Miscellaneous

This is getting real!  We bought our plane tickets last night and our passports were picked up today at the Chinese Embassy.  Thank goodness they all came through and there were no problems!  If you ever have to use a courier in Washington, D.C., I wholeheartedly recommend The Assistant Stork.  Steve is awesome!  I have no idea what kind of magic he worked, but I am so pleased.  

Our house is topsy turvy right now with packing and just general trying-to-get-ready-for a-long-trip.  It is messy!  Well, messier than usual.  I own a small business so I am also scrambling to get everything in order there so that things will run fairly smoothly in my absence.  

I'm off to do some bookkeeping and laundry and hopefully sit a minute or two on the couch.  Tomorrow it's packing inventory and errands to REI and Target and a few hours in the office as well.  Wish me luck- I'll need it to get through the long to-do list!  

TA, baby!! TRAVEL APPROVAL

We got TA yesterday as I was on the phone with our agency rep.  She was just telling me that it hadn't arrived yet and that the DHL man usually comes in the afternoon.  Then he walked into the office as we were talking!  She opened the envelope and our TA was right there on top.  It's hard to believe after all this time.  I would be shaking my head if I weren't so busy.  

I got up really early this morning and drove to D.C. to drop off our visa applications at the Chinese Embassy.  I had planned to meet up with a courier....and thank goodness because they didn't accept my mom and her boyfriend's passport and visa application because they aren't part of the adoptive family.  If you're traveling on a tourist visa they need to see your airline ticket or reservation.  Doesn't that seem backward?  Wouldn't you want to make sure you can get into the country before you spend thousands of dollars to buy a plane ticket?!  Nevermind that two different couriers told me that it wouldn't be a problem.  I ended up handing off the passports and applications to the courier who assured me that he could take care of it.  Fingers crossed!  

As I left the embassy and checked my email, I had a new message that we got the consulate appointment we had requested.  This is great news because we'll get to our son before his birthday but also before he has to leave his foster care facility and return to his SWI.  Thank G-d!  This means that we leave on Saturday!  Today is Tuesday, so there is just so.much.to.do. between now and then.   I am so glad that my mother-in-law offered to have a cleaning crew come in and clean up right before we get home!! What an awesome offer-  one less thing to worry about!  

Today has been a frenzy and I'm tired but I'm sure I won't be able to sleep tonight.  *sigh*  I packed for four people, made/received literally about 50 calls and emails to/from different travel agents and our adoption agency, set up a VPN, held the mail, did laundry, emailed coaches and teachers and made a trip to Target.  I have another phone date at 10:30 tonight then I will be grateful to climb into bed.  

Heartbreak and waiting on TA

I don't even know where to start to catch you up on what's been going on since I last posted here.  On one hand, life goes on and things have been routine, even boring.  Kids have gone to school, soccer, dental appointments, play dates and birthday parties.  We've had two birthday parties for our boys which were totally different but just right for each of them- one was small, mellow, quiet and the other was big, rowdy and loud.  We've also been preparing for our trip to China.  I've been picking up small things that I know we'll need for the trip for a month or two now.    For folks who are keeping track, we had article 5 pick up on November 26 so TA should come literally any day!  Tomorrow, maybe?  We are so, so anxious after all the hang-ups we've had with timing to get the show on the road, get to China and meet our son!!! Hold on sweetie, we're coming as fast as we can!  

Since we're taking the boys to China with us, they each now have their own electronics.  Our oldest will be fine, he could probably put his nose in a book when we leave the house and not look up until we land in China.  Our other son bounces off the walls at times so that should be really interesting on a 12-16 hour flight! (depending on layovers)  I never thought I'd be the mom who willing buys electronic gadgets for her kids- anyone who know me knows I don't like that stuff!  But it will be worth it a hundred times over if it helps the kids be better traveling companions.  And, of course, they are "learning" toys so I can delude, I mean convince, myself that they are not totally rotting their brains by staring at the little screens for hours.  I am *so* not looking forward the the electronic detox when we come home.  It's gonna be bad. LOL.  

