Wednesday, Jan 31st

Today we went to the Chinese Shrine and inside we saw a show.

After that Mary and Kristine took us to a village that would probably be similar to where Annaka came from. That was tough. The poverty in the village was unreal. The children followed us everywhere. They were so happy, running and talking. They could say Hello to us and were so excited. Tonight we will be going out to dinner with everyone from our group.

Annaka is doing good. We are seeing more smiles but it is still not all the time. We have noticed a lot of soothing behaviours she uses. When she wakes up in her crib she will move her head back and forth very quickly. It breaks my heart to see this. She will also rock while she sits. This morning she sat on the couch and rocked on the couch. If you know anything about Andrew, you know he does the same thing. We figure they are two peas in a pod. Our couch will be broke in no time. Kristine said that when the nannies fed the orphanes they would either go right back in their crib or in a walker so this is how they handled it. That's hard for us, we want to just love her all the time and take all that insecurity away.

Here are some of the lastest pictures. We are taking a ton of pictures but I can only post 4 at a time for some reason.

Birthday party for the girls

Jenny got a Birthday cake for the girls last night. It was Amelia's 1st birthday. All of them liked the cake. Getting a picture of all them was a bit tough though.

Today we are going to a shrine and to watch a dancing preformance.

The newest BFF's to join the Ketchum-Binner families...

Laney and Annaka having there first "girl talk".....

FOR MY BIG SISTER and BIG BROTHER

hi Ally and Andrew,

we miss you guys!! Annaka is sure lucky to such a good big sister and big brother!!

She is excited to see you guys! Are you having a good week? How was school today?

We love you THIS MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! mommy and daddy xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

4:30 am

Good Morning~ We are up , its 4:30. The time difference is still not the easiest t0 get used to.

Annaka is doing good she is sleeping right now and off course Daddy is holding her while he watches some TV. Yesterday was a really busy day. We started getting on the bus at 10:45, the civil affairs office is across the street but you wouldn't want to cross the street here. Seriously, the traffic is unreal. The cars, buses, mowpads and bikes do what ever they want when ever they want to. If you want to turn you just start to turn, it doesn't matter if there is a bus coming at you. When we got there we were the only 4 families there. The room was very nice and big, but cold! About 10 minutes after we were there, they brought the babies in. There was about 7 staff to about 14 babies. When they put them down on the benches they would just tumble over, they were sooo bundled up they wouldn't get hurt anyway. We tried to find Annaka, but I think we were looking at Carol and Mikes' baby. When they started to give us the babies, they call your name and you have to show them your passport then the man says "this is you baby". Some babies are quiet some are loud (I wont name names...Laney!). Annaka was pretty quiet, she would cry but not bad. After we all got our babies we were able to leave. The bus took us back and we were told by Kristine not to bathe them or change their clothes. I was glad she told us because the first thing you want to do is clean them but we didn't. WE did take off her socks though! She has very cute, little feet. Except they sink horribly!!She feel asleep at 1:00 and then I had to go to sign papers at 1:30. Michon and I went down and Raina and Scott would meet us down stairs at 2:00. Laney was having a harder time. She was crying a lot more and didn't want much done with her. She did let them feed her and with a fight she got her diaper changed. They all handled it different and Raina and Michon did great with her.Then Scott and Raina went downstairs they had to sign the papers and the girls got their foot prints done. After that it was back to the civil affairs office. We had to get a family picture for her birth certificate and then we met with another lady who asked us why we choose adoption. Then of course we had to give them the amount of money they needed. I let Scott handle that part. It was glad to get rid of all that cash. They gave us a very beautiful vase as a keepsake for Annaka. When we got Annaka from her orphanage we also got a beautiful necklace for her and a business card form the orphanage. I thought that was very nice of them. I was not expecting that.We had one more stop. We had to get in the bus again and go to yet another building for the notary of the documents. We all got called family by family and we were asked questions by a gentleman, while Kristine translated what we said. When I was asked what my age was I said "36 then I said, oh no, Raina is 36 I am 35!!" GOOD GRIEF! I think Kristine thinks we are connected at the hip!After that it was done, Kristine said ,"Congratulations you are legally your daughters parents."

