Toy Market and Medical Exam

Outside the medical exam center.

Inside the exam rooms for adopted children. The flooring was interesting. It had little pictures of bears with balloons that said "happy birthday".

In the first room Haylee was measured. She weighed 18.2 lbs. She is just a little girl. But if she continues to eat like she has than she will put on the pounds in no time.

In the next phase they checked her mouth, ears and hearing. She passed them all - I guess.

In the last phase they checked her heart and skin.

Some of the beautiful shops that are along the street. These were very colorful and pretty.

Outside the "toy market".

Me and Cordelia outside the mall.

A beautiful catholic church on the busy streets. If I remember correctly Cordelia said it was built in 1830. I hope that is right.

The only word I can think of to describe the toy market is overwhelming. I have never seen anything like it.

Haylee tries her first ice cream. Yummy. They have these ice cream bars called "Magnum". They are good. I've had one for dessert two nights in a row now.

Today we had a bit of change in plans. We were going to go to the Qingping market but Cordelia called and asked if we could change plans. There are some other families coming into town and she wanted to take them there as well and so we will wait until Saturday. Since it did not appear to be a very busy day at the medical clinic, we decided to do that. We were happy because we like to avoid the crowds. The clinic is on the island so it took us only a few minutes to walk to it. Once inside we went to room marked "examination room for adopted children". We were the only ones there. Off to the side are three separate rooms. In the first one they weighed and measured her. Then they checked her hearing, mouth and ears. They told us she has a cleft palate - which wasn't a surprise. Then they checked her skin and heart. It was all very short and Haylee didn't seem to mind at all. She did start to get a little said when they laid her on the table and took off her clothes but she quickly recovered when I was able to get her dressed again. Since we weren't going to the Qingping market we decided to go to the "Toy Market" instead. But it was much, much more than that. We took a taxi and then went into a mall. It had four floors with rows and rows of stalls selling everything you can possibly imagine. There were stuffed animals, purses, alarm clocks, models airplanes, towels, blankets, jewelry and every trinket you could ever imagine. It was so overwhelming. I don't think we were much fun to shop with because we didn't purchase much. It was just too much stuff to decide and lot of it was junk. We did find a few things but often times the things we wanted were only sold wholesale and so we were unable to purchase it. We walked around and around. You could seriously get lost in there. We wanted to take more pictures but Cordelia told us that in China it is considered impolite to take pictures of individual store fronts. Even if we were able to take pictures it would hardly have done it justice. I have never seen so much stuff crammed into so much space. Haylee was getting restless but she loves Cheerios and that kept her happy for a while. Eventually she went to sleep. There was another market down the street that Cordelia told us about so we walked along the street. There were so many different vendors. Everything you could possibly imagine from spices, dried seafood, beans, fruit, etc. It was fascinating but some of the sights and smells were a little much for me. It was a lot of excercise and by the time we were done I was exhausted. I'm not used to carrying around a little baby. Cordelia sent us home in a taxi. By the time we got back to the hotel I felt like I could barely walk. We ended up taking a nap. Then we went out shopping. I bought Haylee a beautiful white dress. I was thinking she could maybe wear it when we take her to the temple to be sealed to us. I hadn't seen it anywhere else on the island and I thought I was getting a good deal. But the next shop we went into we saw the very same dress and it was 5 yuan cheaper. Kevin is not wanting to buy much but I want to buy everything. I figure it will be a long time before we get back to China. It is fun to go into the shops and look around. And quite frankly, it is our only past time. Tonight we went to Lucy's again. We were going to go to another restaurant but we took a look at the menu and it scared me a bit. Nothing looked good to me. At Lucy's, Haylee tried french fries for the first time and I'm happy to report, that like most food, she loves them! She is starting to really warm up to us. She will walk over to me and put her arms up. She loves to be carried. She is really belly laughing and smiling for us although for everyone else she only gives a blank stare. Last night I was looking at some pictures of the kids that mom sent - thanks mom - and she got excited looking at them, clapping her hands and talking. I think she will like having siblings.