Today’s highlight was that Sarah began smiling and laughing on a regular basis and was confident enough to go beyond arm’s reach from us. She’s really beginning to blossom, and it’s wonderful to watch, but more on that later.

The days event was to visit the Hunan Embroidery Museum. Embroidery is one thing the Hunan province is famous for. Hunan is famous for the great quality of their embroidery. We saw embroidery that you would think was a painting or a photograph until you get really close and look at the millions of tiny stitches. The artists take normal silk and split in into dozens of very thin threads to make some absolutely beautiful work.

Then, there is the embroidery that is only done in Hunan. Think about normal embroidery – on the front it’s a picture, but on the back it it is just a bunch of stitches. Hunan artists developed a technique where the back is a picture as well. Then they developed a “magic” technique where the picture on the front and the picture on the back are different pictures. The pictures here are the same piece (front and back), which is mounted in a spinning frame.

The museum and workshop is an amazing place to see artists work, and to see the beautiful artwork they turn out. We were in awe of their skill, but more importantly, we wanted Sarah to have a piece of where she came from, so we picked up a few small pieces of embroidery. Of course, Sarah slept through most of it.

Now back to the real news – for the past few days, Sarah has had to be either touching or very close to one of us. Yesterday and today, we’ve been showing her little by little that not only are we going to be here for her and not go away, but that we’re the authority figures too (she has our unconditional love, and she has boundaries to grow up within). She’s been responding little by little, but this afternoon Jordan and Daddy went bowling, and Sarah stayed in the room and played quietly in her crib while Mommy did things around the room. Then, at dinner she spent most of the time crawling around on the floor and squirming in her seat. Of course this seems pretty normal for a 19 month old child heading quickly for the terrible twos, but considering how Sarah was on Monday … well, let’s just say that “our prayers are being answered” is an understatement. Tonight she went to sleep with only normal fussing.

I know that there are tough times ahead (just like every other parent in the world) but I also know that God is greater than any and all of those problems. He is certainly working wonders in our little Sarah.