A Little More Information

I got her new measurements today. They say she weighs a whopping 11.2 kilos! That's 24.7 pounds, which is pretty much what big sister Miranda weighs. I'm not buying it, since that's a good 7 pound weight gain since her referral paperwork three months ago. Looks like we'll be bringing a whole variety of clothing sizes with us.

I hear she has 6 teeth, too!

We decided on her new name: Phoebe Qianyang (and we are trying to keep our last names off the public blog, but imagine my last name followed by Mark's with a hyphen in between). I'm afraid she might never make it to 1st grade recess if she has to print her name neatly once before being allowed outside, and I feel a little badly about that. But we thought she might like to keep her Chinese name as part of the name she'll carry for the rest of her life, so Qianyang it is.

I heard back from Adopchina, and as it ends up Phoebe was not one of their sponsored children after all. Another family traveling with us heard that their daughter definitely is, and the sponsoring family asked to stay in touch with the adopting family-- pretty wonderful, huh?

Yesterday Miranda and I went to the post office to mail Phoebe a care package. Tucked inside was a disposible camera, a little stuffed dog we've been sleeping with for three years, a handmade blanket, and a list of questions for her caretakers about sleeping, eating, and pooping, all the baby essentials. Sometimes these things come back to parents, sometimes they don't. I told the clerk, "To China. For the baby we're adopting." She click-click-clicked away and then said, "It will arrive to her on Monday." And that's when I choked. Suddenly, Phoebe is real and waiting and living not so very far away on the other side of the world. I wonder who is puts her to bed and where she spends the day and if she has little friends and if she has said her first word and if tooth #7 will be there by the time she's in our arms.

Maybe, if we leave on the earliest possible date we've been given, we'll be arriving in China one month from today.