100 Wishes Quilt

100 wishes quilt


You're probably wondering what this is!! Now that we are officially a "waiting family" we can start on the next project. Here is some information on the quilt:

To welcome and celebrate a new life, there is a tradition in the northern part of China to make a Bai Jia Bei, or "100 Good Wishes Quilt." It is a custom to invite 100 people to contribute a single square patch of cloth. The 100 patches are sewn together into a quilt that contains the luck, energy, and good wishes from all the family and friends who contributed a piece of fabric. The quilt is then passed down from generation to generation. We ask that you please participate in this project. We love the idea of welcoming our daughter into our home with a quilt that represents the good wishes for her from our family and friends.

Here Is What We Would Like You To Do:
1) Choose any 100% cotton fabric that you like. It can be from a piece of clothing or from a fabric store. It just needs to have a design and color that you like.
2) Cut one 8" x 8 square from the fabric.
3) On an acid free piece of paper (so it will last a long time), put a small piece of the fabric, include your "good wish note" and your name and address. The fabric will be used to make a quilt, and the notes will be placed in a life book which we will give to our daughter when she is older. She will be able to match the fabric and wish with the squares in her quilt.

Ideas For Selecting Fabric Squares - Select a fabric that is meaningful to you. 100% cotton fabric is best, as it washes and wears better. If there are several members in your family, please feel free to send more than one good wish note and pieces of fabric. We ask that the fabric is pre-washed (to prevent shrinkage) 8x8 fabric square and we will add it to the squares for little T's quilt. In China, these quilts were originally made from the garments of family and friends surrounding the child with luck and good wishes.

Ideas For A Good Wishes Note - Well, what would you wish for an infant to have in her life? Some ideas are good health, perseverance, compassion, love, and a sense of humor. Use that as a guide for your good wish note. Keep in mind that our daughter will not see your note until she is older. It would be great to get the fabric and notes by March 2007 so the quilt can be completed before we bring our baby home. Please take a few minutes from your busy schedules to help us create this very special keepsake. The miracle of this adoption has been helped and nurtured by so many of you and this will be so incredibly meaningful for us as well as our new arrival!

I will be sending out an email to our family. If you would like to participate please let me know by leaving a comment and I will email you our address. Once we start getting squares in I'll probably set up another blog for the pictures and wishes.

Home from the Hospital

Mom is doing well. She came home from the hospital on Sunday. The doctors are very pleased with her progress. She is able to carry on a conversation without being prompted and she has her appetite back!

Father's Day was great. I cooked T's favorite meal and invited our neighbors over. We swam and ate and enjoyed each other's company. Their little boy took a few steps at our house! Too cute! Their daughter was excited to see me after 2 weeks...she wouldn't leave my side!


While in NY I redid the room my mom will be staying in. My brother came in and put lamenated wood flooring in the room, I added an area run, dusted, cleaned everything up and it looked great. I also went and bought a sofa slipcover and new sofa pillows for the living room. My dad got a new phone for Father's day from me. This one has 2 handsets!! He thought you had to have 2 phone lines for this...too funny. I went through a ton of mail, dusted, vacumned, cleaned off the computer desk, swept and mopped floors. Mom said she was pleased with everything.

Not much happening in the adoption world. Just chillin'! We have 7 ballgames this week so we'll be very busy.

A Thousand Miles

I'm sitting at my mom's desk waiting to call the charge nurse and I saw this bookmark and smiled. Our journey to little T did begin with a single step. Not only will it be over a thousand miles but it will be for many, many months. The 12 month wait is very hard - we've only been a waiting family for a few weeks! I wonder at night if she has been born yet. Is she okay? Is she cold? hungry? scared? crying? So many questions are running through my mind. Are we just crazy starting all over with another child now that the boys are older and able to take care of themselves?

These questions may never be answered. Unless little T's mom leaves a note with her birthdate we won't even know that. That is scary - the "not knowing" part. We won't know her medical history, her family history - nothing. Of course, no one knows the future but at least we know our pasts. I can't imagine what it will be like for her when she gets older. I'm not prepared for the questions that I know she will ask - but that is something I can do while we wait to meet her. I can learn about China, read books, read blogs of other families that have adopted, and learn how they handled the questions.

Yes, our journey started with a single step - but it will continue for many many years.

Quick Note

Just a quick update. I am still in NY and mom is still in SICU. We are praying that she gets down to the floor today. She is finally responding to us!!!!

Adoption update - we received our LID (log in date). It is May 30th!! We made the May cutoff.

I'm Addicted

Being addicted to the RQ site I sent an email to our agency concerning the newest weight questions. Though I don't beleive that we have anything to worry about (rumors were for 300 or more pounds)I just felt better knowing something. Here is there response to me:

"The dossier department forwarded me your email and I am happy to try to reassure you. At this time, China does not have any restrictions for family’s adopting from China based on weight. If such a regulation should be put it in place, it does not affect people already in the process who are logged into the CCAA. I know it is a fear that many people are experiencing right now based on the rumors but we have not seen this to be an issue for anyone to date. We are a very cautious and conservative agency in making sure that we present dossiers to China that we believe are fully qualified based on China’s qualifications. I hope this helps! "

So I'm trying to stay off of RQ (sigh...like that will happen!) and being upbeat and positive about the whole thing. I'm in a postcard swap with one of the lists I'm on so that will keep me busy doing her scrap book. As soon as we get our LID (Log in date in China) I'll join a quilt square swap. (more on the 100 wishes quilt to come later!)

In other news - my mom is not doing well at all. Her heart valve is leaking to the point that it is breaking up her red blood cells causing her to get blood on a weekly basis now. On top of that she has a dissection of the arota. (<--click here to learn more about it!) She is taking tests today to see if she is strong enough to undergo surgery on June 7th. I'll be traveling to NY on the 5th if the surgery is a go and will probably not have access to the internet while I'm there. This surgery will be for the valve and not the arota. She will need to recover from this surgery and then go again for the other surgery. If she doesn't have this done she might live for another 6 months to a year. Please please keep her in your prayers. She is so important to me and has shared my dream of adopting even when big T wasn't on board. I so want her to meet little T next year!

In CCAA's Hands Now

More good news from our agency:

From: CCAI Dossier & China Departments



Congratulations! Your dossier has been delivered to the China Center of Adoption Affairs.



We will notify by email as soon as we receive your official log-in date (LID) from CCAA, and then you can go to the CCAI website to download Dossier Log-In Date Packet. This can take approximately up to 6 weeks from now.




Sincerely,

CCAI Dossier & China Departments

DTC!!!

Guess what??!!! I got the following email from my agency this morning:

CONGRATULATIONS, T & C,

Your dossier was sent to China yesterday afternoon (5/24/2006)!


WOW!!!!!!!!!!!! I can finally say we are PAPER PREGNANT!!!!! I'm so excited I can hardly stand it!


Yeah!!!!!!

Hillbilly

My Hillbilly Name Is...

Lil' Dixie West

Hillbilly Name Generator

I saw this on another blog and thought it was cute. What's your hillbilly name?

Lazy Weekend

What a great weekend we had. Little T made Jr. Legion baseball again this year, it was homecoming at church, little J graduated from pre-school, and the weather was just beautiful!!



I pretty much was lazy all weekend. Same old thing - vacuum, dust, dishes, laundry. When does a girl ever rest? Big T cleaned the pool and reminded me for the millionth time that he hates the pool. L & Little T went to a church competition Friday night. T came home that same evening and L got back Saturday night. Big T and I had a night to ourselves Friday night. Did we go out to dinner? See a movie? Have some fun? Rent a movie? Go to a nightclub? NO!! We just sat around the house, made a pizza bake, and enjoyed each other's company. Aren't we romantic??!! Actually, it was very nice. We talked about baby T, the boys, the future, and then just zoned out.

Our dossier has been in translation since last Thursday. I am ever hopeful that it will be sent to China this week. How I would love to finally announce that we are DTC (dossier to China!!)



Big T's mom was asking if she will be home in time for the family reunion next year. That would be great if she is. With the current timeline we can expect a referral next May and then travel in July. Usually the reunion is at the beginning of July but T's mom said that they could move it to the end so everyone can meet her. That would be so exciting. Maybe CCAA will shorten the wait time again - who knows what their plan is!!!

Jump!!

JUMP!! JUMP!! JUMP!!

People are jumping ship. The wait times have crept up to 12-14 months so a bunch of people are switching countries. Our daughter is in China. I knew this over a year ago. Yes, a year is a long time to wait but think about this. It is already the 19th of May. Half the year is almost over already!!! Between baseball, football, wrestling, church, and work time will fly by!! JUMP PEOPLE JUMP!!!! 'cause the more people that jump off, the closer we get to our daughter!!

In the meantime we'll just relax and take the slow boat to China. We'll be patient and wait for our little munchkin. This will happen - all good things take time.

This is so funny!!!

check it out!!

The Evolution of Dance

Yes!! We are in translation folks!! That means we will be DTC this month. Can you tell I'm excited?

