An update on Jack!

Wednesday are my designated days to go to the water park.  That way it has already been decided and the kids don't have to wonder and ask everyday when we are going.  Yesterday was a busy morning.  I ran over a large bolt and it was clicking with every turn of the tire.  I dropped off the car at Sears. Got picked up by a friend for bible study.  Bible study was 2 hours, then back to Sears, Costco again (went on Monday) cause we needed cat food...ugh.  I came home and we left for the water park finally. I know, a lot of background info, but I can't tell a story without a ton of detail. lol.  Anyhoo, I was sitting and chatting w/ friends. I checked my phone and Doug texted that when I get home there is an update in our email on Jack from our agency.  REALLY!  I am not going to wait to see this update.  I grabbed my friends leg and said "you have access to the Internet, right?"  I have been waiting to see how he has grown since the last report from October or December (sometimes dates conflict).  Jack is 20lbs and 28in. long.  It does sound a little disproportionate, but he doesn't look it in the pictures.  Oh yeah, his feet are 4.3 inches too.  I guess that is good to know for shoe size. :)  Below is what the orphanage says about Jack:

Dang Zan Biao

7/15/2011 Update


Medical/Development:
His current health is good.
He can walk, can play with toy bricks, but can not run, jump or go up/down stairs
He can say nainai and mama.
He is not potty trained.

Personality:
They call him Biao Biao.
He is outgoing.

General:
His sleeping and diet schedule:
Sleeping time: 9:00pm-6:30am
Nap time: 11:30am-1:30pm
Eating time: 10:00am and 6:00pm
He also drinks formula at 6:00am, 2:30pm and 9:00pm
He eats noodle, congee.
He is in the orphanage.
He received a package from the family.

I have to admit, the pictures aren't the best.  Jack appears much healthier looking in the pictures I received back in April.  Maybe it is because he is getting around a bit more and he is exposed to more.  I don't know.  I guess I had the idea that because he is in a good orphanage he wouldn't have bug bites(it appears that way) and marks all over him.  Doug reminded me that is orphanage life.  There is only so much they can do for these precious little ones.  He also seems to look much older from a few months ago.  That makes me sad, cause he is growing up so fast.  I hope and pray we get our LOA quickly.  I can't wait to hold my little one in my arms!

A quick update

Just wanted to let everyone know some exciting news.  As I posted in my last post, we were waiting for our LID (log in date) and then we will wait for LOA (letter of acceptance). The same day that our agency's representatives hand delivered our dossier to the CCCWA, we were logged in!  I was stunned when I received the email.  Usually it takes a few weeks to be logged in.  Now we are offically waiting for our LOA.  The LOA wait can vary in length.  Once we do receive our LOA we will have a reasonable guess as to when we will be traveling.  I am so excited to be at this step, all with in less than a weeks time!! Praise the Lord!!

Finally our dossier is in China!!

I am so excited to move on to the next step in our adoption journey!! We did finally receive our immigration approval in the mail on July 1st.  It was a long 71 days.  I was able to get the approval notarized and certified at the state capitol on that same day.  Then I got it authenticated on Tuesday, July 5th in San Franciso.  I couldn't go on Monday because of the 4th of July holiday.  I overnighted the document to our agency in Colorado.  They were able to get our dossier translated and put together to send to the Chinese government.  My hope was that they would send it on Friday the 8th.  We were told they would email us when they sent it.  Friday came and went and no email came through.  I feel this constant reminder that I need to trust in the Lord.  His timing is always perfect.  I felt pretty good over the weekend, not too disappointed that it wasn't sent.  I thought about it, of course, but not consumed.  I see it as a victory!  Hopefully dreams don't count as being consumed....lol.  I am a dreamer, every night pretty much. Yesterday I wasn't home and texted Doug to check our email to see if the dossier had been sent.  At one point I had him check for another email and was waiting for him to respond.  This was his text: "Just received an email 8 minutes ago that our dossier was sent to China late Friday afternoon!!!!!!!!"  I was secretly hoping that they had sent it Friday and just didn't have the chance to notify us.  It was such great news!!  I also share Doug's quote because he is so cute when he is excited.  I have found that he is just as excited about every step as I am.  Once we decided to adopt our hearts have been in sync.  Not that they usually aren't, but I thought he would be more a go with the flow kind of guy in this process.  He is just as passionate for our little Jack than anyone else.  He even lets me pay the extra fees to overnight these packages so that they get there at 8 rather than 10 the next morning.  It is exciting to share this with my wonderful husband!! 

The next couple steps are:
1) Wait for China to log us in to their system, which is called log in date (LID) after LID we
2) Wait for our Letter of Acceptance (LOA) which is China accepting us to officially adopt Jack. 
These two steps can take up to 10-12 weeks. Yikes that seems like such a long time.  I hope and do pray it is sooner.

