China day 5: Gotcha Day

 

omg leaving in thirty minutes to go meet Mary Carson. so excited. so nervous. basically feels exactly like I'm about birth a baby without the big belly to show for it. I read a Psalm a day before my bible study each day and today's Psalm was 46. Praying v1-2 for MC - God is her refuge and strength, a very present help in what is going to feel like trouble. Praying that she won't fear as it looks like to her that her mountains are being moved into the heart of the sea. Praying v5 for her: "God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved; God will help her when morning dawns. And then v10 for both of us: Be still and know that I am God. I can barely type this because my hands are shaking. Next time I post it'll be with my baby. 💕❤️️💕

One last picture before we go...

 

On the way...

 

 

China day 4: travel to Guiyang!!!

We woke up early this morning (5:30 to be exact) and got repacked, ate breakfast, grabbed Starbucks, and met our group to head to the airport at 0800. We got to the airport early, got our tickets and through security fine. Our 11:50 flight left early and we arrived in Guiyang around 2:45. We waited for our new guide and then we were off through the streets of Guiyang for our hotel. 

 

We got to our hotel and wow is this place different from Beijing. Outside of the city, it is so much more rural- lots of little, tiny villages separated by mountainous peaks on the flight in. In the city there are still the mountains scattered around the outskirts, and the city is such a contrast. We're in a beautiful hotel on what appears to be a very metropolitan street - we haven't explored yet but we saw an Apple Store on the way in and several other nice shops, and yet just beside our hotel the other direction there are several little shantytowns. We ate dinner at a place called the birdcage because inside there are these big birdcages that have tables inside them where you sit. The food was great. Much more flavor than what we had in Beijing and I'm guessing that's because we're one province away from the Sichuan province which is know for its spicy food. 

When we got checked into our room there was a little crib already set up and the reality of what we are here for really sunk in again. We'll meet Mary Carson in about 18 hours and I'll keep this short because I'm feeling all the emotions. We covet your prayers for tomorrow! 

China day 1: Beijing

We're here! First full day. So excited. We all slept pretty well considering the complete reversal of times (7 pm is now 7 am, etc). The breakfast biluffet is included with our hotel room so we had breakfast in the hotel. It was a pretty big spread with lots of Chinese options (preserved duck eggs anyone?) and also many European type offerings like croissants. After breakfast Adam went for a run in the hotel gym and I watched the kids as they went for a swim (complete with the required swim caps). After this we got ready and headed out to explore a little of Beijing around our hotel. 

We explored some shops and took pictures of the 'interesting' flavor options. Like these:

 

We had lunch at a great Chinese place (thank you God for picture menus and some translated phrases). We ended up with this spread which was delicious. 

 

There are definitely only chopsticks as options, so we're really perfecting our skills.  The meal was a success except for Adam's initial tasting of the dumplings dipped in a super vinegar-y (his least favorite thing ever) sauce. He recoiled a couple times and I honestly thought he was going to vomit in his lap but he held it in 😆. He's going to love me for posting that but hey - gotta preserve trip memories. 

After lunch we hailed a taxi to go see a Chinese acrobatics show. Traffic here is TERRIBLE and it took us about 50 minutes to go what the map told us should be 20 minutes. We honestly thought we were going through miss the show (that we had already paid for) But we made it! 

 

The kids were literally on the edge of their seats. 

 

It was fantastic and so entertaining. Crazy stunts with no supporting wires (or as the translation said: "no insurance.") The 8 motorcycles whizzing around this metal ball were a favorite. 

 

It was so great. When it was over we hailed a cab back to the hotel and wow. TRAFFIC. I think I breathed more second hand smoke in that hour taxi ride than in my whole life. When we were gridlocked in traffic on the highway with about five blocks to go to our hotel we paid the taxi driver and got out to walk it. Yay fresh air! 

 

 We had dinner at a dumpling restaurant near the hotel which was great - again thankful for the picture menu and translations because that helped us to avoid the lung soup, the pig's intestines, and the fried silkworm chrysalis dish. 😳 We headed back to the hotel for face-timing the little kids and bed. Great first day!