How should we celebrate?? Hmmm....both boys are going to Asheboro for a church youth competition and will be back Saturday. T and I should go out, maybe to dinner and a movie. That would be nice. We'll see. I'd like to see the Poseidon Adventure but I've heard it wasn't that good.

Dancing my way to China!!

Nothing...nothing in email, nothing left on my answering machine, nothing sent in the mail...I'm going nuts!!!! I think I might needs some more retail therapy!

I saw this on another blog and decided that since we are adopting from China we could also adopt a "lil'monster". Check out the egg under "China Weather". This will hatch on June first. Wonder what the monster will look like?

Mother's Day was wonderful. The boys surprised me with a card and a dozen red roses. Even Big T didn't know that they got those. How sweet. Big T cooked my favorite Tuscan chicken and I pretty much was lazy the entire day. I had hoped this would be my last mother's day without little T but I guess that is not meant to be. I love my boys and I'm so grateful to have all 3 of them in my life. Our boys are growing up into fine young men!!

On the 11th I wrote that it had been almost a week since I sent in my dossier to my agency. In reality it was over a week!! They received it on May 2nd. Today is May 15th!! I haven't heard anything and I'm going nuts!! I so want to be DTC and LID this month...it's so hard to not have control over this.

Ok...it's been almost a week and I haven't heard ANYTHING about how the dossier looks yet from my agency. I'm going crazy wondering what in the world is going on..is it acceptable? is something wrong? is it all there? do I need to redo some paperwork? ugh!!

I brought KaCee to the vet yesterday for her annual heartworm check. We noticed a bump on the inside of her ear so I had the vet look at it. He said it was a hematoma. She is 3 1/2 years old, weighs 85 pounds and has never spent the night away from us! We take her and Jasmine everywhere - the lake, NY, the mountains. KaCee is even afraid of the dark! Anyway, the vet said that she would have to spend the night so he could drain out the blood and then bandage it up for 12 to 14 hours. Poor puppy - had to sleep in a cage...no one there to love on her and give her treats or play with her. I think that we, as a family, are more traumatized that she is!! I'll go pick her up tonight after work and I'm sure she will be even more spoiled when she gets home than she usually is.

My youngest son is driving me crazy - he is into playing this game on-line - which is fine. But, when you ask him to get off it will take him 30 minutes! He said he needs to finish a deal, say good-bye, etc. I've started to ground him from it and he's done better - except for yesterday. It was time to get off and get ready for Church, well he got mad and started running his mouth. I cut him short and said he was grounded from it for a week - that made him madder and he started slamming around his room. I ignored the little punk and told him to meet me in the car. When he came in I looked at his shorts and they were FILTHY!! I asked him to go change and he slammed the car door, kicked the pool table, slammed the screen door, slammed the kitchen door and stomped into the house - so I just left!! He enjoys the youth group at church so he didn't get to go. I was so mad at him! I went to Wally world for some retail therapy and found this:

Yes, I know - I already have 4 blankets for little T - but I just couldn't resist. I called J and went to her house to borrow her sewing maching. I'll post pictures when I'm done.

***UPDATE*** - I've finished sewing the blanket and now I'm cutting it. Ugh!!!! What a PITA!!!

Back to L - when I returned home from J's he was in his room and didn't say boo to me the rest of the night. He is only 13 and he needs to control his anger so no internet for 2 full weeks and no going to Bean's house either.

That's pretty much the happenings around this place for the past few days. Not too much excitment in hicktown USA!!

Guess what a fruitcake I am!! Yesterday I went to the post office to send in our 6 passport photos. I was so proud of myself getting those out right away. So I'm home in bed - it's a sleepless night and I'm starring at the ceiling thinking. I bolt up and say OH MY GOD!!! What a dumb arse!!! I sent the pictures with NOTHING ELSE!! No explanation of what they were let alone who they were of. And if their mail department is anything like ours, they'll open the package and throw away the envelope. I quick like email my agency first thing this morning and they said not to worry - they'll match them up!!

Whew....not only was I thinking I would have to shell out another 32 bucks but then I would be wasting another day when our dossier could be sent to China.

OMG...my oldest son is growing up so fast! This is his girlfriends Junior prom - his will be next year. Doesn't he look handsome??

Here's a picture of T & T ready to go to the prom. Aren't they a great looking couple??!!

Yes, I'm bored. On one of the forums I'm on it was suggested that while we wait we write down what we have done everyday. This way we will know what we were doing when our daughter was born, etc. So, even though we are not even DTC yet (should happen next week)I'm going to go ahead and start this. Since we would like a girl who is around 15 months there is a very good chance that she is already born! Wow...our daughter could already be born, sitting in China just waiting for us to come get her.

So this last week went by very quickly:
Monday I had to take L to the doctors for his eye. The school made him leave because they though he had pink eye. We tried to tell him he didn't, that his eye was just irritated from his contact but for safety reasons they said he had to leave. Well of course he didn't have pink eye but the nurse gave us a script for antibiotic for a sty he has on his other eye.

Tuesday T had a ball game and his team did not do well at all. He went 2 for 3 with a nice double but they still got beat by the mercy rule (10 run lead).

Wednesday I took L to the eye doctor for his yearly eye examine. What a fiasco that was!! They had a problem with big T's insurance and it took me forever to get it straightened out. Once we got back to see the doctor she examined him. She asked how long he kept his contacts in and I said too long. Well, sure enough, his corneas are swollen so she couldn't get a good read for his new contacts. He is out of contact for at least 2 weeks. Oh, and the sty...it's not a sty at all. She said it is a pore that is blocked, sort of like a pimple - but it's something else. Anyway, she tried to excise it but couldn't. He has to put hotpacks on his eye 3 times a day and if it doen't go away he will have to have it surgically removed! Oh joy!! We went out to dinner after that because big T and little T were in Wilmington for another ball game.

Thursday was a run around day. When I got home I had to take L to get his new glasses and little T to get his Tux for prom this weekend. OMG!! He looked so good in that tux! I can't wait to get pictures today!! We also went to our neighbors house for D's 1 yr old birthday.

Friday I relaxed - well almost. My neighbor called and asked if I could watch her youngest. No problem!! He is such a cutie patootie!! He hadn't had a nap so he was pretty tired and just a little bit fussy. At 8:30 I gave him a bottle and he was out like a light. Around 9:30 or 10 I brought him home. His sister was in bed already watching Buzz Lightyear and his grandma was drinking coffee and watching tv.

And you all know what I am doing today - Saturday. Working!! yuck...

It's 10:40 on a Saturday morning. I should be at home, just getting up from a restful sleep...but nooo.....I'm at work and have been since 9 this morning!! What am I doing blogging? Well, we are doing an upgrade and waiting for our vendor to finish it. They should have been done first thing this morning but of course they aren't. That means we sit here and twiddle our thumbs - not much else we can do. I've filed some, moved some files around...was a little bit productive but I've decided to take a break.

The bad thing about this whole deal is that today my oldest goes to his first prom. (Let me hear it...awwwwwww....)He goes for pictures at 5, has a dinner reservation at 6:30 and then off to the prom. I want to be there but it will take four hours or more to do testing and I'm almost an hour away from home. We won't be able to test until 11:30 at the earliest. You do the math. If I make it home it will be just in time. This makes me sooooo mad!!!

So it goes in the Saturday morning rut for C!! Oh well...I'll talk to my boss and see if I can't skate out early - we'll see what he says.

I received a comment from a reader about how she and her husband have talked about adoption. We too have talked about adoption in the past in fleeting moments. I even called to talk to a social worker about foster care but never followed up with it. The seed for adoption was planted years ago in both of us - it just bloomed quicker for me. For me the decision to adopt was easy, but for my husband it was another story. He wanted nothing to do with it for an entire year!! I cried, begged, pleaded, and prayed and still he said no. I don't know what turned him around - I asked one day on the phone and he just said "Fine - call my company - find out what they give as benefits - lets do it." I just about fainted!! We talked some more that evening about this life changing decision, about how it would affect the boys, us, our marriage and especially how it would affect her, our daughter, to come into this family, to America, away from everything she has known her short life. We of course went forward with it and we are looking forward to seeing her beautiful face next year.

If the seed of adoption has been planted in your heart, let it grow. It's a journey you'll never forget nor regret.

Tracking number 8XX4055XX34X
Signed for by T.KRIER
Ship date May 1, 2006
Delivery date May 2, 2006 10:22 AM

Delivered to Receptionist/Front Desk
Service type Priority Pak
Weight 2.0 lbs.

Status Delivered


That's right folks....our package has arrived. Now the agency does their critical review and then it flys off to China.

Tracking number 8XX40XX78XXX
Ship date May 1, 2006
Estimated delivery May 2, 2006 10:30 AM
Service type Priority Pak
Weight 2.0 lbs.