Waiting on Immigration approval

Today it has been 63 days since we sent in our application to get immigration approval to adopt from China.  When we started the process it was taking around 45 days to receive approval.  As you can see it has jumped up dramatically.  It has been very discouraging. We have a number to call to see if we have an officer which usually means you are very close to approval.  Doug has been calling the last couple of days, because I can't handle hearing the answer "no" .  The longer we wait on this means the longer it will be to travel to bring Jack home. I know the Lord is in control and His timing will be perfect.  Intellectually I know this, but my emotions sometimes take over!  "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus." (Philippians 4:6-7) This is the verse I need to cling to as I wait through this process.  I desire to know not only now these truths, but when tested to be able "count it all joy" (James 1) when going through trials-small as this may be. Just some of my thoughts and struggles while waiting.

Look what I stumbled across!

I was looking at some new pictures someone posted from a recent trip to Luoyang.  I saw one of the nannies holding a little baby who looked very similar to our Jack.  I zoomed in and checked to see if this little boy had malformed right ear and he did!  The one thing that threw me was he had more hair than Jack.  Well it turns out that these pictures are from 5 days earlier than the ones I already posted.  The orphanage must of buzzed him.

What a sweetie!  His nanny chose to pick him up out of all the little sweet ones, what a blessing!

Jack in the left corner with his little friends.  They are all so cute!

New pictures of Jack!

I joined a yahoo group who's members have or will adopt from the same orphanage in China.  I decided a few weeks ago to check it out.  The reason I am interested in the group is to know if anyone will be traveling soon to the orphanage.  If someone is, then it is possible to ask them to visit Jack and take pictures for me.  I found a lady who would be traveling April 21-25 to the orphanage.  I emailed immediately to ask her to take some pictures.  She responded that she would try her best.  I was so excited to get some updated pictures of him.  I told my friend who is part of the same group, because her son is also in the same orphanage.  By the way, it is pretty amazing that a close friend would have her son in the same institute as us because there are hundreds of institutions in China.  It will be cool to be able to tell our boys that they lived in the same place in China and now will grow up together here.  She also emailed the same lady and got confirmation that she would take pictures for her also.  We waited and waited and didn't hear anything.  On Tuesday, the 26th I received a text saying my friend got pictures.  I rushed to the computer and checked to see if I had any.  I had none.  I was disappointed, but very happy for my friend.  I thought maybe the lady forgot or they didn't let her into see the babies.  I didn't know.  I emailed the lady to ask politely if she saw Jack.  I got no response.  I was bummed.  Thursday morning I felt a tap on my back and I thought "Oh Grace why are you up so early."  Then there was a iPhone in my face with a picture of my beautiful boy!  The contact didn't forget and we got 10 new photos of him!! (see our 2 favorites, both above and at left)  It was such a blessing to awake to new pics!  I opened my eyes and squinted trying to focus my sleepy eyes on little Jack.  Not only did I receive pictures, but a little bit of information on his development.  All of the pictures are of Jack and his main nanny Li.  Li said that he is very healthy and has 8 teeth.  He is crawling, can pull himself to stand (on a low bar they have for that purpose) and can walk around holding onto the bar.  He is very clever and he LOVES his bottles.  This might explain those cheeks!  She also reported to me about his hearing because Jack has a malformed right ear.  She said his hearing seems fine; she called his name a few times when he wasn't looking at her and he would turn around right away to her voice.  She said overall he looked healthy and gorgeous.  She also went on to tell me how although the orphanage is very poor, they appear to give the children much love and affection.  I was greatly appreciative of the time she spent with Jack and finding out information for us.  She was so kind to ask questions for us.  I never told her about Jack's ear.  She noticed herself and took the initiative to check his hearing out for me. 

I was bothered about one thing after receiving the update.  It was me and my lack of contentment and joy.  A friend once said she wanted her joy not to be dependent on her circumstances.  That statement was running through my mind after praising the Lord for the update.  I was grumpy, sad and not joyful when I didn't get the pictures a few days earlier.  I let a little disappointment in my life take my focus off of Jesus.  This adoption journey will be just that, a journey.  We will wait and wait and wait.  The only way to go through this journey joyfully, because I will be disappointed, is to focus on Him.  I thank God for making me wait to get the updates on Jack.  If I had not of waited I wouldn't be able to be aware of my discontent.  Isn't the Lord kind?  Even when I was being selfish he still chose to bless me by gently showing me my sin and providing an update on Jack.

A wacky trip to Sacramento and San Francisco

I don't know if this will interest anyone, but I want to keep a record of the craziness of my adoption journey.  It is totally intriguing to me, but may be a little dull for others.  Sorry for such a long post.

