Monday, May 9, 2011

We received our letter of confirmation!

On Friday Lyndsay called us clearly excited. We had received our official letter of confirmation from China. Once we sign it and send it back to our agency, they will send it back to China and once that happens we'll get the travel approval 4-6 weeks from then. After that it's another 2-3 weeks before we LEAVE FOR CHINA!

Our care package is off to Eliza!





Today I received an email from Ann at redthreadchina.com that the care package we ordered has been put together (see pictures!) and is off to Eliza's orphanage. It will arrive within 2-3 business days. She has requested that the orphanage take some photos of the "party" which I can only assume means that because we sent a cake for the other children they will have a little party to celebrate it. If they do this then we might expect to receive these photos sometime within two weeks after the party. Oh my gosh, we could be getting current photos of Eliza even this week yet! DEEP BREATH. I'm so excited!

The care package we ordered includes two outfits, a blanket, a toy, some candy for the orphanage staff (that I hope will be shared with the older children), two letters Ann translated for us (one to Eliza and one to her caretakers), a photo album which we were allowed to supply family photos for and a disposable camera for the caretakers to take pictures of Eliza over the next few weeks until we arrive to get her.

You'll notice in the photos that there are Chinese characters. We named the photos with who is in them "mama_daddy" or "brother Nick and brother Kaden" and she translated so the staff at the orphanage can tell her who we all are. I love this idea so much, that she'll see our faces before we arrive. I'm so hoping that helps her understand, it will be a hard transition for her to leave everything she knows to go with two strangers. But all my friends with Chinese children have remarked how quickly their children bonded with them so we can only hope that it happens as quickly for Eliza. Not so much for our sake but for hers.

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Sine then....

Tomorrow marks week FOUR that we received Eliza's file. I thought the time would crawl by but it has flown instead, every minute bringing us closer to our child. We have spent the time frantically finishing the nursery details (paint touch-ups, etc) only to move all of our bedroom furniture into the nursery so we could finish refinishing our floors and the hall as we'd always planned. It is making me nuts to have the house torn up when I am desperate to be putting it all together in preparation for Eliza. We've also made a two-page list of everything we have to do before we bring her home, a list that is really only a partial list.

So far we have: shared our happy news with the people we love, friends and coworkers and facebook :), painted our bedroom, sanded the floors, registered at a baby store (that was surreal), purchased a crib, started the spring yard preparation (although we'll have fewer flowers this year since we're conserving our cash), started cleaning out closets, stock piling gifts (people are so sweet and excited for us), hung the new curtains in the baby's room (love them!), made doctor appointments, started planning leave for the trip, connected with friends who have also traveled to China for their children and went out of town to celebrate my last childless mother's day (so fun). I'm sure I'm forgetting things and there are a million things left to do but I do each with happy anticipation because we know why we are working so hard.