Annaka was still doing great, she was just watching everyone. We hadn't gotten a smile yet. Then Michon came in and did the tickle trick and she started to laugh and smile. that was really nice to see. We went downstairs to eat with Raina, Michon and Laney. Laney was doing much better, she was very content and takes it all in. I have yet to hold her though, maybe today. We attempted to eat, its just not same as American food. The girls down in the restaurant are so cute. They asked me what Annaka's Chinese name was and when I said it they all started to giggle. I asked them what they were giggling about and they said, " superstar" I guess Wan Ci Ling is a famous superstar in Tokyo. After supper we visited in our room with Raina and Michon and Laney. Annaka was giving Laney a hard time cuz shes a "superstar!"Then we decided it was time for a bath, she did good. She cried but we got her clean and it felt good. Scott said her feet still smelled. She took a bottle and was asleep. I was up with her at 12:30.Annaka is so cute, she is so much littler than I expected. She has a lot of hair for all those barre ts I bought. Today we are going to a park and then another store to buy more baby supplies. I suppose diapers and baby food. We will get more pictures of both girls today and post them. It was hard to get alot of pictures of Laney yesterday. I will leave you with this picture of Annaka.

More pictures!

HERE SHE IS!!!!!!!!!

Introducing ANNAKA WAN CI BINNER.

She is better than we every imagined.
The 3rd picture is Laney!!

Bottom picture is us after we got back to the hotel.

A couple pictures for your viewing pleasure

The first pitcure is for "Grampa Lee" Love, Heather

The second picture is outside Riana and Michon's room. We are thinking this was a school doing morning exercises and saying the national anthem.

Annaka's Crib

In less than 16 hours we will have a baby to go in this crib. It still doesn't seem real to me. I just cant imagine having her with us.

We met with Kristine and she said we will get the babies and then we will go back to the hotel. About 3 hours later we have to do paperwork then we go to the Civil Affairs Office for more paperwork and for our "family picture".

Kristine took us to a store just a block away so we could get our supplies. WOW, do the people stare at us! We asked Kristine if they were okay with us adopting or are they angry at the people that come over to get the babies. She said the people here are happy to have us take the babies. She said they will swarm you when you are out with the babies. To only let them touch their hands and face and not let them hold her (we wouldn't anyway). I am just amazed at the people who just stare. They don't care if we see them or not. They are just amazed by us. It is a very weird feeling to say the least.

Well, Scott is down at Raina and Michon's room so I guess I will head down there.

Then next time I post it will be with a picture of Annaka!!

We made it!!!!

We finally made it. I am not going to sugar coat and say it was a easy flight because it was really hard!!! Our first flight was over 13 hours, that took us to Tokyo then we went from Tokyo to Guangzhou and that was 5 hours. 17 hours on a plane is really hard! We got to our hotel last night at 12:00am and had to be back to the airport at 7:00am this morning. We only flew for 1 hour to get from Guangzhou to Nanchang. Its nice to be here, Scott and I got lucky. They over booked the hotel and we got upgraded to a big room. It has a couch and desk with plenty of space for Annaka and Laney to crawl around. The other couples are very nice. The first couple is from the Cities and the other couple is from New Jersey. Today we will meet up with our guide Kristine at 3:00 to go over the BIG DAY. We have to go through our documents and then she will take us to a store to stock up on water, pop, formula and rice cereal for Annaka.We just ate at the restaurant in the hotel, the food is really different and we are hungry. We are hoping to get some food at the store to keep in our room. Our appointment is at 11:00 tomorrow. I still cant believe that she will be ours after that.

