Officially ours!

Wynn slept through the night, thankfully. The first few hours were on my chest, then, I was able to get her onto the bed where she was able to sleep on her back. I stayed awake, tucked around her, until about 4:00, when Ann woke up and switched places with me.

Wynn woke up about 6:00, and began crying again; this time the "I'm in an unfamiliar place with those strange people from last night" cry. She kept that up for a good forty-five minutes while we tried to get cleaned up, and stayed finicky as we got our showers and dressed. We finally got down to breakfast about 8:15 -- I was totally strung out from no sleep -- but Wynn didn't cry too much as we got seated.

Wynn is a messy eater, we can tell you. Ann grabbed a bowl of congee (rice porridge which is actually quite tasty) right away for Wynn, and about a quarter of that is still dried onto my pants and shirt. However, she was enthusiastic about eating -- she wanted some of everything: my noodles and fruit salad, Ann's eggs and biscuit with jam. We had a small plastic cup which Wynn was able to sort-of drink water from; again, about half that went onto my pants.

Time was running as short as we had to be in the lobby at 8:50 to head out for official business. Ann ran over to the gift shop and found a better sippy cup while I went back up to the room to clean us up and start getting our stuff together. Somehow we assembled everything we needed in five minutes, and we left our room at 8:50. That's when the elevators decided to stage a work slowdown. Instead of taking us down from the ninth floor, we went up to twelve, and then back down to one, stopping at every floor along the way. (all the elevators are doing this now, it wasn't just "us")

Our van took us back to the same building where we got Wynn yesterday. Our group of two couples, and a larger group from Pennsylvania using a different agency, were there to complete the Chinese government paperwork, and be interviewed by the Ministry. The head of Wynn's orphanage was also present. Ann, Wynn, and I were promptly ushered into a conference room with a big, black table (and Chinese and Soviet flags) and asked a series of questions and told to sign and put our red-inked fingerprints (and Wynn's footprint) on a bunch of documents. Then the official proclaimed that the adoption process was complete - and that Wynn is now and forever our daughter.

We could ask questions of the orphanage director, and in the process found out that Wynn had been living with her foster mother for about a year. That explains why she's SO upset at finding herself with us now. It's hard to listen to her rage and cry, but we're taking it as an indication that she loves deeply and will eventually have those feelings for us too.

Wynn was the calmest we've seen her during the government proceedings; she actually relaxed a bit and watched as all the other kids and grown ups milled around the (stifling hot!) waiting room. She was great in the van back to the hotel too.

She's done a couple more rage-filled cries this afternoon - getting progressively shorter each time, and usually right before and after she sleeps. We have no appointments or business to attend to until we fly to Guangzhou on Saturday, so we have a few days to just hang out at the hotel and get used to each other. And get some sleep.

All the clothes we brought are ridiculously huge on her, so Hannah is taking us on a little shopping trip tomorrow morning to get some new clothes and some shoes for Wynn.

Random Stuff: Wynn is toilet trained. We hold her up over the toilet; she puts her feet on the seat and sqauts to go.

She is fasciniated with Scott's chest hair and likes to pet his belly.

Cheerios are the greatest thing ever invented. They're a food. They're a game. Put 'em in a plastic container, and they're a rattle. Awesome.

Also - The orphanage gave us a bag with the clothes Wynn was wearing when she was found abandoned. They have also given us the note her birth mother left with her; Hannah is translating it for us today, so we'll get to see it tomorrow. As we're traveling this rough road with her now, we keep reminding ourselves that her path to us wasn't easy either.