Our Perfect Baby

Lest you all think we're just here for the touring and scenery (which are quite amazing, I must say), let me reassure you that we are trying to soak it all in and relay it to friends at home so that we can someday provide our daughter (and us later, when we come off our "cloud") a glimpse into the world we've entered, the homeland of our sweet baby's birth. I know we've not shared too many details about Hannah Li, so I'm devoting this entire entry to all things baby.

First and most importantly, Hannah is a very happy baby, with the sweetest tickle spots right around her ribs. She likes to talk. Her favorite phrase is "ba-ba-ba-ba-ba-ba." She can click her tongue and blow rasberries, which have lately gotten more slobbery. She stands on my lap and started giving me hugs after a few days and, not long after, began to share them with Jaycie and Daddy. I give her kisses, which she loves as well, but she's not yet returned any. She chews on her little pointer finger and is a fan of her pacifier, especially at sleepy times. She also rubs her blanket on her face when she's sleepy (Aunt Jen-Jen, her blankie has been awesome!).

At this point she is very attached to mommy, but she's very entertained by Jaycie, who can make her cackle when she (Jaycie) does this little dance to "Side to side, and do the butterfly." She reached out for her daddy to hold her today at the medical examination room for the first time. She likes him to hold her as long as he's moving, but when the pace slows down it's back to mommy. She does not like for us to change her clothes (seems like all the babies in our group are that way), and diaper time can also be a wiggly time, but not always.

She doesn't spit up all the time, but she did the first day and yesterday quite a bit during our trip (I'm sure the Guangzhou airport is still fussing about the puddle we left at the top of one escalator). Maybe travelling doesn't agree with her. The jury's still out on that one. Jaycie was a spitter-upper, too; the sour smell is familiar, but yucky.

She has two teeth on the bottom, so we're mostly introducing her to foods that are easy on the gums. She likes her congee (a soupy rice w/ some kind of broth in it) quite a bit and steamed egg is another favorite. Like Jaycie and us, she likes watermelon, which they serve after most meals and always at breakfast. The veggie puffs we brought are a favorite (they basically melt in her mouth), and she'll pretty much try anything we offer. Daddy has already tried to win her affections by giving her ice cream last night (naughty Daddy!).

Hannah can sit up, but she easily falls to the side, so we're careful to place pillows all around when she's sitting by herself. You may notice the bruise on her cheek, which is from the first day, when we didn't know how unstable she was and she bonked over into the nightstand (we felt terrible). This isn't unusual; many of the babies in our group lack balance that babies their age back home exhibit. They've likely spent lots of time in walkers and not much time exercising on the floor. We're also working on tummy time. Even though the medical report said she could crawl, she cannot. Scooting and rolling over are more her style. We're also working on sitting up from lying down as well as excercising her leg muscles, as she's not even close to walking.

We all love her so much already, and we are learning more about her each day. She is a delightful baby, and so much fun to watch. Life for us will never be the same. Much praise goes to our heavenly Father for allowing all of this to occur, even when we were afraid it might not during the long wait. I know that the time we spent in this process had a purpose - to lead us straight to the baby of our hearts - Feng Fu Er - forever after known as Hannah Li Fowlkes.