Trip to the Orphanage

HI there, Here I am again.... we tried to update this yesterday and spent 1 1/2 hours updating the blog and the internet connection was lost and we lost everything...so here goes again.

We were very fortuntate to be able to visit Shekina's orphanage as many orphanages do not allow families to visit unless they are returning to China with their daughter. There are 8 families who have adopted from the same orphanage and we travelled 2 1/2 hours by bus to to Dian Jiang Orphanage and were fortunate enought to be permitted a 1 1/2 hour visit....we were thrilled! Dian Jiang is a social welfare Institute and the building also houses the elderly. The abandoned girls range from 2 days old to 3 years old. On "Gotcha Day" ( Sept 28 - the day we received Shekina and we became her "forever family") we found out that Shekina had been in the orphanage since Oct 16, 2004 (when she was found outside the orhphanage gates in a carton wrapped in a quilt) until June 2005 when she went to live with a foster family until we came. Unfortuntately, we are not permitted to have any information on her foster family. :( However, we did sent over a disposal camera asking that pictures would be taken of her between our referral date at the end of July when we first found out who are precious sweet baby girl was until we picked her up. We did get the camera and film returned to us as can't wait to see if the pictures show anything of her foster family or if they were taken in the orpahanage! Stay tuned!!! :)

Here are the gates to orphanage where Shekina Joy was found almost one year ago:



We were excited to see brightly painted walls as we climbed to the stairs to the 5th floor where the Orphanage is situated The children are divided by into rooms by age 0 - 2 months, 3-4 months, 5-6 months, etc. The 5-6 month room is the last room Shekina was in. The children share a crib and her cribmate was Carli whose adopted parents live only one hour from us in San Antonio... so it will be fun to be able visit together often! :)



















The view from the 5th floor.....


















Here is the Director of the orphanage and she put Shekina and Carli into the exact crib that they had been in prior to leaving the orphanage at around 6 months, as you can they are not too thrilled!






































Here are some pictures of some of the abandoned girls waiting to see if they will be adopted out to a forever family. The older they get, the harder it is to be adopted.

Notice the "split" pants on the the little girl on the right (below). This is the typical style for chinese children's clothes and it makes it convenient "to go" when out and about! :)

Here are pics where the children are bathed,

the playroom...

....and their "swiiming pool"! :) Notice the "donut" lifesaver that is put around their neck in this narrow "swimming" tube! :)

We were thrilled to be able to visit Dian Jiang and to be able to see where Shekina spent her first six months of her life and to be able to share that with her one day.