Status On FedEx vehicle for delivery

Tracking number 8X74XX578X47
Ship date May 1, 2006
Estimated delivery May 2, 2006 10:30 AM
Service type Priority Pak
Weight 2.0 lbs.
Status In transit

Details

May 1, 2006 7:38 PM

Left origin GREENVILLE, NC 8:44 AM
Picked up GREENVILLE, NC

My little brother is starting his own business cleaning up the debris after natural disasters like wild fires and hurricanes. His company is called Leve1dmc. I've put a link to his website on the side bar. He has also put some of the pictures he took of the California wild fires up on the site. I've included a picture here but you gotta go check out his site and look at all the other pictures.



Firestorm

DONE!!!! We are finally done with the paperchase. What you are looking at is the FEDEX shipping document. CCAI will receive our dossier tomorrow morning by 10:30. It then goes into critical review where they make sure everything is correct, mount the pictures and bind the whole thing together. Then they will send it to China which will be our DTC (Dossier To China) date. When China receives it and logs it into their system we will get our LID (Log In Date). Yeah!!! This is a huge step closer to our daughter. Now the real wait begins.

Shenzhen, China.

What was a tiny fishing village on the border of Hong Kong in 1970 is now a buzzing metropolis of over four million people. With 13 buildings at over 200 meters tall, including the Shun Hing Square (the 8th tallest building in the world), Shenzen is a marvel of lights after sunset. You can’t help but ask yourself if you are in a video game or in a real city.
Metro/Urban Population: 4.2 million

Guangzhou, China


Guangzhou

Guangzhou is a very modern city, yet it is called "the City of Flowers,” as each of its spectacular skyscrapers is surrounded by grand green spaces and flower beds. Although it only has six structures at over 200 metres tall, there are plenty of other high-rises, each displaying a design that stands out in its own respect. This includes the 391 metre, 80-floor, CITIC Plaza which appears transparent against the (usually) clear blue sky!
Metro/Urban Population: 4.1 million

Shanghai, China




Not to be mistaken for a space station, Shanghai is a real city! China's biggest and most advanced city, Shanghai was said to be the most cosmopolitan city in the beginning of the 20th century, but lost its glory during the “Mao era”. It is now quickly regaining its position as one of the biggest economic powerhouses in the world as well as a showcase of modern architecture. In Shanghai you’ll find 25 structures that are over 200 metres tall, one of which is the insanely tall, the 468m downtown Oriental Pearl TV Tower.
Metro/Urban Population: 13.1 million

And finally Hong Kong




Hong Kong is number one on my list for many reasons: Hong Kong has a whopping 43 buildings over 200 metres tall, 30 of which were built in the year 2000 or later!!! It also boasts four of the 15 tallest buildings in the world… that's all in one city! Hong Kong’s skyline shows a large selection of distinct sky-reaching towers, with beautiful night lighting and reflection. This city exemplifies the post-modern skyscraper and skyline. Finally, the mountain backdrop makes this skyline (as you can clearly see) the greatest on the planet!
Metro/Urban Population: 6.9 million

I got the first picture from My Chinese Dream. Her daughter Mali is beautiful. Check her out and while you're out surfing around check out the other skylines at Top 15 Skylines.

Another dossier photo. We have to have 8 family photos and 3 couple photos. I also have a family reunion photo from last year we are going to send. So, that's 3 family so far. I have another picture of just the 2 of us from a friends wedding a month ago. That will be 2 couple photos. Jeez...who would have thought getting pictures could be this difficult??

Hmmm...maybe....the picture is off balance but it might just do. Everyone has a nice smile on. I had to crop the picture because you can see all the stuff on the deck by the back door and it looked kind of messy.

Waiting...waiting....waiting....we are waiting on the Assistant Stork to finish up with authenticating our documents so we can send everything to the agency. That should happen next week. So that is about all that has been happening around here. The boys are on Spring Break so there isn't any baseball (yeah!!). Work is still work and will always be work!
Here's a great picture that J sent to T of his parent's wedding day. Wow!! We've never seen this one before. Thanks J!!

I've been reading other blogs and noticed a trend. Quite a few of them have names without the word "Journey" in the title! I can be creative when I need to be (come on folks, I'm a programmer....Creativity is not needed, just logic!) "T for Two...Double Happiness...Grouchy LadyBug....little hugs...The Cady Chase...Wandering Child"...and so on are different blogs that I read. Ok, lets see. I have 3 wonderful guys in my life, 2 dogs, and a cat. We are a sports (ugh!) oriented family who is adopting a daughter and sister from China. What about "3 Guys and a girl" - nah...too corny. "Baseball and Ballet"..."Cleats or Pointes"..."Chopsticks vs Forks"..."Puppydog tails"...."To the Moon and Back"..."Jump Rope"..."hopSCOTCH"..."T For Me and You"..."The Maddening Chase"..."Chopstick Dreaming"

Tell me what you think!!

Well we have seen another snafu in the great paperchase of 2006! Our marriage certificate is FAKE!!!!!!!!!! Haha...just kidding. I did have to send it back to the county clerk for them to certify though. Here's the scoop. Sent the mc to Albany to be certified, they send it back and say it needs to be done at the county level. Ok, sure...sent it to the county clerk in Wampsville. They send it back and said it needs to be done at the town level. Um....ok. Sent it to Chittenango...guess what? They called and said it was already certified but they would go ahead and get me another copy with a notary stating it was a true copy. Sounds fine. WRONG!!! When I got it back I got nervous because all of the other documents that have been certified had the certificate attached to the original document. This one did not. So, I email my agency and they confirmed my fears. Sh......!!! So I called the Department of State and spoke to a very nice woman. She said that yes - the marriage certificate needs to be "County Certified". I explained to her what happened and she laughed and said they have no clue. Now look lady - this is no laughing matter - this is our daughter!! I next called the county clerk...she had NO CLUE what I was talking about!! She said "You need to send it to the town". Oh Lord...here we go, I opened up my can of whoop a$$!! I then said the magic words of "County Certified". Aha!!! The light bulb goes on and she says "Oh..yeah, we do those. Send it with $3.00" OMG!! So, I sent that off and should get it back next week, then it has to go back to the DOS so they can certifiy that the county clerk that certified it is certifiable....I don't know about that, but I sure am!!!

We are headed to NY for Easter this year. We will leave on the14th and return on the 18th. Quick trip. I think if I get that mc back before we leave I will hand carry it to Albany, even though it is a 3 hr drive from the house. Then - if T will let me....we could hand carry the documents to be authenticated in DC since we go right by it on our way home.

Latest rumor - China only referred PART of May 31st and not the whole day...I'm not listening anymore to rumors!! *LALALALALALALALALA**

All we have left to do now is to authenticate our home study, marriage certificate, I171H, and adoption petition. I'm going to send them to the Assistant Stork who did our other documentation. She hand delivers them to the State Department and Chinese Consulate in Washington DC. We are going to pay the extra $20 per document to have a 24 hr turnaround. That means that we should get everything back by Tuesday at the latest and then we can send everything to our agency CCAI.

Check out this video!!


Faith - the dog with 2 legs

IT CAME!!!!! IT CAME!!!


I'm am running around this office doing the happy dance!! Our 171 came today. This means WE ARE DONE!!!!!!! Wow - finally - we are done!! I have to get this notarized, certified, then authenticated, take some pictures, and fed ex everything to CCAI. OMG!! I'm soooo excited. The wait for our daughter will be long - but it will be so worth it! We are one major step closer to getting her.

No news...no news...no 171...this is sooooo frustrating!!! When is that little piece of paper going to come? We want to be DTC as soon as possible. With the wait times now pushing to 12 - 14 months, the sooner our paperwork gets to China, the better.

China closing it's doors to international adoption? Wait times of up to 14 months? Ok, wait just a minute here. I don't mind reading rumors, because, hey, they are just rumors - but when they start saying that China is going to close the doors to adoption and the wait times are going up and could reach 14 months, I start to get nervous!! Most of the time I don't pay any attention to them but these 2....jeez...I dunno!! So, I did some research, emailed some people, and was reassured that China is NOT going to close their doors anytime soon. Whew!! Now the wait time, who knows. It has taken them (CCAA) 3 months, yes 3 months, to get through the month of May. If this keeps up we might see our daughter some time in 2008!! I don't think that will happen. What I'm praying will happen is that people will start jumping the ship, switch countries, and then the wait time will go back down to where it was last year - 6 months. If you want to see some rumors check out the Rumor Queen blog under Fortunes Can Be Funny.

We still haven't received the I-171 yet. But today is another day!!

APC is stilling raging over the Washington Post article and some of them are reminding us "newbies" that our daughters will be just miserable here in the US because we ripped them out of their home country. They will be sad and hard to bond with. Good God people!! Of course she'll be sad - jeez we are taking her from the only thing she has ever known. Then we are going to fly her half way around the world to a place that looks and smells completely different. We expect her to experience some grief over this. And yes, our daughter will have to put up with some bullies at school, she'll have to put up with stupid remarks by strangers, she'll have to put up with sideway glances....but guess what? Don't we all put up with this in one form or another? At some point in our lives have we not all been made fun of, bullied, looked at strangely, ignored, etc? How did we handle this? Are we "Unhappy Adults" because of this? Don't think so. Our parents helped us through those times and taught us how to handle these situations. We are now teaching our kids - this is called parenting folks...seems to be a big word for a bunch of peeps.

