A little of this and a little of that

I have been working on my blog. This computer stuff is tricky. I have been trying to put in my blog "sidebar", blogs that I like to visit. I think I have tried at least 20 times to do it and can never get it to work. Finally, today I got it to take, but the blogs were at the very top of my page. So, I tried many new things and got it to work. Now you can look to the side and if you click on those blogs it will take you to the blogs I like to visit. One thing I have found out is that there are tons of blogs out there on adoption. I really have enjoyed reading them because it has taught me alot about what to expect when we get Annaka home.
I posted our blog address in my Christmas letter this year so I better make this look like I know what I am doing.
On to Annaka. We sent our paper work for our visa's to Virginia today. We have to get those done in order to travel. We have a tentative date set for our travel conference call. Decmeber 29th or January 2nd. We will talk with our agency about travel plans and hopefully get every thing laid out so we can go get Annaka!
Things have been really busy so time is flying. This weekend we are having both Ally and Andrew's b-day parties. Ally's is on Saturday, we are taking her and her friends swimming and to pizza. Sunday is Andrew's. He is going to go bowling with his friends.
We also have our annual TIKI / Christmas party. We have great neighbors. We started our TIKI nights about 4 years ago. We get together at each others houses about once every one or two months (sometimes more sometimes less). One neighbor has 2 girls and the other has 3 girls. So together we have 7 children and 6 adults. We BBQ, talk, have fires, and just have fun. Its really nice and I love having such great friends for neighbors. Last year we started our Christmas caroling. We hooked up our trailor and pulled it around with our 4 wheeler. We sang at the other neighbors houses. I laughed so hard, I almost wet my pants. The kids loved it!
Then we come back and have hot chocolate and the kids open their christmas presents.
So, tomorrow is the 2nd Annual Sacramento Subdivision Christmas Caroling (as we call it)!

One week ago..

One week ago we got the phone call. I still can't believe we actually received our referral. We were not supposed to get it. The CCAA had said the cut off date was September 8th. I was bummed, but it was going to be only one more month. Now that I have Annaka's picture I cant imagine tyring to wait one more month. It is amazing how bonded you can feel with a picture. I think part of that is because we have worked so hard to get to this point and waited so long. She was worth every day of waiting.
We hope to hear this week about our travel. I am so anxious to hear when we will be going to get her. I dread the plane ride but I will grin and bear it since the end result is taking Annaka home.

This is the picture that came attached to Annaka's health information. She is sooooo cute!!

What a week...

This has been such a exciting week. We were so surprised to receive our referral. Annaka is beautiful. She is 10 1/2 months old and weighs around 16 pounds.
We hope to travel in January to get her.
Ally and Andrew were so happy when I showed them Annaka's picture. They knew exactly what I was going to show them when I said I had a surprise. I tried to record them seeing her for the first time but I forgot to push "record"...
We also got Annaks's health information, she is healthy. She weighed 14.5 pounds on Oct. 10th. So I am figuring she weighs around 16 pounds right now. Her birthday is January 20th which is the same date of Laney our best friends that are also adopting and received their referral.

I have done a little shopping, I bought my first outfit at Gymboree. That store is dangerous, I don't think I will be going in there to often.

We are starting to get ready for Annaka's arrival. I can not stop thinking about her and wondering what she will be like. I carry her picture everywhere. Life feels like it is flying by with birhthday parties, christmas and planning for Annaka. I dont mind though.

The stork came after all!!

We introduce you to Annaka Wan Ci.
She was born on January 20th, 2006.
We are awaiting more information this week.
This was a total surprise to us. We thought we would be waiting until the end of December for our referral.
Once we get more information we will let you know all the details!

First time for everything

Ally and Andrew were amazed at the sight of the ocean and Mexico. The waves were pretty big for most of the trip at the ocean and they were knocked down a couple times. This is a neat picture of them shell searching.

We found out this AM that we were not included in this batch of referrals. CCAA matched up to Sept. 8th. One day short of our Sept. 9th log in date. On a positive note I can say we are going to see our daughters face next month forsure . But to be honest, it was a disapointment. I feel like if we made it this far so what is one more month. I was able to tell the kids that they will see there sisters face after Christmas, thats pretty cool they think.

Our first Snow Fall

Could it be our month, FINALLY!!

It feels real finally!! Our agency says they are very optimistic that we will be recieving our referral this month. I cant believe we are finally this close. This month has gone so fast that it has really helped pass the time.
Next friday we will be taking the kids to Mexico for 6 days. We decided that life will be changing very soon so we better take the kids some where special. Scott and I have been to Mexico 3 times and we really love it there. We have wanted to bring the kids there for a long time. The resort we are staying at is www.GranCaribeReal.com it is all inclusive and has a great program for the kids if they get tired of the sun and swimming. Ally is so excited because we will be there on her birthday. That will be very special for her.
I am a little worried that we could get a call from our agency while we are in Mexico, I am going to make sure I tell them that if they call with the news leave a message and we will call them back ASAP! I wont have the computer with me so I will let you know as soon as I can. Keep your fingers crossed that we get to see our daughter soon!!!

