First Meeting - Tuesday 10/21

Our first meeting started off rough. The caregiver walked toward me holding Ryan who held the ball I had sent to him earlier in his little hand. I think seeing our eager smiling faces was a bit overwhelming. It is hard to remember at times like these that he is not used to big toothy grins from strange looking people he doesn't know. So his initial reaction was to turn away, cry and cling to his caregiver. Thankfully my reading had prepared me for this reaction so I did not take it too personally. I gave him some space and several of the other children from the orphanage came up to me with natural curiosity.

Once Ryan had settled down a bit, I reached into my back pack and brought out a little teddy bear to give him. He accepted the bear from me but was still a little wary of me and clung to his caregiver. After a few minutes, I reached again into my bag of tricks again and brought out a bottle of bubbles. What kid can resist bubbles? Ryan and the other kids seemed entertained by the bubbles. Next I brought out the animal crakers. Is there any end to this shameless bribery?? Aparently NOT! ;o) He accepted a cookie.

Ok, now he has the ball in one hand, the teddy bear hooked in his elbow and a cookie in the other hand. He didn't seem all that interested in eating the cookie, just held it with a death drip. By now he was pretty relaxed and the caregiver handed him to me and he came without objection. Wow, patience, persistence.. and a heavy dose of bribery wins out! :o)

There was a lot of conversational clatter with the caregivers, and children. So I just held Ryan and sang to him quietly in a low voice and he began to melt into me. The caregiver came over and pretended to try take him away from me and Ryan leaned away from her and clung to me! I know he still loves his caregiver, he was just demonstrating the temporary priorities of a two year old.. but I enjoyed it just the same.

He still looked very confused. The caregivers would say things to me in Vietnamese. I know they were trying to assure me, or provide guidance I wish I knew what they were saying. The kids were much easier to read. They eyed the bag of animal crackers, so we shared them with everyone. They eyed Ryan's ball and teddy bear.. but he hung on tightly to those. So cute!! At one point the caregiver said something to Ryan and we got to see his elusive smile! Move over Mona Lisa!

By now Ryan was feeling comfortable with me so my mom came closer and eventually Ryan let her hold him. I have some really sweet pictures of that! My sister Diane was kept pretty busy taking pictures of Ryan, the orphanage, and the other families and their kids but, like us, she got kisses from Ryan.

The other two families Barbara & Dan (adopting Gianna), and Maria & Joe (adopting Jada) had a much tougher time of it. Shortly before we had to leave Jada would sit in Joe's lap and take cookies from Maria. But this was a long process. And poor Barbara and Dan.. Gianna would have nothing to do with them, she clung to her caregiver and shreiked if they tried to hold her. She was obviously tired and needed a nap, so the timing was just really unfortunate.

We will visit the orphanage again tomorrow afternoon, and all three families will have their bribery arsenal fully loaded! :o) I feel very fortunate to have cleared the first hurdle. It could have gone very differently which would have been sad, but understandable.

When the time came to leave it was very difficult letting go and handing Ryan back to his caregiver. You could see the confusion on his face. They were telling him we would be back tomorrow.. but it is a lot for a two year old to comprehend. We waved bye-bye until we were out of site, and then I sighed a very deep sigh realizing how very fortunate I am!