PAPER ERROR

I received my envelope back, and I was excited to have that document completed by the San Francisco Chinese Consulate...only to open it up and see I made an error! I gave them a money order check for $20 instead of $25 grrreat! Now I have to resend and pay more money just for mail service. On a brighter note...we are sending off a care package for my little angel. Some pyjamas, blankie, pillow, a photo of us and disposable camera.

Somewhere Between

This is so amazing! Please watch if you have ever adopted internationally! I cried the entire time-this is so special. Its on NETFLIX now.

INTRODUCING...

The "I'm a SUPERSTAR" Pic

When we saw this pic, we just knew this was the Amelia we've been dreaming about in our hearts. My husband says she's going to fly planes-yes, he chose Amelia as in 'Amelia Earhart'. Whatever it says in her medical file...she clearly hasn't let that slow her down. Our girl is on the move and probably already knows, how much she is loved by God first and foremost and of course by us-her family in Florida. She is recieving excellent care at her orphanage, she is very attached to her nanny and has these adorable little friends that she likes to hold hands with...it just makes you melt. I really did think I was peeking into the kingdom of heaven when I saw her videos. The music playing in the backround, and the giggles and songs of the children, running around with eachother. Sighhhh who says angels are not living amongst us?

'The Call' Pic

This photo said to us "Look Mommy and Daddy" I am strong and I am going to walk! Plus, look at my adorable smile.

Pre Approved for a Perfect Daughter

We are P.A.! Therefore, we are now free to send her a care package and we are now free, to share her with all of you! Today we finished up our homestudy-it was a little more complicated than I had thought, because China is a Hague country with Hague requirements. So now we wait for the homestudy approval. The CCCWA has received our letter of intent and has wired us back a PRE-APPROVAL for adoption of our beauty! HOORAY. With all the stress lately, I have to admitt, I had to cry this time...parts of me do not know why. Freddy had a grounded airplane today at his station, and everything that could go wrong today-did...and I thought he was not going to make it home on time to see our SW. But he did, and I am glad for that...and then I opened my email for the first time today, and saw the subject line was P.A.!

Mei Mei

A sister is a gift to the heart, a friend to the spirit, a golden thread to the meaning of life. ~Isadora James Having a sister is like having a best friend you can't get rid of. You know whatever you do, they'll still be there. ~Amy Li A sister is a little bit of childhood that can never be lost. ~Marion C. Garretty Is solace anywhere more comforting than in the arms of a sister. ~Alice Walker Big sisters are the crab grass in the lawn of life. ~Charles M. Schulz If you don't understand how a woman could both love her sister dearly and want to wring her neck at the same time, then you were probably an only child. ~Linda Sunshine You can kid the world. But not your sister. ~Charlotte Gray I would like more sisters, that the taking out of one, might not leave such stillness. ~Emily Dickinson Help one another, is part of the religion of sisterhood. ~Louisa May Alcott Sisters never quite forgive each other for what happened when they were five. ~Pam Brown In thee my soul shall own combined the sister and the friend. ~Catherine Killigrew Brothers and sisters are as close as hands and feet. ~Vietnamese Proverb A sister can be seen as someone who is both ourselves and very much not ourselves - a special kind of double. ~Toni Morrison Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in their power, which no subsequent connections can supply... ~Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814

My Nerves...

Today we ended up sending the dossier to Tallahassee for certification sans-homestudy. Then we sent off our marriage certificate for authentication, to San Francisco. I really hope I didn't mess something up! I get so nervous when it comes to this point, especially with the China authentication step. Next step, we have the homestudy appointment this week and I do not know how long it will take to have the paper work in my hands, from there. When I do get it, I will have to send it to Tallahassee and begin the immigration process. lately the children have been driving me bonkers. I probably, have been driving their patience also with all of us. I cannot wait for Legoland myself! Latest with the kiddos: Frederick is really growing up since he's turned 11 he's become super handsome and kinda moody too...they call it the 'tweens'. I had to pay mackenzie $20 to allow my to cut his hair. He has a beautiful head of hair on him, but his ears don't get cleaned well when the hair is constantly, dangling in them. He looks darling, but he doesn't think so...He too is losing his baby face. Noah's reading, is really improving since we've been homeschooling. He is alot more confident now that mommy has more time for him. Hopee, is starting this new screaming thing that's got me squinting at times. She is still her stubborn self and refuses to sit in her car seat-she insists its for 'mei mei' and that she is not a baby anymore. I do appreciate her maturity, but at times she's growing up too fast its scary. Oh ya...I am painting around the house to fix some of Hope's art work and preparing a spot for Faith in Hope's room or maybe in my room-I'm not sure which yet...and I am painting some old frames and rearranging stuff-NESTING SEASON HAS STARTED.....my husband is so groaning;)

It's Monday again...