China arrival day

We made it to China! So many answered prayers already. We made our super short connection in Chicago. By God's amazing providence our flight from Charlotte landed 6 gates down from where our Beijing flight was taking off, in.the.same.terminal. Amazing. On the flight to Beijing we were almost the only Caucasians on this flight and definitely the only ones with blonde hair. The beginning of culture shock. 😂

 

 

There are no pics of us after the flight because we looked somewhat haggard. The flight was pretty good though - just long. We watched a bunch of movies and the kids were able to sleep about an hour and a half ish which gave them the stamina to make it to a regular bedtime. The long long flight did make us pretty apprehensive about the flight home with one more. 

 

We landed after about a 12 hour flight, shorter than we thought because "we caught good tailwinds," whatever that means. We deplaned in Beijing, went through immigration in the line for foreigners, collected our checked bags (they all made it,another praise!), went through customs, and met up with our guide that was waiting for us with a sign. 😃 

 

 

Our agency arranged the transportation and everything so we hopped on a bus for our hotel. 

 

Our hotel in Beijing seems great so far. They had a bunch of Christmas lights out front and it appears that they love Santa in China. There was some kind of party at our hotel last night with a Chinese Santa who gave candy to each of the kids. 

 

 

We got checked in and settled in our rooms and then headed out for a quick dinner. We basically ate at the first place we could find which was a type of Irish pub. We had some pizza (yay China) and headed back for early bedtimes given that we'd been up for something like 27 hours. 

 

So thankful to be here! 

it's finally here!

It's finally here! The day we leave! All the years and months and days and hours and minutes logged of prayer and hoping and paperwork and here we are, sitting in the airport, waiting to take off on our adventure to #makeourfamily7dyers (official trip hashtag). 

We hardly slept last night. The excitement! The anticipation! The chaos! We fit in one of our favorite Christmas traditions last night as our last night all together as a family of 6. Christmas Jammies and hot chocolate from Caribou and the drive through nativity at Carmel Pres where we go to preschool. Adam had a meeting last night. I finished up packing and hung out with Mary and around 11:30 tried to sleep. I dreamt I couldn't fit all of our stuff in the bags and had to pile it together and sleep on it. Adam went on a midnight run and returned around 1 am. Weird night. We were up by 5:30ish for our flight. 
 

The morning was smooth. We got to the airport and got checked in and got through security with no problems. 

 
The kids are SO excited. 
 

We wanted to take a minute to say a HUGE thank you. We have gotten countless texts,emails, and calls of support. We have felt so encouraged,supported, loved, and upheld by so many of you as we have walked this adoption road. You have supported us financially, you have given orphanage donations, you have dropped off items for our trip to our house (necessities, books to read, goody bags for kids, Gatorade packets and pedialyte packets, epi pens, monogrammed shirts, meals to eat before we go, suitcases to use or have, the list goes on and on and on). You have prayed for us. You all have been so amazing and this journey has made us all the more thankful for a community around us that is like family. 

 
As we depart on our first leg of our long travel day (we'll land in Beijing at 4:30 pm Thursday China time which is 4:30 am tomorrow our time), I'll leave you with a couple very practical prayer requests:

-we have a super short connection in Chicago. There was bad weather there (another gate had Chicago listed on the destination board as 'North pole') and we're praying this doesn't affect our flight. Please pray we make our connection and if possible have time to grab food for lunch to bring on the flight. 

-Pray for all the logistics of landing in Beijing, transportation to our hotel, and getting checked in. Pray that we don't lose either of our kids 😂. We've super prepared them with photocopies of their passports with the name, address, and phone number of the hotels we're staying at in each city on it and both of our names and phone numbers. These are in their jacket pockets and in their backpacks. 

-Pray we stay healthy. And for safe flights. 

-Pray our bags make it (all five of them) all the way to Beijing. 

-Pray for the little at home and got our hearts as we'll miss them on this adventure. 
 

-Of course for Mary Carson and for her transition. 

All in all, we are so thankful and so excited. 

“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name! Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” ‭‭Psalms‬ ‭103:1-5‬ ‭ESV‬‬

where will we go and what will we do?

So, where are we going and what are we doing (in 2 days!?!?) Read on to find out!

