I slept like a log last night!  I was so exhausted.  Caylee did too.  I don't think she moved until 6am this morning when the alarm went off.  Randy woke up once but after a little bit was able to go back to sleep.  All in all, we have done ok with the time change (ha...I say this today but who knows how I will feel tomorrow).  I meant to say last night about this hotel that we are staying in...it is quite nice!  We walked into the lobby last night after getting off of our bus & someone started to play the piano and violin.  What a welcome!  Bethany has been so very organized and our guide, Tom got everybody their room keys and we were off to bed for the night. 

 

We got up this morning at about 6:00 to get ready for the day.  It was a busy one.  Breakfast has been included in our stay here at the hotel and they had everything.  Lots of western foods but a lot of things that I didn't recognize either.  It was good!  Caylee was happy because they had bacon & mandarin oranges.  :) 

 

We met the rest of the Bethany families in the hotel lobby at 8am and we headed first to the Cloisonné Factory. Cloisonné is an ancient technique for decorating metalwork. This was so cool to see how they took each little intricate part & placed it on the metal in just the right place & handpainted everything.  Seems like it would require a lot of attention to detail.  But the pieces were incredible! 

 

We next went to the Great Wall of China.  Wow!  I wish I had a better word for wow!  It was amazing!  To step foot on that wall and to climb those steps was just unbelievable.  And steep.  I mean reeeeeaaaallllly steep!  They don't make it look that hard to climb on tv.  We didn't make it to the top but we got to explore it and that was so much fun.  I was thinking about Jesus today climbing that great wall and how He is our Strong Tower.  I feel like I don't have the words to adequately describe the feeling I felt.  It's something that we have talked about doing for so long and to actually be doing it is quite overwhelming. God is so good! 

 

After leaving the Great Wall, we headed to the Jade Factory which also had a restaurant in it.  We got to sit family style and have all the food placed on a lazy susan (that's probably not what's its called) & share everything.  We sat with 2 other families AND Flat Stanley.  That Flat Stanley has been everywhere!

 

Going to the Bird's Nest was next.  We got to walk all around where the Olympics was held a few years ago.  And we got to see more of Beijing.

 

We came back to our room for a little while and then met some friends for dinner.  Our waitress was so funny and for some reason did not seem to appreciate when our friend said "thank you" in Mandarin.  She let out a big "pffffffft".  She even stepped away from our table, took our picture & stepped back to the table without saying a word.  There were some things on the menu that we decided not to try because they said words like "lean meat" and we weren't exactly sure what kind of meat it was. 

 

The touring is fun and we have another big day tomorrow but I am anxiously awaiting getting to Guangzhou so we can meet our little sweetie.  Please pray for her.  Pray for her transition.  Having a forever family who loves you is always the best scenario but everything that she knows is getting ready to change.

I have to hit the sack.  It is after 10:00 here & Randy and Caylee are both already asleep.  And I feel like I am not getting my words out right because I am quite sleepy.  Thank you for all of the love & prayers!