Ellie's home...first year of life

To the right is a picture of the orphanage where Ellie has been living since her birth.

The orphanage is located in Dianbai County in Guangdong Province, which is in Southern China. Hong Kong is immediately South of Guangdong Province. See the map of Chinese provinces at right.




To further pinpoint where Dianbai County is, see the map of Guangdong Province at the right.

















To get a wider perspective, see this map of East Asia. Click on the map for a larger view. Note that Dianbai would be located on this map just below the "M" in Macau (at the Southernmost region of China).

Travel dates

We can't believe it is finally here. We will fly to China May 10th which is Ellie's birthday. We will spend a day touring Beijing seeing the Great Wall, Tiananmen Square... Then, we will fly to Guangzhou; this is the capital of Ellie's province, Guangdong. Guangzhou is called the Gate to China as the major trade center. We will be staying in the famous White Swan Hotel. Apparently thousands of families pass through here monthly adopting these precious babies. Our Gotcha Day (the day we get Ellie) is May 14th. Because of the time change, this will actually happen after you guys in the US go to bed on Mother's Day. This is a Mother's Day I will never forget! We will stay in Guangzhou until the 26th. We are arriving home the first day of the kids' summer break. Thank you for all the offers to help with the kids; we are going to miss them horribly and your friendship is certainly going to help make the time fly by faster for them (and for their grandparents who are making all of this possible).

Finally...a name

After 2 years of attempting to name our daughter, the process became much more focused once we received the translation of her Chinese name. We always knew that we wanted to incorporate "Danielle" after Suzy's great grandparents, Jewell and Carey Daniel, who were missionaries in China in the early 1900's. Translating her Chinese name, "Bai" means white and indicates Dianbai county where she lives; "Xiao" means dawning, and "Hui" means sunshine. There is a connotation of wisdom or knowledge according to our translator. Drawing on this information, we have decided on Danielle ("Ellie") Sophia. "Ellie" means light and "Sophia" means wisdom. So, Ellie Eisenberg it is.

You can see two pictures of Jewell and Carey Daniel below.

Waiting to Travel

Thank you for following our journey! We received our referral March 5. The call actually came on Suzy's cell while she was out to lunch with her sister and dad for his birthday. She strained to listen as she sat in the noisy waiting area of a Mexican restaurant. What a moment! She hung on every word as the rep from our agency listed off weights and measurements, likes and dislikes, motor development, sleeping habits... of our daughter. Of course, Suzy immediately called Toby and with tears in both of their eyes she spelled out her name, Bai Xiao Hui, from Dianbai County in far southeast China. Her birthday was May 10th, 2006. This baby that we have been praying for and dreaming about is now a little girl that we can call by name. Every day since then we have been pouring over her medical records, looking at her pictures or reading about her hometown and orphanage on the internet. Words cannot express how thrilled we will be when we actually get to hold in our arms!

On March 10th, we moved (just a few houses down the alley) and as I write this I hear the pounding of construction as we are adding a playroom upstairs. The 4 of us have been sleeping in the same room for a month now and we are sadly used to living in dust and boxes. In our new house, our baby will have her own room even though Audrey was glad to share her room with her sister in the old house. After waiting 2 years for our daughter, we are amazed at the timing. We were not even thinking about moving when we saw this house for sale back in Nov. We made the decision in just a few days and had the priviledge of owning 2 houses for 3 months. We should have just about a month to get our house in order once the construction is done. We should be traveling to China in May right as Toby finishes his 3rd year in his PhD, which means that he will be done with classes and only have dissertation left. There is even a good chance that we will meet her on or near her first birthday. Life is good.