skip to main |
skip to sidebar
Today was awesome. I went to the pool with my friend and we stayed for 6 hours! It was really, really fun. We also helped with another friend's sister's 8 year old birthday. I walked in the door and my mom said "We have a LID!!! It is July 22, 2006!!!" Quite a few people found out their LID's today. And to make this day even better, its REFERRAL DAY!!! I love referral days!! The youngest I've seen was born on January 3, 2006! All the children are BEAUTIFUL. The CCAA site still isn't updated, but we do no that referrals went through July 13, 2005, because their are people LID on the 14th who didn't receive referrals. Kinda strange the website was never updated though... Oh, AND the July Fireflies have a logo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (above photo) ISN'T IT BEAUTIFUL?America World is pleased to announce the receipt of 12 healthy female referrals today! Families receiving referrals were logged into the China Center of Adoption Affairs on July 8, 2005 (group 221). The little girls are currently located in the Guangdong and Jiangxi provinces. Please join us in congratulating these families, and in praying for them as they prepare to travel. ^ Congrats all AWAA families and everyone else receiving referrals today!!!
The boredom is gone!!! My friends are home :). One is over now. We are playing lots of fun, board games and having a sleepover. Nothing new on the adoption. I think some referrals came out early this weekend and more are supposed to come out tomorrow or Tuesday.
Well, after being bored all week, today was a fun day, FOR SURE! Dad and I went downtown! We walked around a little and then went out to eat at Fuel Pizza. Yum... Then we walked to the huge library. Dad wanted to work on genelogy stuff. I was fine, I would just find a book and read for 3 hours. Of course, they moved ALL the teen books to a different library for only kids and teen books, so I was quite bored. To make matters worse, they had internet but my library card didn't qualify for internet use. The library was so big, that I didn't even know where all the research books were (I was going to read some stuff about China.) Finally, I found more computers in the genelogy room that had the internet, and just looked at adoption websites until we left. That was nice. Then, I came up with a brilliant idea to surprise mom with the high chair we had been looking at. So, we stopped by Target and got the high chair. (which mom is very surprised and excited about.) Well, while we were there I some really cute bibs. (the ones pictured above) They came in a 3 pack and the green and pink ladybug one (in the middle) is the one that sold us on 'em. Aren't they fun? I love them!!! Oh, and I came home to 2 fun ladybug quilt squares (see quilt blog) and a postcard from my good friend whos in Europe for 6 weeks! I love getting mail & quilt squares!
I cannot help myself. I have been looking at baby clothes. Expensive baby clothes. Mom and I are VERY picky when it comes to baby clothes, and we knew we would have a tough time finding ones we liked. Well, this morning I went on Ragsland. They have the CUTEST jumpers and smocked dresses-our favorite. There is an adorable Christmas jumper that is green gingham with candy canes at the bottom and rick rack. Then there is my personal favorite, a monogramed, lime green gingham jumper with pink gingham buttons. (pictured above) And of course, the teal poodle jumper that has pink polka dot bows tied on the straps. Too cute! Excpet for the fact that all these jumpers are over 40 dollars. :( I guess we'll wait for sales. Well then theres Gymboree. They have an adorable squirrel jumper. I'm so in love with it. And they have a really cute cherry jumper that I love as well. But as I said, I am sure that all these things will go on sale. (And we'll be the first ones in.) I have been so bored all this week. All my friends are out of town. I'M READY FOR MY SISTER!!!!!!!!!!!! If we had her, I could play with her, read to her, stroll her, dress her, bathe her, etc. Someday I can do all this. Someday...... well, dad and I are getting ready to go on errands... more later.
First off, we just ordered this Floppy Seat (shopping cart/high chair cover) for AnnaClaire.
