Logged In!

I just got off the phone with our social worker, and we have our log-in date! Basically, a "log-in date" indicates that China has received our dossier, accepted it, and entered us into their database. Our agency received notice today, but our official log-in date was yesterday. We are so happy to see some movement with the new database! Of course we already have pre-approval to adopt Leah, but now we have to wait for our official letter of acceptance. Normally, log-in date to letter of acceptance is about 2-3 months, but that is without pre-approval. Since we have pre-approval, we are hoping it will be faster, but the new database makes everything particularly difficult to predict right now. Once we do get our letter of acceptance, travel should be about 2-3 months away.

One step closer to this sweet girl!

Your Questions Answered, Part 2

Greg's dad, Nick, asked us about Leah's orphanage. I've taken a little while to answer this question because I wanted to check with our social worker about what we can and cannot share. Also, I don't really have a lot to say because unfortunately, we don't know all that much! She is in an institution in a smaller city near Chongqing. The orphanage is one of our agency's partner orphanages, so some of the staff have actually traveled there. The physician we spoke with about Leah's file had visited there, and she assured us that it was a "good" orphanage. When we travel to pick up Leah, we will have the opportunity to visit her orphanage, so we should be able to tell you all a lot more about it at that point.

That's about it -- we wish we had more information to offer!

Any other questions?? I'd love to continue this series of posts :-)

Swimming Lessons

We finally got Peter and Thomas enrolled in swimming lessons this summer, and they are loving it! It has only been one week, but they have both made a lot of progress. Peter especially has always been so afraid of simply letting his feet leave the bottom of the pool, and he really seems to be gaining confidence. We convinced him that there was no way his teacher would let him drown, so just be brave and try everything! Here are a few pictures from their first day:

Ruthie came along to watch and play

Science Center

On Saturday, we took the kids to a science center in a nearby city. It was a little bit of sensory overload for the kids and craziness for the parents trying to keep up with them! But we really did have a good experience, and I'm glad we went.

On a bed of nails

Not so sure about this...

Whoa!

Shark!

Archaeologists

Daddy really enjoyed himself at this exhibit

Doing his best frozen Han Solo impression

Alice in Wonderland

A few weeks ago, Peter participated in a summer theater camp. Did he have fun? Let's just say that he is still listening to the practice CD and singing the songs (or playing them on the piano). Also, he often makes comments about "...when I do theater camp next year." The kids met all day Monday through Friday, and performed the show on Friday and Saturday. They put it all together in one week! The show was Alice in Wonderland, and Pete was a rock lobster and a card. In addition to performing on stage, he got the chance to participate in things like making costumes, playing games, and meeting new friends. It was such a wonderful experience for him. Enjoy the pictures*!

Opening number

The rock lobsters

Caucus race

Our friend Hannah is the three of diamonds -- she's painting the roses red!

Queen of Hearts

*Photo credits to Hannah's mom, Monica. Thanks for taking the pictures and sharing them with me!

Frustration and Excitement

Frustrating news first...we received an email yesterday evening saying that China's new adoption database is experiencing a lot of malfunctions, particularly with log-in dates and letters of acceptance, which is exactly where we are right now. All we can do is continue to wait and pray that these issues will be resolved as soon as possible. We want to get Leah home so badly! Why does an orphan have to sit and wait when there is a family longing for her? Argh.

On a different note, I received some very exciting news yesterday, and I just have to share with you all. Back when we were looking at files of children to adopt, we were given three specific files from our agency. One of those three was another little girl with down syndrome a little older than our Leah. We had a phone consult with a physician at an international adoption clinic and discussed all three of these children's files. The really great part of this conversation was that this physician had actually traveled to China and met the children we were discussing! Anyway, the doctor lit up when talking about this little girl and her big personality. Her medical file indicated some major heart defects. Any family that were to commit to bringing her home would be looking at multiple heart surgeries with no guarantee of success. The doctor explained that she has a significantly shortened life expectancy if she does not get these surgeries. She said that if this child could just get the first surgery done in China somehow, it would greatly increase her chances of being adopted. On a whim, I emailed Love Without Boundaries, an agency that works to get medical care for orphans in China. I briefly explained her medical needs and asked if there was anything they could do to help. I received a very quick response asking for more details about her name and orphanage. When I told them the name of her orphanage, they said they had worked with them before and had a good relationship. The agency said they would be in touch to keep me updated. So about a month and a half later (yesterday), I got an email from them saying that she will be having a heart catheterization in Shanghai on Monday!! Being relatively clueless about Chinese geography, I mapped from her city to Shanghai...over 1,000 miles. This is a huge trip for her! However, if she is a candidate for surgery, she will have to return to her orphanage until they can raise the funds for it. But please pray for her this weekend! Pray that she would not be too scared, that travel would go smoothly, and that the test will go well. I will update as soon as I hear from them!

