Day 3 - The Forbidden City

Happy Eighth Birthday to Julia Grace Ball!  We Love You!

Breakfast this morning went much better.  Joseph gobbled up everything on his plate.  We didn't leave for sightseeing until 10 am so we went back to the room and tried to teach Joseph how to play quietly with us. 

We sat in the floor and colored together.  At first he shook his head "no."  He didn't want to color.  But Mike and I began to color together and soon he joined with us.  I learned he is left handed - just like all my other kids!  We tried making sticker pictures, but he preferred putting the stickers on our cameras and everything in the hotel room.

We have so much hard work ahead to teach Joseph how to live in our family.  The skills that helped him survive in the orphanage like grabbing, hitting and kicking aren't appropriate for life in a family.  I'm so thankful for these weeks alone with him in China, but every day is hard work. 

Sightseeing was Tiananmen Square, The Forbidden City and a silk factory.  If your names are Nathan, Julia or Katherine and you're reading this first thing Sunday morning, you should check our book basket for a book called You Wouldn't Want to Live in the Forbidden City.  Also check the book about Mrs. Frizzle and Imperial China.  Those books will help you learn about the places we visited with Joseph today.  (And thanks to the person who bought us the Forbidden City book off my Amazon Wish List for Joseph.  It came before we left, but I couldn't see who sent it.)

Joseph melted down in the silk factory so we had to leave abruptly.  We came home, put on music and insisted on rest time for everyone. 

So much more to write, but I'll close with this photo of Mike at Tiananmen Square trying to look like a photo of Chairman Mao.