The biggest news, what I actually sat down to write about, is really hard to talk about.  As I start to type it, I have tears in my eyes and still can't believe it's true.  But it is, horribly true.  It will make our trip so bittersweet.  Just four days after getting our LOAs for both kids, we got a late night call from our agency's China coordinator.  I think the first question out of my mouth was, "Are our kids okay?"  It wasn't a referral call, so I knew it wasn't good.  That's when she told me that our daughter was "no longer available for international adoption."  Apparently there was a lot of back and forth as our agency coordinator had spoken with the SWI director earlier that day and was repeatedly told what they thought she wanted to hear.  It's a really rare situation for a family to get LOA and then not be able to bring their child home and this had happened to another family about a year before because China believed that the child was too sick to travel.  I believe in that situation that the story was only partially true and for some other reason, the child was "not available."   

It turns out that our daughter was probably adopted domestically.  This is good for her, I suppose, since she will get to stay in China and I don't think she ever knew about us.  As horrible as it is to write or to say, I hope she didn't.  

She is loved and will be loved.  But let me tell you folks, it really, really sucks for us.  We have all cried for hours over this loss, including our children.  Our oldest, her biggest advocate, took it particularly hard.  He sobbed, body wracking sobs, for hours upon hours after we told him.  He said, "I'll never have a chance to love her."  All I could say through my tears was, "You already do.  That's why it hurts so much."  He is the sweet boy who from the moment he saw her picture said to me, "Mama, you have to persuade Papa to bring her home."   My sweet, sensitive boy.    

We spent seven months planning for her, making room in our hearts and life and home.  The kids have lots of family pictures drawn with two new siblings.  It's been one of the most heartwrenching experiences of my life.  At every turn, there is a reminder of her.  The little trampoline I look at every time I go downstairs to do the laundry.  I bought it because in her file her two favorite activities were stated as "the trampoline" and "going outside".  Last week while rearranging the bathroom closet, I found a little cup with her name on it.  I didn't have the heart to do anything with it, so I pushed it back to a dark corner of the closet where another day, it might not be so painful to get rid of or put away.  We still have her pictures up on the fridge because I can't even bear to take them down.  I did pack up all the clothing, hair bows and girly stuff I bought for her and that was pretty awful.  I won't give up hope that some day I'll have a daughter, so I am not ready to get rid of it yet.  It's waiting in the attic, just in case.  We have had losses before but even my husband had never experienced one like this before.  "She was so real to me," he said.   

I should say that of the friends and family we've shared this with, people have been mostly very supportive and for that I am thankful. I've had a lot of nice emails and people reaching out to let me know how sorry they are.  Our agency has been as supportive as they can be.  If you're unsure of what to say in a situation like this, a simple "I'm sorry" will suffice- better not to ignore the elephant in the room.  

And, yet, like I said when I started this post, life goes on.  "The living must go on living" is a phrase that certainly comes to mind, even though it's awkwardly untrue in this situation.  It feels for all the world like a death.  We will surely mourn our daughter's loss for a very long time to come.  She will always be in our hearts and she will probably never know how many people love her a world away.  Be well, sweet Lucy, live well.  

LOA...Finally.

We got our LOAs for both kids on October 10.  It was 141 days when the average has been running about 50.  Just yesterday I heard of someone getting their LOA after 34 days.  34!!!!  So, 141 was painful to say the least.  Maybe the new system is finally making things more efficient, like we were promised when they first implemented it.  

A few days after our LOAs arrived, we got some devastating news that I haven't had the heart to blog about yet.  We are reeling.  Hopefully in the next week or two, as things settle down a little bit, I'll type it out, but right now we just need to take care of ourselves.  

Mid-Autumn Festival and Sukkot

I realized at some point recently that the Chinese holiday of Mid-Autumn Festival and the Jewish holiday of Sukkot (Sue-COAT) will be at the same time almost every year since the Chinese calendar and the Jewish calendar are both lunar calendars!  This is so awesome!  We are so excited to be able to celebrate both holidays simultaneously with all of our kids in the coming years.  Because the Chinese lunar year starts sometime usually in January/February and the Jewish lunar year starts sometime in September/October, the holiday will line up exactly on two out of every three years.  On the third year it is not exact but very close.   Fall is always a very busy time of year for us with many Jewish holidays and all of our birthdays, and the usual Halloween, Thanksgiving and back to school events.  It is great that we will get to celebrate two holidays simultaneously and that one of them is Chinese!  

