We are so thankful - she is amazing!

Hey all,

This is the Aldridge family of 6! She's an absolute doll!

Today began with a minor panic over copies of the passport photos - thanks friends for your efforts there - we ended up solving it here.

After breakfast we went to the office of civil affairs to get MeiLi and do paperwork. (We are three families doing all this together - one family from Omaha and another from South Dakota.) When we arrived we started, the kids were not there yet, so we started paperwork - which was finalizing the adoption. It was all signatures and fingerprints on papers in Chinese -we could have been agreeing to anything - there was generally no English translation.

The kids showed up kind of suddenly - we were fully in it. At 5, MeiLi was the oldest of the three, the others 4 & a half and 3 & a half. She was absolutely incredible! She seemed to have the best grasp on what was going on and so came to us easily. She knew us from her family photo book and within minutes was playing "where's mama? where's baba? where's Qiaoqiao?" games with us. She was even consoling the other girls and enjoying blowing bubbles and playing with her polly pocket dolls.

Our Holt leader for the in-province part of the trip even said, "I've never seen a child do so well."

She let her friend play with her toys to help make her feel better.

We left there to go to another office (this one a storefront) to get her passport photo and a family passport photo - and have ours re-done. From there, we went to a notary. Upon notarization, it is my understanding that the Chinese adoption is final - she is ours. The only backing out is our choice, from that time we have 24 hours. I don't see it happening.

On the bus, Meili had a great time pointing with mama at things out the window. She also got her family photo book out of her backpack to show the other two girls that she has a dog now! It was too cute.

We came back to the hotel and then decided to go out for lunch. She was just perfect. She has no problem being carried by any of the 5 of us, and loves to hold hands and sit in our laps. We were on our own with Allie and Jenna translating in a Chinese only place. We ordered apple juice for the kids - which turned out to be more like an adult cider drink - but MeiLi chugged 2 of them!

We returned to the hotel and split up to our rooms. It didn't take long for one of the other families to show up with their kid having difficulty - but being around MeiLi calmed her down. Afterwards we went to their room for a while - and MeiLi began to have some difficulty. A few hours later (after a couple episodes of sleeping and crying), a Holt staff member showed up. We asked her what was the issue. She said that she wanted to go swimming in the pool. She had never been swimming before.

Off to the pool as a family - we all had a blast. She was laughing and giggling and splashing and kicking and having a great time. On return to the room, she was doing great - totally satisfied. Both other families showed up, we hung out in the room for a while - the kids together are a total hoot - and we all went to the pool again. Everybody had a great time. Well, maybe not so much the staff and other swimmers - we create quite a racket - but we had fun.

She is such a doll. She loves to sing and dance! We had sent her a music cd a couple of months ago with a songbook, and she knows every song in it! Her two little friends know a couple of the songs, and it is absolutely adorable to hear them sing and sing.

She is the most gracious, generous, helpful little girl. When the other girls were sad, she would share her toys to help them feel better; when she had a snack, she gave some to each of us; when she was sad, she let us hold her and comfort her - she didn't push us away. She's so darling.

After dinner we are all getting very tired - including MeiLi. She's cute, adorable and fun - and it REALLY helps that Allie and Jenna can talk to her. I am so thankful they took Mandarin.

We are well, but tired after day that opened with stress but ended with wonderful satisfaction. Thanks so much for your prayers and support.