Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Did you hear?

We are leaving in 2 weeks! Tickets are booked and hotel reservations are made. Itinerary is being fine tuned but we know the important things. And our friends DID get the same dates as us so we are thrilled! They live in Texas, so we will meet up with them in Shanghai and be together the remainder of the trip. We are SO thankful that God has answered our prayers and allowed us to find friends to walk this road with. It is a small travel group, just our 2 families, but that is enough for us.

We depart St Louis on Wednesday October 8th at 7:55AM on American Airlines. We change planes in Chicago and head into Shanghai from there. We land there on Thursday the 9th at 2pm. Spend a few days touring Shanghai and getting over jetlag.

Sunday we take the train to Hangzhou and then we meet Ms Mavery Monday Morning, the 13th!! Tuesday we travel to Jinhua, where we will visit her orphanage. Friday night we fly into Guangzhou. Her medical appointment is Saturday. Monday is our Consulate Appointment. Tuesday is our swearing in.

We fly from Guangzhou back to Shanghai on Thursday the 23rd and then fly Shanghai-Chicago-St Louis. We land in St Louis on Thursday the 23rd at 8:20 pm.

On Tuesday the 7th,the night before we leave, the kids will take us to a hotel out by the airport. We thought this would make it easier on all of us. We would have to leave the house so early on Wednesday morning, and I do not want to leave while they are sleeping. Especially Sage as I worry that will make her never want to go to bed again if I leave her that way. So this way they can drop us off Tuesday night and say goodbye. In case you wonder, no, we are not taking any of the children with us. Just Mark, myself and Mavery. We will miss them, but the thought of Sage on a plane for that long, is enough to make me break out into a sweat. No way could she handle it, nor could she handle being out of her bed for that amount of time, or sharing a hotel room, or sitting still for any length of time. Some day we hope we can take both girls back for a heritage tour. When she is OLD and calm. Though I am not sure she will ever be calm! ;0)
Just the 2 of us, for 16 nights, does not sound to bad!

I am working on a travel blog, so will post that soon!

Counting down the minutes!!!

4 comments:

annaliese said...

oh I am so glad you are able to travel with friends! :) how I wish we were them this time as well ;)

so excited for you, and praying for you always.

know that my heart is traveling along with you!

hello to China from me :)

Anonymous said...

Shannon,

I found you a while ago through Amy Heymann's blog. Our girls are from the same SWI. I didn't realize you are near St Louis. We are too! We live in Alton, IL AND Ft Leonard Wood, MO, and are back and forth a lot. If you'd ever want to get together with another Christian adoptive family, we'd LOVE it!

We have 4 kiddos, 2 bio, 2 from China, and another one on the way (from China).

Mary Morris
marshmallowfluff@gmail.com

Mom 2 six said...

How exciting ~~can't wait.

julie w said...

Shannon,
Hey! I haven't got a chance to see your blog in forever! i can't believe you leave next week! how exciting!!!!
I can't wait to follow your journey to Mavery!
Love ya!
Julie