-sigh-

Ok - off the soap box now - sorry folks. Adoption news - the homestudy agency has received THE letter and will mail the new homestudy to BCIS this week. That means we should have our 171 within a few weeks. Once we get that then we can send the homestudy and a copy of the 171 to be certified and authenticated. The last step will be to send the paperwork to our agency, CCAI. They will review it and send it to China (DTC - Dossier To China). After that...the long, long, long wait. 10 - 12 months from the LID (Long In Date). All this paperwork and the longer wait times are worth it though. Our reward at the end will be Tiana.

Pretty neat - this is a word cloud. You can create one too...just go here


Thanks for the neat site Karen!!

My neighbor has a 10 month old cutie pie little boy named Jason Jr. and a 3 year old little girl named Hope - which is one of my "red threads". Last night I was visiting and she gave me a bag of clothes that Hope can't wear anymore. It contained some 3T's, 2T's, 18 month and 12 month clothes and a pink pair of sneakers. Yeah!! All of them are in great condition so I'm going to keep them. I've got to get to Target and buy some containers so I can store them until T can wear them.

Here's an update on our paperchase. We finally got the letter from NY - jeez, what took a month to get should have only taken a week. I've sent that to our home study agency and need to send one more item which will get done today. Once they receive that then they will send our new homestudy to BCIS and we should get our 171H within the next week or two. Ok...so goodbye March DTC...hello April DTC!! We will get there eventually!!

By the way, there was an article in the Washington Post titled "Stealing Babies for Adoption". If you would like to read more about this article and some of the issues behind this report go here. Scott has an adorable little boy he and Tina adopted in September of last year. Or you can go to Brian Stuy's blog (which is also linked from Scotts blog) here.

Why adopt from China?

Watch this video and you will understand. This is just a taste of the lives of these young children. The young man in the video has started China Care and is making great strides in the poorer orphanages. Get some tissue ready and enjoy! This is just one of the many many reasons we have decided to adopt our daughter from China

http://www.chinacare.org/ChinaCareVideo-HiRes.html

Totally weird and proud of it!!

You Are Austin

A little bit country, a little bit rock and roll. You're totally weird and very proud of it. Artistic and freaky, you still seem to fit in... in your own strange way. Famous Austin residents: Lance Armstrong, Sandra Bullock, Andy Roddick

What American City Are You?

Shopping

Big T and I were talking this weekend about taxes and what we were going to do with the refunds. Guess what he wants to do? PAY BILLS!!! Imagine that!! I asked about a new vacuum cleaner and he said I could spend up to 500 on one. That should get me a nice one - at last!! I think that we have spent over that now by buying the cheap ones that just don't last over the years. Anyway, while we were talking I mentioned that I haven't bought anything yet for our daughter. He asked what she needed and I said I didn't know, maybe some clothes, shoes, toys, etc. He mentioned the thrift shop and my neighbor for hand me downs, then chuckled and said I could buy our daughter what she needs just to not go overboard! Yeah!!! I've been given the okay to shop! So, while I was at Wally world (listening to commercials/music in spanish - but that is a different post!) I found this cute hooded towel - and it was a ladybug!! Now, don't get me wrong here folks, I don't really buy into this "ladybug" thing that a lot of people believe in, but it was so darn cute I just had to have it!! That towel was the only thing I bought for her, but I was excited just the same. I also got a plastic tub to start storing her items in. I've put the gifts from the cyber shower, the ladybug towel, the 3 hats I've made, and the blanket I've crocheted in it. This way I can keep everything together. My neighbor is going through her daughter's clothes and the ones that don't fit her she is going to give to me. I'll probably buy more tubs as I gather different size clothing. I'm not sure how old she'll be or what size but I feel I can buy 16 month on up clothes and be pretty safe. Time to keep my eyes open for sales!

I was surfing around the net today at lunch reading up on some of the other blogs I follow. One of them had this in it....cute. At least I haven't lost all of my "northern talk"!!

Your Linguistic Profile:

70% General American English

15% Yankee

10% Upper Midwestern

5% Dixie

0% Midwestern

What Kind of American English Do You Speak?

I called on Monday the 27th to see if the commissioner had mailed out the needed letter. His secretary had no clue what I was talking about. I called them 3 weeks ago and nothing had been done. I once again gave the secretary the needed information and she said she would look into it. I called back yesterday....nothing had been done!! Huh??!! Don't these people know this is holding up our adoption?? So I explained once again the importance of this and she said she called the clerks office and was waiting to hear back. She then did a search and couldn't find anything!! OMG.....it's like I'm banging my head against a brick wall!! She gave me the clerk's number and I called her. Guess what? The chick at the commissioners office had just called her about a half an hour before I did. Hmmm.....someone isn't telling me the truth! Anyway, she said that she will have to go down to the basement. She isn't even sure she will find anything. She (Debbie) will call me back if she does. If I don't hear from her by Monday I'm to call her. I then called our home study agency and spoke to Helene. She is so helpful! I explained what was going on and she said just write everything down. If we don't get the needed letter then she will put in the home study what we did and that will be just fine. whew!!! I've been sooooo stressed over this!! I just wish they would fax that letter to me so this part of the paper chase will be done.

KISSES IN THE WIND


I hold you in my heart and touch you in my dreams.
You are here each day with me, at least that’s how it seems.

I know you wonder where we are… what’s taking us so long.
But remember child, I love you so and God will keep you strong.

Now go outside and feel the breeze and let it touch your skin…
Because tonight, just as always, I blow you kisses in the wind.

May God hold you in His hand until I can be with you.
I promise you, my darling, I’m doing all that I can do.

Very soon, you’ll have a family for real, not just pretend.
But for tonight, just as always, I blow you kisses in the wind.

May God wrap you in His arms and hold you very tight.
And let the angels bring the kisses that I send to you each night.
— Unknown

People Just Don't Get It!!

I was looking at one of my adoption forums this morning and I saw this post about an anti-adoption site. (Thanks Donna!) They are so quick to judge. There are so many little ones who need a home, who need a mom and dad, who need to be loved and cherished. Yes, they are loved in an orphanage, but its not the same. You and I both know it. We are not buying our daughter, we are not "saving" our daughter, we are not doing this because it is the "trendy thing to do". We are going to adopt a little girl to give her the love, attention, and support that every child deserves. Why should she sit in an orphanage if we have the ability to meet her needs? Why should she be scared and lonely, to suffer a life where she will not be able to realize her full potential? There are over 1 million little girls missing in China each year. Over 1 million! The people at the anti-adoption site are selfish. The children that are adopted have been left in front of police stations, on the side of the road, in front of orphanages, on the bus. The penalty in China for having a second child is extremely high. They are fined almost a years worth of wages, the children can be denied residence, food rations, and even schooling.

We are not taking these girls away from their heritage, away from who they are. We are going to love and support them. We are going to dream with them, cry with them, and laugh with them.

Cyber Shower

On Saturday, the 25th, I went to my first cyber shower. What is a cyber shower? It is where a group of us get together on line, send each other a gift, then meet on a scheduled date and time and open up the gift you received. It was a bunch of fun! I met 2 people who are just a few months behind me in the paper chase and they live out towards Raleigh! My gift came in the mail a few weeks ago and has been sitting on my counter teasing me! When I opened the box there was some confetti, a piggy bank with the Cinese symbol of love on it, some Chinese candy, a pretty purple blanket with a butterfly and dragon fly on it, an adorable panda bear that had a message recorded on it, and a book that I can put our pictures in and and send to China. She also sent a card that she made which was so sweet. I'll take a picture and post it so everyone can see it.

Saturday was also my birthday and big T surprised me with a quick beach get-a-way! The boys went to their friends house and after the shower we took off for the beach. It was very nice! The weather wasn't very cooperative, but just to get away was fantastic. We didn't do much, just went out to dinner, then back to the condo to hang out. In the morning we went to breakfast then came home. I know, like I said we didn't do much. It was nice all the same! One of his friends has this condo for 5 or 6 months so when the weather gets warmer we are going to take the boys down for the weekend. We are not beach people but it will be a mini vacation for us and the boys will enjoy it.

Adoption news - the latest referals were sent out and go through the 25th of May. Looks like we are going to have a 10 month wait until we meet our daughter. I also have to call NY again to get them to fax me the needed letter so we can finish up with the paperwork.

We still haven't received anything from NY. If we don't today I'm going to call again and have them fax the needed paperwork to me. This is just hold us up!! I'm climbing the ladder and I'm almost at the top rung, just about to step into that light....then boom...I'm knocked back down.

