Nangua means "little pumpkin" in Chinese. It's what they called Abby at the orphanage.
10 years ago, I didn't have a digital camera. One of the dads in our travel group did, and he took this photo of us at our first breakfast together. (Thanks, Steve!)
Then he sent it to my email, and I used the hotel's business office to get to my email and send it back home. When I got back to work in February, every classroom in my building had a big red heart on its door, with that photo right in the middle of the heart. My substitute teacher (Thanks, Rick!) had printed the pictures and placed them. What a great homecoming!
(At 16 months old, she looks like a little pumpkin, doesn't she? And that wonderful sweater was made by another teaching colleague- I work with some pretty great people.)
Ab looks pretty happy in that picture. Here's one scrapbook page of the night before:
She was a bit worried during the hand-off, but after a bath (she hated it) and some food and toys (she loved them), things settled in.
There's a saying that goes, "With children, the days are long, but the years are short."
True, that.
After many long days but 10 short years, Happy Gotcha Day, Nangua!
And a BIG THANK YOU to my family, friends, church family, colleagues, and neighbors. Your support, babysitting, encouragement, babysitting, words of wisdom, babysitting, sense of humor, and babysitting have been overwhelmingly wonderful. Couldn't have made it this far without you!
Now about puberty...
