We Made It to Beijing!

We made it to Beijing and are now in our hotel room for the evening. It's 8:00 p.m. here. The flight was smooth. It took us about 14 hours to fly directly from Chicago to Beijing, and our tour guide and driver met us at the airport and drove us to the hotel. We're staying at the Holiday Inn Temple of Heaven in Beijing in an Executive Suite, which is on the 16th floor (the top floor of the hotel), and has a bedroom, a sitting room, and two bathrooms. It comes with lots of perks, too, like free soft drinks -- including Coke Light, which is what they call Diet Coke here in China, free snacks, free laundry service, etc. It's quite nice. I'm really tired and the bed looks very comfortable. I'll post more tomorrow.

We Made it to Chicago

We made it to Chicago safely and are now in the hotel for the evening. We're staying at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare, which is very close to the airport, so that we don't have to hurry to make our flight out tomorrow. The traffic was not bad at all, we had no trouble finding our way to the hotel, and the hotel is very nice. We had lunch at O'Charleys in Marion and dinner at a restaurant in the hotel. Our trip is off to a very good start. I'll post more when I can.

We Got New Photos of Hugh!!!

We've Booked Our Flights!!

Heath has decided to stay at home with Emily and Rachel while a friend and I travel to China to adopt Hugh. We're planning to tour Beijing for a few days before traveling to Nanning in Guangxi Autonomous Region for the adoption. We're so excited to finally be bringing Hugh home. Yeah!!! Here's our flight information:

Tue. March 3-Wed. March 4, flying from Chicago to Beijing
Sun. March 8, flying from Beijing to Nanning
Fri. March 13, flying from Nanning to Guangzhou
Wed. March 18-flying to Shanghai and then to Chicago

We Got Our CA (Consulate Appointment) and New Pictures of Hugh!

We got our Consulate Appointment (March 16th) and new pictures of Hugh. He had an accident and hurt his head during the Chinese New Year celebration, but he's reportedly fine now. He's soooo cute, and we can't wait to bring him home!!! It won't be long now!!!!

We Got Our TA (Travel Authorization)!!

We finally got our TA (Travel Authorization) from China. It was dated February 9, 2009. Yeah! We should get our CA (Consulate Appointment) very soon, and then it's time to travel to China to bring him home. We're sooooo excited.

We Got Our LOA (Letter of Acceptance)!!

We got our LOA (Letter of Acceptance) from China today. Yeah!! We'll overnight it back tomorrow, and then we wait for our TA (travel authorization), which our agency thinks will take 2-3 weeks. We're still hoping to travel in late February or early March. Yeah!