Day 2 with Benjamin!

Since we completed all of Benjamin’s paperwork yesterday when we met him, our day today was free.  We had a tour scheduled to the Stone Forest, but we thought it would be over the top for our little ones, especially with Benjamin just joining our family.  So David, Matthew and Daniel went, and the girls and little boys and I stayed at the hotel.  It was fine as long as we were in the room and really it is going better than we could have imagined. Anna assured me that we could take them all to breakfast. I should have listened to my ‘inner voice’, or wisdom that comes with age.   I put the boys high chairs next to each other, and immediately Samuel started hitting Benjamin, and then Benjamin started kicking him.  And they were loud.  At one point Samuel starting grunting, and Benjamin decided he wouldn’t be out done, and grunted louder. Then Samuel started screaming at him, so Benjamin, again not to be out done, screamed even louder.  As we were scrambling to find food that Benjamin would eat  in hopes to gain some sense of control (he is very picky and has obviously not had many solids), Samuel got impatient and was able to reach a plate full of food and tossed it and it broke.  And then Benjamin joined in on the fun and started throwing food off his tray. I’m really not exaggerating.  At this point Mercy, Hope and Joy were just staring at the boys in disbelief and then Anna and I did the responsible thing – we started laughing. And the waitress that had cleaned up the broken plate and food, and had walked by many times and smiled at us, started laughing also.   So, we left and ate snack foods in the room. 

The boys have really done so well.  This has been our easiest transition.  Both boys were in foster care and that seems to have made such a huge difference in their adjustment. 

Tomorrow we are going to visit Benjamin’s orphanage.  He spent very little time there, but we are unable to visit the foster family or even get information on them so we feel like this could be important to him one day.  We were unable to go to Samuel’s orphanage other than the conference room we received him in, but they did walk us to his finding spot.  We will ask about Benjamin’s finding spot tomorrow, and hopefully be able to visit it.   

We are having a great time and really love China and the Chinese people, but we are also looking forward to being home with our boys so we can begin the real journey.