I know, I know...all in due time...but I'm so frustrated! Everything that happens has a reason, yes, I do believe that. Last night we could have won 1000 in a reverse drawing, but the number that we get each year was given to another couple. That's okay - that couple must have needed the money more than we did. It took a year for big T to finally say yes to adoption, that's okay too. I was a peace with it and knew that he would when he was ready. Now...it's taking 4 months to get this paperwork done and becasue of this last fiasco we probably won't be DTC until the end of March!!! I was hoping to see our daughters face by Christmas. Unlese CCAA speeds up the referrals, this won't happen. The agency is saying a 10 month wait. That means January of 2007!!! ugh!!

Curious About George

This is Curious George. There was some discussion on one of the forums I'm on about whether or not a 3 yr old from China should see this. Now you may ask yourself what is there to discuss about this. It seems that there is a scene where the man in the yellow hat allows George to be captured and sent back to Africa. So, what? That is considered to some an abandonment issue! I know, I know...I don't see the problem here either. I mean, its a movie folks! I want to protect my daughter too, believe me I do, but I will refuse to hide her away from these so called "issues". The posters were saying that their daughters were very sensitive. hmmmm....we adults read too much into EVERYTHING!! I took a 3 year old last night to this movie. We had the whole theatre to ourselves. Was she upset when the mean guys came and put George back on the boat? Was she sad? Did she ask her mommy why the man in the yellow hat was abandoning poor George? Did she just fall out and cry her little eyes out? Nope. Ya wanna know what she did? She ran all over the theatre, hopping up and down the steps, getting stuck in the seats, and just having the best time sitting in all the different seats. She hardly even watched the movie, let alone become upset because George was going back home. Did she understand this so called abandonment issue? Nope, she's only 3!! All she knows is that she got to go see a movie on a real big tv, eat some popcorn and rasinets, play with the folding seats (help momma, I'm stuck!), and hop up and down the stairs.

I will protect and love my daughter, but I will not keep her so closed up that she is not prepared to face what is outside of our safe little family. If you have a little one, take them to the movie. Enjoy how they react to the "big tv". Enjoy the "help momma I'm stuck", enjoy each and every laugh, each and every tear, each and every moment, because they grow up way too fast!

Doing the Happy Dance

Can you see me? I'm going around in circles with my hands in the air and my head back just screaming and laughing!! I got the 10 documents back on Sunday from the assistant stork. They have all be authenticated by the Chinese Consulate!! That means that all we are really waiting for is our marriage certificate (which I have to send out yet) and the 171H which will hopefully come when they get our new homestudy. If feels so good to have most of this done!!

So, while I've been waiting for the paperwork to be ready I've tried to keep myself busy doing other things. So far I've crocheted a nice size blanket for T and I'm working on a smaller one. I'm going to go to Michael's tonight and see if they have a bag of cloth tags. If so I'm going to sew them to this smaller blanket and make it a "tabby blankie" for her. I've also knitted 2 hats and I'm almost done with the 3rd hat for the kids at the orphanage. I might do some scarves too. I sure do have plenty of time!! I wonder how many blankets, scarves, and hats I can make in a year!! I think 6 months into the wait I'll start on her "corner nursery".

We talked about digital cameras and laptops this weekend and what I planned to bring with me. Big T questioned why I would need a laptop and I said "Don't you want to see our daughter placed in my arms for the first time?". He said of course he want's to see that!! My heart just fluttered! I hope that the wait times creep back down because I sure would like to have her by this Christmas!!

Nothing else has been happening. I'm waiting on something from NY so that Nathanson's can finish up our homestudy. - again! Come on NY...you do everything else fast...let's get off your can and get going!!

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, that is frustration you see!! T took me aside when I got home Friday night and said "we have a problem". Seems his clearance came back with something on it. Never mind that nothing is suppose to show up, or that this was suppose to be expunged, or that it was 27 YEARS ago....it still showed up. Now we have to do a horse and pony show for Homeland Security, and I still haven't heard back from our agency. (I called them on Friday after he told me.) I'm going crazy here pulling my hair out. It is 10:30 in Colorado...why haven't they gotten back to me? We are so close to completing the paperwork....

Ok, now I'm whining. I'll wait until 2:00 here and if I don't hear anything back I'll call them again. If we have to do another home study and I got to find the place to get records then I want to start now...not tomorrow.

I just checked on line and I saw where the post office tried to delivery my package to the A.S. but they left a note...huh?? I did sign the waiver of signature.... I also emailed her on Friday and again today but she has not acknowledged either one but I'm sure she will today. She's been very helpful thus far so I'm sure I'll hear from her soon.

So Close!!

I just sent off 10 documents to be authenticated to the Assistant Stork. She will walk the documents to the state department and to the Chinese embassy for a moderate fee.

Documents left to be certified:

1. Homestudy
2. Marriage Certificate
3. 171-H

Documents sent to the Assistant Stork

1. Financial Statement
2. Employment verification – T
3. Employment verification – C
4. Police Clearance – T
5. Police Clearance – C
6. Adoption Petition
7. Physical – T
8. Physical – C
9. Birth Certificate – T
10. Birth Certificate – C

Rumors are flying around the different boards. Some say that CCAA is going to pick up the pace and send referrals from the 2nd half of May all the way into the middle of June. Some say that referrals will not even come this month and when they do come next month they will only be for the last half of May. Some agencies are telling people they will have an 8 to 10 month wait, others are saying 12 months. Good grief!! I'm trying so hard to get DTC by the end of the month dependentependant on the 171 coming....and I don't expect it until the end of this month.

Waiting...I'm not very good at this waiting game...what am I going to do while we wait? T will keep busy with the boys, this isn't the front runner in his head but it is mine!! I've already crocheted one blanket and I've started another one. We are only doing a corner nursery so that project won't take a bunch of time. I don't want to go shopping for clothes or baby items until I know how old and what size she will be. Any ideas?

Just some thoughts

A quick update on the paperwork. I received most of the paperwork back certified from NC. I have not received T's employment verification back. I checked the USPS website but the confirmation number I have but it is not in transit yet. Wonder what's going on with that? Oh, and our marriage certificate came back again!! Jeez....duh C!!! You weren't married in Onondaga County...you never LIVED in Onondaga County! Now I got to send it back for the third time to get it certified. In the meantime I'm going to use the assistant stork and send her the 7 pieces I have now for authentication.

I got an email from our agency after they reviewed the homestudy. There are 5 changes that will need to be made then it will be all set. A few of them are about our parents health. They don't want anything in the home study talking about heart disease (T's dad and my mom). So, the sw will take that out. She will also have to change the financial information to match what our petition says...which is what I told her to begin with!! Anyway, I emailed the home study agency with the changes and they left a message on our answering machine stating they should have it changed in the next week or so....no!!! I don't think so!! If we don't get it back by Friday I'll make a phone call. I've heard nothing but good things about this home study agency but my experience has not been the best. The communication between them and us is horrible. I have to call and leave messages and call again to finally get some answers to my questions.

So, we decided on the name of Tiana Claire. Pretty, yes, I agree, but the more I think about this other name in my head the more I really lean towards it. It doesn't roll off your tongue like the first one does but everytime I say it I think of both my mom and grandma and just smile. The name is Tommiann. Yes, one word, maybe with a dash, like Tommi-Ann. The middle name would still be Claire along with her Chinese name. Writing it with the dash seems to look better and would stand a better chance to be pronounced correctly once she gets to school Alot of people have been talking on APC about 2 middle names and the pros and cons of them. There was also a post about an older girl being adopted and how she couldn't understand why the Americans chop up the Chinese name. For example, the name could be Fu Hong Lei. Fu is usually the orphanage name or the directors name. Hong Lei is the girls name. A bunch of families would just keep the Lei. The girl said that would be like having the name of Karen and just using Kar. So, we will probably keep her whole Chinese name...which will make her name even longer!! Tommi-Ann Claire Hong Lei .....she'll probably cuss us out everytime she has to fill out legal documents or get her driver's license!!

We hoped to be DTC by the end of this month but it looks like it will be March. So with the current time lines I think we'll have her picture by November or December and then travel next year. It seems sooo far away but it's already February....come on time...keep flying by!!!!

Happy Chinese New Year - Year of the Dog

What a weekend! Saturday T and I left for Charlotte to get our fingerprints done. We arrived around 1:30 and waited - something that I'm getting used to!! The office was very busy but we were out of there by 3. I talked to the gentleman at the front desk and asked if they accepted walk ins. He said YES!! That really upset me because we could have had this done a month ago, but then I thought about it and two things came to me. One, our homestudy was just sent to them the week before and two, this adoption has been in God's hands for the beginning. He has a plan for us and our daughter. God is good and will take care of her while she and her her forever family wait to meet.

On our drive to Charlotte T and I talked about a few things. One of them was teaching our daughter about her culture. He made some very good points about this and after thinking about what he said I agreed with him. We talked about culture, school, language, etc. We also talked about the rest of the fees and how close we were with the money aspect. He said that he would make sure I had money to buy gifts with and for me to just make sure everything else is taken care of.