Birthdays!!!

Happy Birthday Scott and Jade!!

comments

I have had several people say they try to leave comments and can not. I finally looked into this and I think I found the reason. I have switched the comments to everyone and anyone can leave them. SO, feel free to try again! I would like to know if anyone even reads this??

The stork is flying

What a month it has been for the August LID's. The CCAA has been extremely slow at getting the referrals out. Finally today they updated the website and they met referral dates up to August 25th. That is great news. That means we are next, at least I hope. I am going to try hard not to get my hopes set to high, but our agency seems to think we have a very good chance of seeing our daughters face at the end of the month!

This is our issue

this is our issue... we have a 6 year old boy who is addicted to our couch. He will fall alseep in bed but always ends up on either the couch or our bed.. I really dont mind to much, but he is almost 7 and would rather sleep on the couch every night then his own bed. I have tried to tell him that when Annaka comes home he will not be able to sleep on the couch because we might be up and that would not be good.
This night I had to laugh because Scott and I were ready to head to bed and when Scott looked downstairs Andrew was on landing fast asleep. So where do you think he eneded up??? take a look.

A day at the farm

The kids went to our friends farm last weekend. They have so much fun there. Both of the kids are same age as ours and play really good together.
Ally rode Sally's horse all day. Andrew and Charlie played with the 28 cats/kittens . When I went to pick the kids up they were black with dirt. Cecila was so worried that I would be mad. I could have cared less, the kids had so much fun and it was well worth the dirty clothes!

Were so close!

The referrals were sent out and they went up to August 9th. That puts us only 4 weeks from our LID. Looking at the website I review often I would hope we could receive our referral by the end of November. Unfortunately there are some big LID's with a lot of referrals so I am not real sure if that will happen. If we do end up going out to December we would run into the China New Year in the month of January which could make our travels to get Annaka a lot more delayed. I don't think we will know anything until we see who far the CCAA matches the next month. We are getting so much closer than we were 5 months ago. I look at some of the blogs and these families are not logged in until summer of 2006. I don't think I could do it again if I had the choice. It just gets to hard to wait and wait and wait and wait and did I say wait!!
Life keeps our family busy though. That makes time go faster but everyday I go in her room and wonder when she will be home, what she will look like and how she will change our family. I cant wait to see how the kids react to having a little sister. They are so good with my neighbors little girl and my friends little boy. Ally loves to pretend she is the big sister and Andrew gets this high pitched voice when he talks to them. Kind of like how we talk to our animals... Funny.

Matching room

This is an article I found on the matching room process. I thought it might help explain some things. Heck, I even learned some thing from it.
First, they review the baby dossiers and make sure there are no issues with them. Parent dossiers were reviewed months before, baby dossiers are reviewed when they arrive and then immediately matched.
So now they have a stack of baby dossiers. They look to see how far this stack will go in the month without sending out a partial day and they pull all of those files. That is the likely cut-off date. Sometimes something happens and they don’t get this far. Sometimes something happens and they get farther.
Next they match orphanages up with agencies. This orphanage has six babies, this agency has six families. These two orphanages are in the same province and have a total of 12 babies, this agency has 12 families. When they are through with this is when (I believe) some agencies start to get information about the cut-off date.
And then they start matching individual babies to individual families. At some point during this part of the process most agencies hear from their person in the matching room to let them know how many referrals they will be receiving and from what province(s). Some agencies share this information with their clients. Some choose not to.

Update on getting Annaka home

Well, we have passed yet another month of referrals but only made it to July 22nd. That means we are only 6 weeks from our LID. Seems easy enough doesn't it. Then why is China so slow?
I have to say I am out of reasons. You get to a point that when it happens it happens. I can't explain things in china, I will just be glad to have her home and be done with the wait. Right now there are families over there getting there children. Its neat to read about them but also hard. We could still be waiting another 4-6 months if the rumors are right. I will update when we hear how far this last batch of referrals gets. There are rumors it could go to August 10th but I don't have my hopes to high...

This ones for you, SUZI!

My friend Suzi told me after she viewed my blog that I did not have any pictures of Andrew on it . SOOOOO , this one is for you! My friend Kay found this Mr. Incredible costume at a garage sale. Here he is!

First day of school

I am finally getting a post in here. Getting started on the first week of school and getting back into the groove can be hard. All and All this week has gone pretty well. I have only had to email the teachers a couple times about forgetting things.
This is a picture of my neighbors and Andrew's "girlfriend" Jackylynn. She is the one on Andrews left (notice the hand holding). Nex t to her is my friends daughter Kelsey and behind her is her sister Laura. Behind Andrew is Ally.
Jackylynn and Andrew are so cute. There friendship blossomed last year when Andrew would help Jacklynn get back and forth from daycare to school on the bus. Jacklynn was really scared and Andrew helped her by sitting with her and consoling her. The boy has a heart of gold. I really didn't know this was going on until daycare told me what a nice job he was doing with Jacklynn. Since then he has called her his girlfriend and he means it. They even exchanged valentine gifts last year!