We miss you Ally and Andrew. We have the sign up that you made us Andrew in our room so we can look at it everyday. We also have the list you made Ally of all the fun things you want us to bring back.. Hugs and Kisses!!! XOXOXOXOX

It's Time

We are ready!!! Suitcases packed, backpacks ready, documents are all ready to go.
We have had so many well wishes and we really appreciate everyone's support through out this journey (even our TIKI friends who at times thought we were making the whole thing up!).It has been an up and down road. We never expected it to take this long. Ally was 6 and Andrew was 4 when we started our journey. Ally is now 9 and Andrew 7. I think they are great ages to be big sister and brother. That is the one thing I am really looking forward to. We have had some tears from Ally tonight about leaving, but I think they will be okay. Between school, dance, church and having Grama and Grampa here time will pass quickly.
Raina and Michon are ready to go and I thank God we get to experience this with our best friends. Not to many people get to have a journey that they get to have there buddies with them the whole way through. Annaka and Laney will continue to see each other after the plane lands and we go home. That is really something special.
So, this is it... 2 1/2 years later we are finally ready to go get our daughter.. Thanks for all the well wishes and prayers! I will try to post from Tokyo tomorrow night but if I can't we will post as soon as we can. Love, Heather and Scott

Packing

Well, we are getting more and more ready. I have now packed Annaka's stuff 2 times. I hope that is it! I have to put my clothes on top of it all,so I better be done.
Tomorrow I have to bring my cat, Echo out to my Mom and Dads'. Echo is 20 so he needs some special attention while we are gone. The kids are off school tomorrow so that will be nice to have them with me. They are getting so excited. I have planned some neat surprises while Scott and I are gone to keep their mind off of how long the trip will be. Scott's Mom and her husband, Gordy will be staying with the kids while we are gone. I can't tell you how much that helps to know that the kids get to stay in their own surroundings. Scott and I are feeling a little nervous, excited, overwhelmed, anxious.. You name it I think we have felt it.
1 more day till we leave!

Could this be Annaka?

I joined a group of families who have gotten their children from the same orphanage as Annaka. When I opened my email yesterday one of the members had written saying she had taken some pictures at the orphanages when they had traveled there about 3 weeks ago while getting their daughter. She posted them on her blog and wanted to see if we recognized any. This is the one we think looks a lot like Annaka. We have stared at this picture with Annaka's referral picture and Scott swears it is her. Its not the most pleasant picture, but not many of the pictures were. Our friends were really lucky, there was 3 pictures of their daughter on it. That was really neat! The pictures were a eye opener for us. I am just so thankful that she will be in our arms in a week. So, what do you think? Is it her?

Birthday Cake Baking

Here are some pictures of the chef's preparing Annaka's Birthday Cake.

Happy Birthday Annaka!!

Today is Annaka's First Birthday. It feels weird to have a daughter out there who is one today, that we can not hug, tell her we love her or celebrate her day with her.
Ally and Andrew are going to bake a cake for her today and we will sing to her. I think when she gets older she would like to know that we celebrated her special day. We are thinking of her a lot.
It is getting so close. The biggest thing now is to get our paperwork in order. I just want to make sure we are bringing all of the correct documents.
We are going to meet up with Raina and Michon before we leave go through everything.
At this time next week we will be in China. yyyiiipppeeee!!!

8 more days

WOW! We leave in 8 days. Time is flying by.
We got our travel intineary yetsterday. The best part is the 2nd day we are there we will get Annaka.
Here is the trip planned out...Remember we leave on Jan 26th but arrive in Tokyo onh Jan. 27th.

