China Day 3: Gotcha Day!

Today was full of nerves, anticipation, elation, and pure joy; and at the same time today was full of grief for one little girl.  For those that haven't experienced a Gotcha Day, it's a mixed bag of emotions.  Meeting the precious girl in person that you've been waiting for is absolutely indescribable.  Having to then watch her grieve the loss of everything she's ever known is hard.  Watching one of her closest nannies and another employee of the orphanage say their final goodbyes was hard.  Having the first sound of her little voice we heard in person be painful cries was hard.  Watching Lucille fall asleep on Heather's chest on the van ride back to the hotel, with a lone tear running down her cheek when her eyes finally closed was hard.  Watching her little body shift between complete silence, staring at us with no emotion, to crying her little heart out the next moment continues to be hard.

But, we know this is not the real Lucille.  We've seen the videos and the joy this little girl has inside of her.  We've heard the stories from her caregivers about what she's really like.  We know she must grieve at this time, and it's a very good thing.  The fact that she is grieving so hard means she was cared for deeply and that she was loved.  It means she has the ability to be attached to her caregivers, and that she will learn to trust us.

Let's back up to the actual meeting:  We had a really hard time wasting time today!  We ate breakfast, had a paperwork meeting, went out to lunch, and just sat around the hotel room trying to waste time until 2:00pm.  That's when we met in the hotel lobby and took the van to the China Civil Affairs office.  People shoved on the elevator for the 8th floor, so much so that Steve & Ella had to wait behind for the next one.  Heather entered the big room first and there was one lady standing by the infamous curtain that leads to the kids room.  Heather could tell by her face that her child was in there.  So, Heather walked over to peek and immediately saw Lucille sitting next to her nanny.  The nanny saw Heather, and Heather waved and pointed to communicate that she was Songrui's mama!  They smiled back and leaned over to tell Lucille that mama was there.  Steve and Ella arrived a few minutes later, and before we knew it this precious little one was being brought out to meet us.  She had a stone-serious look on her face and wouldn't come to Heather until the Dum-Dum suckers came out.  :-)  She accepted nothing from Heather except a Dum-Dum, which she promptly tried to put in her mouth with the wrapper on.  We stayed in this room for another 15 minutes before the nannies left, and that's when the extreme expressions of sadness came out of this tiny body.  We can only describe it as a loud, mournful sob.

God knew what He was doing by having us bring Ella along.  We're so proud of her and how gentle she has been with her little sister.  Ella's being so helpful and really helping Lucille adjust.  Lucille constantly looks over to Ella in our room, seemingly to make sure she's still around and to see what she's doing.  She's been copying Ella playing with various toys this evening.  Just within the past hour (~6:30pm local time) Heather loaded up some Chinese kids tunes on her smartphone, and Lucille proceeded to move her hands and shake a toy to the beat. 

We know you're all waiting for pictures, so without further delay here you go!  Presenting for the first time, Lucille Marie Songrui Adolphs!

China Days 1-2: Travel

Well, our trip sure has been eventful thus far and we don't even have Lucille yet! We're going to try to recap our days on this blog, probably in more boring detail than you all care about, but we want to have it for our own sake. So, sorry!

We've already mentioned how we noticed our air conditioner not working the evening before we were supposed to leave. There was no way we could wait until we got back to fix it because there are people staying at our house with the kids while we're gone. But as our beautiful friend Meg pointed out we were amazingly fully packed and ready to go much earlier in the day, so Steve actually had a full evening to take apart and diagnose the a/c. He got up at 6am on the day of departure to drive to the opposite side of town to visit five different places, none of which had the part we needed. However, the last place recommended a store that Steve didn't have on his list and they actually had the part! He made it back in plenty of time to install the part and save the day! Our hero!

Our fabulous friends Nate & Marie arrived to drive us and all our luggage to the airport. They got to witness the awkwardness of their friend crying in the back seat as we drove away. Sorry, guys! Leaving the littles behind is the hardest part! They prayed with us when they dropped us off, which was so very special to us. We have the best friends ever. The first leg of the trip to Detroit was uneventful, but it was fun seeing Ella experience everything for the first time. The flight attendant gave her a little pin to commemorate her first flight.

In Detroit we were waiting for our flight and a woman approached me and said, "are you Heather?" She introduced herself as Debi, a fellow adoptive mom traveling to pick up her precious 7 year old daughter. Of course, I immediately knew her from one of the adoption Facebook groups I'm a part of. I don't care how badly some people dislike Facebook, it is definitely a blessing in the adoption world. We're able to have an extremely supportive, encouraging community around us of moms from all over the country (and even the world). It is invaluable. So here's a shout-out to all you moms in my FB groups! I consider you part of our "village!" So Debi had seen me walk by and remembered my face from FB. I'm so glad she came and introduced herself! She was on the same flight to Shanghai. After we boarded we sat on the plane for nearly 2 hours before taking off. I'm thankful for the blessing of wi-fi and all you friends that kept me company by talking with me over messenger :) 14 1/2 hours later we landed at the exact time our next flight was taking off. We had to deplane on the tarmac, take a shuttle to the terminal, meander our way to the long, slowest-moving line known to humanity-Customs. We had to collect our checked baggage, and it turned out that Debi's checked bag never made it on the plane, so please pray it meets up with her today or tomorrow before she meets her daughter!! At this point we teamed up with Debi, each taking turns encouraging each other that it would be OK! We somehow found the counter that had someone who could get us a hotel room for the night and book us all on new flights for the next day. We waited awhile for the hotel shuttle and once it arrived everyone else stormed it within 2.5 seconds and it was clear there was no way we were going to fit! So, Steve to the rescue again! he chased down someone and paid for a taxi to take us and Debi to our hotel. We checked in and said goodbye and good luck to Debi. We crashed for five hours and were back to the airport!!