Phase 1 - Beijing: We head to the airport really early Tuesday morning to catch a 10 am flight to Chicago. After a short layover (please pray we make our connection!), we board our flight to Beijing. That flight is roughly 14 hours or so and although we depart on Tuesday around noon, we will land in China on Wednesday afternoon around 4:30 pm. Mostly because we lose half a day to the time difference, China is roughly 12 hours ahead of us (yay jet lag!). So we land in Beijing Wednesday evening and head to bed. Thursday will be a free day with no guide - we're excited about this and planning to rest and explore and see an acrobatics show with the kids. We have this free day in Beijing because it saved us around $2000 to fly into Beijing on Tuesday as opposed to Wednesday. So we said yes. :) Then on Friday morning we will meet up with our travel group which will consist of a couple other families from our adoption agency. We will visit the Great Wall and the Olympic stadium in Beijing on Friday. Saturday we will visit Tienanmen Square, the Forbidden City, and the Summer Palace. Then we will have a traditional Peking Duck dinner that night. Sunday morning will conclude 'phase 1' of our trip - also known as the arctic tundra portion. Haha - truly the temps are in the 20s. China is situated similarly on the equator as the US and so temps in Beijing are likened to Chicago in winter. The purpose of our time in Beijing is to allow our bodies to adjust to the massive time change and to get to visit historical places that are significant to Mary Carson's culture. I've always wanted to visit China and am seriously so excited. Sunday morning we will fly south to Guiyang, in Guizhou province which is in the southwest of China, and it is where Mary Carson lives!

Phase 2 - Guiyang: Sunday afternoon we will land in Guiyang, Guizhou, we hear the flight is around 3.5 hours. The weather there is somewhat similar to here (Charlotte, NC) - highs in the mid 40s/50s in winter. We will check into our hotel, grab dinner, and then try our best to sleep (although we may be too excited) because we'll be meeting Mary Carson the next day!! Monday we will meet Mary Carson around 1 pm. YAY! Can't even wrap my mind around what this will be like. We will meet her in a Civil Affairs Office in Guiyang. There will be a brief exchange with her nanny or foster parent depending on who is there, and then she will be ours! This is called her 'Gotcha Day' in the adoption world, or the 'Family Day.' Technically the first 18-24 hours are like somewhat of a trial period. A chance for you to assess the child's needs before you actually commit. For us this is just a formality, as Adam and I have talked about how at the point of receiving Mary Carson, to us it will be as if we just birthed our child, and we wouldn't give her back for any reason (ever, ever, ever). We will go on Tuesday to sign all of her adoption paperwork and this will be her official adoption day. After all of the paperwork is signed on Tuesday, they will begin processing Mary Carson's passport so that she will be able to fly with us to our next destination in China. That process takes a couple days, so as we wait for that we will explore her province. One day we requested to visit her finding spot and I am glad that we'll be able to do this. I feel desperate for her sake to gather as much information as we can while we are there, and visiting the spot where she was found is a big part of her history. On a side note, she has a finding spot because in China it is illegal to surrender your parental rights, meaning it is illegal to place your child for adoption. So if you are unable to parent your child, your only option is an abortion, or to abandon/place the baby somewhere to be found. Interestingly, it is also illegal to abandon a baby, so these parents are in such a hard place. My heart hurts for the pain that I know Mary Carson's first mom must have felt and must continue to feel. On Thursday we will pick up Mary Carson's passport, and then on Friday we will leave Guiyang and fly south to Guangzhou in the Guangdong Province.

Phase 3 - Guangzhou: We will land in Guangzhou on Friday afternoon and get settled into our hotel. Guangzhou is in the Guangdong province in the south of China - it is in the same province as Hong Kong as is about 3-4 hours by car away from there. It is similar in weather to Florida in winter so the highs are around 60s/70s. (Are you seeing my difficulty here in packing for three different climates??). The purpose in us heading to Guangzhou is that this is where the US Consulate is located and all US adoptions are processed through here. We will join up again with other families from our agency that were in different provinces adopting their children and we will all be in the same hotel. (I'm thinking there will be two other families in Beijing and three other families in Guangzhou). Saturday morning we will have Mary Carson's medical exam at the US consulate - which is basically a public health screening to make sure she doesn't have any communicable diseases like TB and that she is ok to fly/immigrate to the US. That day is also Christmas eve! Sunday is Christmas in China! That will be an experience. Noodles and Starbucks for all! The consulate is closed Monday in observance of Christmas (since they are the US consulate, they celebrate US holidays). So Monday will be a free day in Guangzhou. There is a safari park there with a panda exhibit that we are hoping to visit one day. Tuesday we will have Mary Carson's consulate appointment where we will go in and take an oath at the consulate, swearing that we will never leave or abandon her. After this they will begin processing her US visa so she can fly to the US. We should be able to pick up her US visa on Wednesday, and then Thursday early morning we start our 27 hour journey back to the US of A. We'll fly Thursday to Beijing, and then have a 4 hour layover because we will have to collect our checked bags and clear security again and then recheck our bags for our flight to Chicago. We'll eventually land in Chicago around 4 pm on Thursday (which is funny because of the 12 hour time difference, it's like the longest day ever). After a 4 hour layover there, which will probably be barely enough time to clear US customs, we'll board a plane to Charlotte. When we leave the US consulate in China, we'll get a sealed immigration packet for Mary Carson that we can't open. We will give it to the customs officials at our first port of entry into the US which will be in Chicago. We will hand that packet to the customs officials after waiting in apparently a very long line, and when the customs officials open that immigration packet, and Mary Carson walks across the line into the US, she will be a US citizen! Amazing. And I'm sure we'll all be insanely exhausted by then. We'll board our flight to Charlotte and then at 11:45 pm on December 29th, after 17 days in China, and 27 hours of travel (the journey to the US), we'll be home!