Your Questions Answered, Part 1

My friend Ada asked "if there was anything we could be reading/doing to get ready for the new needs your family will have." (Which, by the way, is a very thoughtful and sweet question. Thanks, Ada!)

Full disclosure: I've read a lot about down syndrome, I've read books and blogs by parents of children with down syndrome, and I've talked with physicians about down syndrome. I still feel like I have no idea what to expect when we get home! I know there will be many doctor appointments, therapy appointments, and meetings with the local school district. There will be lots of day-to-day adjustment for our whole family. But I feel much like a first-time parent: you can read all the books you want about pregnancy and parenthood, but you don't really know what it is like until you actually do it!

That being said, our adoption agency recently shared some information about how friends and family can best help a family adjust when they bring home their newly adopted child. One of the most important parts of those first few months for us will be fostering a healthy attachment with Leah. She is only three years old, but she has already experienced loss and abandonment, and moving halfway around the world to a new culture with people she has never met will not be easy. She will need to learn to love and trust us. We want her to feel safe and secure in our family. To that end, we will probably not be all that social when we come home -- so please don't be offended! We need to avoid overwhelming Leah and quietly and patiently teach her that we love her and will meet her needs. So here are some dos and don'ts our agency put together for friends and family:

Do

1. Help with household tasks like cooking, cleaning, yard work, running errands. 
2. Encourage the family with emails, cards, phone calls, and care packages. 
3. Redirect the child to the parents. Examples: "Go give your daddy a hug" or "Let's ask mommy if that's ok."
4. Care for other children! Pete, Tom, and Ruthie could easily feel overshadowed and will need help transitioning to life with another sibling.
5. Read and educate yourself about adoption.

Don't

1. Don't meet the needs or wants of the child. To foster a secure attachment, Leah will need to see us providing her care (feeding, getting dressed, etc.) so she understands who her parents are!
2. Don't shower the child with gifts. Just ask us in advance if a gift is appropriate. Also, you may need to actually let us give the gift and get credit for it.
3. Don't shower the child with attention or affection -- again, that should come from us (sense a theme?!). Newly adopted children are often easily overwhelmed.
4. Don't compare her to our biological children.
5. Don't make assumptions about her feelings. It is easy to think that Leah will be grateful and happy to be in a family when in reality she could be overwhelmed, sad, and grieving the life she knew.

Please keep the questions coming if you have them! Don't be afraid to ask!

Ask Us Anything

I wish we had something to report about the adoption, but we don't.  Our agency estimates three weeks from sending in the dossier to receiving a log-in date, and it has been more than three weeks.  Barely more than three weeks, but more.  Hopefully we will hear something very soon!

In the meantime, we would like to answer your questions!  Surely you must have them.  I have had multiple folks come up to me recently and say something like "Can I ask you a really [insert word here like 'horrible' or 'inappropriate'] question?"  And then they proceed to ask a perfectly non-horrible, very appropriate question!  So what do you want to know?  Ask us anything.  We're thinking mostly questions about the adoption, but really anything is fair game.  Feel free to comment with your question, or send me an email or facebook message if you don't want everyone to see what you asked.  Depending on how many questions we get, we'll either do a post answering all of them, or break them up into a number of posts.

Finally, what post is complete without a picture?  Here's Ruthie, who is apparently sick of the heat and wishing for Grandma, Grandpa, and snow!

Blueberries!

We decided to take the kiddos blueberry picking on Saturday, and what a great idea that turned out to be!  We had a fun time, and now we also have a freezer full of locally grown blueberries that taste much better than the expensive ones in the store.  Thomas got a little impatient towards the end, but at one point Peter declared, "This is even more fun than my Indiana Jones video game!"  Inwardly I yelled, "YES!" and proclaimed the whole thing a major success. 

Happy 4th

We went to see Granny and Gramps for the 4th of July!  We had a busy weekend that included visiting Gran and shooting off fireworks.  The boys also got to go to their first water park, and they had a blast.  They were mostly fearless (there was one slide that Thomas did not want to go down again!).  They went down tube slides, body slides, and took on the wave pool.  Peter even told me that the lazy river was "lame."  (Normally I love a good lazy river, but this time I did have to agree with him.  While the rest of the rides were awesome, this particular park's lazy river was pretty lame!)  Obviously I did not want to take a camera into a water park, but here are pictures from the rest of our trip:

Ruthie isn't so sure about the fireworks

Gramps loves the fireworks too!