Names, dates, and times

Yesterday was much much muchly more much easier than the day before.
What we learned from Tuesday was:

schedules are important
schedules are crucial
sleep is, well, part of the crucial schedule

I guess I might learn something about how to live my own life while
learning how to take care of a baby. Charles has always said that I
need to be fed and watered on schedule, and I know what the lack of
sleep does to me. So, it should be no surprise to me that when we
feed, water and nap Zi on a schedule that she knows, she is a
sweetheart. Yet, there it is. I learned it.

Now, to try to apply that to myself! Ha!

That is not to say that yesterday was perfect. She had to have a
medical exam which included vaccinations -- poor little thing! The
doctor said she has a heart murmur, which immediately made Charles
love her even more (have I mentioned that my husband is in love with a
Chinese girl?) because he also has a heart murmur. Here, though, is
the BIG news: she weighs 19.5 pounds and is 29.5 inches long!!! BIG
in many ways. The 9 month Carters clothing fits her perfectly, so she
is long and lean for an Asian baby and right in the middle of the pack
for American children.

We also learned (from one of our guides, Lily) that she has what is
known here as Queen's or Phoenix eyes (how perfect is that?). This
means that her eye shape is such that they rise on the outer edges
(like a traditional rendering of the Phoenix where the inner (nasal)
canthus is the head of the Phoenix and the outer canthus is the tail,
which is slightly higher than the head. These are considered highly
desirable or attractive. I can't say that I disagree with that!

We don't have any more "official" things to do until next week, so
tomorrow we are doing some shopping and taking it easy. While I still
would love the chance to go explore China a bit more, I now understand
what my friend Fliss said when she said that they did not explore
more...something about this trip makes you just want to sit in a room
and watch a baby! :)

After being here for almost a week, I've figured out that we have been
mispronouncing the name of her orphanage (Yangxi), and Yang is her
middle name. I've been saying it the way it looks to us, yang,
because that is how it is spelled, but it is actually more like
shyong, which is quite beautiful. I wish we could keep that too, but
I know that every English speaker in her life will pronounce it (with
that Southern twang) Yaaang. So I guess I'm okay without it. But
when I hear people call her a shyongshi (my phonetic spelling) girl, I
find it gorgeous. Maybe I'll call her that sometimes. I don't know.
I just think her whole name is poetic: zee shyong song. Now, there
is a difference in those two "o's" -- I'm not sure how to
differentiate it in English, though. Anyway. She has a pretty name.

oop -- she stirs. More later.