After only a 12 day wait WE HAVE OUR LOA!
Yes, I did mean to shout. And I’m gonna do it again.
WE HAVE OUR LOA!!!!
And what is an LOA some of you might ask? Well, it is the letter of approval from China asking us to sign and officially commit to adopt Dang, Xin Yi. It means that China has officially said that she is ours and we can now start the immigration process in the US to bring her home. This came much earlier than we expected and means that we might travel much sooner than expected (like maybe April-ish).
I’m freaking out, by the way.
We’re going to have two kids. Holy crap.
For Christmas this year we got the best gift ever…a surprise referral.
Please meet Dang Xin Yi. Soon to be known as Merry Eleanor XinYi.
Xin Yi (meaning Happy Heart) is currently in Nanyang, China under the care of her foster grandma until we are allowed to travel to pick her up. Our LOI (letter of intent) was sent to China just before Christmas. Next step is LOA (letter of approval) from China. Our agency says ~30 days. Cross your fingers, please.
Then for a post-Christmas surprise we received an update with a new picture. This was taken on Christmas Eve. The windburned cheeks are killing me (just like Ava’s when we met her) so I’ve already bought some Aveeno lotion for the care package that we’ll be sending in a day or two.
Today is her 1st birthday. We had a birthday cake at home and Ava kindly blew out the candle for her sister since she isn’t here quite yet. She also sang quite a rousing rendition of the happy birthday song which I (thankfully) managed to capture on video since it was so darn cute. Merry’s birthday gifts today were the official pre-approval (PA) from China letting us know that they have moved our file to be officially matched with her and our I-800A approval which is the beginning piece (and the one that generally takes the longest) of the immigration paperwork and process that will allow us to bring her home.
Okay, fine. And I bought her some socks and vitamins for her care package, too. Since I bought them today then I think they can count as birthday gifts.
We expect travel should happen sometime in late Spring. My prediction is May but I would love to be wrong and it end up being a little earlier. We waited for two seemingly never-ending months to travel for Ava. I sure would like to see that short of a turnaround time now.
We are thrilled, of course, and can’t freakin’ wait to go get her.
I thought I’d be able to make it through NaBloPoMo but work won out after all.
We have a big project going on at work right now and I am just exhausted. I am averaging about 4.5 hours of sleep a night with last night clocking in at slightly less than 3 hours since I was working late (sometimes laptops and bringing your work home with you is not a good thing). Then we had to get up early to try and walk in for our 900th fingerprint appointment for our second I800A application with USCIS since, once again, the fingerprinting appointment they gave us wouldn’t work for either of our schedules. Thankfully that trip was successful (based in large part, I think, because J wore his uniform which comes in handy for a perk every now and again) and didn’t turn out to be a really early morning and long trip through the tunnel for nothing.
Fingerprints? Yeah, they’re as bad as always. Maybe worse. It’s always good to hear you have the worst fingerprints the technician has ever seen. He asked me if I cleaned a lot since household chemicals can damage your fingerprints. I nearly fell on the floor laughing at that, of course. He also proactively did a paper and ink copy of my fingerprints since he thinks it’s likely my electronic ones will be rejected. All this would be great if I were a criminal, apparently. Not so much since all I want them to do is approve the same form they’ve already approved for us 4 times over the last 6 years.
So anyway, I blew this 30 day posting thing . Ah well, I’ve posted more this month than I have all year so at least there’s that.
Just when I think my head will explode if I hear “MamaMamaMamaMamaMaaaaMaaaa” one more time – I heard this tonight: “Mama, I love you more than marshmallows, cupcakes, and frosting.”
Knowing how much she likes frosting (she IS my kid after all), I take this as high praise indeed.
She also gave me 42 hugs. She counted every single one of them AND threw in an extra one “just because, Mama.”
I simply could not adore this kid more.