We leave in 2 days. TWO!!! All these months (14 since we started the process, but years of hoping and praying for this baby), and now we're down to a matter of days. God is so faithful, y'all. 

For great is his steadfast love toward us, and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord!

attachment and cocooning and how to interact

Aww man, I've had this post swirling in my head for months or more and in some ways I've been dreading writing it and dreading posting it. But the time has come.

In the last post I talked about how when Mary Carson comes to us, she will be a baby to our family. Part of the reason for that, comes from information we learned about in our adoptive training. In that training including books we read and seminars we attended, there was a lot of information about how letting children regress (act younger and treating them younger than their biological age), allows their brain to go back and to make up some of those missed stages. These kids have literally had to grow up so fast - they've had to be responsible for getting their needs met on their own.

How did little babies get their needs met on their own? First of all the biggest needs for a baby are probably feeding/food, physical touch/comfort, and bodily care (diaper changing, bathing, etc.). To get these needs met on their own babies learn to employ a variety of methods. For example, if an adult came by, these children had to act happy or silly or smiley to try to get held so that they could get some physical affection. They had to meet their own needs for food, sometimes stealing or hoarding food in their orphanage to make what they had last, or acting silly or putting on a smiley show to try to get more food. Their bodies learned to get their needs met. And it.was.all.up.to.them. 

When Mary Carson comes home, we need to let her go back to being a child, teach her that we are her parents, and that she can trust us to meet her needs. Because she is used to getting her needs for food, comfort, and care met by so many different adults, we are going to have to keep her world small when she comes home. If other adults including us are meeting her basic needs for food, comfort, and care it will be confusing to her as to who she is really supposed to bond with and trust. Meeting needs are the way attachment is built - I wrote a blog post on this a while back that I'd love for you to re-read if you have the time or desire. In order to facilitate this bonding and attachment, there is a term in the adoption world called 'cocooning'.  Basically if you think of a cocoon, it's a safe environment where growth and development can happen. This is what we hope to provide for Mary Carson when she comes home. It is somewhat similar to the time that a baby is in the mother's womb. In the mother's womb, a baby is growing and developing, and for 9 months, they are learning the voice of their parents and attachment to their parents has already begun and has grown for 9 months. We didn't have those 9 months in the womb with Mary Carson. Oh how I wish we did. It would have been my greatest honor to carry her in my belly. But that's not the story God had for her and for us. So we have to work at attachment. We have to make up for the 9 months in the womb and beyond. Cocooning is the beginning of that attachment dance.