Secondly, and more importantly, we have some big news. Earlier this month, we filled out a SN application with our agency. Mom contacted the coordinator to find out how the SN matching process worked. That was on Monday. After a few rounds of telephone tag, Mom and the coordinator finally got in touch on Tuesday. At the time I was reading my wonderful book, The Waiting Child. I heard mom say, "This is so unexpected! We would LOVE to see her file!" I had seen the caller ID and known who was calling, but I thought that the coordinator was calling to let us know how the matching process works. She had the file of a baby girl who turned 9 months old yesterday! We were very surprised, considering only 4 SN referrals came in, and there are a LOT of people on the interested families list. Plus, we just recently filled out our application. It's such a God thing!! I AM OVER THE MOON! I am so in love with this baby girl. Today we received the official referral package with all the medical reports (still in Chinese..) and all that other good stuff. Before we can send LOI, we have to talk with a doctor. The coordinator had requested we speak with a Chinese doctor. Well, we didn't know of any Chinese doctors, so we were going to take the translated info to mom's normal doctor. Today, we called our one and only Chinese aquantince to see if they could help translate. Well, they said yes, but asked if we needed a Chinese doctor and recommended one who is a strong Christian! What an answer to prayer!!! We have to speak to the doctor and get these things translated before we make our final decision for this precious baby. We are already in love!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We have a total of 5 pairs of footy PJ's for AnnaClaire. I think they are so cute. Here's a picture of me holding them all. The yellow one in the middle and the pink one on my right pocket (left from sitting), we got today. They are from Costco. The pink one has a little moon on it with a lamb under it and lambies on the feet. The yellow one says I (HEART) U with a little bunny peeking out. The feet on those have bunnies. The other 3 are pretty self explainatory (one has stripes and hearts, one has pink and green flowers, and one is light pink - there are polka dots on that one, I know its hard to tell) I can't wait to put these on my mei mei!
(pictured above- a cart holding dossiers at the CCAA. This is off someone elses blog) There's not much to say, so I'll talk about a very common topic: I really want to know our LID. I have gotten used to the fact that we don't know it, so it is not bothering me as much, but I still want to know it. There is someone who was DTC July 8 and LID July 22. So maybe our LID is July 21. One never knows. I would think we would've found it out already. I do know that CCAA doesn't randomly send things, they send it with other things that go to the agency. Well our agency got SN referrals last week and our LID was not with those. So I'm guessing we'll find out LID when referrals come (soon!).
Well this morning I biked to my friends to petsit their puppy. It is SO hot outside. Our neighborhood has SO many hills and biking up them is the WORST. I am done outside for the day- it is MUCH to hot. I cannot IMAGINE being in China right now, wearing the lazy panda (once again, my name for the snuggly thing) with a 20 pound baby in it, plus dripping sweat while touring. I know you want to get your baby when you can, whatever the season, but I must say, those people are wonderful to go now. Well, we're off to Costco to order my new contacts. Then more petsitting. Whew!
We went to Chickfila today. yum!! Their milkshakes are excellent. If you haven't tasted one yet -go now and get one. I like the cookies and cream best, but chocolate is good as well. After that, we went in the Children's Place to get more $4.27 footy p.j.'s. Sad thing was that we found the CUTEST one. It was white with little bears holding American Flags on it. But there was only one left and it was 6-9 mo. The only other one they had was boyish, so we went empty handed. Then we went to Barnes & Noble (we had 30 min. before my eye dr. appointment). I really wanted to get AnnaClaire a book. I looked at ALL the books and finally decided on Guess how much I love you. It's a really sweet story. After that I had my eye docter appointment. Wow what a change!!! I got new contacts and I can see EVERYTHING! It's amazing! My eyes were MUCH worse than last year. Well that's about it for now! Referrals are supposedly being sent right now for June 29-July 13.
Today we did a little more shopping. We went to Concord Mills and Babie R Us. This was actually our first time at Babie R Us after starting this adoption!!! We got AnnaClaire a few things...I finished the best book ever today. It is called The Waiting Child by Cindy Champnella. It is soo good. I definatly recommend it. I actually started it yesterday afernoon and am already done. So even if you are not the biggest reader, this is an excellent book that keeps you reading. It's about the adoption of Jaclyn and how her dream is for the little boy she took care of at the orphanage, Xiao Mei Mei to get a mama too. It is so touching how much she wants "her baby".I better go to bed. It's late. It's been a really busy day!