For those who are unfamiliar with the adoption process,  it takes a lot of running around to get certain documents needed for the adoption.  One of the steps in the process is do get all the documents that are going to China notarized, certified and authenticated.  Basically all my docs are notarized locally, then they need to be certified by the CA Sec of State saying the notary is licensed in CA and then the Chinese Consulate will authenticate that the CA Sec of State is in fact our Sec of State.  Rather than sending all my docs to Sacramento and S.F. then wait to have them sent them back to me, I decided to drive them up myself.  I took a friend with me who is in the same stage of the process.  It was kind of a mini road trip.  We left around 5:30am.  We arrived at 8:30 to the Sec of State office in downtown Sac.  We found a meter, put some coins in and went up.  The process was painless, we were in and out in 20 minutes.  I was a little nervous because I didn't want to make any mistakes.  I felt as if my docs were like gold-very precious and I could not afford to lose them or have any errors.  The docs were certified and we were back to the car.  Come to find out we parked in a passenger loading zone!  Why did they have a meter in a zone where you can't park!?  It was extremely frustrating and cost us $52.  I couldn't believe that in those 20 minutes we were gone that we got a ticket!  Oh well. :(  Off to make copies of the docs.  I don't have GPS so Doug mapped out each step.  We got to the copy shop, paid the meter and made sure there were no yellow curbs. The next set of directions took us to the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco.  We arrived in S.F. around 11:15.  We were a little lost for about 20 minutes or so.  Eventually we found the Consulate.  The Consulate closes for lunch from noon to one and then closes for the day at 3:00.  We thought we were there in the nick of time.  We found the front of the line and kept following it down the street and around the corner!  I was a little stressed.  I drove all this way and I wasn't sure I was even going to make it into the building to have my documents authenticated.  We waited and waited.  It was kind of weird as I was able to experience China without leaving California. A foreign language around you, and people who don't understand what personal space is.  Parking in S.F. is tricky.  I parked in a 2 hour zone. By the time we would be inside the building my parking time would be up.  I left my friend in line and tried to find another parking spot.  My friend calls to tell me she is at the door next to enter.  I am panicked!  I finally find a spot.  I am stressed out and trying to parallel park, it was a nightmare.  Then I look up and see a sign a little ways up that reads "No Parking Fridays for street sweeping from 12-2"  I look at the clock it is 1:30; I can't park there!!  I would probably get another ticket.  Off to find another spot in S.F.  I am getting more stressed as I can't find a spot.  Finally I round the block another time and find a spot that I can legally park in.  I park, jump out of the car and run to the front entrance.  My friend is waiting to the side, letting people in front of us.  We enter and pass through security.  Then we join another line for about an hour.  Finally, at 2:15, I give my documents to the Consulate, pay my money and I am good to go.  Unfortunately my friend was not able to get her documents authenticated.  It was very sad and frustrating. :(

We headed back to the car disappointed.  I grabbed the next set of directions Doug had printed for us.  I told him I wanted to travel back via the 99 rather than I-5.  That is the route he printed.  Not too long after we were out of the city, we realized we had missed an exit.  No worries, we would just take I-5 instead of 99.  We could catch the 152 through Los Banos and have dinner there.  Doug calls to check on us and see where we were.  I said we were on the I-5 heading toward Los Banos.  I told him we saw a sign for Firebaugh recently.  Doug said, FIREBAUGH, tell me the next exit you see.  Manning was the next one. I told him it was a different one, not the one in the south valley.  Then the next one we came up to was Kamm.  Hmmmm...what are the chances that there is a Manning and a Kamm where we were that were different than the south valley.  I knew at that moment we were lost.  Doug pulled up a map and guided us to a town called San Joaquin.  Did I mention we were very low on gas? Meanwhile, Doug gets a knock on the door.  He opens it to Hannah, who is in hysterics crying.  She can't find the dogs and apparently, according to neighbors have been out of our fenced yard for several hours.  Doug goes out to look for the dogs and then realizes that I am out in the middle of booney land and need his guidance.  He sends the kids off to look for the dogs.  He guides me where to go.  We get to San Joaquin, the middle of nowhere and look for a gas station.  Not a sight of one.  We pull to a little shopping center with a liquor store and pizza parlor.  We decide the pizza place will be a better place to ask where a gas station is.  I ask, the girl looks at me blankly and says she doesn't speak English.  Great, I am lost with no gas and the town doesn't speak English.  I start to hand motion putting gas in the car and she says "Oh, Cirlce K"  and points somewhere.  Well at least I know they have gas, finding it is another issue.  We walk outside and find another girl and she speaks English and tells us where the Circle K is located.  We get gas and we find our way out of San Joaquin heading towards Kerman.  I call Doug back and they found the dogs.  They were across the street playing in the water basin having a grand time.  Hannah, although relieved, was still an emotional wreck. My sweet little girl!

The weekend before a friend who used to live in Kerman metioned a Chinese restuarant in Kerman.  As we were driving on what I would assume was the main drag of Kerman, I found the Bejing Garden restuarant.  A nice way to finish off our crazy day of adoption madness, with Chinese food.  It was sooo nice to sit down and eat and relax.