Home again, home again

Well, according to Matt I am supposed to give a detailed account of our trip, here. The truth is, I don't really know what to say. It's very hard to give words to such a beautiful, meaningful experience
We flew Pitt to Houston to Guat City on Thursday. Our flight left Pitt at 6am so we had to get up at 1am to get ready and get to the airport. Needless to say, we were a little tired when we got to the Marriott in Guat city at 1:30pm. We unpacked and then anxiously waited for the attorney to bring us the baby!
Matt and I met the attorney at her car in front of the hotel. When we saw her she was holding a little pink bundle in her arms - our baby!
Well Eliana was smacking her lips and sticking out her tongue like she was just starving! Luckily the attorney had brought a bottle with her, so there I was feeding the baby before we even got on the elevator!
We could not (and still can't) get over how tiny she is! At a whopping 6 pounds she looks like a little newborn, even though she's 3 months old!
The weekend was wonderful. The attorney left the baby with us Thursday evening and we kept her until Monday morning. What a crummy day that was! The yuck actually started Sunday as thoughts of having to leave her kept creeping into my mind. It was hard not to be sad in advance, knowing Monday was going to be heartbreaking.
Anyway, we spent the weekend at the hotel. Since the baby isn't legally ours yet we were not permitted to leave the hotel. That was fine with us. We had all the entertainment we needed right there in our baby! Besides, as new parents, we were kept pretty busy with bottles and diapers and naps.
The hotel we stayed at was really nice. It was quite a nice hotel with 3 good restaurants, a lovely pool area and very friendly and helpful staff. We stayed on the 'family floor' which had a 'baby lounge' just 2 doors down from our room. There were so many other adopting families there! The Marriott is highly recommended by the adoption agencies here and so they get a steady business from American adoptive families. We would run into people at the restaurants, in the hall and in the baby lounge at all hours of the day. It was great to talk to other folks going through the same things and to see all of the beautiful babies!
As you can see from the pictures that Matt posted, Eliana is just beautiful! The poor baby had a cold when they first brought her to us so she was pretty snotty and congested. She was just feeling yucky, especially Th and Fri, so we had to snuggle and hold her all the time. Torture. By Monday she was feeling a lot better. Nothing like some lovin' from Mom and Dad to make a girl feel better!
Despite her small size she looks pretty healthy right now. Arm and leg movements are good, eye contact is great. She doesn't eat a whole lot at one time, but likes to eat often. Her tiny belly can't hold much at once! They are supposed to be scheduling another echocardiogram soon to see how her heart is doing. She has no cardiac symptoms right now - she just needs to grow! I am worried about her small size. I'm concerned about overall development if she's not growing properly. She really does look good, though, so hopefully she'll start gaining weight soon.
We really had the best time with Eliana. Of course leaving was difficult, but we are so happy that we were able to spend time with our daughter. Just to see her, hold her and smell her has been so reassuring in a lot of ways. Now we've got to get this adoption process moving! Please keep praying that each step of this goes quickly and smoothly so that we can get that little baby home. No doubt we can fatten her up if we just have a chance!
I want to thank everyone for their continued support through all of this. We are so blessed with wonderful friends and family. It was hard to be away, experiencing something so great, and not be able to share it with you all. I can't wait til you, too, can meet her and welcome her home. Thanks, too, for the emails and comments to the blog while we were away. It made me so happy to hear from everyone and know how much everyone loves that baby already.