After the Ortho, (ouch, I had to get a new bracket on my braces and a chain...) mom and I went on errands. Our initial plan was to get baretts for our new AWAA monthly swap. But while in Target, we got a little carried away. We saw the CUTEST car seat. It happened to be a Britax, the one mom had been researching and looking at. Well, it was the only one, and for something so big, shipping would be very expensive. So we got it. It is the Brooke fabric. I'm in love with it! AnnaClaire will be driving in STYLE! But the shopping didn't stop there... I couldn't help myself when I saw the cutest bib! (The picture is me holding it) It says "I love my big sister" and has butterflies and a froggie on it. All in lime green (my favorite color!) It was only $2.99. We saw the high chair mom likes best too, and we were good and didn't get that! We have decided to get one big thing at a time. (High chair, lazy panda- my name for the snuggly things that you wear and the baby goes in it and you carry him/her around without having to use your arms to hold him/her, and stroller next) Oh, and we ended up finding baretts (well actually we went with little ponytails) at Wally world. They are grograin and curled. Very cute!
I few nights ago, I had a wonderful China dream. We were in China getting AnnaClaire. She was the most beautiful baby ever. She had a huge smile on her face. The next night, I had a dream that I found a huge rock and got $18,000 for finding it. Hmm!?!? What could these dreams mean?
In the old photo albums, I am pictured wearing a ladybug dress and ladybug bow. I had 2 different ladybug dresses actually. And in one picture, Drew, Will, and I are digging a hole to China. (To get AnnaClaire!!!) Where's our LID? 17 days since DTC and counting........
Day 3 of the swim meet was today! By this point, everyone was really tired, so it wasn't the best day. I took off in 2 and added in 2. I got 3rd in the 200 brst though! :)
I don't remember if I wrote it on these journals or our website journals about a guy in my swim group how they adopted a little girl from China a few years ago, but anyway I had the chance to see her today! Boy is she cute. She's 8 years old and her name is Anna. She is adorable! I also saw my new "friend" that I talked about yesterday. The 2 year old from China! Boy if AnnaClaire were here, she would've had lots of China girls to play with at the meet! Nothing much else is going on here. I have a swimming break now until it starts back up in September. :( I am probably gonna get really bored!
Where is our LID??
Rumors have it... MAYBE August could yet through half of August. MAYBE! this is not CERTAIN. Just a RUMOR.
This morning, we drove up to Shelby for the second session of my meet. I swam okay. I got 3rd for the 13-14 year old girls in the 100 breaststroke, so that was exciting. Well, my friend and I went over to the swim store, and sitting right near it was the CUTEST little China girl! She was about 2... She had little pigtails and oh she was so cute! I waved and said "hi" and she waved back all excited and smiley. Ohh I can't wait until we have our China doll. Anyway, as I said in another post, whenever I see a China sweetie, it makes my whole day. So of course, this day was made with the sweet smile of a little almond eye shaped girl.Oh I can't wait to have my mei mei!For now... WHERE'S OUR LID?!?!
Mom, Sadie, Mrs. P, and I drove up to Shelby for a swim meet today. The meet is Friday-Sunday, and since it's only 52 minutes away, we aren't staying overnight. Well anyway, on the drive home, Sadie and I were listening to my iPod. I put on one of my favorite songs and really listened to the lyrics. The song is My Savior my God by Aaron Shust. I've heard the song a lot but I never really listened to it that closely. Well I REALLY like the first part.
I am not skilled to understand
What God has willed, what God has planned
I only know at His right hand
Stands one who is my Savior
I compared this right away to the adoption. I know it is a lot eaiser for me to understand than to tell, so maybe this won't make much since, but it just really spoke to me. I am not skilled enough to understand God's perfect plan. Sometimes the rumors, wait, and want make me just feel like going over and getting mei mei, but I must remember it's all in God's timing. It's His plan.
Felt the need to share this...
