Amelia’s Shining Star

 “My little eyes
are watching
All you say and do
And when I grow up
big and tall
I want to be like you.

My little ears
are listening
To everything you say
I am learning how
to grow up
To be like you
someday.

So be careful how
you teach me
To be the person
that you are.
You’re a knight in
shining armor
You’re my brightest
shining star.”

~Unknown

Our sweet Amelia Mei is one of the luckiest girls around to have Liam for her big brother—her own shining star!  Throughout this journey, we have not only been falling in love with our new daughter, but the love we have for our son has grown when we didn’t even think it could get any bigger!  For us, this journey has not only been about bonding with our new daughter, it’s been about watching and helping our boy take on his new big brother role and nurturing Liam and Amelia’s already growing bond as forever brother and sister!  Words cannot describe how proud we are of our little boy for not only taking on this 3 week adventure across the world, but for the great big brother he has started to become!

Liam has wanted to be a big brother for so long now, so it just melts our hearts to know that his dream too has finally come true!  Some of our most favorite, touching moments of our journey here in China have been those shared between Liam and Amelia.  Liam goes around calling her, “My baby sister” or “Amelia Mei”, or "Meli Mei” all the time…he always has to include her middle name-it’s so cute.  (Meli, pronounced Meely, has become her nickname).  Although Liam is challenged with feelings of jealousy, the love he already has for his baby sister is obvious through some of the smallest acts.  He is always watching over her and trying to protect her.  If she’s about to slam her fingers in the door, he will pull her away, or when she’s crying as I’m changing her, Liam will tell me to stop, or when we're doing something that seems to be causing Amelia to cry, Liam will yell, “Don’t do that, that’s my baby sister!”  If she gets a hold of something too small, Liam will take it away and tell her she could choke.  And after Amelia falls asleep at night, Liam always wants to peek in to look at her.  We love to watch their interactions together, as Amelia is so intrigued by her big brother.  Liam has started to play with her more and more and the other day after one of Amelia’s crying spells, Liam went over to her and started playing peek-a-boo with her - there’s no better distraction than Liam’s pure big brother entertainment.  Liam will also take Amelia’s stuffed animals and make them sing and dance in front of her, or he’ll imitate her noises in effort to talk babble with her, with each time getting louder and louder just to make her laugh. Today, Liam even noticed that her bow had fallen out of her hair and he put it back in her hair so sweetly.  Amelia loves attention from her big brother and her face just lights up with the cutest smile whenever he’s showing her the love.  Some of the cutest interactions of Liam and Amelia together are when they are taking turns beating up on Daddy or taking turns giving him “zurburts” in Daddy’s belly.  They love fighting for Daddy’s playtime and attention!  And of course there are those moments when Liam wants to push his baby sister in the stoller or take her hand as she is walking, which are some of the sweetest big brother moments of all…

Throughout this transition, Liam has certainly had his difficult moments and his jealousy has gotten the best of him on many occasions, but we’re so grateful that the good big brother moments far out way the bad.  It’s been difficult not getting any alone time with either Liam or Amelia as we would if we were home, but we’ve become quite experienced at multi-tasking and sharing our love!  Liam has never been one to want to play independently, so one of the challenges is that he continues to want and expect our full-undivided attention and he wants us playing with him all the time.  Thus, we try to continue to throw Liam the football while changing Amelia’s diaper, or we play part in his imaginative play games while trying to console Amelia as she’s crying, and basically we try to involve Liam in everything we do.  Ever since being in China and becoming a big brother, our already super sensitive, affectionate boy has become even more lovey dovey towards us.  We can tell he’s loving all the time with his Mom and Dad, despite having to share us with his sister.   He is constantly giving us hugs and kisses, wanting to cuddle, and is telling us he loves us all the time.  Before we get into a taxi, rather than calling “shot gun”, he’ll call, “I get to sit on Mama’s or Dada’s lap” - depending on which mood he’s in :).  (Another lovely attribute of no seatbelt/no car seats in China).  The other day as Liam and I were walking back to our room, he said “Mama, I love you so much.  Can I always sit on your lap in taxis?”  And at night time he has thoroughly enjoyed sleeping not only in the same room as us, but in the same bed too.  He usually sleeps with Ben, but he typically wants cuddle time from both of us before falling asleep.  One of his infamous quotes has become, "Mama, do you have to do the blog.  Can't you just go to sleep with me?".  Some of the best affectionate moments have been these spontaneous back rubs.  We don’t know what has gotten over him, but out of the blue he will start rubbing our backs…if we knew this came along with big brotherhood, we would have done this long ago!

Although Liam is loving the 24/7 time with Mom, Dad and baby sister, it's obvious how much he misses home.  He talks about his friends and family back home all the time.  Although it’s been hard on Liam to be away from home, he has really been such the trooper and we are incredibly impressed by how well he has adapted to not only his big brother role, but to traveling around China for three weeks.  We are now at our 5^th hotel of our stay—enough to tire any 4 year old out!  But Liam has instead found so much fun in this journey!  Although he has his bad moments as any kid would, the majority of the time, he is happy, smiling, laughing, having fun, and just enjoying time with his Mom, Dad and new baby sister!  We can’t believe we contemplated NOT bringing him on this trip as we literally could not imagine for one second not having him here for this experience.  We are so thankful to God and to our family for helping us to make this decision to bring Liam…as it’s one of the best decisions we ever made!  To think of all that Liam has gotten to see and do and how much his being here has added to OUR experience…it’s truly amazing! 

But no Great Wall of China or Buddhist Temple could out-do one of the biggest highlights of Liam's trip...of course, playing catch with his Daddy, even in China...

As we near the end of our trip, we look back at these days in China as not only the first days we spent with our new daughter, but as the days that our little Liam and sweet Amelia Mei first became brother and sister.  We so look forward to watching their bond grow in the days and years ahead!  We are so very proud of our boy and we know in our hearts that big brother Liam is, and will always be, Amelia Mei’s knight in shining armor, her brightest shining star!

More to come about our first few days in Guangzhou soon!