WE MADE IT TO CHINA!!!!!! Yay! And let's start by saying that this was no easy feat. Here is the rundown-

On Wednesday, 4 hours before we were scheduled to depart from our house to the airport, Emily started complaining about pain in her throat and tummy. I took her temp and she had a low-grade fever. The pain then became severe with vomiting and we rushed her to the doctors' office. They did a culture and found out she had strep. They then prescribed some medication (requiring refrigeration) and said that the infection should clear up within 24 hours, and that she would start feeling better almost immediately, so they cleared Emily medically for our flight. Our flight was scheduled for 6 am, but we were supposed to check in by 3:30 at he latest. Anyway, right after Emily got home from the doctor's office (and right after she took her first dose of the antibiotic), Emily's vomiting became severe, she couldn't keep any food or liquid down and she was lethargic/ dehydrated. We rushed her to the hospital ER. They put her on an iv fluids, gave her anti-nausea drugs and pumped her full of iv penicillin. She started to stabilize very quickly, but they still weren't satisfied with her progress as of 3 am. I then contacted the adoption agency and told them the situation and said that there was no way that we would be able to make the flight...we had only 3 hours to go before takeoff and Emily was still in the ER. The next available connection to Beijing wouldn't get us to China until days later, which would cause us to miss our travel group. Just when it seemed that we had no option but to split up and have only one parent travel to China and one stay home (even though every one of us would have been miserable in that senario..........at 3:50, the doctor stabilized Emily and now Emily was rehydrated, keeping foods and drink down and her fever broke. And, due to the high-strength iv antibiotics, Emily was no longer contagious. Hallelujia! But I still didn't feel right about traveling so quickly with Emily. And then Emily cried and cried to me that she would miss China and it broke my heart. We threw her medicine in a small cooler, rushed to JFK and prayed for the best. We arrived just as our plane was boarding, but still had to jump into the security checkpoint line. It was immense and slow. And once we got to the checkpoint, we had to wait an extra 10 minutes as the security guy was holding our laptop/case for further inspection. Our plane was leaving! Just then, an airline worker from our flight came out and was looking for us. She was not happy and began screaming and cursing at us (right in front of Emily, mind you) that they were holding the flight for us and that we needed to move NOW, with our without the rest of our luggage that the security guy was holding. Mike said very calmly, "Excuse us, but we just rushed here from the ER". Just then, the security guy finished his inpecting, gave us our luggage and we ran like crazy for the plane. It took about 4 hours for those jitters to go away. As for Emily, she was fine. The fever/ vomiting was gone and did not come back and her appetite even came back. And The doctor at Stony Brook was a miracle worker who just kept saying to Emily "I will do everything I can to get you well and on that flight." And she did!
Emily slept for the majority of the first flight (6 hours) from JFK to San Francisco, and by the second flight (12 hours from SF to Beijing), she was putting on the airline headphones and dancing, saying "Mommy, this music is sooooo cool!" So, after 20 hours of travel, we all made it China in one piece. We managed to get some sleep on the plane, but are still incredibly tired. We arrived to Beijing Airport at 2 pm Friday (China time), where we waiting for (and met up with) the rest of our travel group and our guide. We then hopped on our bus and were taken to our hotel (Chang An Grand Hotel), which is very nice! There is an big fish tank with koi and a tank with a seal (both of which Emily loved). The group then took an hour to check into the hotel and get settled before meeting back up to go to dinner together at the hotel restaurant. Emily met a new friend, Naomi who is a 4 year old in our travel group (also becoming a big sister). They played My Little Ponies together, played hide and seek and danced together in the hotel lobby. It was cute. There are a lot of big brothers/ sisters in our group. Seven families in all, three of whom are adopting boys and four are adopting girls.
On our trip to the hotel, our guide Chen Chen (who is extremely nice) talked to us about the massive construction that has been taking place, as the city of Beijing has been modernized. Some of the skyscrapers are more like works of art and some are very unusual. One building was nicknamed by locals and dubbed "The Big Pants". I've inserted a picture,, taken off the internet from when it was being built. Anyway, tomorrow we are off to see the Great Wall, a jade factory, and a Chinese acrobatics show. Right now, it is 9:36 pm on Friday (China time) and we are dead tired! Off to bed..........