Other than that, tonight's session of the meet went well. I had the 400 fr and dropped 11 seconds. :) It's also VERY hot here. Of course I cannot compare our weather with China... but wow, it's HOT!
Well..... 2 weeks and one minute ago, the FedEx man was picking our dossier up from the AWAA office in Virginia to go to CHINA! 1 week and 4 days ago, the dossier arrived in Beijing! (The ticker is supposed to be the Beijing skyline, its the closest thing they had...)
Anyway, HAPPY 2 WEEK SINCE DTC ANNIVERSARY TO US!!!
Now, where is our LID???
COME ON TAs AND REFERRALs!!! I AM RUNNING OUT OF PEOPLE TO FOLLOW! --the last person going to China I am following left yesterday. They come home August 3. I highly doubt any of the June 26 batch of referrals are going to get their TA's in time to travel before then. So sadly, I just might have a few weeks without anyone to follow in China. Hopefully end of June-July referrals will come out soon, so I can atleast enjoy everyones pictures... Referral days are so exciting!
When we first began the process of adopting, I thought that the mothers abandoned the little girls because they didn't want them. They wanted boys. But since then, I have learned other wise. With all my heart, I believe that AnnaClaire's (and all the other Chinese children's) bio mother loves her VERY much. I believe with all my heart that she is full or courage to choose life for her little girl. I am so grateful to her for having no fear. I know now, that the mothers abandon girls because the boys work and care for them in old age. They love the girls very much, and it must be so hard to make the decision to let them go. I found a great way of putting it on a website today. I'm going to put it in my own words.I have heard people say that in China, the parents don't like girls. But that is far from the truth. I cannot tell about how many people I read about that are in China, and the people come up to them making comments how lucky and pretty their baby girl is. The Chinese hug her and hold her. They simply love their girls!
So the question. Why then are so many little girls adopted from China if the Chinese love their girls? I can only begin to answer this question. It is custom in China that boys grow up to care for their parents in old age. Girls grow up to marry husbands and so they care for their husband’s parents in old age. In other words, it is the son who makes it possible for his parents to retire and live comfortably.
For this reason, Chinese women feel the need to put their daughters up for adoption. Sadly, doing this is illegal in China. AKA the Chinese women must abandon their daughters. Some are just a day old when this happens. They take an incredible risk when they leave their daughters to be found by someone else. Abandonment IS the only way to make an adoption happen in China. But I wouldn't exactly call it abandonment. I would call it "left to be found."
I love busy days. I don't like being home all day just checking all the rumors and all the peoples websites and wanting our LID and referral and baby sister. Today was one of the days I like. First, I got to sleep in a little later than usual (8:15). After swimming, I watered plants and then Mom and Emily's mom took Emily, Elizabeth and I to the mall and out to the California Pizza Kitchen as a reward for helping set up for our swim team banquet last week.The mall was great. Tons of sales since they are now getting all their fall stuff in. Well after our fun time at the mall, (which may I add, I cannot wait to shop for AnnaClaire at Gymboree and Baby Gap and all those cute stores) I went to my swim party. It was a pool party. It was really fun!! It was delayed a little becuse of lightning, but it turned out awesome. Oh and I even had time to check on everyones China journeys that I'm following, updates of some favorite adoption sites, and RQ!!!!!!!!!!Still no news on our LID... Will there ever be?I'll keep ya posted................Check out the ticker, 12 days since DTC!! WOOHOO
Last night was our summer league allstar meet! It went well and we got 5th. I woke up this morning and had swimming. Like always, I came home and checked the RQ site. A little bit of bad, a little bit of good. Firstly, the wait is most likely going to extend to 18 months. Did you hear me? 18 MONTHS! That's a year and a half. That's CRAZY! Here's what RumorQueen had to say:
My interpretation of the Australian statement is that in one year the wait will be 18 months. If they were told this in late June early July then I’ll assume that they mean that December of 2005 LIDs will see their referral in June of 2007.
In order for that to happen they will have to do appx 6 months worth of LID’s over the next year. This means the CCAA may be about to go back to half months again. Because we all know if they keep taking 3 months to get through a month that the wait will get much (much) longer than 18 months for the December LID families. So this news is actually predicting that the CCAA is about to speed up a little bit.
