Don't Worry, Sugar, We're Coming!

Hey, we’re waiting AGAIN! This time we’re waiting to travel to bring home the most beautiful baby in all of China. AND we’re still waiting for our I171H from our very own government. Since we couldn’t get an answer from the Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) office to any of our phone calls or emails, we made an appointment using the online appointment maker, no real person involved there either, and drove 3 hours just to ask, “What is the status of this piece of paper that we must have before we can bring our adorable baby girl into the United States?” Basically we were told that the woman who does that job has been on vacation. Apparently, she is the only person in that office who knows how to do her job. I know it’s selfish of me, but I sure hope nothing happens to her before she processes our I171H. I surely don’t want to make another appointment to drive back over and stand at a window and discuss my personal business in a room full of bored immigration-challenged persons with nothing better to do while waiting their turn but to listen to our personal saga, only to be told that I need to quit holding up the line and accept the fact that the USCIS is completely inefficient. They are after all part of Homeland Security. If red tape and bureaucracy can keep our country secure, then we can all sleep easy tonight.

Introducing Miss Tabitha Jian

After two years of waiting, we have finally been blessed with an absolutely beautiful baby girl. She was born on July 23, 2005 and currently resides in Hunan, China. We can't wait to bring her home! I am totally in love with her tiny little face.

We met with our agency at 1:30 today to get the preliminary information and will get a package tomorrow with a few more details. G-Daddy and I both gasped when we saw her picture and tears sprang into our eyes. We couldn't be happier.

All the grown progeny and grandkids will be visiting this weekend along with Grandpa and the chaos is beginning to ensue. More updates later.

Just One More Day, Please

Just one more day, please, and we would be announcing our referral!!!! We missed the cut off by one stinkin day. One day. “The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before August 25, 2005.” But I’m still so excited because we’re NEXT! Sometime in the month of November we will get to see Baby T’s picture and will know how old she is and where she is from and how much she weighs and so forth. Then comes the next step…you got it, shopping. Well, maybe first I’ll cry tears of joy and do the “Happy Snoopy Dance” and I’ll write lists of things to do and buy and I will call everyone I know. There’s all kinds of Real Important Paperwork that I’ll have to do and travel arrangements I’ll have to make but those are just minor details. Shopping will be the first order of business. Right now I just have this incredible nesting urge. I’ve got to go clean something.

October's Referral Eve

It’s referral eve!!!! Or thereabouts. You never know exactly when referrals will arrive from China but I do know from our agency that CCAA is busy making matches. Maybe, just maybe they’re making ours! Most likely we will just miss this round of matches but that means we WILL be next!! I’m not going to be excited about the fact that right now a darling baby girl could be matched with our family. I’m going to be calm and not even think about the fact that I could be looking at my baby’s face any time now. I’m not going to dwell on it. Nope, I’m calm and I’m not thinking about it. Not wondering what Baby T will look like, not obsessively checking my phone over and over to see if I missed a call even though the phone is attached to my waist. Not checking the Rumor Queen site every 15.5 seconds. I am having no problem concentrating on my job, finishing my sentences, remembering why I walked into a room…Wait, that’s not true, I always have problems with those things. But I am perfectly calm. DID YOU KNOW I WILL BE GETTING MY REFERRAL SOON???!!!! I WILL BE TRAVELING TO CHINA TO GET MY BABY GIRL IN DECEMBER OR JANUARY!!!! I’m calm. I’m concentrating on whatever it is that I am supposed to be doing right now.

Fingerprinted, Again or Assault with a Deadly Tampon

No we haven’t committed any crimes. At least not lately. But there’s this pesky form called the I171-H that you must have if you want to adopt a child internationally and getting the I171-H involves being fingerprinted and having a home study done complete with other types of background checks, letters of reference, and a clean bill of health. To make things more exciting and to make it even harder to adopt, each little piece of this process has an expiration date and all of them are different! Regardless of the expiration dates, we have been in this process of adopting our littlest T so long that everything has expired. Therefore, we all (me, G-Daddy, and Big T) trooped over to the Jacksonville Homeland Security Office, because only Jacksonville Homeland Security People can be trusted to do fingerprints in this area of the state. We left our liquids, cell phones, and sharp objects (of which the men in my family seem to carry a wide variety) in the car. At least I didn’t throw tampons at the guards this time. Last fingerprinting episode I was taken by surprise by the security measures and had my purse packed with all types of womanly essentials including chocolate, tampons, lipstick, lotion, books, a mirror, unpaid bills, toys, breath mints, hair essentials, a small vacuum cleaner, hand sanitizer, and so forth, very few of which were sharp objects but when combined could probably be made into some sort of weapon. When the hubby gathered up all the non-allowed objects to return them to the car, I handed over my purse. I decided at the last moment to reach over and remove my reading glasses, which, unfortunately, had that granny necklace thing on them that pulled out a dozen tampons with it and flung them all over the security guard. I guess I’m lucky tampons aren’t considered a deadly weapon or I would be blogging from my prison cell. Needless to say the guard was a little surprised. This current visit was much smoother and now we’re back to WAITING for Baby T.

