Its a Christmas Miracle! A new post!! :)

It's been a while since we've updated our blog (not sure if anyone is still reading it) since we were traveling and then exhausted and then we've had company since we've been home. It was a very long and stressful trip but we made it. We loved Vietnam but we are so glad to be home! Alexa is doing great and really adjusting to her new surroundings. She loves people and reached right for her Grammy and her MawMaw when she saw them. She took a few nights to get adjusted to the new time zone.
Here are some pictures of our last few days in Vietnam and our trip home. Through all the excitement and exhaustion when we got to the airport we somehow only got videos and no pictures. Our next update (hopefully soon) will have some more pictures since we've been home. (by the way all the pictures downloaded in reverse order so you might want to start at the bottom :)

Alexa is touching US "soil" for the first time!

Alexa enjoying her cozy bassinet on the first four hour plane ride...unfortunately we didn't have one on the 15 hour one.

This is the crazy Vietnam airport at about 10pm. There were so many people there we couldn't hardly move.

At the Vietnam airport getting ready to come home!

Alexa with her friend Haven in Vientam

Alexa loved the swimming pool! She was trying to dive off Leanne's lap into the water even though the water was freezing.

Alexa was having so much fun kicking her legs in the water. We are definately going to have a swimmer on our hands.

This was in the Vietnam version of a shopping mall. It was pretty nice and had 4 or 5 stories.

At the Chocolate Buffet at a nice hotel in town. Leanne was sick for two days from this:)

Alexa and Haven at the Chocolate Buffet...unfortunately for them, they didn't get to sample the chocolate.

Our last night in Vietnam

At the Temple of Literature

We are with our in-country facilitator Anna.

Celebration! We have Alexa's US visa and can travel home!

Alexa in one of her hand-smocked dresses we got her in the Old Quarter for $8!

A beautiful cave in Ha Long Bay. This ray of sunlight coming into the dark cave through a small hole reminded me of God.

Alexa was the main attraction in the cave. Everyone wanted to touch her and ask about her.

Standing outside the cave

Our Little family in Ha Long Bay. We will never forget this trip.

A view of the bay from our boat...so beautiful!

Nic and Alexa "flying".

On the boat.

Alexa loved the air blowing on her.

We are going to try to post more regularly from now on now that we are finally settled and know what we are doing:)

We Are Coming Home!

We got Alexa's visa yesterday and were able to change our plane tickets to leave on Wed. at 11pm! We will be flying into Columbus at 2:15pm on Thursday. We are very excited to be home but are a little sad to leave because we will really miss it here. The people here are so friendly and happy. We are really dreading the 25 hours of travel time and anxious about how Alexa will do on the long plane rides. She doesn't like to sit still for too long:) I'm sorry this is so short and there are no pictures but I have a lot to pack and get ready before we leave. Maybe Nic will be able to post later and add some pictures.

We are fine and having a great time!

Sorry for the delay in posts, but our internet was down for a couple of days and I just got it repaired. No need to worry. Should it happen again please do not be alarmed. Leanne & I can both honestly say we have not once been fearful in any situation. Everyone here is very friendly and we are not worried. I feel safer here than in most big cities in the US! I started this post the other day, but it didn't post because the internet went down. Yesterday we went to Ha Long Bay and I'll try to post some stuff on that later.


What we learned about Miss Alexa so far…
We went to the doctor and got of her checkup for her Visa today. She weighs about 16 pounds & is a little more than 27 inches. No teeth yet, but she likes to chew on stuff. The doctor said for some reason Vietnamese get their teeth later, so not sure when they’ll come in. She has a very small Mongolian spot on her lower back (you wouldn’t notice it if you weren’t looking) which is very uncommon for asian babies. Most asian babies have large Mongolian spots (but they do fade)

She’s typically a very happy baby. Even when she is cranky/hungry if she sees herself in the mirror she will instantly start laughing or giggling. However, she doesn’t really like to have her clothes changed. She’s ok with the pants, but not when you start forcing her arms through!

She always loves to be held. We were shocked to see that in 80-85 degree heat (with very high humidity) she stayed in the baby carrier for 4+ hours 2 days in a row and even took a nap with beeping horns! We have been very blessed with that! (Daddy was more cranky than baby :) However we did find out that she doesn't care for 3 hour car rides when she can't sleep or strech out.

She doesn’t seem to be very needy, but she will decide in an instant when she’s hungry and you better be quick at getting the bottle! And boy does she have a grip. She holds on to her plastic keys for the majority of the day and will only drop them once or twice all day. When we got to dinner the other night we noticed she had brought the tv remote with her!

So far we’ve been lucky that we’ve been able to console her with any problem she’s had. She doesn’t appear to have gone through her grieving period which is very common. Most of the
families we’ve talked to their babies went though it on the 3rd or 4th night. (we’re on day 6)

There wasn’t much scenery in the orphange so she is very interested in the world around her. She really likes to crawl around the apartment hunting for cables or bottles, etc.

Most of the time she is fairly laid back, but once we get about an hour or two from bedtime she gets pretty wound up! We have been very lucky that she has been sleeping 8-9 hours without waking the last several nights. We are hoping it stays that way!

This is going to be pretty short because I'm about to fall asleep but I at least wanted to put some pictures on here for those of you who keep hitting refresh:) A quick update on things: we got Alexa's passport yesterday (that was exciting:) and we have her medical exam tomorrow at 2:30 that we have to get done for her visa. Most of these pictures are when we went to the Old Quarter to shop (we got some great bargains) and walked around town. We met some friends here that we have been hanging out with. They are another couple from Nebraska that adopted a baby girl and we've been having a great time with them.


This is outside a temple.

Nic and Mike with the babies...we bought our new strollers in Old Quarter for $28 (470,000 Dong!)

Lake Hoan Kiem

Alexa was wore out from shopping and had a nap on Daddy at the Ice Cream parlor.

Alexa napping again in our cyclo

One of the ladies selling flowers off her bike.

Talk about a big load.

This picture is for you Carrie...everyone takes their babies on their scooters, even ones younger than this.

The Rogers Family in our cyclo. We weren't sure if we were going to make it out alive. The drivers just cut out in the middle of traffic in the intersections.

YAY!!! KFC...now I will have something to eat:) When we tell people we are from KY they know what we are talking about because of this.

Nic and Alexa in front of Hanoi Hilton which is the prison where John McCain was held. We haven't been in yet because it was closed.

Just another picture of our pretty baby:)

We will try to update more later and I will see if I can get Nic to add some videos:)

-Leanne

Day 2

We had a pretty good night. Alexa fell asleep about 6pm and didn't wake up until 3 (we were both awake, just waiting since we are still mainly on Ohio time and were wide awake. We gave her a quick bottle and she fell back asleep until 6. We can only hope she stays on a pattern similar to this :) After a successful bath we went down for breakfast and then to the pool. We were surprised at how well she enjoyed the pool & her bath (we didn't get any photos from that, but have some longs videos on the camcorder). I did add couple of shorter videos at the end of this post. (the 30 second videos take about 30 min each to upload, so we'll have to save the larger ones for when we get home)


Her pouty look after getting out of the pool



But happy again after she was dried off

On the way to our first breakfast (suprisingly she never bothered her bow)

She loves her puffs!

She wanted everything on the table!

We found out she could crawl today and she found every cable in the room

Videos