We’re sitting in a coffee shop in the Guangzhou airport waiting on food because we’re starving! Been a long time since breakfast.

Our flight out of here is at 8:00 pm (8:00 am EST). If the plane is on schedule, we’ll arrive in Beijing at 11:15 pm and crash at the Sino-Swiss Hotel.

It was a bittersweet day.

On the one hand, we’re certainly ready to get home to some semblance of a normal routine. But on the other hand, this was a very good trip and it’s always hard to say goodbye…not only to our travelmates but to our great guide and friend, Elvin, in Guangzhou.

I video-chatted on Skype with some folks from church this morning.

I warned some of them that I would put their picture on our blog for the world to see. Now they are believers.

I can’t believe this was our last full day in China. And brother let me tell you…it was full.

Carmi was up and out of the room early this morning. She and one representative from each of the other three families had to make the 40-minute drive to the American Consulate and get a new affidavit of vaccination notarized. This affidavit is basically a promise that we’ll have our children’s vaccinations up-to-date within 30 days of our return to the US. The group was gone from 8:00 am to around 10:45.

While Carmi was away, I got the kiddos up and we enjoyed a leisurely breakfast at the White Swan buffet. After eating, we had to explore the incredible waterfall inside the hotel as well as the fish in the pool at the base of the waterfall. These fish are big enough to eat Karys in one gulp.

Once everyone returned from the consulate, we walked to a nearby restaurant for lunch. This was the restaurant we first experienced during Karys’ adoption trip that has a seafood market of sorts in the front. Visitors to the restaurant may pick what they’d like to eat so you are guaranteed a fresh meal.

There are normal seafood selections like fish and lobster-lookalikes. Then there are these tasty morsels:

I asked Zane, through the translator, if he eat these things. He unmistakably assured me that he does not.

We then loaded up in our tour bus and headed to “pedestrian street” and the electronics market for some shopping.

As soon as we walked into the electronics market, we saw this counter with Nintendo DS’s and games so that’s where the majority of our time was spent. Most of the games were “downloads” onto a game chip. There were very few original DS games. But I found one (Mario Kart) and bought it for Eliana. I bought another Chinese game for Zane who was one happy camper when we arrived back at the hotel.

There were DS units that normally cost $130 back home being sold for only $70. One of our families started to purchase one when, at the very last moment, the seller (in the white shirt) admitted that the unit was refurbished and packaged as “new”. The family thanked him for his honesty and then told him he could keep it.

All four of our families worked up quite an appetite and enjoyed dinner together at Lucy’s.

Before returning to the hotel, we stopped at a deli next to the White Swan and ordered a couple of cakes for our birthday celebration tomorrow. Lastly we ventured into another store also next to the White Swan and purchased a traditional silk jacket for Carmi and silk outfits for Zane, Eliana and Karys. I bought myself an outfit on “pedestrian street”. We’ll model them all tomorrow in our official “red couch” photo session.

Zane came out of the bathroom after finishing his shower tonight and said “Babba” which is Chinese for father. I looked and he had pulled up one of his t-shirt sleeves to show me a red area where one of his shots had been administered yesterday. Poor guy was having some soreness.

Before going to bed, Eliana had a chance to “video chat” one more time with her 1st grade class back home.

Today we got up bright and early at 6:00. Well, actually only I got up that early. Doug didn’t roll out of bed till almost 7:00 and he is the morning person. I am not!

After the wonderful breakfast buffet at the White Swan, it was off to the medical exam and photos for the visa. There were many other families waiting at the medical exam office so we did photos first. All of our agency families then filed in to get the medical exam and I use that term quite loosely! Zane was the only one who had anything truly done. He had to get three shots, poor guy. I know one was for measles, mumps and rubella but can’t remember the other two. They are on the medical report which is with our consulate documents.