There is one agency out there that is telling their people we may see a slight increase in the pace as we get through the next couple of months and then another drastic decrease once we hit October and November again. This makes me think that we won’t see an even two weeks per month, but maybe two and a half to three weeks for a bit and then several months of referrals that hover around a week.
One person wrote in the comments that they think that 18 months is just another milepost and not a destination. Considering that they told us 12 months and that is now 18 months, I am afraid that may turn out to be an accurate statement. Only time will tell.
Secondly, are rumors about THE MOVE. The bold one is the one that (as of now) effects us the most. The italics after is what I have to say.
The CCAA website still shows the old address.
Agencies have been instructed to send dossiers to the new address.
An agency has issued a statement that the CCAA will not be “handling any business matters or processing any paperwork for a few weeks”. They also state that they don’t have any information about when the CCAA may re-open. I can only pray we already have a LID!
There is one largish well known agency saying this is a well planned move to ensure this does not impact the adoption process. The CCAA will not close, they will move departments one by one.
Another agency reports that the office workers were busy last week drawing maps of where their desks will go at the new place.
Another agency says the CCAA is not closed but the move may effect things a little.
One of the biggest agencies says the CCCA will be closed from the 17th to the 21st. However, it is not expected to cause any long term delays and they don’t know how this may effect this month’s referrals.
Another agency says “the CCAA says that it is not their intention for the move to cause significant or long-term delays”. The agency states a bit later that they (the agency) don’t anticipate that this will be a long adjustment, just some possible delay until they are completely moved in. They also say that those most impacted would be families close to receiving a referral and those waiting on Travel Approvals.
One of the smaller agencies says that the CCAA is moving this week and their work will be affected from 2-3 days to one week.
Today was a fun day. We visited a church, which we really liked. I think the little girl sitting behind us was Chinese. Or else Vietnamese. She was really cute!! I really enjoy seeing people with their adopted daughters. It makes me think about how much I can't wait to go around with AnnaClaire!!! I spent the day at the pool again. I can't wait to have AnnaClaire. Oh, we are officially the July Fireflies. Well unless 10 more people vote for the July Butterflies or the July Asian Angels- TONIGHT. I highly doubt that'll happen.... I like the Fireflies! When is our LID????????
Well the weekend has been great so far! Yesterday I went shopping with some good friends we then helped our moms set up for the swim team banquet, which by the way was awesome!!! I slept over at my friends house and this morning we had half of a swim meet. (the one canceled on Thursday.) WE WON!!! It was our last meet so that was exciting. I had a fun day at the pool and out to lunch, but the whole time I couldn't help but think "Are we LID yet?" I am so anxious to know!!! Oh that brings me to the good news!! On the July 06 DTC group, someone posted that they contacted thier angency, and they (the agency) said that the move shouldn't be a problem because the CCAA is going one department at a time! So even if we aren't LID yet, our official LID date won't take another 3 weeks! :)Maybe we are LID today...
This is AnnaClaire's bedding. Isn't it so cute??? It's the Allison bedding from PB Kids. The longer thing is the bumper, the polka dot thing is the sheets and the skirt looking thing is the crib skirt. (I took it out because we ordered it and I had never even seen it so I HAD to take a look. We decided to keep everything else packaged all nice.) The crib skirt actually came today!!! We were going to also get the sham (for her rocking chair) but they ran out. And the quilt we decided not to get because it would just hang there... Kindof pointless... Besides she will have her OHGWQ (one hundred good wishes quilt) Well I'm totally in love!!! I can't wait to set up her crib :). Now I just have to talk mom into letting us paint the crib white... I think the bedding would look really good with a white crib, but mom really wants AnnaClaire to use the same crib that Drew, Will, and I used. That doesn't bother me, as long as we paint it white! (I really like white cribs!) I actually feel like we can start doing stuff now that we are DTC!