Things left to do: I need to notarize papers for our dossier-if Fred could only get home in time.. I need to have Fred send the papers to Tallahassee for certification-not apostilles via USPS. I need to send off our marriage certificate that is already certified, to San Francisco's China consulate for authentication (ughh we just had to get married in Las Vegas). I need to get the homestudy completed, so that I can send it to USCIS and get fingerprint clearance. Then when our certified papers come back from Tallahassee, I send the to the Houston Chinese consulate for authentication. I'm biting my nails in suspense....all of China's papers must be withing 6 months. Well, on the positive side-we were given 6 free tickets to LEGOLAND! Yippeeee...Thank you SISSY! My poor kids deserve it though. Homeschooling families get a major discount on 'homeschooling days' look into it if you homeschool! http://florida.legoland.com/en/buy_tickets/Groups/education/Home-School-Days/ Uhmm what else? Well the last few nights I have been stressing and dreaming up medical diagnosis and waking up stressed with headaches. I have really began praying in a different way, and I think it has been God's intentions. God has given me much peace since about Faith-its miraculous because I was a mess. Life is truly a mystery, and if you're up for it, God will stretch ya! This stretching has been good for me, since I can be a control freak-it is good to trust Him. Amen

Homestudy session 1

Today we are meeting with our social worker at 6:30pm in her office-yeah! Have never done so with a photo of a baby girl in our hands already;) Well of course we arrived late! But Adrienne our new social worker was so kind and great about it-phew. I really like her perosnality, I think for this adoption she is perfect for us.She brought up a lot of great points and asked us about Faith's diagnosis and our resources thus far. Don't think my mind was not going a mile a minute! We meet up with her one more time, on the 19 and that is going to be like a four hour affair. But she said to get it over with, since we need this paperwork done already. You'd think that I would have notarized and sent things already but I haven't! I've been so exhausted-emotionally over all of this! I want to thank you guys for your support and for reminding me that I have always been a worry-wart;)Cannot wait till you get to see pics of her. We have to wait until we are locked in as her family.

LETTER OF INTENT-SENT!

God has confirmed for us that this referral is our little girl! We received another video and medical update-and this little girl is vivacious! I am so thrilled that the stress is gone..and no more doctor woes are standing in our daughter's way. Thank you for all of your prayers, I knew that we were covered in them. And the Lord has answered...we are humbled and so over joyed with such a treasure from above.

More Praying Please..

When we stare at her picture we are sure she is ours-we're already calling her Faith and agree she suits her name. Then we heard from our pediatrican yesterday; Yes just yesterday, after church. He was very kind, patient and thorough with us about our daughter's medical report. But he said her file seemed 'too risky' to him. He thought she might have some developmental delays-this for some reason scared me the most. She has been diagnosed with Meningocele and has never been operated on. There is a good chance she may or may not need surgery in the future. I never thought much about her development, being in an orphanage you can't assume she's going to be writing speeches. But still, he made me cautious-maybe too cautious. My husband has been so firm and solid about this little girl being ours-it's astonishing. CCAI has been so supportive and patient with us, and so we are reviewing some more before we move ahead and modify our adoption petition-to a letter of intent (LOI) specifying this little girl as our daughter. You would think after Russia-this would be smooth sailing and I would be as brave as a horse. I feel more like a donkey! I feel lost, and confused..and I have more information in front of me then I had for Hope in Russia (where I had actually travelled for the info). China does a better job with the details and photos, I have her daily schedule and the name of her nannie. I just pray for peace of mind. I hope to soon be past this stage and share photos of the little girl, who has shaken things up around here in the last few days like thunderstorms-not to mention I've caught a cold!

FLASHBACK....Faith looks almost identical to her big sister...

TADA.....YES I FIT RIGHT IN MOMMY-LOOK AT ME! Big sister Hopee's, early photos in Russia. I can't show you yet...but in case you forgot or in case you did not follow Hope's story-http://hope-ourbabygirl.blogspot.com/2009/12/doe-meeting-hope.html CHECKED *Same chubby cheeks *Same button nose *Same terrible hair cut *Same spunkiness *Same love in our heart TADA.....YES I FIT RIGHT IN MOMMY-LOOK AT ME!

SURRRREAL!

