More pictures and update...

Jacqueline here. David has put up some pictures during this past week before this post. This is the first time I am able to post to the blog b/c we didn't have a computer easily accessible in Chengdu. It has been a challenging week and we had some rough days but today seems a lot better so far. Jamie tends to have a lot of meltdowns and tantrums later afternoons, even with good napping so I don't know what later will be like. He is easily angered if he doesn't have exactly what he wants when he wants, so it's more trying than we expected, but we're starting to get a bit more used to being parents day by day. I had so hoped I"d be able to post a glowing report but it has been seriously rough!

 

The meeting and first couple of days were the easiest days so far except for today. I am hoping we're turning a corner maybe. Or it may be that we skipped the highchair today at breakfast and David held him to eat. Poor little dude had a bad cold that required a trip to a children's hospital for Rx antibiotics. The med gave him diarrhea so we've had blow outs all week every day and let me tell you, this little man does *not* like his diaper changed! So it tiresus all out. He's on medicine for the diarrhea and a bland diet which makes him very mad at meal times b/c he sees people eating the food he wants to try and we can only feed him bland stuff like congee (rice porridge) which he doesn't really care for, and soup noodles. He loves bread so we've been giving him some today  and yesterday. One thing that has been really helpful for us and especially for Jamie is that he sleeps well for the most part. He cries for a few seconds several times during the night but I think it is b/c he gets a leg stuck between bars of crib, or perhaps that is when he's processing grief over the changes.

 

He awoke smiling for me today. He is okay with me but clearly prefers his dada. He still gets the names confused and calls David mama, lol. I was shocked that even on the 2nd day he was imitating our words already. On the 2nd day he tried to say his first English word 'people', gotcha, button, dada, bee and thank you. He loves when we say thank you as he hands something to us. We just wish his happier moods were longer lasting and his rages were shorter and less frequent but today has been significantly improved so I'm hopeful to some extent. We'll see what this afternoon brings! We go out w/ families for dinner tonight along w/ the woman that matched our family and the other families with their children (her name is Lilly.) We already anticipate that David won't spend much of the meal at the table since Jamie will likely be very upset that he can't eat what everyone else is eating.

 

He stuffs too much food in and won't swallow while he stuffs more in and gets outraged if you don't keep shoveling it in. I hope over time he'll figure out he should swallow some first. He is a serious cheerio addict and you'd better not take his cheerio cup away from him or he'll let the world know your offense. Hard to tell if this is all his regular personality or if it's b/c we're new and he doesn't understand and can't express himself and he's sick. If this is who he is he is very strong willed and firey!

 

I wish I could post videos here but youtube is blocked. His voice is incredibly cute and high pitched. He likes to point at everything to hear what it is called and he says, " Da??" and we tell him whatever the object is. He loves to watch cars and buses. He said 'bus' yesterday. He called me mama a couple of times today. The picture in the list with the older Chinese man holding Jamie is from his finding spot. That is the man that found him!!!!! We were floored that we got to meet him! He is named after this man. When we went to the finding spot (number 2 gate you see us under in picture) we looked around and our guide said some people went to go tell the man that we were there so he came to meet us! Wow. We found out that he and his wife tried to adopt LuQuan but were told no by their government b/c they already had a child and were older. He took him to the police station shortly after finding him and was told to bring him to the children's welfare institute (orphanage.) I am so happy that we have a picture of him holding our son. What a treasure for Jamie some day to see. We also will be able to send him pictures of Jamie once we are home!!

 

Well that's about all I have time for now. Hope you like the pictures!