Some Progress

It looks like another month of dossiers have made it through the Review Room! So that means June 2006 and maybe even July dossiers are under review now. It's a step in the right direction. Here is the latest from the CCAA website.


I'm waiting for the CCAA to begin the 2006 referrals before I start on her nursery.

I'm still hoping for Beach Baby to be home in 2008.

The wonders of YouTube

Some days, the wait is harder than others. As those who know me say, I don't wait well. I sit in my office at home and stare at the binders on the shelf: Paper Chase, Referral, and Travel. They are inactive, gathering dust.

On those days when the pity party is cranked up to 11, I sit down and pull up YouTube.com.

What a wonderful thing. I type "Gotcha Day" in the Search field and up pops pages and pages of videos of parents meeting their babies for the first time.

Stories of travel. Rooms full of new families. Babies cradled in their parents' arms for the first time.

Lots and lots of babies; screaming, happy, sad, goofy, sleeping and playing.

I watch and forget about the wait and wonder about the moment when it will be our turn.

m

There can always be more Paperwork

This month, it's 1 year since my Homestudy was completed. Update required. In July the first of my U.S. documentation, my fingerprints, expire. Update required. In September, my I-171H joins the expiration party. Yup, update required.

The Homestudy is only good for 2 years; you needed an updated Homestudy to renew the other Federal paperwork. The big question, how much closer to the adoption will I be in May, 2008? I could end up repeating most of the Paperchase again.


On another paperwork front, the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption added a certification requirement on all international adoption agencies. What that means for me is that families in the process need to complete some classes on international and transracial adoption. I'd actually already taken most of the classes but I might need to take them again.

Hey, did I mention that I start grad school next month? I LOVE Paperwork!

Bring it on; my little Beach Baby is worth every page.

m

The Pig was a sign, not an impulse buy

I'll admit I was in the store (Itsy Bitsy World @ Polaris) because I needed a baby fix. I'd already been to Baby Gap and Gymboree looking for a baby "pick-me-up" with no purchases made.


But I swear, the Pig literally threw itself off the shelf at me. I had to buy her.


She's been named NO because she is 'Not Olivia' the Pig, though she bares quite the resemblance. She is now in charge; in the house for 1 day and already forcing me to do things. I respond well to guilty looks, even from inanimate objects.


In the photo, NO is sitting atop the newly altered toy chest. I added wheels and safety hinges to a box I found at the antique mall. All work was done under the watchful eye of the Pig. The next project is the emptying of the guest room so it can become the nursery. I think NO is preparing a project list for me.


m

Beach Baby's got a Patron Saint

It's March. It's been 6 and 1/2 months since LID and well over a year since I began this journey. And with every passing month it seems like the day I'll be bringing home my little Beach Baby gets farther and farther away.

Will it be 2007? 2008? 2009?

A while back I decided the little one's patron saint is St. Jude. For those without a Catholic upbringing, St. Jude is the patron saint of impossible causes and desparate cases.

Shortening this long wait is an impossible cause, don't you think?

I wear a St. Jude medal around my neck every day. I've started giving St. Jude medals to my family and friends.

I may be a lapsed Catholic but I will take any help I can get.

m

Happy Chinese New Year

It is the year of the Fire Pig.

According to Chinese astrology, Water is my lucky element.

2007 is the begininning of the Water cycle.

The predictions are that the next three years will be very lucky for me. I really like hearing that.

If you'd like to check out your Chinese astrology, follow this link:

http://www.chinesefortunecalendar.com/CFTCal2.htm

m

The latest stats

The China Center of Adoption Affairs posted their update this week.

Slowly,


Slowly,


Slowly,



the dates crawl closer to my August 10, 2006 LID.

m