not because we made any huge strides with Caleb, or because we did anything super special here in China.  And while I am positive that the fact that today is Thanksgiving and 2/5ths of my whole world is on the other side of it has played a huge part in the emotional rollercoaster that has been today, I think the majority of my emotional state is due to the fact that God continues to shower His beautiful love on me, and I am, once again, humbled by the fact that I am so undeserving.

Ever since we got Caleb (I will give you the details - give me a minute!), I have been singing the old hymn, "To God be the glory, great things He hath done..."  How wonderful a way to put into words what has taken place in the Nixon family over the last year!  Great things HE hath done for sure!  Jodie and I have shared with a few people that once we said "Yes" to adopting, God took the reigns and we have had little control since.  It has been so amazing to be part of this journey, and we are so very grateful that God chose us to parent Caleb here on earth.  It is so evident to us, and I pray to all of you and one day Caleb, that God has huge plans for this sweet boy.  And it is so humbling to know that we get to watch it all unfold before our eyes.

I have been putting this post off for several reasons.  One, I simply haven't had time.  I haven't wanted to waste even one second that I have had with Caleb.  Every moment I have while he is awake is a moment I can use to bond with him and love on him and attempt to make up for the 3 years with him that are lost forever.  And every night when he falls asleep, I have been right behind him!  Secondly, I know that I will never be able to get how I feel about the events of this week on "paper" in a way that truly captures the enormity of it all, so I am having trouble even starting.  Honestly, there just aren't enough words, even if I took all the words in all the languages across the world and put them together.  There simply aren't enough.  But I guess I will try.

So I guess I left off on Sunday night.  So Monday.  Monday, November 23, 2015 - a day we will NEVER forget.  We woke up early, but had until 12:30 to just hang and prepare for Gotcha Day.  We went up for breakfast with the rest of our group.  We were all so filled with anxiety and nervous energy.  Some of us couldn't even eat.  But we stayed up in the cafe for quite a while, getting to know each other a little better, sharing stories of how we got here and about our children, ultimately just trying to make time fly.  After breakfast, we came back to our hotel room to gather all the Gotcha Day necessities.  That was so hard.  I packed a bag for Caleb, then I repacked it 3 more times, hoping that it would be filled with perfection for him.  There was no way to know if he would have toys to bring with him, if we would be able to keep the clothing he came dressed in, if they would require a clothing donation should we be allowed to keep the clothing he came dressed in.  All we knew was that he, and the 4 other children from his orphanage being adopted that day, had a 7 hour drive to get to us.  We didn't know if they had come in the night before and were already somewhere in the city waiting to meet us, or if they had left Shantou City early that morning and were still en route to us.  All we knew was that we had to be in the hotel lobby at 12:30.  Finally, at 12:00 we decided to go on down.  We just knew that pacing the floor of our room wasn't going to do anything but help us lose our minds.  To our surprise, the other 3 families were already down there too.  It was kind of humorous actually.  We were all so ready.

Before heading to the Civil Affairs building to meet our children, we had to go to the bank to exchange our final adoption fee, which we had all brought to China in the form of perfectly crisp, new $100 bills, into Chinese Yuan.  Boy, what that an experience!!!!!  I don't look forward to doing that again!!  We were in the bank for over an hour!  At one point, we were sitting there at the window.  The teller, who sat behind a wall of glass, had all our money and our passports on his side of the glass.  It was rather unsettling and a little nerve racking.  But, all went well and we accomplished what we had come to do.  Next stop, Civil Affairs.

We got to Civil Affairs a little later than was planned.  Our guide, Helen, wasn't sure if the children had arrived yet or not, so we just made our way up to the adoption floor to wait.  We walked through the door, and there he was.  I lost it.  It was him, in flesh and blood, right there in the same room as us.  I melted completely.  At that point, though, we weren't allowed to talk to him.  He was actually on his way to the potty with one of the nannies, and Helen had a few pieces of paperwork for us to look over before we could get started.  So while we looked over that, we got our cameras ready to capture him heading back to the room.  Here is our first picture of our boy (he's the little boy in the blue shirt holding one of the nanny's hands.):

At this point, I was a complete hot mess.  All the work we had done.  All the questions we had answered.  All interviews and applications.  All the hoops through which we had jumped.  All the dotted "I"s and crossed "T"s.  All the STUFF.  It had all lead up to this.  It was finally time to meet our sweet boy in person.  But I was a wreck!  What if he was too scared to know that this was all done out of love for him?  What if he didn't want to come to us?  What if...?  What if....?  What if...?  But there was not time for "What if...?".  It was time! Then.... ?  This.....

Our boy RAN to us.  And he hasn't looked back yet.  And we are blown away!

I can remember being pregnant with Georgia, scared to death that I didn't have enough love to give her considering breadth of the love I had for Samantha.  Of course, I did.  I do.  One would think I would've learned my lesson with that.  But, even so, this is different.  I know that I felt love for this sweet boy from the moment I saw his picture.  But throughout this process, there has been this underlying fear that I didn't have enough true Momma Love for him.  There was this fear that, since I didn't birth him, even though I wanted to love him as if I did, that I wouldn't.  But, man, I am so very much in love with this kid.  I love him 100%.  I love him as though he has been mine since day 1.  I love him as though God had knitted him together in MY womb.  I. LOVE. MY. SON.  And I am so incredibly Thankful.

More pics to come soon.  Please keep the prayers coming.  Pray for endurance.  So far this has been an absolute joy.  We have had NO issues.  He's eating well, he's sleeping well, and he seems to really like us.  And while I am loving this bonding time with him, I am missing my big babies something fierce.  We have been able to FaceTime with them every day, but it's just not the same.  I want to wrap my arms around them.  I want to introduce them to their brother.  I want to get on with life as a family of 5.  I want ... to go home.  But, we are only 1/2 way there.  We have just shy of another week here in country.  So please pray for renewed endurance.

Thank you all for your support.  Love you!