The little things she does

Because of our dogs, we have to feed our cat Theo on the stairs and put a gate up to keep the dogs out (and Eliza from going up). Theo often sits on the steps and cries to be fed. Eliza likes to play in the cabinet where we keep the paper plates which we use for his food and also where we keep his cat food. She likes to move the cans around, stack and unstack them. Very two. She was playing in there earlier today, right before I took her up for her nap. On the way back downstairs I noticed that she had left one paper plate and one can of cat food on the bottom step ... seemingly for Theo. It made me smile. Smart girl!

Yesterday my mom and I taught her to pat her chest indicating "mine" which she was using today. I'm pretty sure she even said "mine" at one point. While we were practicing this she also let me know that she understands the other meaning of patting her chest, which means "Eliza". I'd say her name and she'd pat her chest. Then she looked at my diet coke and patted her chest. I had to pat my chest and say, "mommies". Ha!

Eliza at home

Yesterday marked one month since we've been home with Eliza. I can't believe how it's flown by. The time has been spent recovering from jet lag, my cold and then hers, cocooning and nesting getting to know each other. We've spent lots of time visiting Nana and Papa, aunts and uncles and cousins and taking Daddy out to lunch. I can't believe how seamless it's been, like she's always been with us (which indeed she has been for many years in a way). I know that other adoptive parents have echoed the same thing; but it's like she was meant for our family. She fits us like a glove. The boys are great with her, Nick especially. He likes having her attention and she is happy to give it. Actually all of the boys have been cute with her, even our favorite neighbor boys who are almost like family. Everyone has been so excited to have her home with us finally.

Today we visited my office and co-workers. They knew we were coming and had planned a little shower for us. I was reminded how blessed I am to work at Marquette and to have the co-workers that I do. Eliza was a hit. Her obsession with men is crazy. Of the nine men working in our office today she forced 7 of them to pick her up (some more than once) and pitched a fit when they put her down before she was ready. But she wouldn't go to a single woman. She didn't show an ounce of shyness, I've never seen such an outgoing toddler.

But by the end of the day it was evident that her runny nose of the morning (which had turned into a faucet by evening) had developed into another full-blown cold. Poor baby. Poor mommy.

I've been trying to find time to catalog the photos and finish uploading them all from our cameras, but every day -- during nap time when there is one -- seems to bring new priorities to tackle. Maybe tomorrow since we'll probably be nesting at home because of her cold.

This isn't a very exciting post but I wanted to write a little something since we just passed month one of being home. More soon.

The orphanage

We can't say enough good things about Eliza's orphanage and the nannies there. They are amazing and so clearly in love with all the children. When we visited Eliza was like a rock star, surrounded be nannies saying "Baoer! Baoer!" (her Chinese name). Her main nanny cried when we left. We joked with our guide later that it's because Eliza was so much work she was relieved to see her go. Ha! Here are some photos from the visit to the orphanage. By far my favorite is of Eliza looking into the baby play room where she used to spend so much time.

We have our daughter!

Thanks to Marquette's VPN connection we are able to sneak onto our blog and also Facebook. Woo hoo! The trip has been amazing, the people, the sites, everything. But of course nothing can beat Eliza! Gotcha Day was as magical as we anticipated. She is amazing and smart and funny and pig-headed and brave and lovely and naughty and sweet and has us wrapped around her little finger already. I won't waste too much time with stories for now, I'll just post some pics here and gush more later.

And we're off like a herd of turtles...

Yesterday was chaos to say the least. We scrambled and packed, counted and sorted money...lots and lots of money!... and picked up and bathed dogs and did laundry and repacked and picked up some more, chased some paper for our travel package, emailed our poor case manager late in the evening in desperation on some MIA paperwork, packed some more, recounted the money .... into the wee hours of the morning. We left the house at 2:30 a.m. and headed to Mitchell. By 5:30 we were in Chicago.

Now it's time to let you in on a little secret. Our travel agent, assigned through our adoption agency, is a big giant idiot. We hate her, I mean really really hate her. I won't go into it here, this is a happy place...ha!...but here's how she rolls: She originally wanted to book us directly out of Chicago. We said, "well, it's doable but it's a two hour drive and we'd rather leave from Mitchell (Milw)". She said, "Ohhhh, OK...yes, two hours is too far to drive, I'll book you from Milw to Chicago and then directly to Beijing". Excellent. Then -- after many other things that irritated, angered, annoyed and frustrated us ... we got our final itinerary exactly 11 hours before we had to be at the airport. All in military time. Did we have time to check it? Nope. If we had it would have taken her 30 hours to get back to us anyway (her average response time) so we just figured it would be fine, how bad could it be?

