Merry Christmas!

What a precious Christmas season! In order to "save for China" (a common catch-phrase around our house), we drew names for presents and have kept the names secret. It's been the sweetest, most thoughtful season of family gift-giving I've ever experienced. While we wait for Christmas day, we've been "secret-Santa-ing" each other with little treats that demonstrate I-know-what-you-like kind of love.

We also cherish the hope that next year at this time, we'll have another member of our family to love.

The flip side of that coin is that this is the last year we'll spend as the 5 of us. Sometimes we forget to treasure what we have while waiting for the next great thing. Jayme, my sweet girl, you know what I'm talking about! Treasure 2!!  :-)

On a logistical note, I paid for priority shipping plus delivery confirmation to send my extra money order to the Chinese Consulate, since we had underpaid our authentication fees. Well past the expected delivery date, I phoned our local post office and was told that the consulate probably had so much mail, they missed "scanning" my letter, so it didn't register as delivered. The P.O. guy recommended I phone the consulate (kidding, right?!) or phone the post office in Chicago (kidding, right?!). Needless to say, no way was I going to be able to talk to a person.

Bottom line - here we sit again. Mailbox watching. Waiting for our dossier. And possibly have our "match" not occur until February. I know, I know, in the grand scheme, what's a month? Jesus has her in the palm of His hand and will watch over her. BUT we're human and we are so excited to meet her!

One more note: we're talking about the girls and I leaving for China 2 weeks early to see more of the country! The girls would love to backpack up to the older sections of the Great Wall, since the tourist-y sections have been rebuilt, and aren't as authentic. Hm. Mom will have to research this carefully. Anyway, the thought of spending a whole month in China is pretty thrilling. The only downside is Doug's job has got him firmly grounded to GEHA, and he couldn't possibly get away for that long. So those of you who are prone to prayer (like that phrase? ha), please pray that "whatever is the best thing" will happen.

Just a little hiccup!

Just caught up with 49 phone messages, having been out of town this weekend - meeting friends from Texas in Branson. Last Friday, the Chinese Consulate in Chicago had called and left a message, telling us we didn't pay enough for our dossier processing! Today, we're already 5 days beyond the day they called, so we will be sending another money order overnight to Chicago tomorrow. The lady from the Consulate said they had completed the authentication, and were getting ready to ship it when they noticed the mistake! We were sooooo close! In the grand scheme, no biggie I guess.

We continue to pursue an understanding of Chinese history, modern Chinese culture, language, and foreign adoption. I just finished another book about China, and started my next. The books I'm finding range from clinical facts in history to novels set in China by Chinese authors. So fascinating. We are also watching a Great Courses video series about the modern history of China. It has covered opening Chinese markets, the cultural revolution, and the Beijing Olympics (did you know it started at 8:08 on August 8, 2008? Eight being a very lucky number!) We only have one more lesson to go. Allie has her Chinese final tomorrow evening, with high hopes of getting a 4.0! Jenna and Nate have enrolled at Longview for next term in Chinese I, which Allie will continue to study with them, while she takes Chinese 2.

We visited a REALLY cool Asian market called 888 International Market (notice the 8s?) on 119th and 69 highway. Besides having a blast looking at whole roasted ducks (heads on), baby octopi, squid, live tilapia, buckets and buckets of jelly fish, pig livers, omasum (cow stomach), etc., there was a Chinese gentleman in the back corner of the market selling all things Chinese - beautiful paintings, pots of all sizes, tea sets, statues, etc. He spoke VERY little English, and it was great fun to watch Allie practice communicating with him. I was so proud of her. All I could manage was "Ni hao" (hello) and "Xei xei" (thank you), and lots of smiling and bowing. We managed to strike a few deals with him, and brought home some beautiful pieces of artwork for our living room. 

We are having SO much fun on our adventure!  Thanks for reading!

Funny how you never know until you know!

Oh my. There are so many subgroups in America - so defined by MANY and various interests. Who knew there was a Chinese Adoptees Cultural Center in Lee's Summit?? We had been advised to be involved in a Chinese cultural group for Mei Mei when she comes. But personally, I cringed a little at the thought of some group possibly (probably) being 30 miles away at 8am Saturday mornings. Really. I pictured Olathe or Gladstone.

Allie's Chinese language professor, Valda Hsu, (who happens to be a long-time friend from church) invited the head of the Lee's Summit group to speak to their class at Longview. That's how we found out about it. (Well, there was one other co-incident that also led to this group, but I'll let Doug tell you about that!) Sigh. This is all. SO. GOOD.

So. Valda Hsu invited our family to a Chinese Culture Celebration that was yesterday. There were ~15-20 families with adopted Chinese children there. The children performed Christmas songs in Chinese, performed yoyo tricks (not American yoyos, but the hourglass-shaped object they flip around on a string held by 2 sticks.), and since they also offer language classes, the American parents and siblings demonstrated their abilities with speaking and reading Chinese. Then, Valda held a caligraphy and paper-folding session for all the kiddos. The theme was the upcoming Chinese New Year (the year of the Rabbit!) in February.

Then we went down to Pleasant Hill to Pumpkins and Pines Farm (which was a blast and we recommend it!) to tromp all over looking for our Christmas tree, keeping Nick from peeing on every other one. (jk) We imagined how next year, we'd have Mei Mei with us looking for a tree!

Gotta go help - we're setting up the train under the tree and watching Goose freak out! She makes a sound like she's growling at it. Very funny.

Thanks for visiting!