Passing the time

We have been so busy this last week that it is a nice way to pass the time as we wait for Annaka.
Scott's cousin, Wade came up with his wife, Paula and 3 children. This is a picture of the kids all together. Michael is the in the back and from left to right are Aly, Andrew, Nathan and Levi and of course Russell had to be in the picture. They live in Missouri. It was a nice visit. We hadn't seen each other in over 5 years. Time sure flies when you have children.
Ally went to her first Girl Scout camp this week. She stayed 2 nights. She had a great time. She says the best thing about camp was the dog "Bear". Imagine that of all the things to do at camp she likes the dog best... Her and her best friend, Gretchen went together.
The adoption stuff is about the same spot it was last time I wrote. China is still slow as ever with referrals. There are rumors that we will not get our referral until November and then would hopefully travel in January. I don't know what to think anymore. I returned an outfit I had purchased for Annaka when I thought we would be getting the referral in September. I am just tired of thinking maybe its only 2 months when it seems like it gets longer and longer. When I read the other blogs it seems like everyone is in the boat. We are all tired of waiting for our daughters to come home. I know when she is here and I will look back and say, why did I let it bother me, but until she is home it will.

The dreaded question

Today at work I was asked what day we will bring home Annaka. I get asked this a lot. I know people dont understand the process of adoption.
I tried to explain that China is continuing to be slow at referrals. Every month goes by I think maybe we are closer. But when the end of the month comes and the referrals come out we are not much closer to getting her picture than we were the month before. I know that time is going by and we are really getting closer. No matter how long we have to wait, we will wait. No matter what other changes China takes us through we will continue to talk about Annaka and think about the day she joins our family.
I think maybe by Christmas we will have her. I thought she would be home this summer. I thought she would be home by Halloween this year. No matter what we cant wait to get Annaka home.

Build a Bear Workshop

Now that I made a blog, I can show you the bear the kids made for Annaka this spring.
I took them to Build a Bear Workshop at the Mall of America and they picked her out. They got to stuff her, sew her up and give her a heart that says "I love you". When they were done they picked out the little outfit and shoes.
She is patiently waiting to be Annaka's playmate.

Our most recent family picture..

this was in taken last summer at Como park. Guess its time for antoher more recent family picture.

update on the CCAA website

this is the update we see in the CCAA website.
As we got through these next couple months I will explain more about this. Basically it takes a long time to get to the review room, but even longer it seems to get to the placement room. Since our log in date is Septmeber 9th of 2005 we are very close to getting matched but it all depends on how many other LID's there are before us.

The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before October 31, 2005.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before July 13, 2005.

One of My Favorite Pictures.

I absouletly love this picture.
Alyssa when she was 3 years old.
Could she be any cuter?

how it all began and little more

years ago Scott and I began our journey to adopt from China. It started with researching agencies to see which one fit us the best.
Once we found the right one we set up an appoinment to take the 2 day class that goes through the process of adoption and what other types of adoption are out there (foster children,or other countries ).
After the class we started the "paperwork". This is a huge undertaking. I have never kept track of all the dates we got things done, but it took us 9 months to complete.
Once we got all of our paperwork done it is called the "dossier" . This includes all of your important documents, homestudy, birthcertificates, background checks, and much much more. Our agency then sends this to China for our LID, (log in date) This is a very important date and becomes about as important as your social secuirity number. The LID is the date you are logged into China Center of Adoption Affairs or CCAA. When we initially started this we were told the wait after your LID was 6 months utill you get your referral. Referral is the picuture and health information of your little girl. When it comes you can either accept or deny it, based on what you feel the information says. Denial of referrals doesnt happen often. Unfortunetly, that wait has gone from 9 months, all the way up to 18-24 months. After you get your referral and you accept it you will travel in 6-8weeks. I thought this would be good for us to teach you the "lingo" Adoption is a pretty long journey and I was really suprised how on top of things you have to be in order to get your dossier done the correct way.
Where we are at. We are patientely waiting to get our referral. If it all goes the way we would like we would recieve it in September or October. BUT, this is something that I have become very used to. We think that could be the date but then again we thought Annaka would be home by now.
One more thing I want to add. We are very lucky and unique to also have our best frineds Michon, Raina and there 12 year old daughter Ashley adopting with us. Raina and I have been best friends since the 7th grade. Scott and Michon are best friends and recently Michon has started to work with Scott in his electrical business. We have the same LID (thats a quiz, what is LID?) and will travel together to get our daughters. They will come from the same orphange or foster home in China. We all feel this is going to be such a rewarding thing for the girls. For them to be able to play together and share things will be something very special.
I will end this, its amazing how much you can write when youare home sick with pneumonia . I cant talk with out coughing so I might as well get this blog going.

first day at this

Today is my first blog entry. I have created this to keep our family and friends up to date on our daughter, Annaka. Adopting from China has been roller coaster these last few months. With China's referrals taking longer and longer I really dont know when we will be getting Annaka home with her family.
We talk about Annaka everyday, she is a big part of life. Once she comes home our family will be complete.
Heather