After finally settling on the flight to Chicago at 5 a.m., after 3 days of little sleep followed by not going to bed at all last night.(and looking forward, oddly enough, to the 14 hour flight to China so we could finally sleep)..we had time to review the itinerary. We arrived in Chicago at 5:30 a.m. .. our flight to Beijing is at 1:00 p.m. YES. A SEVEN HOUR layover, two hours from home. We could have driven here almost 3 times. We could have gone to bed. We could have almost walked here from Milwaukee.

Did I mention how much I hate our travel agent?

But with that said, here we ARE! Full of coffee with two games of Farkle under our belt. We look comical with our money belts that are oh-so-not disguised under our shirts so full of cash they are (if you want a definition of stress look under adopting internationally and the requirement to bring 10K in cash with you overseas). I actually look pregnant because of my money belt...irony at it's best. ;) Walter is passed out on the bench next to me. We'll be boarding fairly soon so wish us luck. After this it's all smooth sailing!! (Right?...please say "right!").

Next stop, Beijing.

Seven days to Eliza!

One week from today, we will be united with our baby girl. According to our itinerary, "Gotcha Day" will be Monday, August 15th, although we've been warned that she could be waiting for us at the hotel on Sunday when we arrive in Nanjing. And to complicate matters further, if we get her on Monday morning, it will actually be Sunday evening here. :) So if we cross your minds anytime between Saturday and Sunday it's a safe bet that it's because the magical moment has happened. Seven days. ONE WEEK. It is impossible to find words to express what this feeling is like. It is part disbelief, part shock, part awe and total joy all mixed up into one emotion. I had a hard time sleeping last night knowing that in less than two days we'd be boarding a plane to China. We have waited so long that there have been many points along the way that have felt more like daydreams rather than a wait. Adoption is peaks and valleys I always say. Sometimes we see her clearly and other times it's as if she has been blanketed in a mist. But now she is SO CLOSE that I'll say it again, I have no words to describe what I'm feeling right now. Maybe just this...wow.

What Ethan has to say

My nephew Ethan was over last night and wanted to see Eliza's room. Ethan is 10 years old and we call him "E". I said to him at one point, "Ethan, we're going to have another "E" in the family!" and he grinned. He also said that he would be Eliza's favorite cousin because he always wanted a little sister and he'd play with her a lot (and make her dolls fall off of a pretend cliff, etc....great). Later he asked what kind of nickname she would have "What can I cal her?" ..."Maybe 'Little E'?" His mom and I thought that was pretty cute. :) Ethan is very proud of the fact that he helped pick out the new drawer pulls for Eliza's dresser. He likes to show them off to people and say how he picked them out in part because he felt they fit nicely between the fingers as you pulled the drawer open.

He's a punk and we love him! He'll be a good cousin!

Our travel approval is here!

I got a call from our agency a little after 2:00. Our travel approval arrived! I ran around the office showing everyone the document ... I was high! Our agency will plan to work with the US Consulate in China to get our appointment for August 22 meaning we can plan to leave by August 10th!! We were told earlier (sometime around the time of the referral) that after 3 days in Beijing we'd get to Eliza's province on a Saturday or Sunday and get her either that Sunday or Monday. That means our "gotcha day!" will be either August 14 or 15th. Wow. We are so crazy happy! Walt and I opened a bottle of champagne when we met at home after work. We can't stop smiling.

Good morning, baby girl...

Dear Eliza, I have found myself each morning passing your room and stopping in to say, "Good morning, baby girl". Your room is beautiful now that it's complete, but it is empty. I can't wait for you to come and make a mess of the gorgeous pillows on the window seat, to see toys strewn across the perfectly polished floors, to come in to find the expensive curtains pulled off the rods and onto the floor. (Someone will have to remind of this oath once it actually happens ... ha!). Because until we see your sweet face in that room it will always feel incomplete.

Today is Monday. It was back to work after a beautiful and lazy weekend. Saturday we spent the day in the lake with your Auntie Alison and Uncle Michael. We laid about in floats all day and got too much sun. It was relaxing and just what we needed. Yesterday I went to brunch with Maggie and Max (I'm Max's godmother). Max is 4 and has a sister just a month older than you, Maggie and I expect the two of you to become close friends once you meet! We had our brunch at the very restaurant where your father and I made our monumental decision to begin an adoption almost 5 years ago. All we knew of you in that moment is that you hadn't yet been born but would be born in China.