Mid-Autumn Festival is also called Moon Festival, because it takes place on the full moon.  The festival celebrates three things: gathering of friends and family, thanksgiving (for the season's harvest) and prayer.  I look forward to learning more about it in the future as we celebrate every year.  

For folks who don't know about Sukkot, it is a festival that commemorates the time the Jewish people spent wandering in the desert living on faith and in tents but it's also a time for thanking G-d for the harvest of the past season.  This year when we built out sukkah (SUH-kah), it had a Chinese theme with red lanterns.  I'm sure we'll build on this theme every year.  We build a temporary structure in the backyard to remember the tents of biblical times and hang out in it as much as possible for the duration of the holiday.  It's a really fun holiday in addition to the spiritual part and the kids think that it's great fun to build a gigantic "fort" in the backyard! 

One important prayer that is said at Sukkot (and many, many other times!) is the Shehecheyanu which translates roughly into English as "Thank you G-d for creating me, sustaining me and enabling me to reach this moment".  This prayer and this festival are all about rejoicing and being grateful for what we have and for being alive. Note that this *not* a prayer to ask for anything.  It's just about gratitude and that's something I think all of us should take time to celebrate!  There is more to Sukkot than that, but you get the gist. 

The after dinner jam session in the sukkah, drums and guitar.

This year all I could find were Korean moon cakes, but it was a kind of last minute effort as we have been so busy...next year when our Chinese children are home, it will be a priority to find Chinese moon cakes!  The moon cakes I bought were delicious by the way, with a sweet sesame paste inside and an outside that was like a steamed rice dough *and* they were freshly made locally.  I understand that a lot of the Chinese moon cakes are packaged and shipped so not very fresh.  The Korean ones were much more plain than the Chinese ones I have seen which usually have an ornate pattern or design pressed into the top and are actually quite beautiful.  

In other news, the LOA still isn't here.  The Adoption Authority in China has been close for Mid-Autumn Festival so hopefully they will be working overtime this coming week and we will get our LOA SOON!  I did recently hear of several families whose dossiers were "misplaced".  Apparently they were all put in a pile and forgotten about for a month or two.  Our was *not* in that pile (thank G-d!) but do you think it might be in another pile somewhere else, misplaced or forgotten?!  We have been so patient up until now, trying to trust the process, but I am going to ask our agency to check, email, call or do whatever they can do first thing on Monday morning!  So far, they have been super helpful and very efficient as far as what needs to be done on their end, but this wait is verging on ridiculous! 

 

Waiting Kids

I just started a separate page where I am going to be listing some waiting kids.  Please check it out!  So far, I have just one little boy listed and he's been waiting at least three years.  Please help me find his family!  Every child needs a family to love them and help them thrive.

Please email me if you want more information about the children on my waiting kids page.  The kids I'll be advocating for are part of China's waiting child adoption program and therefore many of them have minor and/or correctable special needs.  To find out more about China adoption and if you qualify to adopt a child from China, please read more here.

Day 89

We're on Day 89 of waiting for our LOA today.  I am starting to feel discouraged.  By tomorrow we are officially at the outer limit of the average time it takes to get LOA.  In our minds, our littles are already part of our family and we are so, so ready to bring them home!  

In the middle of last week I was really feeling bummed about how long we've been waiting for LOA until  I realized that our kids have been waiting for a family for almost four years.  That really puts it in perspective for me.  Four years.  To be so little with no mama or papa to tuck you in or kiss your boo-boos.   It makes me so very sad...and while it also makes me feel impatient, I realize that 89 days really isn't that much.  And, maybe, just maybe it will come tomorrow!  (Then we could still be average!  Never thought I'd be striving for average.  Haha!) 

While thinking about how long our kids have been waiting for a family, my mind wanders to the other kids who haven't been chosen.  Some of these kids have been waiting far longer than our kids and the older they get, the less chance there is that they will be chosen by a family.  Stay tuned for some pics and short bios of waiting kids.  I think it's a good way for me to spend my time while we wait, don't you?  Maybe some other moms and dads will see *their* kid here...and there will be one less orphan.