Well, I couldn't help myself. I checked the RQ site. More agencies have said that yes, the CCAA is moving this time. I had heard that the CCAA has said they are going to move every month for awhile, but the agencies are saying its true. This is bad for everyone adopting from China. I won't even bother going down the list saying who. Please pray that we are already LID. I really didn't think waiting to hear our LID would be so hard, but oh, it is! Not to make things worse or anything, but another angcey, that is usually right, says referrals will go through the 13. Of July. And that people won't get them until August, when the CCAA is done with the move. AHH! Poor June/July people. Haven't they waited long enough?Well one week since DTC!!! Is today LID day???It's so hard not knowing...
:(
The rumors are bad. Very bad. I know they are just rumors but still. 1: at this rate, we won't get referral until July 2009! I doubt everything will stay at this rate though. That would be CRAZY! 3 years is WAY to long. 2: the CCAA is closing for either 1 or 3 weeks to move. This is bad because if we aren't logged in yet, we won't be for another while! I'm praying with all my might that we are LID already. That would be a week after DTC (basically) which I HAVE seen happen before. PLEASE, LORD, PLEASE. I am believing with all my heart that the CCAA is doing as much as they can before they move, and that they have logged us in. I can only pray this is true. Maybe I shouldn't look at rumors anymore, they make me to sad. This is also bad for all the people LID June/July last year because they have to wait for the move to get referrals. And for the people waiting for TA. It's bad all around! Not good news to come home to after the delayed swim meet. Not good at all. I am sure God is working everything out in His wonderful way. I just need to assure myself a little more. Well I better get to bed. Oh and also, Int'l Shipping Release is not what we thought. The dossiers were delivered at 5:33PM on July 10. So, ISR must mean it was given to the FedEx in Beijing... Well If they logged our dossier in right away, then maybe we are LID!! We'll have to wait and see. The word WAIT is getting to be used a lot.
Well, the ticker says it all!! I made this one, and really like it. I think the baby looks Asian even though maybe she's not. Well... today was a good day. It went by really fast! I stripped wallpaper for 5 hours!!! I'm getting really, really good. I'll have to teach AnnaClaire how to strip wallpaper so she can help me strip our bathroom. Or maybe by that time, it'll already be stripped, considering by the time AnnaClaire could do it, I'd be in college!! My friend, Sadie, and I had leftover Chinese food for lunch. It was really good! I love Chinese food! I am a little scared about the Chinese in China though. Will says he's ready for REAL Chinese food, but I WILL NOT eat dog. Or cat. And I'm kindof scared to even eat the chicken. And no way will I eat fish with the head still on! I don't like red meat so that's a problem too. I have a LONNNNG time til China though:( Well atleast RQ says (*it's just a rumor) that the referrals will speed up and maybe all of July in July. Wouldn't that be AWESOME? Just in time for us too! Then maybe it'd get down to a 10 month wait! That would be so awesome. But just so I don't get disappointed, I am going to stick to a random guess of June 29-July20. It sounds like a good cutoff and it's SO much better than 5 days worth! Well, that's my guess, but all of July would be a LOT better. We'll see pretty soon:) I can't wait til referral day. I love looking at all the peoples babies. Maybe next July (or even earlier, please Lord!) we will get our referral. I can't wait to see my mei mei!!! I love her to death already!! Well what's your guess for our LID? I hope July 17 or earlier. My guess is the 15th. That would be soooo nice. Well I better go for now. I have swim practice at 6:45am tomorrow, and I want to read a little before bed.
Wow!!! Sorry I never posted yesterday! I have been SOOOOO busy! Last night we won our summer league meet:) that was exciting. Today after swimming at 6:45, I helped my friends who are moving around the corner, strip wallpaper at their new house! Then I went to my friends birthday. Wow I went from being home all day and being on the computer ALL day looking at adoption blogs and all that, to being extremely busy! I haven't even been on the computer in 2 days til now! That is surprising. Now I'm really behind on all the people who are in China though, which is sad. Maybe I will catch myself up tomorrow. Well, we received our packet from AWAA. Including us, there are 5 families, 1 single! Cool! I know one of the families in our group has two boys, but I'm not sure about the rest. I'm hoping there is a girl around my age. That'd be really cool. I can't wait to start talking to our group and getting their sites and all that!! Well, I better get to bed soon, I want to read a little and I have to wake up early tomorrow. Good night!!! Oh yea, we got a quilt square from my g-ma yesterday. That was the first one from a relative!
