China - Part 3 {Adoption ceremony and orphanage visit}

Although MOST of you already know our China story, I completely left you hanging a month ago half way through our trip- and I totally forgot to add part 3.  Major fail.  This past month I started doing more photography sessions and we had Jake's birthday party so it's been busy all around.  I really hope to finish writing about our China trip by the end of the month so I can post new updates about Ben and our family!

So, around this time during our trip Cole was starting to get really clingy.  Between the jet lag and a new member of our family he was pretty unsure of everything.  This was probably the hardest part of our trip for me- knowing that Ben and Cole needed me and I couldn't be there for both kids all the time.  I knew it would be just a short transition but in the moment it was really hard.  


During this time of our trip we also went to visit Ben's orphanage (It was the orphanage he spent the first year of his life at- he was transferred to another one a little after he turned one but we couldn't visit this orphanage because it was too far away).  I had mixed feelings because we would see Ben's nanny again and I knew he had a really hard time being taken away from her on Gotcha Day, but I didn't get a chance to thank her for taking care of him and I really wanted to do that. When we arrived we talked to the director and then Ben's nanny came out. I walked up and gave her a hug and thanked her and afterwards she reached out her hands to hold Ben so I tried to hand him off and he started crying and didn't want to let go of me. I couldn't believe it. The whole time we were there he didn't want to play with any of the toys and didn't even respond to any of the nannies when they tried to talk to him- they even played his favorite video and he just gave them blank stares (our translator told us that every time he saw that video/ heard that song he would immediately start dancing ) The nannies really love their kids and do such a great job taking care of them and I'm so glad we went. And, I'm so glad that it confirmed Ben was attaching to us and liked being around us.

Although the orphanage was very clean and the nanny's were so caring, your heart couldn't help but break for the other kids that were still there waiting for families. There were so many kids and not enough nannies to take care of all of their needs. We are so thankful to have our little guy home with us but I think often of the other children that are still back in China in the orphanages.  We couldn't take pictures of the rooms with the kids but you can see below some of the pictures we could take of Ben's orphanage to get a feel for what it is like. 

SaveSave