So how will this look in real life? Part of the reason I've been dreading this post is because I am kind of the opposite of a home body. Even though I'm an introvert, I like to be out of the house. When we have little babies, I hate to be stuck at home - I love to just get out and do the 'normal things' and it really helps me feel normal emotionally. And since we have 4 other kids, we don't really plan to stay at home all the time... that's just not really do-able with our other kids, and it's not us. So we'll venture out, probably less frequently in the first 4-6 weeks than we normally would, and when we do venture out, the plan will be to keep Mary Carson close; I hope to mostly wear her or hold her if we're in a setting where there are a lot of people around. We plan on coming to church! But we won't be able to put her in the nursery for a while, we're hoping to wait probably 3-6 months before we do this... hopefully closer to 6 months home, but this whole thing is a dance and we'll see how it goes! Maybe she'll attach so quickly to us! Who knows! We won't get babysitters for at least the first 3-6 months either... outside of our family, probably not for at least 6 months is our hope.
So how can you help us? Bring us some food! Come hang out with us after the kids are in bed. Bring wine and let's sit by the fire and chill. We'll be starved of adult conversation, and will so be missing our every Saturday night date night for awhile. Maybe stop by our house on the way home from your Saturday night date night and let's hang out as a nightcap. How we will so need our friends as we enter this whole new world.
So... how can you help her? Gah, it's so hard. I've been there. I've prayed for the kids my friends have brought home. Prayed constantly for them, and when they come home, I love them! I want to express that love! But it's not good for the kid at first. One day it will be fine, but not for a while. So in the beginning, if you see us out with Mary Carson - please come up to us! Say hi to us! Say hi to her! Give her a high five (she might look at you like you're crazy until she learns what this is), or pat her on the head or the arm. Really the main thing to avoid is giving hugs or picking her up. If she runs over to you and holds her arms up like she wants to be held, I get it, it's the cutest thing ever, it's adorable, you feel loved by this tiny Asian baby! But truly she's not doing this because she knows you and loves you (yet). She's doing it because she's used to getting adult affection anywhere she can. If you think of any well attached, well adjusted 18 month to 2 year old - would they go up to a (relative) stranger and throw their arms up to be held? Um, if you've met any of my 2 year olds, no way. They're so wary of other adults. They should be until they know you. And so if she runs up to you, please say something like, you know what - my back hurts and I can't hold you right now, but I know your Mommy or your Daddy would love to... and guide her back to us. Or say, you actually don't need a hug right now, but you know Mommy does - oh look - here she is (just don't hold her while you guide her to us)! All of that would be beyond amazing and so helpful. The other thing you can do to help us with attachment is to avoid giving her any food or drinks. I know you want to give her that cookie you've been saving for her, or a lollypop, or whatever. And if you have something for her - we would love for her to have it - but please bring it to us, tell us it's for her, and we will happily give it to her.

I'm the biggest fan of it takes a village to raise a child, and I love nothing more than those people that I love interacting with and loving on my kids. And the time will come that you will be able to interact with her without thinking of this special attachment dance. But in the beginning, everything for her is fresh and new. This family. Our friends. Church. America. Everything. We would so love your help in coming alongside us as we parent this beloved daughter.

Thank you friends for reading and asking these questions, and wanting to love us and Mary Carson well. It means more than you know.

We will meet our precious daughter 2 weeks from today!

she's a baby to our family

Today I'm attempting to answer the question, how did/do we prepare our kids (who happen to be all bio kids) for this adoption. I'm hoping this also serves as a basis for how we are thinking about attachment and lays the framework for a post that I'll share this weekend on cocooning. Obviously, I can't speak to how any preparation we've done will all turn out, since we've never done this before. But I'm sharing this post in the hopes that it gives information, helps someone else think through these things, and gives you a behind the scenes as to what our life might look like.

In the adoption world, a child's age can be delineated into their biological age and their family age. So Mary Carson will come into our home with a biological age of 20 months but her family age will be that of a newborn. The reason for this delineation is also the way that we have been explaining this transition and what life with Mary Carson might be like to our kids. She will be a baby to our family. Even though she's almost 2. So we will treat her like a newborn. And this is how we've described the transition to the kids.

The conversations that we've been having so frequently for months look something this...

When you were a baby, you cried so much. And Mommy and Daddy held you all the time to comfort you and make you feel better. When Mary Carson comes home she will be a baby to our family, so she might cry a lot as her body tries to understand what it is like to live in a family. And every time she cries, we will run to her and hold her right away. We will hold Mary Carson a lot. Does this mean you need to start crying again instead of using your words when you need something? No. You had a turn to do that when you were a baby too. Now you are old enough to use your words, but since Mary Carson will be a baby to our family we will hold her a lot and especially any and every time she cries.

