Merry Christmas, Baby Girl

We've been thinking of you all day. Big sister and I have talked about which toys you will like to play with. She has chosen which Thomas book is to be yours, even though Santa brought them both to her. We love you, and we just want you home with us. Sigh. It's too hard to think about how you've spent this day. I hope you were warm, and safe, and not hungry. Oh, my baby. I promise this is the last Christmas you will ever spend in an orphanage. I'll be there soon.

Mama

I Could Use a Little Levity

No More Single-Parent Adoptions

Well, I guess my family can stop worrying about me becoming the “Crazy Chinese Kids Lady” – you know, like the Crazy Cat Lady, except the “Crazy Chinese Kids Lady” collects Chinese kids instead of cats. That won’t be me. My little family will be officially finished when Elizabeth comes home. The folks at the China Center of Adoption Affairs (CCAA) have decided that as of May 1, 2007 no more single parents will be allowed to adopt children from China. What a sad, sad decision this is for thousands of families – and even sadder for the children who will never be adopted. They (the CCAA) say they have twice as many families waiting to adopt as they do children available for adoption. So, I guess they figure they can be a little more choosy about who they allow to adopt. And everyone know a two-parent family is always better than a single-parent family (cough, cough, choke, choke – gag). At any rate, I am just thankful that I am already logged in and waiting for mei-mei. I can’t even imagine how heart-broken I would be if I were one of the many single women who will now have to give up on their dream of a beautiful Chinese daughter. It makes me weepy to even think about it.

Santa's Little Helper

After 2 years of refusing to go any where near the fat guy in the red suit, I finally got a picture of Olivia on Santa’s lap. Not only did she hop right up on the old guy’s lap and tell him what she wants for Christmas (a baby doll and a princess nightgown), but she even introduced her reluctant little friends to her old pal Santa. She’s growing up so fast!

She's 16 months old today

My baby girl is 16 months old today. Sigh. When I first saw her face, she was 11 months old. Five more months of her life passed without a family. Damn. Today is officially day 47 of the TA wait. At the rate things are going, we aren’t even half way there yet. I want my baby home.

Where in the World is E-Baby?

Yeah, that face about sums up our vacation!

Tinkerbelle Lives!

And she spent the night at my house Tuesday night. Olivia had so much fun running around the neighborhood in her Tink costume that she slept in it. I drew the line at wearing it to Julie's the next day. Hey, a mom's gotta draw the line somewhere, right? Who am I kidding? Hell, if she'd have pushed it, she'd probably still be in costume today (although I would have insisted on clean panties, since we all know how hard it is to be pretty when you're wearing dirty panties).

We Have a LID! 10/18/06

Now if you don’t follow Chinese adoptions, that sentence just isn’t going to make sense to you. No, I haven’t been out shopping for new cookware, and I didn’t buy a new hat. What we have is a Log In Date (LID) – a date when the CCAA actually logged in our paperwork to adopt Elizabeth. That magic date is October 18th. Yes, they already said we could adopt her, but we still have to go through another process before they will issue a travel approval (known as a TA). Currently, it is taking about 90 days to get travel approval after you are logged in. Hopefully that means I’ll hear something about the middle of January. Yippee! Elizabeth is coming home. Not soon enough, but she is coming home!

Letter to the Director of Elizabeth's SWI

亲爱的送养人姜有泉，
我叫当劳(名)汤蒙森(姓)。我获准领养您院的石秋英。希望大约过三个月，我就可以去中国和她相聚。

随信寄来的包裹，里面一些东西给秋英，一些给您和您的职工。包裹里还有一个相机。我请您用它给秋英照像。 请您多照一些秋英和她的小朋友合影；照秋英和保育员的合影；照秋英和您的合影。将来秋英长大了，这些照片会让她记住您们。包裹里还有我提的一些关于秋英的问题，请您帮忙找到答案。等我去中国和您见面时，请您把相机和问题的答案一起交给我。拜托您了。

我非常感谢您和保育员对秋英的精心照顾。盼望早日与您们相见。

致礼！

当劳 汤蒙森

2006年10月24日


Thanks, Joan. It certainly looks great!

Some Days are Harder Than Others

William Thomas Carr

10/23/1971 – 09/10/1998


I will see you in the light of a thousand suns
I will hear you in the sound of the waves
I will know you when I come, as we all will come
Through the doors beyond the grave


True love never dies.

Mommy Goes to School

Olivia is going to preschool at the university 2 days a week. Since this week is fall break, all of the student helpers are gone. The school asked all the parents to volunteer for a couple of hours this week to keep the student/adult ratio legal. So, this morning, Mommy went to school with Olivia. She was so excited. We read books, played with puzzles, and hung up a whole bunch of art work. Olivia thought is was great having Mommy at school, but she wasn’t too crazy about the part where I actually had to interact with the other kids. I liked the way she would subtlety move between me and any other kid who got too close. My dog does the same thing. I kept waiting for her to pee on my leg. :)

So, all was well and good until it was time for Mommy to leave for work. Olivia had a major meltdown. She cried – real tears and heart-wrenching sobs. It was enough to make a grown Mama cry. She finally pulled it together (ok, after I promised she could ride her bike in the basement tonight) enough for me to leave.

As I was leaving, I couldn’t help but think, “And this is the child who thinks she WANTS to share Mommy with Baby Sister?”

Sigh.

It's a Girl!

Name: Shi Qiu Ying (means Stone, Autumn Flower)
Date of birth: August 4, 2005
Place of birth: Shi Cheng County, Jiangxi, PRC

Soon to be our Elizabeth Grace Ying - My daughter and Olivia's mei-mei (little sister). We couldn't be more excited! I first saw Elizabeth's face in July, and I knew she was the one we'd been looking for. All the paperwork has been completed so now we wait (and wait, and wait) for China to send us our travel approval so that I can go bring Elizabeth home. So, come on in, pull up a chair and wait with us. I'll try to keep you entertained (operative word there - "try").