Orphanage Visit Day

Today we had the privilege of visiting Charlie's orphanage where he spent the first 18 months of his life.  I knew it might be a hard visit, but I didn't expect to be as emotional as I was about it.  Seeing the people and the places I had only seen in photos was very moving.  As soon as I saw his nanny walking toward me, I burst into tears and hugged her so tightly.  I have so many pictures of her with our son from when he was very tiny until recently.  She loved him and kissed him and saw his first tooth, first steps, etc.  I couldn't thank her enough for all she had done.

The orphanage is very clean and the caregivers all seemed very loving.  They would see Charlie and stop and want to hug him and kiss him.  It was very overwhelming!  Charlie cried for a moment when we left but afterwards, he was fine.  I am so very honored to have visited this important place in the story of his life.

After the visit, our guide took us to the place where Charlie was found.  We wanted to see it and go in person and I'm so glad we did.  What a special thing to stand in the same place his birth mother once stood!

We came back to the hotel and had lunch and then met the group for a visit to an old official's home that is now filled with antiques and local artists.  It was really neat to see the artists make their goods.  This place also had a beautiful garden!  It was so nice to let the kids down to run around in the sunshine after being cooped up in the hotel room for several days.  One of the little boys in the group was friends with Charlie in the orphanage and they enjoyed playing together.  It was adorable!

Today was a much better day than yesterday.  Charlie was in a pretty good mood and we got some time to see the city and get some fresh air.  I thank God for all your prayers.  You have no idea what it means to us to know so many of you at home are thinking about and praying for us!!

Tomorrow Brian has to go verify some documents and then we are supposed to go on another tour outside!

I forgot to mention how the morning began.  I was feeding Charlie a bottle and Brian was in the shower when we heard very loud popping and banging sounds that lasted about a minute.  It sounded like machine gun fire or like the building was collapsing.  I jumped up and yelled for Brian to get out of the shower.  I looked outside and people were just walking around on the street like nothing had happened.  No one was in the hallways.  Brian called the front desk and they acted like they didn't hear anything.  I nearly had a heart attack about it and no one else seems to notice.  When we went outside to walk to our bus this morning, we found out what the noise was.  Apparently there was a wedding at our hotel this morning.  On a Wednesday at 8am.  They lit firecracker like things when the wedding party arrived and then lit them again as they were leaving.  We got to experience the lovely noise again, but about 25 feet away.  Oy vey....

Specific prayer request:  Pray that little man and I do well tomorrow while Brian is away and that we have another good night's rest!  Sleep makes such a big difference!