Saturday, April 26, 2008

Stories While We're Waiting...

We are in our 25th day of waiting for our LOA for Nyah. I’m thinking we still have twice as long to go. Here is an adoption related story while we wait…

I have some concerns about Brynn’s eyesight. We already know she needs glasses but she also, 90% of the time, mixes up green and red. So the question of color-blindness always is in my mind… I wouldn’t think twice about it if she was mixing up say blue and green or yellow and purple. She told me the other day the grass was red. I’ll probably mention this at her next doctor’s visit though I think testing her would still be complicated since she doesn’t know all her numbers or letters, and sometimes not even what the pictures are on the standard eye-site chart. Heck, she didn’t even automatically say the grass was green like I would expect most preschoolers to say and yes, it was actually green and not brown! :)

Anyway, the main point is I shared this with Doug, who is colorblind, and his first thought was that she got it from him and, believe me, he knows that colorblindness is not something you catch from others! How cute!

Anyone considering adoption who wonders if they would love a child the same as a biological one… there is no difference. You’ll find yourself “forgetting” which is which. Sometimes I even claim my biological children can’t possibly be mine. They are all a blessing!

I am going to send our 5th blessing a care package in the next few weeks and try to find out how she is doing so hopefully I will be posting good stuff soon!

Monday, April 7, 2008

We have a LID!

I just got an email that our documents were logged in on April 2, 2008, one week after they left for China and just 2 days after they arrived at the CCAA. Yippee! My smile may not be as cute as this kitty's but it is far larger today!

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Just wonderin'

Well, I am not stressed anymore but I am endlessly curious if our dossier is logged in at CCAA and have spent way too much time looking at recent numbers. I have seen dossiers logged in right when they arrive, some a week or two later, and though I haven't seen any taking up to month, my agency puts that in the "normal" range. Our dossier arrived in China on the 31st. I am hoping the CCAA workers were extremely efficient and logged it in that day but if they didn't, I'm thinking maybe by Thursday the 3rd since Friday, I think, is now a holiday in China and doesn't everybody want to finish up their work before they leave for a long weekend? If nothing else, I know, I just know, the longest it will take will be two weeks from DTC so April 9th is the day in my mind I will start the count from until I know the truth and hopefully, when that happens, I will be pleasantly surprised!

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

We are DTC!

Yeah!! Can you hear my big sigh of relief where you are? Today our Dossier heads To China. That means our paperwork will be logged in (takes around 2 weeks though we may not find out the exact date until long after that) and we wait some more... between 3 and 5 months for our Letter of Acceptance (LOA), which should be followed by a 2-4 week wait for our Travel Approval (TA), which will be followed by our trip to China about 2 weeks later.

What DTC means for us is that there is nothing we can do right now to speed up the process or even move the process along so I can relax a bit. I'm thinking a nap!! But first, I think an ice-cream celebration is in order!

Kate

Monday, March 24, 2008

Waiting to start the big wait...

Our agency received our last piece of paperwork a week ago today but only sends dossiers to China 2x's a month so we have been told that our dossier "should" go to China on the 26th. I know in the grand scheme of things this 9 days of nothing happening won't matter once our daughter is in our arms, but right now, since we have been on the slow end of everything not 100% in our control this entire adoption so far, I'm bummed. I don't think I will really relax until I know our dossier is on its way overseas and I am ready to relax a bit! I think traveling before the Olympics at this point isn't going to happen and that is disappointing but we gave it our finest effort! Sigh.

Here is another 1st birthday picture we received after JinPei received her cake. It is way blurry but I love it because she looks happy and for me it is the clearest as far as seeing how little she is! I think that head of hair makes her look older than she is in most of the pictures...

I am hoping to share good news Wednesday. We are keeping our fingers crossed that from there our documents get logged in quickly so we can officially start our 3-5 month wait for our LOA (letter of acceptance).

Kate

Saturday, March 15, 2008

More pictures of JinPei!

Guess the cake wasn't such a bad idea after all!

Yum!


I'll get some myself, thanks!

I'm saving the icing on my sleeve for later!

In the last picture, the panda bear on the table came with the birthday cake "package" but the other bear is the one we sent in our own care package last month. And the two people on the right, even though the picture is blurry, well I can see one is holding the toy we sent and the other is looking at the photo album. Now we know she got the package we send through USPS you know I'll be sending another one or two or more the same way.

What an awesome day!

Kate

Welcome to the family kiddo UPDATE!!!!


Well, it turns out that she won't be putting "missed my first birthday" on my fault list but she may put "sent me a first birthday cake."

We are so thrilled to have updated pictures and ones on the day she turned 1!