When you were a baby, you ate all the time. Any time you were even a tiny bit hungry, Mommy would feed you with her milk. Now that you are older, you understand that we eat at certain times and that at certain times the kitchen is closed. When Mary Carson comes home she will be a baby to our family, so she might want to eat all the time. She might want to carry food around with her all the time until she understands that in families we always have enough food. Her body didn't know that before - she isn't used to having enough food and drink. Since she didn't know that before we have to teach her. We have to teach her that in families we always have enough food for kids. We will let her have food any time she wants to teach her this. We will let her carry it around. We will let her eat a granola bar right before dinner and we will let her sleep with Cheerios next to her bed. We will let her have whatever she wants until she learns that food will always be there. Does this mean that you need to start eating all the time and carrying food around with you and sleeping with food next to your bed? No. You had a turn to do that when you were a baby - you had a turn to eat all the time and to learn that food would always be there. Now you are old enough to understand that we always have enough food (thank you God for giving us what we need) and that it is healthy for our bodies to eat at certain times and that at certain times the kitchen is closed. Now you are old enough to understand that, but since Mary Carson will be a baby to our family we will let her have food whenever she wants and for her the kitchen will never be closed.
                         Sidenote: Man this one breaks my heart. In all of our reading and training about adoption we learned about how these children's brains are literally hardwired to believe that starvation is right around the corner. Heartbreaking. There is an Academy Award winning actor (Sidney Poitier) that was on Oprah and during the interview she was asking him about how the poverty he grew up in influenced his life today and this is how he responded to Oprah's question... He opened his suit jacket and showed Oprah that he had a Snickers bar in there. He said, "This is always with me. When I was a child there were times when we were starving. We had no food. Even after I grew up, made a living, and could put food on my table, and in abundance, I still lived with the fear that I would not have enough food. I live with that fear even today. So this candy bar is always in my pocket." When the brain is formed amidst hard circumstances, when deprivation occurs, it changes the brain. It is real and it lasts, even as this famous actor said, into adulthood. I really can't even write this part of the post without tearing up. Food is a whole other topic that is HUGE in the adoption world as you can probably see. Eating issues abound. From hoarding, to gorging, to stuffing food in cheeks and leaving it there for hours. We will teach Mary Carson that in this family we will always have enough food.

The conversation continues. When you were a baby, you slept with Mommy and Daddy (don't tell the big kids that this only happened RARELY and mostly it was when they were napping on us and not in the middle of the night, seriously I'm the opposite of an attachment based parent... help me Lord in this transition!). Now that you are older, you sleep in your own bed like a big boy/big girl. When Mary Carson comes home, she will be a baby to our family, so she will sleep in Mommy and Daddy's room at first. We will have her big girl bed all set up and ready to go, but her crib will be in our room and we hope that co-sleeping works out and that at least for a time, she will sleep in the bed with us. Does this mean that you need to start sleeping in our bed again? No. You had a turn to do that when you were a baby, and now it is Mary Carson's turn to be a baby to our family.

Of course all these words are well and good, and I know that our 9 and 7 year olds really do understand. They get it. But our 4 year old and 3 year old? Whew. That's going to be interesting. Maybe all five of them will just revert to baby land and we'll all go way under water. When families come home with newborns, think of how that time period is so exhausting. Everything is new. Every experience has to be learned (by the parents) or taught (to the child). There is not much sleep and not much time to do anything else except for focus on the new baby. This is how we are thinking about our first weeks home as a family with Mary Carson. It's like the newborn period, even though she is 20 months. Even though she might look perfectly normal on the outside. On the inside she's a newborn to our family and we are going to treat her as such. Tomorrow I'll tell you more about this newborn period of attachment and adjustment, called 'cocooning' in the adoptive world and how you can help us during that time - how you can help us build Mary Carson's attachment to us. It was told to us that if she doesn't attach well and securely to us as her parents, then she can't attach well in the other relationships in her life - to you! To her grandparents as grandparents, to friends, to acquaintances. More on all this tomorrow. Thanks for reading and caring and supporting us in this journey!

11 days! We are coming for you Mary Carson!

will she know us?

One question we've been getting a decent amount, is will Mary Carson know us? Does she have any idea what's coming? The short answer is: we don't know.

In October after we got our letter of acceptance (the letter from China that confirmed that Mary Carson was ours), we had the opportunity to send a care package to her. There are a couple of really neat companies that are in China that cater to adoptive families and help them send care packages to their kiddos. One is called Red Thread, and one is called Ladybugs and Love. We used Ann with Red Thread and we couldn't say more good things about her. From the website we were able to select a package and after some advice from others, we ended up choosing a Forever Family celebration care package. We choose this one because it guaranteed that we would receive a couple  more pictures of Mary Carson when they delivered a cake to her foster care center for her forever family celebration that we sent over. Since we only had three grainy pictures of her that were from back in January when her adoption file was prepared, we decided this was our highest priority and choose this package. Here are several of the pictures we got back (I promise I'll get around to answering the question I posed.)

