Tuesday, April 24 - Another good day!

Another good day! Laiya's social worker met us this a.m. and took us by subway, train and bus to go to Ocean Park. She told us that Laiya was quite tired because she didn't sleep very good last night - knowing everything that the next couple days would bring. When I asked her if she was nervous about going with just the 3 of us, she smiled and said, very quietly, "yes". We did have a lot of fun though - even though we got soaked! About a half hour after we got there, it started to rain :-( We still got to ride the tram and a few rides and saw the sea lions (Laiya's favorite) and a couple shows. Laiya's shoes got soaked so we bought her flip flops and said we'd take her shoes and get them dried by tomorrow, but she didn't want to part with them. They are her only shoes! She was going to dry them tonight with a hair dryer. Tomorrow will be a very hard day. I will need a really good night of sleep so I'm not too emotional (me??). We will first have a party with all the social workers that have been involved in Laiya's case since she first went into foster care. We will all go out for lunch together too. Then we will go to her foster home to get her belongings (only one suitcase!). After that we will have a party with her teachers. Then she will have to say goodbye to her foster family, which will be gut-wrenching! The foster brother is 12 years old and they are best friends. After that, she will come back with us to the hotel and will have no more contact with anyone here for 6 months. That's what they recommend, so that she can have that time to bond with her new family. She loved the notes from some of the grandkids - that put a smile on her face! Well, we just moved rooms because the internet didn't work in our other room, and in the meantime, they had me change all my settings on my computer, so I have a bit of a problem. Oh, well . . . That's it for today. Thanks for your continued prayers and please keep Laiya in your prayers tomorrow - it will be a very hard day! Thanks!!