Following the medical exam,  we all met with our guide Elvin to fill out the paperwork for the consulate. Unfortunately, I had somehow managed to leave my file with our home-study at home and our agency will have to fax it to us here at the hotel. Not to worry though, others have done the same thing and it is quickly resolved. I just spoke with Mei, our case manager and she is going to fax this tonight. One representative from each family will also have to go to the consulate tomorrow because apparently one of our forms, the vaccination affidavit, is an old form so we all have to go to the consulate to have a new one notarized. Oh, and we have to be ready to go at 8:00 am, Doug will get to take all the kids to breakfast by himself.

Lunch was another at Lucy’s. Zane had better luck with something to eat this time, he got some fried noodles, but, they were a little too oily he told us.  I am really going to have to change my cooking some when we get home, probably take a few trips to the Asian market in Charlotte. Thankfully I have a very good Chinese cookbook at home!

Also made some plans to have our family birthday party here in China. It will be at lunch time on Thursday. There is a bakery next to the hotel where I can order a cake and Elvin will bring it to lunch for us all.  I was also able to buy a few things today for the kids so they will have something to open, now finding a bag or wrapping paper, that will be possibly a little difficult. We were also able to take our dirty laundry to be done so we don’t have to travel home with stinky clothes .

Steve showed up at our door at 10:00 am this morning with Zane’s passport. Our boy can come home!

We finished packing our bags and were out the door at 11:00.

Zane has been so full of energy the last few days - laughing and picking with his sisters. But today, once we were in the van and on the way to the airport, he became very withdrawn. He would hardly look at any of us. He knew we were leaving Shenyang and I think he realized he was leaving home. It was sad.

We ate lunch at a KFC in the airport and started through security at 1:00. I’m not positive but it looked to me like Steve was a little sad to see us go as we walked away. He gave me his email address and asked us to stay in touch.

Our flight was at 2:05 and was uneventful, thank goodness. We landed at Guangzhou International at 5:55.

After claiming our luggage, we saw a young lady holding up another “Henderson Family” sign. She was not to be our guide in Guangzhou but had been asked by our guide to come to the airport while he got everything situated with our rooms.

She told us that one of our agency families - Gary, Blair, Ridge and Kai Miller - was already there and waiting and that the other two families were on their way. It was SO good to see the Millers again. We hooked up with them very briefly in Beijing at the beginning of our trip but then went our separate ways.

A short time later, Jimmy, Stephanie and Maddox Pirckle showed up. One more family was coming but their flight didn’t arrive until around 8:00. So guess what we did? Our three families climbed into our very own charter bus for the ride to the White Swan. I found out on the bus that all four families have adopted boys - one is 18 months, one is 23 months, one is 36 months and one is 156 months.

When we climbed off the bus at the hotel, we met our guide, Elvin. Elvin was our guide in 2007 on Karys’ adoption trip. He remembered me and gave me a great big manly hug.

The White Swan is a nice hotel but the rooms here are s-m-a-l-l compared to our rooms during the first part of the trip. And the beds are smaller and hard as rocks. Waah. Do I sound like I’m whining yet?

Once the porter (poor guy) unloaded our luggage, we made a beeline for Lucy’s which stays open until 2:00 am. Lucy’s Cafe & Restaurant is an established Western-style restaurant in the old Shamian district of Guangzhou. Carmi and I both had a hamburger, Eliana had spaghetti, Karys ate congee and Zane? Well, we bought him some fish and chips but he wasn’t crazy at all about the fish.

Carmi wanted to stop at the 7-11 across from the hotel to get some water and, since we were there, some ice cream. We thought we’d died and gone to heaven.

Tomorrow morning we go for Zane’s medical exam at 9:30. Not sure what’s planned after that. Hopefully a trip to the Guangzhou electronics market!

We’re packing up the family and preparing to leave for the airport.

Our next stop is Guangzhou in southern China and the White Swan hotel.

We’re in the home stretch now!

I have no idea why the Chinese are so infatuated with Christmas.

In several of the stores that we’ve been in the last few days, it was not unusual at all to hear Christmas songs wafting through the air.

Then this afternnoon when we stopped for lunch after sightseeing, I noticed this Christmas decoration on the wall above Karys’ head. Pretty but a little out of place.

On the way back to the hotel, tiredness affected our children in different ways.