Sunday I celebrated Chinese New Year with some friends who returned home around 6 months ago with their daughter. This was the first time we met but a good time was had by all. She shared a ton of information with me and her daughter is adorable!! The visit made me just want to get to China faster!! I took my friend J and my youngest son with me. They enjoyed the dancing and singing along with some good food and great company. Thanks for inviting us!!

On a side note, seeing all those beautiful kids yesterday brought tears to my eyes. Not knowing what my daughter looks like and her not knowing how much she is already loved by her forever family is very hard for me to deal with. We are not even DTC yet and I'm already driving myself crazy.

We are so close to having everything done. All the paperwork is being certified as I write this. All we have to do now is wait for our 171H from Homeland Security and then authenticate everything. I faxed our homestudy to the agency last week and will need to make some minor changes to it but other than that it looks great. Maybe we can be DTC by the end of February. I also got my passport on Friday and T's should be coming this week. Everyday is a step closer!!!

Homestudy is in!!!

Ok, we got our homestudy back from our agency. They only made a few mistakes that are easily correctable. I'm faxing it to the agency today for their review. I also mailed all documents out (finally!!) to be certified. Seven went to NC, one to NY, and the other one to NJ. We are getting closer and closer to being DTC (dossier to China)!!.


Saturday we get our fingerprints done. I know everyone is glad because that's all I've talked about! Sunday we might go to W-S for CNY but it depends on some friends. We'll see. I think it would be a good experience and fun for all. I think J and L are going. J might bring her daughter and if so I might bring H with me too since they get along pretty good.

Hey, K - if you are reading this know that I'm thinking of you and your family!!

Nothing New Happening

I haven't had anything to blog about recently. Nothing has been happening with the adoption. I did call our homestudy agency and was told that ours was next to be reviewed. Hopefully CCAI will ge getting it soon along with BCIS. I am getting excited about this weekend. Not only are we getting fingerprinted but CNY is being celebrated that day. Hubby and I are going to check everything out!

Doesn't someone out there want to put me in their will? Hey, I know, Tina and Scott O - Kai is "coming into some money" right? Let's get our kids together!! (jk) I honestly think I would go nuts at home all day but sometimes I really wonder. If there was anyway for me to stay at home I might...but alas, there really isn't so why am I even thinking about it?? Actually, I like my job, it is just stressful at times and most of that stress is what I put on myself. That and the so called deadlines that are most of the time unattainable!! Why do people want something ASAP and then when you deliver it, they just say..oh, I'll get to it next week. HUH??!! I just worked my butt off and you'll get to it next week??!! jeez!!! And then we have this one guy who has to walk around in our area to make sure we are here...yes, that's right. He has no other reason to come over here except to see who is and who isn't here. I know, that's how some people get their kicks!

Hmm....looks like I need to go meet with the girls tonight and talk with Jose!!

Finally, I've made it!!

Yep, that's right folks, I have finally made it to the QDM blog!! It took a while but my post concerning the show "Book of Daniel" on NBC had enough merit to make it. I'm soooo proud of myself!!!


'nough said

Back to the Name thing

So L and I are talking the other day once again about names. Tommi Ann is out but guess what?? He likes Tianna Claire!! Huh? Jeez, come on guys, make up your mind. I asked both T's what they thought and they grunted out "I guess" while watching football. So, it looks like we are back to the beginning and naming her Tianna Claire.

Tianna Claire - soon baby girl, we will be coming to pick you up and bring you home to your family!!!!

What a Waste of Time

Yep, that's right. It was a total waste of 4 hours of vacation yesterday for our final meeting with the social worker. All we really did was talk about her puppy (who is very very cute by the way). She collected all the paperwork and ended up calling us last night for some silly questions. She hopes to have this sent off to her boss by Sunday so we should get a draft by the end of next week. I'm getting my friend to come over this weekend to notarize everything for me so I can send it all off on Monday to be certified!!! That paperwork should come back in a week and then it's off to get authenticated. I've looked at the assistant stork and think I'm going to use her service for this as she seems to be pretty resonable. We get our fingerprints on the 28th and should be the 171 in February. It's all starting to come together!!!

Check out this link: http://www.geocities.com/edubsportsfreak/logan.html This is somthing my youngest is doing for school. My heart swelled to see him write that we are going to China to pick up his sister!!

Scrapbook or Quilt or Both??

Now that we are coming to the end of our paperchase I'm starting to think about a 100 wish quilt or a 100 scrapbook. One of the other bloggers on my favorite board is doing a scrapbook and I must say, doing a great job!! I think I'm going to combine the two. I want a quilt for our little one but I would also like a scrapbook of the wishes. Instead of just putting the wish and scrap on paper I will create a page for each one. In fact, if Donna doesn't mind I'm going to copy her idea and give famiily/friends the choice to create a page for the scrapbook or to have me create one. That way I can have the best of both worlds.

Update on paperchase. This Thursday (1/5) we will be meeting our sw for the last interview. She should get the draft to her boss and we should have it in our hands in a week. On the 28th of this month is our fingerprint appointment. If all goes well our homestudy should already be there when we get fingerprinted. I'm also going to get my passport done on Thursday and dh is going to sometime this week. Once that is done I can get everything notarized, certified and authenticated. I'm really leaning towards the assistant stork to get the paperwork authenticated. She walks it right over to the Chinese consulate which saves time. I should have all that done by the end of the month so all we will be waiting on is the 171H, which should come in February.

2006 - Could this be THE year??

Is this the year that we will go get our daughter? Who knows!! It depends on CCAA and how they do their referrals. I hope and pray they will get back to the 6 month time frame but only time will tell.

In an earlier blog I talked about names for our little one. Right now we are leaning towards Tommianne Claire CN but that is a mouthful!! My youngest does not like just Tommie but is okay with Tommianne. I'm concerned about how this will be mispronounced once she starts going to school. Decisions, decisions.

Back to the new year - Our last homestudy interview is this Thursday. I've contacted my friends and they will get our references to us by then. We get our fingerprints on th 28th so we should get our 171 by February. They say it takes 3 months from the date you sent in the I600A - which ours was at the end of November. So maybe this could be our timeframe:
March DTC
November Referral
December/January 2007 travel??

Oh what a Christmas we will have this year!! And the November referral is going along with the 8 month track that CCAA is currently on so maybe if they get back on track we could actually have our referral by September!!!! Either way I will at least know what she looks like. Happy dancing!!

Oh, and yes, it is 2006 and time for resolutions. I was going to a few resolutions but what is the point. I never keep them. So here are a few things I will strive to do this year:

1. Be kinder and speak kinder to everyone.
2. Think before I speak (yeah, right!!).
3. Let go of all grudges and hurts and really forgive the ones who hurt me.
4. Read the bible from front to back.


Just four - trying to keep things on a small scale this year.

Dragonfiles and butterflies

I think I'll go with the butterfly/dragonfly theme. Here are some things I found...



I like the wall painting of the butterfly/dragonfly







This one is my favorite.

I also looked at co-sleepers today. I don't think that will work because she will be too old for one so maybe we can just put one side of the crib down and push it up against our bed. Or we could get a toddler bed and put in between our bed and the wall. I just don't know yet.

Over on APC they posted that the CCAA said the lid through April 25th were matched. Why am I telling you this? Because I'm trying to watch the trend. It's been said that it will now take 8 to 10 months to be matched with totally sucks!! If we get our dossier to China in March that means a referral in November/December and no travel until 2007!!! Hopefully CCAA will pick up some speed again next year and cut it back down to the 6 or 7 month time frame. That would been September/October referral and be back home with little one for Christmas - wouldn't that be wonderful?? Oh, I can only dream!!

Have a great weekend and Happy New Year!!!!

Corner Nursery

Our house has 3 bedrooms and 2 baths. One of my goals before little one comes home was to enclose our carport and convert it into the 4th bedroom. Well, after talking with T about it we decided to wait until our oldest goes to college and then little one can have her own room. Young T has decided that he wants to go to an out of state college. :( No, I'm not happy about that one bit - but it is his decision....anyway I digress - back to the nursery. I had visions of decorating a little girls nursery, painting the walls, picking the theme, buying the decorations, and putting it all together but that plan was dashed. So I walked into our bedroom and looked around and figured, yes, it can be done. I can move the computer to my oldest's room (he will be absolutley thrilled with this!) and create a "corner nursery." It will have her crib and probably a rocker. I can still paint the corner and decorate the corner. Yes, this will definitely work!! I'll post a picture in the future (far future) of the finished "corner nursery". Hmmmmm......I'm thinking dragon flies and butter flies....rolling hill scene on the wall....flowers and trees, a cloud or two, birds, and of course a ladybug.....

Paper Chase Blues

So we got our bc's back from NY last week all pretty and certified but our mc has to go to the County to be certified and then back to the state. Jeez......give me a break. I'm also going to call our social worker today and make sure we are still on for tomorrow night. As I said earlier she had a death in the family and wasn't sure if she would be able to make it or not but I haven't heard from her at all. And I still don't have the references yet.....