During brunch with Maggie and Max I noticed at the table next to us a dad and mom with their Chinese daughter who was about 8 or 9 years old. I tried not to stare but I couldn't help watching them as I thought about how many times I've imagined taking you to that very restaurant and sitting in the very booth where we made our decision to come and find you.

As always I said goodnight to you as I passed your room.

Disappointing news about our travel approval

We were expecting to receive our travel approval somewhere between June 9-23rd. As the 23rd approached we were getting anxious. And then the 23rd came and went. I tried to control myself and not write and bug my agency about it but that lasted two days. They said that they weren't worried since it was only a couple of days outside of the window but that they would contact their liaison at the CCAA. Soon after they said the liaison said the paperwork had all arrived but she would check to be sure it was in order. Our agency suggested we hold tight as there didn't seem to be any problems. When we didn't hear anything back about problems with the paperwork we assumed that it would come any day.

Fast forward another 2 weeks. We have now been waiting a total of 8 weeks for our TA! Last Wednesday I contacted our agency again and again they said they'd contact their liaison. On Friday I made the image shown here of the DHL trucks and Eliza as my screensaver, trying to will the TA to arrive. I posted the fortune cookie image also shown here, on my Facebook page, trying to will the TA to come. Then I received a call from our agency. They had reached the liaison and it turns out that the procedure that our agency followed for sending paperwork for finalizing the match, had been changed by the CCAA but they'd never been notified. So the CCAA had all the correct paperwork but since it didn't arrive as their new process dictated, they simply sat on it.

What does this mean? It means that we should be in China RIGHT NOW but instead are delayed by another 5 weeks (if not more). I couldn't help crying as the agency delivered this latest news. Five more weeks! Five more weeks for that baby to sit in an institution. Five more weeks of development and growth and milestones we will miss seeing. Five more weeks of an empty crib in the nursery. I realize that in the scheme of things five weeks is not the end of the world but it is devastating none-the-less. We are so close!

Hang on baby girl, we'll be there as soon as we can.

Finally, a completed room for Eliza

After the referral the next few weeks were a mad rush to finish Eliza's room which we had started over two years ago. It was frustrating to have to move our bedroom furniture into her room in order for Walt to finish refinishing the upstairs floors which included our bedroom. All I wanted to do was put her room together. While Walt hammered away at the floors I was having curtains and pillows made for the windows and window seat. Once we were able to move back into our own room, I was finally able to start putting Eliza's room together. Walt went to Canada around that same time and by the time he came back, the room was pretty much complete. My two year obsession with collecting bird art for her wall collage paid off, I was very happy with the end results. Let's hope she likes birds. :)

New photos of Eliza!

In May I posted about sending Eliza a care package. That was on a Sunday night. The following Friday we were wrapping up the evening and I decided to check email one more time before bed. It was about 10 p.m. and low-and-behold, there in my inbox were photos from Ann at Red Thread China! My reaction was ridiculous! I was so excited (having had a few glasses of wine earlier made my reaction all the more animated). I screamed at Walter to come and look and together we viewed photos of our daughter, taken in the days before, enjoying the cake we sent to her and the other children at the orphanage. I couldn't believe it. She had so much hair and was still so perfectly chubby and sweet. She was wearing one of the outfits from the care package. Baby girl, there YOU ARE!!

We were also thrilled to see how clean and bright the orphanage seemed to be and that the caretakers had logos on their shirts from the "Half the Sky Foundation", a wonderful organization that provides nurture and developmental care for children in orphanages. This is a great sign.

I'm a terrible blogger

A lot has happened since we sent off the care package to Eliza, and received our confirmation letter (more on that later) but I haven't stopped to write about it. Every time I come to the blog, I realize how nice it is to look back and remember the details so starting today I'm going to try to get better at this. :)

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.

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.

Since the day our world changed forever...

Yesterday marked one week since the "file" arrived in our inboxes. It has gone by in a blur. Easter Sunday was this past Sunday and I sat in church holding her pictures. My heart swelled with an unbelievable gratitude to God for finally bringing us our daughter. We have a daughter. I can't stop saying it. I'm finally a mom. Wow.