Nov 2010

I know Carolyn has written most of this - but here is my point of view - D

Nov 1 – Carolyn took the medical records to the MO sec of state office in downtown KC for certification (to say the notary is a notary and their commission has not expired)
Nov 10 – our fingerprint appointment is scheduled for the USCIS (Citizenship and Immigration) – we mix up 11/10/10 and 11/11/10 and miss it.
Nov 11 – we drive to the Homeland Security office for fingerprints – office closed – Veteran’s Day
Nov 12 – back to Homeland Security (this is a 45 mi drive one way – by KCI) – get fingerprinted – hopefully this is not blown – app fee was huge
Nov – we watch a webcast from Holt on travel to China. They make a case for using the Lotus travel agency.
Nov – we decide to simplify Christmas this year for our immediate family because of the upcoming expense of going to China – we each draw 2 names – limit $25 per. This seriously cramps my style as gifts is one of my languages – but I agree to play by the rules. But this includes secret Santa between now and Christmas day.
Nov – my secret Santa delivers some mints – I'm liking this.
Nov 28 – we return from Indy to find USCIS approval in the mail – yeah!!!
Nov 29 – Carolyn takes the USCIS approval for notarization at the bank and certification at MO sec of state. Makes copies – the entire dossier is complete…
Nov 30 – Carolyn ships the dossier to the Chinese consulate in Chicago for authentication (that the secretaries of state are the secretaries of state). Should be back mid Dec.

"Just do the next thing"

One of my heroes, Elizabeth Elliott, was quoted as saying "Just do the next thing." Sounds trite, but really, give it a try next time you're paralyzed by the overwhelming nature of something you need to do. It works!

So, the "next thing" is to mail our COMPLETED (:-)) dossier to the Chinese Consulate in Chicago. Most of us didn't even know there was a consulate in Chicago. It's a branch of the Chinese Embassy in Washington D.C. It seems that there is enough business to take care of here in the U.S. that the Chinese have 4 Consulates in addition to the Embassy. Each consulate deals with business within a group of states. So, Missouri's consulate is in Chicago - and they have to Authenticate our completed dossier.

I've heard this takes about 2 weeks until we get it returned to us, authenticated.

Each of these steps cost a surprising amount of money. Meaning, you look forward to doing the next thing, then discover in the dossier instructions that you gotta take another good look at the budget and figure out where this next chunk-o-change is going to come from.

Nevertheless, this little human life is priceless. We can't wait to meet her!

Please keep praying about the weird situation with the Koreas. China is allied with North Korea.

Oh, and P.S. We got the package mailed today in case I wasn't explicit!
Oh, and P.S.S. . . . Even though we spent the morning laughing at Jenna's hilarious comments while being on Valium, and later on the "Michael Jackson" anesthetic to get her wisdom teeth removed. She slept all afternoon, and is puffier than a chipmunk in acorn heaven! Please wish her "get well soon" on her facebook!

Wahoooooooooo!

Our final document, the approval! from! Homeland! Security!, came while we were in Indianapolis, once again proving, a watched mailbox never delivers!

We had been hoping the document would come before we went to Indianapolis, because then we could take a little side trip up to Chicago, where the Chinese consulate is, to drop off the dossier in person. Chicago is only about 3 or 4 hours from Indy. Anyway, it didn't come in time. Doug's been so hard-at-work these past coupla years anyway, he was hesistant to take any more time off. So all for the best. But taking our mind off of mailbox watching was good for us.

We had a wonderful, relaxing, well-fed, game-playing time with Amy, David, Michael and Claire. Side note: we think our pup Nick is pretty awesome, but he definitely has competition with their dogs Margo and Neigh-Neigh (haha - horsey spelling). They are german shepherd and border collie. Majorly cool dogs.

But wait, I digress . . . SO our new plan for tomorrow is to get the immigration document notarized, then make our 3rd trek downtown to the Secretary of State's office to get it Certified, then back home to pack up the completed dossier to ship off to Chicago, the Chinese Consulate!! Wow wow wow! We're so close!!

Oh, and the original plan for tomorrow was to start building a room off the attics of both upstairs rooms. Seriously.

Fingerprints and dates . . . duh

We've had the immigration fingerprinting appointment for a month. We knew the government would make the appointment and we had to show up whenever they said. So Doug took half a day off, we rearranged our schedules, rendevous-ed 3 cars into Grandview, and up we drove, almost to the airport, on VETERAN'S DAY! That's where the "duh" comes in. What government facility would be open on Veteran's Day? My first thought was, "Why did they schedule us on Veteran's Day? Didn't they know they would be closed?" My second thought was, "Maybe I got the date wrong." Well, the government gets things wrong, but I'll bet they never get a holiday wrong, so sure enough, it was my mess-up. It's hard to anticipate how you're going to feel when something falls through, but the head-smack that I felt for the rest of the day surprised me. I was horrified. The USCIS Appointment Letter clearly states, (and I quote): IF YOU FAIL TO APPEAR AS SCHEDULED, YOUR APPLICATION WILL BE CONSIDERED ABANDONED. (And it's really in ALL CAPS!) Well, to save you from more whining, the bottom line is that we went at the crack-o-dawn the next morning and got it done. That was hopefully my first and last freak-out. Now we wait for another couple weeks to get our USCIS approval form.

Signing up to "Follow" without registering for Google account . . .

Notice on the upper left of the page header is a button that says "Follow". Just click on that, and that's all you have to do. You don't need to start a new account with Google or Yahoo or whatever.

If you've ever considered foreign adoption . . .

Sweeeeeeeet video

Hi - Emmi was cruising HoltInternational.com and found this video. We recognize some of these kids from the photolisting page on Holt's website. It's tooooo cute! Wish I knew the lyrics to the song they're singing - looks like they're praying . . . for "forever families". It's even possible we could be matched with one of the girls in this video. Takes my breath away!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DrkO9ooYiaA&feature=player_embedded