 This picture absolutely breaks my heart. I feel like the kid on the far right is looking over at Mary Carson like, let me see whose turn it is to get a family now... While he waits. Breaks.my.heart. If any of these pictures touch your heart at all please ask me more about adoption!

 The one below is one of my favorites of her.

So many kiddos that need families.

 Heart melting. 

So to get back to the question posed at the beginning, with the care package, we also sent a photo album. It was a soft sided baby photo album. We sent the 5 or 6 pictures to Ann at Red Thread and with each picture we typed what we wanted the caption to be (like we would send a picture of Adam and I and for the caption we would put, mama and baba - the Mandarin way to say dada). And Ann translated the caption into Mandarin characters and put them on each photo so that theoretically her foster family could show the photo album to her and read the captions. For the final picture in the care package we sent this one with our kids holding a picture of Mary Carson. 

So, do we know if she knows us? Nope. We don't know if she's been prepared at all. We sent that photo album, but we don't know if her foster family read it to her or showed it to her or anything. Some kids from her province have come to the family on gotcha day carrying the photo album and totally recognizing their families, and some kids from her province did not come with the photo album and didn't seem prepared at all. So there's the whole spectrum. We have no idea how much she will know. 

What we do know is that gotcha day, the day we meet Mary Carson, will be Monday December 19th. We will probably meet her around 1 pm in the afternoon China time (which will be while you are sleeping overnight on Sunday night December 18th). We know that we will meet her in a Civil Affairs office in Guiyang, Guizhou. We hope that we will meet her foster family on gotcha day, and there should be a chance for us to ask some more questions about her on that day. The other thing we know about gotcha day is that, for us, it is so exciting and celebratory and it is the culmination of this long long stage of waiting and this very full paper pregnancy. But for Mary Carson, it will be scary. It will be the loss of everything she has ever known. It will be the loss of her Chinese caregivers, and the loss of familiar food, and familiar smells, and familiar routines. This has been so heavy on my heart for her. So as we wait for this day with eager anticipation, there is also a heaviness. A weightiness. Think of us and say a prayer for us and Mary Carson as you go to bed on Sunday December 18th for all of these details and for her transition. Set a reminder on your phone. We would so appreciate it!

overwhelmed is an understatement

You asked for a packing post and here it is. Just kidding. Although I did just print out a 7 page single spaced document from the friendly China adoption online community of things to pack for China. My head is exploding. Send chocolate and wine. Actually can I pack those? Anyways, I digress. They weren't on the 7 page list.

Last week was a doozy. We got travel approval (YAY) on Tuesday, and then overnight on Tuesday  night I got the dreaded stomach bug, given to me by a child in the family who shall not be named who had it earlier in the week. Wednesday morning after some of the worst 5 hours of my life, in a haze around 9 am I saw an email that said that we had to find flights and have a preliminary itinerary to our adoption agency by 11 am if we wanted to be able to book flights before Monday due to the Thanksgiving holiday. Insert panic. We are already flying at one of the most expensive times of the year and this basically gave us a heart attack (4 more days, 2 weeks before your trip is like an eternity). We did end up booking flights and they'll be fine, but they definitely aren't our first choice, especially for the trip on the way home. So that was a crazy stressful day. And then Adam got the stomach bug and I worked 4 days in a row and somewhere in there we had Thanksgiving and celebrated the birthdays of our bookends. AND... what?, I'm leaving for China in 16 days? #holdme

From the end of the earth I will call unto thee, when my heart is overwhelmed; lead me to the rock that is higher than I. -Psalm 61:2

I have been praying this for myself the past several days. My heart is overwhelmed and exhausted. How is it possible when we are already feeling so depleted, that we are leaving for China in 16 days to add a new member to our family. A precious, longed for, desired daughter. A daughter that we don't know yet.

