Wednesday, June 25, 2008
BEAUTIFUL DAY!

Today was wonderful for a couple of reasons. The first one happened at breakfast. An American couple with a young Chinese son sat down next to us this morning at breakfast. After we both introduced ourselves, we found out that our sons had been living at the Philip Hayden Foundation and were friends! The boys recognized each other right away! It was awesome to see Philip’s and Cody’s faces light up at first sight of each other. Cody came around the table to see Philip. Philip, who is very serious about eating and lets nothing stand in the way of getting food, did not want to talk to Cody right away other than to say, “Hi.” Once Philip felt he had had enough to eat that he could be sociable, he began to feed Cody from his own plate. Cody’s parents couldn’t get him to eat this morning, but when Philip handed him food, Cody would eat it! The boys even shared a joke together. Cody dropped a piece of food into Philip’s cup, and they both laughed and laughed about it. It was so cute and heartwarming to see this interaction between the boys. What a great thing it is to meet an old friend in an unexpected place! We plan to have breakfast together tomorrow so that the boys can see each other again.

The other thing was quite unexpected as well. We had a very nice time this morning when we went to the Henan Center for Adoption Affairs. The staff was very pleasant and kind to us and to Philip as we filled out paperwork. We were there for at least an hour and a half or so. Shirley, our FTIA coordinator, told us that all three of us would have to return in the afternoon to pick up the adoption decree. It didn’t dawn on Kevin and me what that meeting might be about even though Shirley told us what we would be picking up. When we arrived, they had us hold Philip and stand up next to their desks. Still we were not understanding the importance of this meeting. Then they talked in Chinese as Shirley translated. They told us that it was official Philip was our son! Immediately we understood that this was not an average sort of filling out paper work type of meeting. This was the time when Philip became our son! In that simple and humble ceremony, Philip became ours and we became his! We are now a family of four!