*emily*
YIPEE! I just tracked our dossier. At 7:49PM (China time, 7:49AM here) Our dossier was International shipping relaeaed in Beijing, China. Dad says Int'l Shipping Release means that the dossiers have arrived in their final destination! BEIJING, CHINA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY
After church today, we went to celebrate being DTC at PF Changs, our favorite Chinese restaraunt. We even got the Great Wall of Chocolate for desert! YUMM! I highly recommend it.
We have slight name change to mei mei's name. We had been thinking about doing it, but have know decided to put the Anna and the Claire together instead of apart. AnnaClaire... AnnaClaire... AnnaClaire... I love it! We think it looks prettier this way and that way people won't call her Anna. Anna is NOT her name! Also since we want to keep one of her Chinese names, this way she won't have so many names! I am happy with our decision :)
Throughout this process, I have really been wanting to make a ticker. I don't know why, I just love tickers. Yesterday, I took advantage of my oppurtunity and made the long awaited ticker. It was kind of funny that it said "0 day since we are DTC!" yesterday. It think it looks better now that it says "1 day since we are DTC" Anyway, I hope you like my gorgeous ticker (at the bottom) (wink wink)
I am very excited because the July 2006 DTC group has a *TEMPORARY* name!!! As of now, we are the July Fireflies.. I like it! I think it would been cool if we are the July Butterflies, but I guess that's a little girly. I do really like the July Fireflies. It has a nice ring. It is definatly better then some I've seen...
I love having the tracking number for the dossiers. It is so nice! This morning, as usual, I woke up at 6:30 for swim practice. I didn't feel the best but thats okay... I came home and had some yummy bread.. Then I did my new daily ritual. I went to the FedEx website and tracked the dossiers. One of my worst fears is the dossier getting lost, so I was glad to see there are no problems. The dossiers arrived in TN last night and departed from TN early this morning! This afternoon, Dad, Will and I went on lots of errands. Will got a new MP3 because his iPod broke and I got my friends bday present.. We went out for ice cream too :) Then I checked where our dossier was. It arrived and departed from Alaska this morning!!! It's making its way to China!! --Pray the no problem theme will continue!!!
6:00pm- Dad got us Chinese for dinner to celebrate DTC! Since Will doesn't come home from camp until later tonight, we aren't going to have our family celebration until Sunday after church... (GREAT WALL OF CHOCOLATE, HERE I COME!! - its a chocolate cake at P.F.Changs that mom promised we could get when we celebrate DTC!!!) any way, I JUST TRACKED OUR DOSSIER. IT WAS PICKED UP IN MCLEAN AT 5:14PM!!
Well well well.. the paperchase has officially come to an end. It has been 6 months and 4 days since we submitted our application to AWAA and we finally are done with the paperchase. We have the tracking number for our dossier, and it should arrive in Beijing at 6:00PM (China time) on July 10! It was transmitted to FedEx today at 10:24AM. I am so excited. It finally feels like this process is moving along! YIPEE! We were originally planning on being DTC July 14, but we had a little bit of a miracle.....
