Settling in at home

We made it home!  We left Guangzhou at 10:15am on December 14 and arrived in Fresno at 11:00am on December 14.  Crazy, we arrived in Fresno before we left China.  It was a total of 17 hours of travel time, with 11 hours of that time being the non-stop from Hong Kong to San Francisco. We were extremely nervous how Jack would fly, especially with our last experience with him flying very fresh on our minds.  People were praying for us and it was evident that God was merciful toward us.  Jack handled the flight wonderfully!!  He started out with an hour and a half nap.  He was then up for about 7 hours or so.  Our seats were not all together on this flight.  Doug and I had the middle and window seat of our row of three, with Hannah and Aaron directly behind us.  A sweet American Chinese woman was on the aisle.  We had asked the flight attendants for help to get the four of us together.  We were told it was a full flight, and most likely no one would give up their aisle seat for a middle seat.  It turned out that there was a middle seat at the bulkhead with good legroom.  The flight attendent offered that seat to the lady.  She checked it out and said sure.  Therefore, we were able to have an extra seat for Jack.  This was a great blessing for our traveling.  Jack sat happily and played between Doug and I for all those hours.  He never fussed. We were even able to watch a movie while he sat and played.   A few other adoptive families were on the same flight having to walk their babies around the plane.  Jack was a little angel.  When he went to bed, he fussed a little more, but nothing to complain about.  Truly a blessing from the Lord. 

When we arrived to the Fresno airport we were greeted by our family and friends.  It was such a great reception, we had so many people celebrating our adoption of Jack. Casey and Grace were the first to greet us.  As we were making our way to the crowd I was getting teary.  Surprisingly, once we hugged the kids I was not emotional.   Our sweet boy was a full of tears.  He was so happy to see us.  Oh, how I love and missed him!!  Grace was just her bouncy little self, excited to be with us.  We got home around lunch time.  Our plan was to stay up until evening.  It was very hard.  We were sooooo tired.  Doug took a nap for a couple hours and I dozed for a little bit.  We wanted to stay up because we missed Casey and Grace so much, we wanted to spend as much time with them as possible.  Aaron sacked out early missing dinner.  Hannah stayed up til 8:30, yet her eyes were very heavy.  We all were in bed by this time.  Jack woke up around 11:30 and a few times after.  We fed him a bottle.  He fussed for a little bit, then stayed asleep until 9:00am.  For the jetlag, I think we all did pretty well.  We felt well rested the next morning. 

First thing on Thursday morning was getting a Dr.'s appt. for Jack.  He has been very congested and coughing and throwing up the week before.  We saw the Dr. and Jack had an ear, chest, and head infection. Poor baby!!  This is why I say the Lord was merciful!  Jack didn't fuss when flying with all of these infections!!  I can only attribute this to my gracious  and kind God and His people praying for us.  Needless to say we started him with strong antibiotics.  The improvements were evident that night.  Jack went to bed again around 8:30, woke up for a minute around 11:00.  We didn't even  need to go to his room. Morning came and needed to be woken up by Doug around 9:00am.  I hope this trend continues! 

We are so glad to be home.  We had a great time meeting new friends in our travel group.  A bond that will last a lifetime.  We feel truly blessed to have gone on this journey with all of them. 

The picture above captures what our last few days have been like.  Jack is soaking up the love and attention he is receiving from his brothers, sisters, mama, and daddy.  This son of ours is no longer an orphan, he was chosen and loved.  He is now a LaCroix with all the benefits of being a member of our family.  He didn't do anything to be chosen.  Just like I have done nothing to be chosen by my Lord and Savior.  "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world that we would be holy and blameless before Him. In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intentions of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace which he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved." Ephesians 1:3-6.  "For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is a gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast." Ephesians 2:8-9  This journey has been one worth traveling. Forever our lives will be changed with Jack.  Our greatest hope is that God would be glorified through this earthly adoption, knowing that our eternal adoption in Christ is far exceeding.  Secondly, our hope and prayer is that Jack will be chosen of God to be His child with an eternal inheritance. 

If I don't have the opportunity to blog before Christmas, may you all be blessed and celebrate the birth of the Savior, Jesus Christ!

Elise and Jack with Dani and Eli on the Pearl River Cruise

Jack and Eli

The day before leaving

Our travel group

Jack looking at his favorite thing from the airport gate,  "cars"

Killing time on the moving walkways at the Guangzhou airport

Our happy flying boy

First night at home, playing w/ sister Gracie

Cheesing it up

Sweet brothers

Daddy changing his first stinky diaper :)