Thanks for the comments, and more details

Hi all -- I want to start off by saying thanks for the lovely comments people have been leaving. I'm not able to comment myself from here, so I can't reply to them in the comments. But I am reading and enjoying them. Thanks for all your support.

Today was the day we were supposed to visit Leping city which is where the girls are from. We didn't end up going though. We had to decide yesterday whether or not we were going, and there was no way we were going to be taking the two girls on a bus for 7 hours. So, one of us had hoped to go and the other stay back with the girls. But given the way things went yesterday we knew there was no way that one of us could manage with the two of them, so we didn't say we were going. C & M told us later last night that M could stay and help me and C could go with DOT to Leping. So, off we went to find our guide to see if we could still go. Well, it turned out that none of the Leping families had signed up to go to the city, so they had made different plans -- one of our guides would go to Wanzai with the one family that did decide to go there, and the other would take whoever wanted to go shopping. Our guide told us that if we really wanted to go, she would take us to Leping, but then the group wouldn't get the shopping trip. I didn't want to be the reason the rest of the group didn't get to this particular mall, so we decided to pass on the trip. I know there are pictures of Leping on the Internet, so at least we'll have those. And we weren't going to be able to go to the orphanage or meet the foster families anyhow. We did get a small photo album when we received the girls which included pics of the orphanage, too. Who knows, maybe when the girls are older we'll make a family trip back to China and will check it out then. I'm also hoping at least one of the foster moms of E and A will send us some pictures.

Last night was a better night for all of us. The two girls were asleep by about 8:00 p.m. At 1 a.m. E woke up, but I had her back to sleep (in her crib!) in about 10 minutes. However, she did wake up again at 5:30 a.m., and we were up for the day then. So, I'm pretty tired now.

Today DoT and I bought a couple of strollers which we will have to use now and in Beijing. They were really cheap and are quite nice. The only problem is that E doesn't seem to fall asleep as easily in them. She's able to hold on to the sides or front of the stroller and therefore doesn't need to lean back. And she pretty much refuses to do that. So, no sleep. Tonight I finally picked her up out of the stroller after I'd been wheeling her around for about 45 minutes, and she put her head right down and fell asleep immediately. She'd been fighting sleep for so long in the stroller, that she fell asleep right away as soon as her head had a bit of support.

So, I've been asked for details about the two girls. Here's a start to what I can tell you...

A:

• the updated papers we got on her say that she is 8 kg (but we haven't weighed her yet)
• she eats her formula easily, but doesn't really want to eat anything else
• she is very good natured -- smiles a lot and is generally very content to do whatever we want
• she's a great sleeper -- usually about 11 or 12 hours a night

E:

• her papers say she's 7 kg (but we haven't weighed her yet either)
• she won't eat formula and for the first day lived on cheerios, baby mum mums, and arrowroot cookies. She's now less thrilled with the crackers and cookies, but today she ate congee and prunes (she had a bit of a problem with constipation -- 'has' being the key word there. The prunes did the trick really quickly.)
• she refuses apple juice when offered it, but if you have a bottle of it around she's likely to take it and start drinking it herself
• she does NOT like taking a bath -- but then again, that assessment is based on one attempt only and she's got a mind of her own. She doesn't much like anything that she herself doesn't want at that exact moment.

We got lots of smiles and even some laughs out of both of them today. We also had a couple more crying fits. But generally they are not lasting long.

Neither one is crawling or walking. In fact, when sitting on the bed, they are likely to fall over after a few minutes if they are not supported. I was a bit concerned about this, but it seems that others of the Leping babies are not crawling either. And today both of them were supporting their weight on their legs when we held them up by their arms. (Yesterday I'm not sure they were doing that.) Both like to babble to themselves and us. And both are facinated by glasses. If DoT and I arrive home with our glasses in one piece it will be a miracle. :-)

Well, that's it for tonight. I'm going to bed early, and hopefully we'll all sleep 12 hours. (Yeah, right.) Here are a couple more pictures of them (this time with them both asleep).

Take care all.

P.S. This posting is getting harder. The buttons and instructions are all in Chinese, and the more sleep deprived I get the harder it is for me to remember which button I hit to publish and which button is for something else (like say delete).

P.P.S. While DoT and I still maintain that these girls are not identical twins - the Chinese people we encounter all seem to think they are. Don't know whether it's a cultural thing, or whether they will actually look much more alike to us when E's suntan fades a bit and they start to share facial expressions, which doesn't happen that often yet. (They're complexions are not nearly as different now as they appeared in the referral photos.)