(this was on July 5, 2006)
We really saw God's hand at work today! We were going to leave our house at 3am for Washington D.C., but our dog, Maggie woke us up at 2, and we were out of the house by 2:30am. Our plan was to bring the documents to the State Department and the Chinese Embassy today, do the next day walk in service at the Chinese Embassy, and bring the documents to AWAA on Thursday. We weren't really even expecting doing this all in a day, and being DTC this Friday! We were thinking we would have a really hard time parking, especially with our big car! Low and behold, we found a great parking spot a block away from the State Department. Well, we got there, and they said they could only authenticate 15 documents a day. We had 17. Uh oh! We explained we had woken up at 2am to do this and had driven from Charlotte, NC! Well, we must have had a pitiful look, because they said they'd fit us in. We were overjoyed. A courier who actually knows Steven Curtis Chapman and the founders of AWAA, the Luwis' said in his 9 years, he had never seen them make an exception like this. Wow that was such a God thing! This man was our little angel. He told us how to get to the Chinese Embassy, what to check for on our documents, and everything else we needed to know. He was so helpful. He said MAYBE if we would be able to get to the Chinese Embassy by 11, we could get our documents by 2 and MAYBE AWAA would let us get the cutoff even though we would be a little late. We weren't too sure because we still had to make copies... Well we tried a Wachovia near the State Department. Their copy machine was broken. We kept driving toward the Chinese Embassy, praying we could find a copy machine. We found another Wachovia, and the man, very nice, set it all up for and let us do all 51 copies (we copied each document 3 times) FOR FREE. We quickly made copies and were on our way to the Chinese Embassy. Walk ins were only until 11:30. We walked in at 11:28, mom found a great parking spot-yet again while dad and I waited to be called. By 11:50, we were called. She said to check back after 2. That means we would probably miss the cutoff. By the time we got there, it could be after 3! Well it would be $170 more dollars to do same day then next day, so dad said we would do next day. I still had a little bit of hope, and practically in tears, I begged dad to let us to same day. Dad asked if maybe they would be done earlier, and she said check at 1:30. We were very happy, but couldn't celebrate yet. Well we prayed that they would be ready by 1:30. We ate lunch and were back at the embassy right as it was reopening after lunch. We thought we would just sit there and wait until 1:15 to ask, but decided to ask then. So at 1:03, dad checked if they were ready, and praise the Lord, they were. What a surprise. We were on the phone with our coordinator, telling her we would be in McLean by 2 for the cut off. We quickly left the Embassy after making copies and shedding tears of joy. After a few pictures, we got in the car-1:21, our parking meter expired at 1:40. We were on our way to McLean! Well, we got lost. But God allowed us to find where we were, and we walked in the office at 2:03P.M. (exactly one hour after we received our documents from the Embassy!) Wow did we cut it close. Our family coordinator showed us around AWAA and then she looked over all our stuff. It was not as nerve wracking as we thought, and it all turned out fine. After many thanks, we were out, nearly an hour later! Wow. Was God good or what? And get this! Right as we got in our car, it started pouring rain! God even held of the rain so our documents wouldn't get wet. IS GOD GOOD OR WHAT? Today was such a miracle day! I could almost see God's hand putting it all together for us in His perfect way. And it all started with something as simple as God urging Maggie to wake us up 30 minutes early. Because if it weren't for that, we would have been too late. Wow, I will always remember this day. This is all part of God's plan for my little sister!! I can't wait to tell her all about this day, and how wonderful our God is! We now have a DTC date a week earlier than expected!! (7/7/06)
Yesterday, as we were walking down to the White House, Leah called and our dossier has been reveiwed, and is fine!
I am starting this blog as a sort of adoption journal. My family is adoptiong a baby girl from China! I have to big brothers and I am 13, so I am really ready to have a mei mei (little sister)
We submitted our online application to America World Adoption Association on January 6, 06 and were approved a few days later. Following that, we had all sorts of stuff leading up to 17 documents to be authenticated. Those 17 documents is our dossier!
For those of you who are clueless when it comes to adoption, first you submit and application. Then you have to get approved. For 3-6 months, you are in a stage called the "paperchase" getting all your documents ready for your dossier (this includes backround checks, docter appointments, fingerprinting, forms, letters of intent/apology, homestudy, authentication, noterizing, and more). You then send (or bring) your dossier to your agency. They reveiw it and send it to China (DTC). China logs it their system a few days/weeks later (LID). You then wait for your referral (pictures of the baby). As of now the wait is 12-14 months long. The shortest its ever been is 6 months, longest is 15 months. After getting your referral, you get travel approval (TA) and then you go get you baby!! (You usually travel 2 months after referral)
