Helen JoXian Pokorny

Let me say a little about that middle name. Xian is her given Chinese name and Stew/I felt strongly about honoring that. As some of you may know, my mom passed away a number of years ago and her name was Jo but she went by JoAnn (combining her first and middle names). It was important to me to incorporate a part of my family into Helen's name along with Stew's surname. As I repeated "Helen JoAnn Xian" to myself it seemed liked too much. So, I did some creative thinking and came up with JoXian (pronounced Jo She En), my mom's name and her Chinese name smooshed together into a cool little, unique combo. I think it's got a nice feel and we love it - Helen JoXian Pokorny.






Helen is in Guangdong Province, way down on the southern China coast. We'll be traveling to the city of Guangzhou in Guangdong Province to meet her. Guangzhou also happens to be the city where all Americans adopting in China have to pass through because the U.S. Consulate is located there. You can find Guangzhou on this map by locating Hong Kong in the lower right-hand corner and then moving a little bit north-west. See it?

We're busy, busy with all the preparations. This weekend we should be able to finish painting the nursery and then we can start moving everything in and setting up the crib. I'll post some pictures when it's all done. Now that we know how old and how big she is, we can get things more settled on our end and start buying clothes for her (doesn't THAT sound fun?!). I've been looking over packing lists that BTDT parents have sent me and trying to come up with my perfect hybrid list. I've promised myself that I won't pack for this trip at the last minute, which would be our usual modus operandi. Friends have recommended either just getting the suitcases out now or using the crib for the same purpose, just tossing everything in as we go and organizing it all later.

I almost forgot to mention one of the MOST important things we know about Helen...she's a "heavy sleeper"! WOO HOO!!