More Waiting and My Birthday

Okay, so all I'm doing is waiting. I'm going through the motions of life and part of me is really participating but the rest of me is just sitting there waiting for our new daughter. I know we're near term but no one else can tell. There's no maternity clothing, no expanding waistline. Well…maybe there is an expanding waistline but it's not due to the new life that will soon join our family, it's due to all the comfort food I've been eating. I'm going to be a new mama soon and I'm really preoccupied with that knowledge. What will she look like? How old will she be? Will she love me as much as I already love her? Will she forgive me for being old? Will my other children love her? Am I ready?

I've been telling people, just a couple of more months until we get our baby for about six months now. After a quizzical look from a male coworker, I explained that it's like football minutes. You know, when there's 3 minutes left on the clock and it takes an hour and twenty minutes to actually finish the game. Someone tell China that they've used all their time-outs. There's no flag on the play, get on with the game! I've decided I should start digging and maybe by the time we get our referral, I'll have made it to China. I'll just need a really long bath. Think of all the money we'll save on airfare.

Tomorrow is my birthday and I am now two years older than I was when I started this process. I love my birthday, though, because I love living and I'll take every day the Lord gives me. This year is a milestone year for me. My mother was first diagnosed with her cancer when she was the age I am now and even though I know it's irrational, I feared my mamogram this year more than any other year. When they called me to come in for an additional ultrasound, I had a sinking feeling and all I could think was that there would be no trip to China now. Today they sent me a letter casually informing me that my "recent mamogram/ultrasound showed no signs of cancer." An early birthday present. So I can shout, "WOOHOO, IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!!!"

Introducing: The WAIT

The WAIT is a big part of our lives right now. We plan to do things when we're done waiting. Our lives will be significantly different when the WAIT is over. The WAIT started one year ago on August 26, 2005 when our adoption paperwork was officially logged-in by the China Center for Adoption Affairs. We don't know when waiting will end and all we hope is that we will have a baby girl when it does. Then we can get on with our lives and can wait for other things like baby teeth, tantrums, little girl giggles, and high school graduation.

Everyone says to be patient and I am, somewhat, but I'm really starting to despise that word. I can't buy things for the baby because I don't know how old she'll be or how big/small. Will she be here for Christmas? Will we be in China for Christmas? I can't pack for our trip to China because I don't know what season to plan for. Me, who has never been out of the country unless you count Mexico border towns, can't plan this momentous trip. And I plan trips across town!

So...what do you do while you WAIT? Right now my WAIT activities include climbing in out my bedroom window and over furniture while my husband refinishes floors; refinishing various pieces of furniture (that's a fun one); checking the Rumor Queen website for rumors roughly 560 times a day; checking the adoption agency website for concrete information at least 3 times per day even though they only update once a week; avoiding looking in the empty nursery; trying not to think about adoption at work but finding myself staring into space often; enjoying the grandkids, the famous Noodle and Hopers, and my sweet little Blond Boy; and thinking about them playing with their baby aunt, my fourth child, and imagining them all squealing as they run through my house. And if you tell me to be patient with the WAIT, I will smile at you and say through my teeth, "I am patient."

Peer Pressure and the Bedroom Window

But Mama, everybody's doing it. All my friends have one. I'm the only person I know that doesn't have one. I promise I'll feed and water it. I'll finish what I start. I'll STICK WITH IT. I won't leave it on the shelf to gather dust.

Okay, so now I have one, a blog, that is, so I promise that six months from now I won't find it all dusty under the couch and say, "Oh yeah, I forgot about that." After all I have lots of stuff to write about. I'm not just any old boring grandma of 3 (soon 4), approaching her 5th decade of life in the process of adopting from China. How many grandmas do you know that climb in and out of their bedroom windows? Of course I wasn't happy about that, but when you come home late Sunday night after a weekend trip and find out that your husband has refinished the wood flooring in front of your bedroom and the only way in is through the bedroom window, there are not many choices. After saying, "I have to do WHAT?", I could have a) found a new home and a saner husband, b) gone to the 24 hour WalMart and tried to replicate what I needed to survive the work week, or c) climbed through the bedroom window. I thought "C" was the best choice until the next morning when the husband informs me that I need to hurry up and get ready because he has to take the ladder to work. All I can say is that climbing out of bedroom windows is a lot more fun when you're sixteen and wearing blue jeans. Not that I did that, of course.