Trying to check-in this morning on our new flight was not without hiccups. They somehow could not find Steve's itinerary and we were having trouble communicating with the agent! Thankfully, I had heard a Chinese woman in line behind us speak English earlier so I asked her if she could help us. We eventually got it worked out and were on our way. I hope you all are seeing the way God provided in each of these tough situations. The air conditioner part, running into Debi so she could encourage us to trust Him, the wi-fi on the two hour delay, a great hotel when our flight was missed, the woman behind us in line who could translate. We never panicked even though there were lots of times that we could have (and believe me, staying calm is not always our first reaction). God is good and He's in control.

So we're now settled into our hotel in Guangzhou and in just about 24 hours we will meet our sweet Lucille :)


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Quick update after our first night out on the town.  Here's how you order at McDonald's here.  No, we didn't try the green bun pork sandwich.  Pro tip, when customizing the cheeseburger for a happy meal, don't deselect the thing that says "10:1 xxxx".  Turns out that line means "beef patty".  We almost had a cheese-and-ketchup sandwich for Ella, but one of the workers that spoke a little English came to us very confused and made sure we wanted it that way.  The cooks in the back had a nice laugh over that one!  Stupid Americans.

Our Last Pre-Travel Update from China!

As we write this post, it's only 25 short days until we fly to China!  We can't believe that May 2016 is here already or that it's been eight months since we submitted our adoption application.

The big news for today is that we received an update on Lucille from China!  At three years old, she's 38" tall and weighs about 30 pounds.  We always love getting the English translations:

• "To let her play with her friends is her happiest thing... She is upset when she is refused to get what she wants."
• "She is very smart and adorable. When she was little, she wanted to call everybody's name to show how smart she was. When we answered her calling, she was super happy."
• When asked what her name means:  "All our children have the same name of Jiang Song and Rui means lucky and happy. Our director gave that name to her with good wished."

We can't wait to finally hold our lucky and happy little girl!  Enjoy these pics from the day Lucille received our care package.

Tickets Are Booked!

We got final confirmation that our Gotcha Day (meeting Lucille) will be May 30 and our final US Consulate Appointment in Guangzhou will be June 7.  So, last night we were able to book all of our flights!  As a bonus we were able to cash in a bunch of frequent flier miles to help offset the cost a little bit.

We're still waiting for a detailed update on Lucille from China but we did get a couple of new pictures from another family that's in country this week.  This family brought along a little care package for Lucille, including the doll you see in the pictures below.

Lucille, we're coming to get you in just four short weeks!!

 

Things Keep A-Movin' On!

Three of the six steps we mentioned in our last blog post have been completed!  Our "Article 5" paperwork is complete and will be dropped off with the US Consulate in China any day now. About two weeks later, the Consulate will issue a letter that states that we are "approved as a suitable adoptive parent and that the child will be able to enter and reside permanently in the United States."

This letter will be couriered to the CCCWA.  It's typically 2-3 weeks later that Travel Approval is issued.  Then we book our flights and go!  We're still very hopeful that we'll depart in late May.

We really don't have much more news, but we wanted to blog as an excuse to share new pictures of our baby girl.  A friend that Heather made through an online group adopted from Lucille's (and Helen's) SWI in 2011 and is in China right now for a return visit.  She was kind enough to snap a few pictures for us!  She also brought along a recent picture of Helen to share with the staff there.  They were very happy to see the picture and to hear that we are getting another girl from the same SWI!

LOA is Here!

We've officially received our Letter of Acceptance (LOA) from China!  Our Dossier, after being translated, was reviewed and accepted by the CCCWA.  We received a preliminary notification of this on March 7, but just got the official email with the document this afternoon.  This means that China has approved us to adopt our little girl!!!

Oh, on that note, now that the process has progressed this far we can officially share her name.  Let us introduce you to our newest family member:  Lucille Marie Songrui Adolphs!  We've received a few new photos several weeks ago and were saving them for this update.

 

The remaining steps are the same as when we went through the process with Helen:

• Our I-800 is being sent overnight to the USCIS (the LOA was the final document our agency was waiting for)
• USCIS will forward this approval to the National Visa Center to apply for Lucille's visa
• The NVC will send the approved visa petition to the US Consulate in Guangzhou, China
• The Consulate will review the visa application, ensure it meets the qualifications for an immigrant visa, and then sign off that everything is in order to complete the adoption
• That approval is forwarded to the CCCWA, which issues our Travel Approval (TA)
• We book our flights & hotel and go get Lucille!

Thanks for continuing to pray for our family.  We're hoping to meet our little girl face-to-face before the end of May 2016!

Dossier to China, and a Happy Birthday!

After many months of interviews, appointments, paperwork, notarizing, certification, and authentication, we're happy to report that our Dossier is complete and was shipped to China!  Now we wait to get "logged in" with the CCCWA and then the translation of our documents will begin.

In other news, little sister celebrated her 3rd birthday on December 9.  While we were sad we couldn't be there in person, we were able to throw a birthday party for her and the other children in her facility!  A birthday cake and treats were brought in for all the kiddos by our agency's China contact.  By the pictures you can see it looks like they had a great time.

Within the next few months we'll be bringing this peanut home!

Love this one of her with some friends (she's the cutie in the middle)!!