Saturaday-evening, we got back from Haiti. I have not really blogged about Haiti just yet-as we are still adjusting to being home. The pictures are still in the camera...and a picture can say a thousand words but we have a thousand more thoughts in our heads about the wonders of Haiti. I will post here, what I wrote for our church's blog. I think that will be easier as far as this blog goes. on our other blog http://reachinggodsplan.blogspot.com/ I will post further thre about details of some brothers and sisters we met and their experiences-I owe that to them and all of their hard work. Sunday-Morning, we celebrated the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ! I taught my 3, 4 & 5 years olds, despite being oh so tired! People from church all wanted to know about our trip to Haiti. So Freddy, was very busy in a group explaining his Haiti exprience-he was such a champ with his mechanical abilities. Monday-I tried to get on track with homeschool-the kids were not thrilled...but we're finishing up cycle one of Classical Conversations and I cannot wait to go back review. Tuesday-is our P.E. park day where they get to do activites and sports with other homeschoolers-they usually look forward to that. But Daddy had other plans; he called me up and told me we were going to a park, only with him instead. You don't even want to know why he wanted to take us to the park with him! He wanted us to film him try out 'JETLEV' I can go into details about it but I'll just post a link so you can see for yourselves-its all the rage around here in South Florida. http://www.jetlev.com/#!/page_performance I just read a book instead while the kids filmed daddy-he's not too thrilled with how that turned out. I am reading a very powerful book right now that my friend bought me for my birthday I recommend it to any parent 'The Power of a Praying Parent' by Stormie Omartian. She has written many books 'Power of a praying husband/wife/woman/parent to adult children etc. Its AMAZING-READ IT! I feel so blessed to be reading it and its so wonderful to experience parenthood-but more so with the Lord. Ok when we returned home on Tuesday we were kind of bickering at eachother back and forth because we were hungry, the kids didn't want to leave the park and Freddy said Mackenzie filmed more of the sky then him jetleving...hehe then the phone rang! Freddy picked it up and he said I needed to come over to the phone...I naturally felt alarmed because all I have been hearing lately, is bad news. So I ran over and he had speaker phone on and then he went to get his camera...I still didn't hear anything..but then I heard it her name in Chinese-our Faith. I still was guarded (strangely) and I just took in the indformation, her 'special need' something I had checked 'maybe' on...Freddy was emotional and I told him "Now Freddy we have to pray because we said maybe on this special need'. We prayed ahead of time took a breath, and ran to the computer to open her file-and we saw her picture and instantly started BAWLING! She is a picture of Hopee at that age-she's 2 years old. When we met Hope we had nothing to compare her to and it was hard to make a connection at first. But when we looked at Faith, it was sureal-she is undoubtedly-our daughter, our 'mei mei'....our file is not even registered with China yet. This is crazy! Our friends are so excited for us they came over to peak and we are now praying for them to hear word of their girl. We sent a picture to my mother in law;) She was surprised...but she is happy for us. Its not the same when you are on baby #5...people start looking at you funny-hehe. We're ok with that though-its supposed to be weird. Uhm, what else can I say? I sent her file to our pediatrician and some other specialists. We have not heard back from our pediatrician yet, but the peds. neurosurgeon, said we will keep an eye on her and deal with things as she grows. We are praying for her little body to remain strong as she seems so resilient. She's a little younger then I had expected...but I think its better for Faith to get care now and the love she deserves now. We will have to rush things now, and we have to change our adoption petition to a 'letter of intent' specifying for Faith as our daughter-Praise God! Three times I saw this scripture in Haiti: Proverbs 3:5 New International Version (NIV) 5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding My husband these past few days has been a better example with this scripture than I have. I am sure the Lord showed me that scripture because He knows how I am. I need to ocntrol everything, I need to understand the ins and outs and worse case scenarios....but I need to just see and listen. The doctor's can say so much...but God knows. Adoption has declined in China and everywhere else internationally...I pray that if it is in your heart to squeeze in one more-please do. We have it so good compared to others. I know it isn't perfect...but what is true perfection and/or prosperity? We just are so blessed in this country we don't get it. The rest are starving...dying...being persecuted for being a woman or a child. Please don't close your eyes...humanity is calling out for a Savior. God might send you.

WE GOT THE CALL!

At 2:22 pm our phone rang from the Colorado office. All I really heard was an adorable, two year old little girl is awaiting your in your email and her condition is something you checked 'maybe' on-we are currently reviewing her file with our pediatrician. I will post more as we find out more, but when we prayed and then opened her file we both cried as she is an exact image of our Hopee!