We are getting closer - slowly - but we are getting closer!!

It's Merry Christmas not Happy Holidays!!

Yes, I know, this is supposed to be an adoption blog but I just had to remind people why we even have the "holiday season". We got a notice today about our "Holiday Breakfast". Huh?? It should have been about our Christmas breakfast. Mark Jacobson, a car dealer here in NC, was saying the poem "The night before Christmas" with a few changes to correspond to his dealership. At the end where it is suppose to say "Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night" he says "Happy holidays to all..." Why are people doing this? So they won't "offend" anyone. OK people, here's something that might just shock you.....we wouldn't have this "Holiday season" if it weren't for Christmas and the birth of Jesus!! It just amazes me how people have forgotten the real reason for the season!!

Jesus is the reason for the Season!!!

Package received!

I sent our birth and marriage certificates to Albany NY on December 13 to be certified. The package was sent "delivery confirmation receipt" and it was delivered TODAY!!! YEAH!!

Your item was delivered at 5:14 am on December 16, 2005 in ALBANY, NY 12231

When they come back I can send them on to be authenticated. One small step forward.

T went to see the sw yesterday for his one-on-one interview. Took him a total of 15 minutes. She told him afterwards that she has had a death in the family and will not be able to keep our 28th appointment. Okay, now she told him on the 15th.....why wouldn't she be able to keep the 28th's appointment I just don't know. Doesn't make much sense to me but it really doesn't matter since we can't get our fingerprints done until January 28th anyway. I'll give her a call tonight and reschedule it..AGAIN!!

Fingerprint Appointment Woes

Finally!! We got our fingerprint appointment letter. But wait, our appointment isn't until January 28th!!!! Our filing date is 11/10/05 why is our fingerprint appointment months afterwards???? I've called them to see if we could get in sooner and of course we can't. Grrrr...so much for being DTC in January!! That's not gonna happen. It takes something like 3 months to get the elusive 171H back - 3 months from the filing date. That means we should get it sometime in February and hopefully we can be DTC in March. That, my dear friends, means we won't get our dd until 2007!! ugh!!!! T goes to see the social worker this Thursday and I've yet to get his physical straightened out. I've also got to get the our references to write those letters...come on people - lets get a move on please!!

On to better things - Christmas!! I love this time of year! Watching the boys open their gifts is something I look forward to. I've done some shopping but have not finished everything - gasp - I know, there are 12 days until Christmas....but I will finish!! The boys are so hard to buy for this year - they want ipods and 4 wheelers and bb guns and new tvs and an xbox 360 - guess I better get outside and chop down that tree that has all the money it it! haha!!

Merry Christmas!!

Telling people our plans

Ok, so I've told a few people here at work of our plans to adopt from China and I've received great responses. Now I've made the official announcement....fun fun!! Why China? Why not here? What does she look like - oh, you don't know yet? That's weird...How much will she cost? Why does it take so long? You have to go to China? If they have so many girls why don't they just send them here so you don't have to travel?

I was warned - I know I was but I didn't think people would actually ask these things!

Paperchase update - ha!! Nothing to update! DH's doctor still screwed up his physical form so he has to go back AGAIN!!! My doctor will sign mine today when I go get my bp checked one more time. No fingerprint appointment yet...grrrr. I talk with the sw today for our one on one interview and dh goes next week. This sw has cancelled on me twice now...hope that isn't a bad omen.

This is a picture of Hope, a little girl I used to watch. Her mom and dad gave her, yes gave her, to a friend of mine. This friend kept Hope for just a about a year, even when the mom and dad moved away. Finally they took her back - we were all heartbroken. I still think of Hope quite often!!

Jazzy is a Hit!!

I'm sure you are wondering who Jazzy is. She is our little 5 lb pom that our sw just fell in love with. It seemed she was much more interested in her than what we had to say. Then she met our 75 lb black lab KaCee. The visit went very well. She asked her questions about religion, our marriage, how we met, what we do for discipline, etc. Everyone told me not to worry about this visit and they were right. It was very easy and she hardly looked at the house. Just a quick walk through and that was that!! In our paperwork from CCAI it states that the sw can do 3 of the 4 interviews at one time but our sw wanted nothing to do with that. So now I go and see her this Thursday and then dh goes next week and our final meeting is the week after Christmas. Ugh!!! I wanted this done before Christmas but I guess that isn't going to happen. I expressed my wish to have the final draft in my hand by the middle of January but who knows. Oh well, I'm sure God has a plan for us it is just hard for us to see it right now. Oh by the way, she didn't even eat one of those cookies!!!

My son's baptism was wonderful. Yes, I cried and dh had tears in his eyes. He was one of 3 that got baptized. When he went in the baptismal the pastor had to motion him to squat down because he was taller that him!! Everyone in the church got a laugh out of that. We are going to go out this week and celebrate with him. DH is working at the Christmas tree lot tonight and Ty has a wrestling tournament tomorrow so we'll try to do that on Wednesday.

We also talked again about names this weekend. DH said he actually likes the name Tommi and he went and got me his family tree paperwork so we can look through it for a middle name. We have a year to decide so we have plenty of time. Hmmmmm Tommi Jeanne?? NOT!!

Sunday is a big day for our family

Sunday my oldest son gets baptized and the social worker comes for her first visit!! Last weekend I cleaned the rugs and this weekend I'll scrub and mop everything else. I'm going to ask my neighbor if she'll come over around 12:30 and start making some cookies so that the house smells "homey" because I'm not sure what time we'll get home from church. We'll get the Christmas tree tonight and decorate it tomorrow after if falls. DH will put the outside lights up and clean up the yard so we should be all set. I'm kind of nervous about this because she can stop us from getting our daughter with one word!! When I've spoken to her she seemed to be very nice and we got off on the right foot so I'm probably freaking out for nothing, but I'm scared and nervous!!

Oh and I forgot about our pool. I gotta get my neighbor to fix something up so that it has a gate to keep out "little" girls. Right now it is wide open! I don't think the sw will like that one bit!!

So much to do!

What's In a Name??

Ok, I thought everyone would like how I combined my grandmother's first name, my mother's middle name, and my MIL's first name to Tianna Claire cn. My dh and ds's do NOT like this name at all. I think it's pretty and unique but they just won't have it. So I've found some other names that I'm going to run by the gang and see what they think. Here are a few:

Akia (pronounced Ah-key-ah)
Taryn Claire
Kera Faith
Skye/Skylar ?
Piper Ann
Marina ?
Kylie Faith
Lexi ?
Kennedy Faith (ha - I really like Faith as a middle name!!)
Kianna ?
Ava Claire
Kelsey Faith
Tehani Faith (pronounced te-ha-nee)
Jenna

So many choices!!!

Thanksgiving

We celebrated Thanksgiving with my BIL. It was very relaxing and we had a great time. I was a little bit down because we usually spend this day with my mom and dad. They were unable to come into town because of her triple bypass 2 months ago. She isn't ready to travel yet - but we are looking forward to Christmas!!

When we walked into their house we were greeted warmly and then congratulated about our adoption plans. Everyone asked questions and seemed to be very happy for us. T's brother and sister in-law said they would be happy to be her guardian - they are my oldest son's godparents and have 2 young children so they were a natural to ask. T's other brother and sister in-law came up to us after dinner and said that they would like to give Logan some air miles so he can go to China too!!! What a wonderful surprise. They are his godparents and are two wonderful people!

We got T's doctors form back and as I was looking it over I notice that they marked his liver as abnormal! Huh?!! I asked T about it and he said he was unaware of anything being abnormal. This doctor is something else. T is going to call today and find out what is going on. Since they marked this as abnormal we will need to get a letter of explanation from them for the homestudy and for the dossier! What a pita!! I go to the doctors this friday for my physical and next Sunday is our first visit with the social worker. We are coming along slowly but surely!!

BC's,MC, and Telling the Family

I finally got my birth certificate in the mail!! Now I've sent all 3 certificates to NY to be certified and then I can send them to NYC Chinese Consulate to be authenticated. I'm also going to the clerk of court today to get our police records going and I will be picking up the boys forms from the doctors. Dh and I decided to clean out the attic this weekend. There is junk up there from when the boys were little! I'm going to have a massive yard sale in a few weeks. If I have time I'm also going to clean out my closet and the hall closet - pretty ambitious plan for the long weekend.

We are going to J & J's for Thanksgiving. I'm not able to get time off so we can't go to NY to see mom and dad. Usually mom is down here and the day after we hit the stores and all the crowds! I'm going to make some squash and an apple pie to bring. We haven't had Thanksgiving with them in many years so this will be a nice change. Plus we'll be able to see G, K & L's new little girl!

