Laila Day - part 2

Laila day.........continued......

When Wayne got home we discussed at length the possibility of this baby being an answer to our prayers; of a dark haired—dark eyed beauty being Latina instead of Chinese? We were convinced it was. Money was the big deal—all of the money we already spent was for naught. Where could we come up with all of the money at once? Wayne, being ever wonderful—figured it all out. Wayne’s family helped and other avenues opened. We said, “yes”, and sight unseen, began preparing to fly out to Philadelphia in 5 days.

Word got out and people and relatives began bringing us all sorts of baby stuff. We had anonymous diaper drops at our front door. Bags of baby clothes began to show up. We had a swing and a bouncer and a crib just appear. Sandy and Tami brought Laila’s traveling diaper bag with all of the things we would be needing for our little girl. We are so blessed to have so many good friends and family. We scrubbed down the old cradle that all of the boys had used. We took the boys shopping to pick out the outfit that Laila would fly home in. It was exciting!

ON May 14^th, Wayne and I flew to Philadelphia to pick up our little Laila. I had not stopped crying and praying for 5 days. NO matter what anyone said to me, I burst into tears. The night before we were to go to the adoption agency, neither of us could sleep—I wrote in my journal endlessly, about my hopes and dreams for this little daughter of mine. Wayne felt the same way.

We couldn’t stay in our hotel room any longer on May 15th—we had an 11:00 appointment and so we got in the rental car and drove through some pretty interesting and scary parts of Philadelphia. We arrived at a tall apartment looking building on Pine Street . Boy was I ever nervous. I couldn’t believe what was about to happen. We were having a baby! We got in the elevator and went up to the 7^th floor and entered an apartment that had been converted to offices for an adoption agency. The people were so nice—we knew we had arrived very early, but we didn’t have any place else to go, so we thought we might as well be nervous there. We read magazine articles and pamphlets on adoption while we waited and finished our final paperwork.

There are moments you remember all of your life. Like a snapshot. This was one of those. The striped couch, the Noah’s ark themed room, the many pictures of happy adoptive families. I just took it all in. Then the big moment finally arrived. The front door opened and a worker said, “Here’s your baby.” She swung the infant carrier around and plopped an angel from heaven down on the coffee table in front of us. I couldn’t believe my eyes—a more beautiful baby I had never seen. Black curly hair—soft like feathers, dark eyes, long eyelashes and a smile that said, “I’m yours.” I started crying, of course, and Wayne reached for the video camera. “Hello baby—hello—we are your mom and dad.”

Laila was incredible--just peaceful and calm. I couldn’t wait to hold her, and snatched her out of the car seat pretty quickly. She felt so wonderful. She was dressed in a cute light pink outfit with rose buds across the front. How appropriate coming from her birth mother, Roseanne.

I remember on the birth of my boys, when the doctor presented the baby to me and the flood of emotion I felt having this new little one in my arms, fresh from heaven. It’s just indescribable. Well, I felt that same way when I first laid my eyes on Laila. She was definitely ours. She filled a place in my heart immediately. Our hearts matched. I just couldn’t get over how gorgeous she was.

We were supposed to meet with the birth mother and waited and waited but she never came. It would definitely be hard to come back and see Laila again, after deciding to give her to us. I can’t imagine what kind of selfless love this lady would have to have. We like to think she was probably there, in the lobby or in the parking lot just watching to see what kind of people had this little angel.

Laila was ours, now we just had to get all of the way back to Utah. The flight wasn’t going to leave til 5:00, so we just waited at the airport. We called all of our relatives and told them about beautiful Laila and how wonderful our day had been. How at peace we both felt. This was an amazing experience. Laila slept like an angel and when she was awake she gooed and smiled. We had so any strangers at the airport an on the airplane comment on our beautiful baby---we just smiled and agreed.

.....to be continued.........