We had the boys on Thursday night so we were able to share the news with them. I think they were shocked too. Kaden was only 5 when we started this journey (he's 10 now!). He said that he needed to practice being a big brother and a middle brother. :) Cute! Nick said he was beginning to believe he'd be 17 or 18 before she arrived home.

We travel in 9-12 weeks! We'll have her home for summer, my total fantasy. She'll be with us on our family vacation in August! How many times have I daydreamed about her being there with us? Probably a million.

Two months -- I can't stop staring at the calendar and at her pictures. I went into her room last night and just sat, picturing her there (picturing furniture there...ha).

It is a dream.

Introducing Eliza Rose Bao'er Grace!

We are over the moon and in love with our little girl! She is 18 months old and currently living in an orphanage in Nanjing, China but will be in our arms this summer!

Here's the story:

March 7, 2011: we officially switched to the Special Needs program after much consideration, soul searching, researching and a review of the list with a physician friend of a friend (thanks Amanda and Kathleen!). Our agency told us that we'd have at least a 5-6 month wait ahead of us before we were matched, on the longer end of the matching for SN once you switch programs. Longer?! We'd already been waiting 4.5 years so 5-6 months was nothing in our minds! It was within this moment that I was able to fully reconnect with the adoption because now it was back on a timeline and all my initial joy and excitement was back as well.

March 21, 2011; our first official "matching night": Even though we knew that there was no way we'd be matched in month one, I still found myself so excited as the day approached and then checked my email all throughout the night just in case. After that day we realized that even if we had longer than the 5-6 months for the match we needed to get moving on finishing the nursery (yes, two years later it still wasn't complete), planning furniture purchases, preparing our employers, etc., etc.

Matching night had been trending on the 3rd Monday of every month for several months. During the first matching night I was imagining our case manager Lyndsay and the other ladies of our agency sitting around into the wee hours working diligently to match their families. I wished I lived in the same state because I would have dropped off cookies or treats for them. But since that wasn't possible I planned to send them a box of candy that would arrive in time for matching night #2 which if the trend stayed true, would have been Monday, April 18th. But then Lyndsay let us know that it wasn't happening that Monday after all but would probably occur a week later. I complained to anyone who would listen that "oh sure, everything is predictable until we move into the program and then suddenly it is all an unknown!". :) So that Monday came and went and I simply waited for the next Monday to arrive.

Tuesday, April 19th: THE DAY I BECAME A MOM! I got back to my desk after a meeting and checked email as usual. One email that caught my eye was from someone whose name I didn't recognize having ever emailed me before (and it was only a first name). The subject line simply read "file" and there was an attachment. My first thought was "spam" so I quickly opened it anticipating deleting it soon after. And the first thing that I saw upon opening the email was the face of a Chinese baby. I didn't get it. At all. Then I read the note, it said:

Good afternoon Sharon,

I know Lyndsay sent you a thank you email but I again wanted to say thank you for the candy! That was so thoughtful! I was just on the CCAA shared list and came across this sweet little girl that I believe was designated to an agency and then just released because I have not seen her before. After I read her very positive growth report, I thought she may be a great file to share with you! Please let me know if you have any questions about her!

I had to read it several times and then I started shaking. Honestly, I don't think I have ever experienced a moment of complete confusion and shock like I had in those first few moments. What? A baby? It's not matching night. A baby? Maybe OUR baby?! I tried calling Walter (I think) and then I called two of my coworkers over to read the email for me because I didn't believe what I was reading. Their jaws dropped but they sprung into action telling me to print the files, that they would collect them while I called Walter. I don't even remember what I said when I reached him, or what he said when he read the email. I know he did ask if she was "locked in" and I said I was sure she was because the agency told us if they found a child for us on the list they'd lock her in right away. So I emailed and asked if she was locked-in and they wrote back quickly and said "no". OMG!!! NO? I wrote back a simple "lock her in!!" and then waited breathlessly to see if it was too late. But then the email came back that it was done, she was safe for 72 hours while we had the adoption clinic at Children's Hospital review her file.

When we sent the file to Children's they told us it would be Thursday before they could get back to us. I imagined the next 48 hours to be crazy hard. Wednesday around 3:30 I was surprised with a phone call from Children's! We spoke for an hour and the assessment was much what we anticipated which was all good news!

That night, Walter and I laid in bed and talked about it. Neither of us had any doubts and from the first second we read the file we had a really good feeling about it all. This was indeed our baby, our little girl!

Six weeks and one day from the time we made the switch. I'm pretty sure we broke our agencies record!