We also told his side of the family what our plans are. We composed an email and sent it to everyone with the who, what's and whys. The response from everyone has been very supportive. Everyone is excited for us and quite happy. When I told my youngest brother he said congrats and what can I do for you. When I told my other younger brother he said "Why China when there are so many kids right here in the US?" Should have known I'd get that response from him. My sister is excited also, but thinks we are completely out of our minds!! Both sets of nana's are happy and papa is too.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

No homestudy yet...

When I first called the social worker I left a message and waited a few days. When I wasn't called back I called her again and she sounded suprised to hear from me. She said she wanted to start this in December due to the holiday but I asked her to start in November so a meeting was scheduled for November 20th. As the time draws near I'm getting more and more nervous. I was so jumpy the day of the 19th - up until she left me a message saying "something unexpected came up" and she had to cancel...grrrr!!!!!!! I should have known better. I swear she just made the appointment for the 20th to appease me and knew all along she wouldn't be coming. Oh well - so now we have our first appointment on December 4th - a Sunday. (I just looked at an older post and see that I had wished for the hs to be on the 4th...LOL) This works better actually because my olders has a wrestling tournament on the 3rd and he wouldn't be there. We got our receipt from Homeland letting us know that we are "in the queue" for fingerprint appointments. DH got his BC but I haven't gotten mine yet. DH has had his physical and I've dropped off the paperwork for the boys. They just had one due to sports in school. I'm making an appointment today to get my physical complete.

In NY

Hey all. I've been in New York since the 11th of November. My mom had a stroke and she asked me to come see her. She is feeling fine and has had no major side effects from it but she is horribly depressed. Hopefully the new meds will start to kick in tomorrow.

Paperchase update - well, there isn't anything to update!! ugh!! I am NOT a patient person and this hurry up and wait thing is gonna drive me crazy. The first homestudy visit is this Saturday but I wish it was the 4th!! Hopefully when I get home I will have the bc's and mc that I ordered and I'll have a fingerprint appointment.

Names - mom thinks we should name her Tomisina Claire CN but I still like Tianna Claire. We'll see, we've got a whole year to think about it. The boys don't really like either name. T doesn't either. My oldest said Sara Elizabeth, who knows!!!!

First HomeStudy appointment

We have our first homestudy appointment set for November 19. I'm nervous about it but excited at the same time. Our social worker seems to be very nice. The oldest has a wrestling match that day but it is close by so T should be able to get back for it. The I600A came back to me due to the amount I sent...ugh!! I've also ordered BC for us and I've completed the adoption petition. Next is setting up doctor appointments for all 4 of us. I think that the pediatrician will not need to see the boys as they just had a physical for school sports.

China adoption - why China

Each year, thousands of children are adopted from the People's Republic of China with the numbers growing steadily. Last year, over 7,000 children born in China joined families in the U.S. through adoption. These children (predominantly girls) represent just the tip of the iceberg of a profound social phenomenon in China - the abandonment of hundreds of thousands of babies each year and the resulting development of an overburdened orphanage system to care for and raise them. This trend is the result of many complex societal forces in China, as the country struggles to limit its population growth.

The “One-child” Policy In the 1950s, China's leader, Mao Tse-Tung, urged his people to have more children to strengthen the country. The resulting growth of the population eventually led to great concern in the 1970s that China would be unable to feed its staggering population, since over 3/4 of the population lived on 1/3 of the land available for cultivation. Furthermore, China was historically prone to floods and famine compounding the problem. In 1979, when the Chinese represented 25% of the world's population, the government in China implemented a one-child policy to be overseen by the State Family Planning Commission. The intent was to limit families to having one child, in the hopes of keeping China's population under 1.3 billion by the year 2000. The baby boomers of the 1950s and 1960s were entering their reproductive years, and 2/3 of the population of China were under the age of 30. These factors made strict population containment appear essential to economic reform and improvement in the living standards. By the end of the year 2000, China's population was 1.26 billion or 21% of the world’s population but was expected to grow to 1.6 billion by 2050. With the attainment of the primary goal, reduced population growth, the one-child policy is generally still in effect today.

Contrary to first impression, the one-child rule applies to a minority of the population; for urban residents and government employees, the policy is strictly enforced, with a few exceptions in some areas for families in which the first child has a disability or both parents work in high-risk occupations or are themselves from one-child families. In rural areas which encompass approximately 70% of China's population, a second child is generally allowed five years after the first. However, application of this provision varies from province to province.

The policy is underpinned by a system of rewards and penalties, which are largely meted out at the discretion of local officials and vary widely as a result. The system includes economic incentives for compliance and substantial fines, confiscation of belongings, and dismissal from work for noncompliance. Cities traditionally have been stricter in enforcing the policy, although Beijing, Shanghai and Guangdong province in recent years have allowed families to have two children to counteract declines in population growth. Despite the severe penalties, many couples still get around the law by sending the pregnant woman to stay with relatives until the baby is born or claiming the newborn baby was adopted or belongs to a friend or relative.
The Impact on FemalesIncreased enforcement of the one-child policy, particularly beginning in the late 1980s, has had a huge impact on Chinese families and the nation overall, because of the preference for sons in Chinese society particularly in rural areas. There are many reasons why families prefer to have sons:

• Longstanding societal preferences in for sons over daughters.
• In rural areas, sons are believed to perform a heavier workload than girls.
• Sons carry on a family's ancestral name, while females do not.
• Inheritance laws pass property through males rarely females and
• The fact that a son is responsible to care for his parents in their old age, which is important in China because the country does not have an established government-backed
  social security program. Also, traditionally and until recently, wives have shared in the responsibility for caring for their husbands' parents before even their own.

As a result, China reports a higher ratio of male births to female births than anywhere in the world. This is believed to be because many female births are unaccounted for due to a variety of reasons. The effect of this situation is clearly evidenced in the school systems of many areas of China , where male students are predominant.

Infant Abandonment In the past two decades, a significant number of Chinese parents have reacted to various pressures of the one-child policy by abandoning female infants. This practice, while not condoned by the Chinese government, is widespread. Infant abandonment in China takes a variety of forms. In some areas, a childless couple may find an abandoned child on their doorstep. These "informal" adoptions circumvent the many bureaucracies imposed on Chinese couples facing domestic adoption. More frequently, infants are abandoned in public places where they will be found quickly, such as busy streets, parks, railway stations or in front of public buildings. Most abandonments occur within the first two months of life, and usually within the first few days. While this practice may seem shocking in some cultures, the circumstances and decisions faced by parents of these children are extremely complex and difficult.

These abandoned children are generally taken to welfare institutions where they are cared for on minimal resources. Only some of these institutions participate in international adoption programs. Adoptions of Chinese Children Before 1990, China permitted very few international adoptions. For example, adoptions of Chinese orphans by citizens ranged from a low of 10 to a high of 62 in the years between 1986 and 1991. In early 1994, China relaxed its international adoption policies in response to various factors prevalent at that time. Currently, the adoption process is administered by the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA). The program requires that parents, either married or single, be at least 30 but under 45 years old to qualify for a healthy child under the age of 12 months. Older children and children with special needs are available to a wider spectrum of adoptive parents. Potential adoptive parents generally work through an agency that has demonstrated a commitment to child welfare, knowledge of international adoption, appropriate licensing and a professional staff.

APPROVED!!

I got a phone call yesterday from Kathy at CCAI. We have been approved! She emailed me the Orientation letter and fee policy agreement. We need to sign it and have it notarized. Here is the letter:

Dear T & C,

Contgratulations! CCAI is pleased to approve your Application for Adoption and send you the first adoption orientation Packet. This pact includes:
1. Fee Policy/Agreement
2. Two Service Agreements, the I171H, Time Sensitive Document
3. USCIS I-600A Information
4. How are we Doing?

Upon receipt of your signed fee agreement, first fee payment and service agreements, we will provide you with the Adoption Dossier Guide. The copyrighted CCAI Adoption Dossier Guide is a thorough compilation of the information you will need to complete your dossier for China. Our families have had great success completing their dossiers on their own with the help of this guide. Compiling the dossier usually takes 3-5 months and costs on an average of $450. CCAI has a team of dossier specialists who will guide you through the dossier process.

And it goes on to say what needs to be signed and notarized.

wow...here we go! We will be sending off the I600A tomorrow! I need to call Nathanson Adoption Services to set up our homestudy.

I can't believe this is really happening!!

It's in the mail!!

Well, my dh has finally seen the light and signed the adoption application!! I sent the application to CCAI yesterday and hope to hear from them by Friday or Saturday. I've already ordered a copy of our marriage certificate and have filled out the I-600A. I'll write a check for the fees tonight and get that out tomorrow. The agency sent me a list of home study agencies I can use here and I will be making phone calls today to see which one we want to use.

We are so excited that this is finally happening after almost a year! The boys are excited about meeting their little sister and can't wait to go to China! I started writting this blog to our daughter but have decided to change it to let family and friends know where we are in the paperchase. Our parents know what we are doing but no one else in the family does. I haven't talked to dh yet to see when he wants to announce our plans.

T - your family is coming soon!! We love you!!