Los Angeles

Our next layover was LA. We had 4 hours or so. But we had to exit one terminal and walk outside to the international terminal, where we then had to go through security again. (yuck) The international terminal was pretty wild at 10pm!!! I honestly felt like we had already entered a foreign country!!! And it was PACKED!!! It was hard to navigate through there at all.

We got to our gate and had quite awhile to hang out in a not-very-nice terminal. We met a couple other families as we waited. They were all people I have communicated with via email, and I knew they were going to be on our flight. Kevin was a zombie. It was already past midnight EST. So he just sat and watched "Finding Nemo," while we chatted with another family.

By the time it was time to board the plane at 1am PST (4am in our heads!!), Kevin was fully awake! And his new friend woke up too, who had been napping in her stroller. Here is Kevin with his new friend!!! :) Because it's a public blog (in order to respect their privacy), I will just call her J. :) J is one month older than Kevin, and she was born in China. Her parents got on a plane to go adopt her on her 1st birthday!! Funny coincidence, since we were leaving on Kien's 1st birthday. :) Her mother said that J loves boys!! And since Kevin loves girls.... they are quite a pair!! They held hands the entire time. :) I walked behind them as we went down the hallway to board the plane. They each had a backpack on their back and were holding hands, about to get on a plane that would take them to Vietnam, where they will become a big brother and a big sister!! I REALLY wanted to catch that moment on film, but my hands were full. ;)

Now for the bad news of this layover... we did NOT meet up with my mom!!! She was supposed to have a 6-hour layover in LA. And even with that, she did not make the flight!!!! She was delayed and delayed on her 2 flights leading up to this one. So she had to spend the night in Chicago. :( Her plans were not confirmed yet when we boarded the flight to Hong Kong. So the plan was for her to email me from her Blackberry. And once we got to the hotel in Vietnam, we'd get internet access set up right away, so I could read the verdict of what was happening and when she'd get here.