Nanchang
01.28 Pick up four families with CZ3539 at 9:55a.m.at Nanchang airport, transfer to Galactic Peace
International Hotel.
01.29 Families meet and get babies in the Civil Affairs office in the morning.
Take family pictures, do registration in Civil Affairs and notarization. Apply for babies’ passports in
the afternoon.
01.30 Shopping for babies.
01.31 Sightseeing tour. Check notary papers.
02.01 Sightseeing tour.
02.02 Get babies’ passports. Fly to Guangzhou with CZ3536 at 4:20p.m.
Guangzhou
02.02 Pick up families with CZ3536 at 5:45p.m. to White Swan Hotel.
02.03 Take babies’ visa pictures and have medical examination for the babies.
Fill out INS forms for the consulate interview.
02.04 Sightseeing tour in Guangzhou.
02.05 Interview for the families.
02.06 Get babies’ visas in the afternoon.
02.07 Fly Home

Stressing

I think I might be getting stressed out. I have been trying to get everything done. I have everything bought for the trip for Annaka. Today we went and found a little snow suit. I think we are going to be outside a lot sight seeing so we needed something warmer than a coat. I have read that the people there will come up to you if your daughter is not dressed warm. They really like to dress the little ones warm. I have made a list now, so I can keep track of everything. We have gotten most of our stuff we need for the trip bought. The only thing that we still need is a plug for the computer. We had to buy 50.00 dollars worth of plugs just to use our blow dryer! I would wear a hat, but I am afraid that would scare Annaka.
That's the other thing I am getting really nervous about, Annaka. How will she be? Will she like us at first, or will she be afraid? Will she want to be held by both Scott and I or just me? Will she sleep? ugh!! See, I am stressing!!! It will all be okay, I know. Its just getting so close! I am not complaining I have waited to long for this to complain. I just need to take a very deep breath! UGH!

Were on our way

We have gotten our travel dates!

We will be leaving on Friday, January 26th at 1:10 pm and arrive in Tokyo at 4:40 PM (there time, 14 hours ahead of us).
Then we go from Tokyo to Guangzhou (6:10 to 10:45pm). We will have to spend the night in Guangzhou that night.
On Sunday January 28th we go from Guangzhou to Nanchang (8:30AM to 9:55AM).
I think we will be exhausted from traveling, so I am assuming it will be a day of rest. If we can, because the next day we will get Annaka!!
As far as the rest of our travels I am not sure. As of now we know we will be traveling home on February 7th.
There is a lot that goes on in those 11 days. We have different places we have to go to get Annaka's Visa and Passport before we travel home. She will not be a US citizen until we hit ground in the good old USA!
Over 2 years we have been doing this. Its still really hard for me to believe that in less than a month we will meet our daughter, bring her home and have her forever!!!
I have been busy getting stuff together for a baby. Its like starting over. I attempted to put the car seat in my van this morning and I couldn't even figure out how to work the thing. Scott is going to have to help me figure this one out. We got bottles, diapers, wipes, toys, medicine, shoes and CLOTHES. I have to say the clothes part is the best. They couldn't make any cuter clothes for girls. I cant wait to see what they have in China, Raina and I have heard things are very cheap!
well, till I hear more I will sign off.
Andrew is having his first sleep over with a boy from his class. He has been talking about it all week. He and "John" are down stairs playing the play station. Unfortunately for me ,that means I have to cook a real supper....

TA's or almost

Our agency contacted us today to let us know that they got travel approval from China for our group to travel . I guess I thought that would be a date to travel, but unfortunately not. Now they fax them back and with in 48 hours they will let us know the date of the consulate appointment. She said to expect a date by Friday. So, more waiting!!! I have never waited so much in my life!
She thought it would be January 26 or 27th. I am still keeping my fingers crossed for January 18 or 19th. Then we would get Annaka on her 1st birthday! How neat would that be.
I haven't mentioned much about our friends that are also adopting mostly because I want to ask their permission first, but our daughters share the same birthday. So it will be double special.
I don't think they would mind me telling everyone that. And no, they are not twins.
So until we hear more I will sign off~

Tiki Night Chistmas Caroling 2006

No travel date yet

We had our telephone conference call on Friday. It lasted 2 hours. We got lots of information about what to expect when we get to China and what we will see. Our agency thinks we will be getting our travel date this week so we should be able to get things moving.
With Chirstmas and everything else this month, things are moving very quickly. We cant wait to go get Annaka and bring her home.
Life will be a lot different but well worth it.

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?