Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Our agency sent us this video yesterday morning!!  What a great Christmas present!

                                               New Pictures... :) Melt my heart, baby girl!





Here's a video we received of Hope back in April.  I just figured out how to load it up on here. :)  Isn't she adorable!

Monday, November 21, 2011

Update

I am so ashamed!  I did so well with Joy's blog, keeping it updated every step of the way.  I have failed miserably with blogging Hope's adoption.  Please forgive me. :)

So on to the update!  Much has happened since summer.  Our fundraising efforts were multiplied in an abundance only God could provide!  We are grateful to the many, many friends, family, neighbors, business associates, brothers and sisters in Christ, and even strangers who chose to help us bring Hope home.  The mountain of impossibility has been removed in a mighty way!  Praise God--He is so in the details of this adoption!

We are nearing the end of our paperwork punts between the two countries.  Last week we passed off the last bit of our documents to Ch*na.  Our Beijing agency staff will take Hope's Visa application to the US Embassy this week.  Two weeks later, they will return to pick up the processed paperwork, called the Article 5, from the Embassy and deliver it to Ch*na Adoption Affairs.  Then we are officially awaiting Travel approval!!!  That is our FINAL approval and our permission to travel!!  Travel approval could come anywhere from 7-30 days after Article 5.  So we could have Travel approval in 3-6 weeks. Travel would still be a week-3 weeks after that. The guessing keeps my emotions churning!  I long to be with my sweet Hope!  I am nesting in overdrive, while preparing for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  It IS a crazy time around here!

Once we receive Travel approval, our agency will schedule our US Consulate appointment.  That is the appointment we attend during the last week of our trip to complete the immigration process.  Once that appointment is set, the agency schedules everything else around it.  We are requesting first available appointment. 

At the earliest we could travel the end of December.  If we receive a late Travel approval, though, Chinese New Year could delay our travel until February--which will cause me to completely break down and be a blubbering mess!  Chinese New Year begins January 24, and the entire country closes down for a full week, and little happens the following week.  So we need to complete our trip before Chinese New Year!  If there are no major delays, that should not be a problem.  But we know that anything is possible with adoption!

Being the optimist that I was born to be, I am still holding on to the possibility of leaving in December.