A Free Day...and don't drink the water...

OK. I was going to give up but now I will try again. This is my third time writing this. Each time before I've done something that erases everything I type. Now I am not hitting any keys beyond the letters. But I type very fast and try to self correct as I go. So maybe I'm hitting a certain secret combination erase thingy that I don't know about. But for YOU, I will try again. :-)

Yay! Yay! We had a free day! No business to do, no guide, just us and where ever our feet can take us to. Nice! We started off with a Skype talk with the boys and family, then a chat with my brother, his lovely wife Kelly, and one of my most wonderful nieces, Nicole. Anna Lin just LOVES her Aunt Kelly and cousin Nicole (cousin Sarah Ann was in bed. She loves her too!). Skype is the way to go people, for you heading off to China. Talk computer to computer for free. You can chat, you can talk through the microphones, or add a webcam and you can really kick it up a notch! What a great way to start the day, hearing the voices of those we love and seeing their faces. Though Dawn had to troubleshoot her webcam, so we hope to see our boys' wonderful faces today. We hear that Noah is like a bass-maniac catching them right and left. Zak has commandeered Uncle Bob's golf cart. Spencer and his cousin Nick are the four-wheel renegades! I believe they said Spencer crashed, which is just another reason why we are not in a hurry for him to get his driving permit. ;-) Oh we miss you guys so much!

After this it was a walk around the lake here in Hangzhou, which is just a walk across from the hotel. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. I love parks and man this one is beautiful. It was a cloudy day, but like where we live a cloudy day is a blessing in the summer. The weather was so nice, with a little breeze. It was just the right thing for energetic kids. Michelle and Alex went with us with their new son Paul Lei. He's a hoot. A male Anna Lin kicked up a notch. :-) His dad is really bonding with him, messing around with him, rough housing a little, and racing him here and there. Makes me smile. I have three boys and I really do love boys. Love my girls too, don't get me wrong. We found Pizza Hut and had the American Special. Yes that is what it was called, pepperoni pizza. It was good. They put us upstairs in a room by ourselves. Notice a pattern here... Maybe the down stairs didn't have room for us. But we were the only ones upstairs... Still it was nice.

After that a walk back to the hotel, some R & R. We found the Monkey King on the TV. We were so excited. Autumn doesn't seem interested in the TV, which is fine by us. But Anna Lin and Ric were in heaven. OK, maybe Ric wasn't in heaven but he was excited. I later went to the grocery store with Michelle and her family, with Autumn in tow. She's my shadow. Got the essentials: instant noodles that come in a bowl with folded up fork, Lay's potato chips for Ric, a 12 pack of water, and one Milk Tea for me to try. I like chai tea lattes, cold or hot, and this reminded me of one. Tried it this morning...well let's just say it's not the same and I'll be hitting the Starbucks later. :-) Not terrible though. Some people look at us like crazy (beyond the fact that everyone looks at us period!) because we buy so much water. But there is a reason for that. One that I forgot when we first arrived and brushed my teeth. Then I remembered and thought, "Oh, that was just a little. No big thing." Well I'm only getting bottled water from this point on. Let's just say Imodium is a good thing to bring along just in case... Cause dealing with stomach issues, on top of sleep deprivation and adoption paperwork is not fun.

However, we are now set with water and all is fine with the world. Autumn is doing well. We're getting closer each day. Can't remember if I already posted this (since I have had to rewrite three times now...) But yesterday she surprised us by writing out the numbers 1 to 10. Wow! This was unexpected. I don't mean the Chinese number characters, but the Arabic numbers that we use. (Did you know they were Arabic?) I can't wait to find out what else this little girl has up her sleeve.

Angi