I. Have. So. Much. To. Do.

And in the midst of feeling so completely overwhelmed, what have I been turning to? Things. Stuff. Packing perfectly. Control.  After an emotional breakdown Friday night, I realized the Lord showed me that I have been putting my hope in the things of this world that I can control in the midst of all the uncertainty that is coming for our family. Having the right clothes and shoes and outerwear and medicine and matching pajamas (I know, but it's Christmas! ok, ok, just laugh) and packing them all perfectly into packing cubes organized by color (ok people, I'm nothing if not type A, and let's be honest, I'm the opposite of a light packer) for five people for three different climates. And having the right gifts for the littles while we are gone and the right gifts for the bigs on Christmas day wrapped in my suitcase for China and having all my Christmas gifts for everyone in both of our families totally done and wrapped. Etc etc etc. It's like my mind can't even contain all that has to be done. So if you get a random email from me in the middle of the night, it's because I just thought of something and I had to get it out of my brain.

Is it actually the trip to China that is stressing me out? No. I love adventure, I love something new, I'm so looking forward to it. Part of my underlying anxiety is the idea that I have absolutely no earthly idea what to expect with regards to A NEW CHILD joining our family. I like knowing what to expect (insert big eyes emoji here). A huge change is coming for our family and I have no idea what it will be like. We get to China and they hand me a screaming (?) Chinese baby and what is it going to be like? I so want to know. But I don't. There is One who does and He is with me and He promises to never leave me or forsake me. And I need to fix my eyes on Him. I love how that verse in Psalms says, when my heart is overwhelmed, lead me... The prayer in that verse is that my heart is so overwhelmed, I have to be led. So this is my prayer. Lead me to the rock that is higher than I. 

As I've been thinking about this, I've been realizing it's somewhat like when people get married. They spend all this time planning the wedding, which is a temporary thing, but the marriage is (hopefully) forever. What they/we should be doing is planning mostly for the marriage. I should be planning mostly for the marriage of our family to this new child and vice versa. But I think that instead, I've been trying to distract myself with the 'wedding' / the details of the trip because the idea of the marriage part is all just so unknown.

So what do we need? How can you help? Pray. If you read through this whole purge from my journal basically, please say a quick prayer for us. That in the midst of this uncertainty we will fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. He is the one who is before all things and in him all things hold together. We need more of Him to do this. And pray for the details. And pray so much for Mary Carson. Because however uprooted and unsettled I feel by all that is about to happen, Mary Carson will feel all the more so. Our change in residence to China for 17 days is transient, but her change that her little body is about to go through, her addition to our family, is permanent. Pray that that leads me/ us into compassion for her. Pray that the Lord would lead our whole family, including Mary Carson, to the rock that is higher than us.

From the end of the earth I will call unto thee, when my heart is overwhelmed; lead me to the rock that is higher than I. -Psalm 61:2

baby shower for Mary Carson!

Some of my sweet friends threw me a baby shower for Mary Carson. I loved that they (thank you Lauren, Mary, and Anne!) and all the sweet friends and my mom and mother in law, Vicki wanted to take the time to celebrate this sweet life as we have paused to celebrate the others. Since we didn't really need anything I checked with our adoption agency who checked with Mary Carson's foster care center in China to see what type of donations they needed. They responded that they really needed toys. (well, that narrows it down right?). Although a lot of our toys are made in China, from what I understand, they are made to be shipped out, and therefore if they are bought in China they really cost the same as they would in the States. Which makes them cost prohibitive for many. Basically any toy would work as long as it didn't need batteries or have English all over it. So I registered for some that I thought would work and this is what friends brought. We are taking them all in a suitcase that we will just donate to the foster care center as well. Thank you to all my friends who joined with us in blessing the orphanage and foster care center this way. I know they will be so thankful. Some friends also brought some things just specific to Mary Carson and some adoption themed books for her, which was so great.

All in all it was a great time with sweet friends to pause and pray and celebrate this newest blessing.

These two girls had a blast being with the grown-ups at the party.

I love how they've been friends since they were literally days old.

So thankful for this friend and her attention to detail. Love all the nods to China at the shower. It was perfect!

The same lovie that all our other kids have with her sweet name on it, love it.

So thankful for my sweet prayer triad and the way the Lord has knit us together.

 Wish I had gotten so many more pictures with friends!

Overall, just so blessed and thankful for the blessing of another child. Mary Carson, whose name Mary, means wished for child. She truly has been wished for for so many years. Thankful for this answer to prayer. Oh how the Lord is faithful to us. 

And we have our travel approval!

We received our travel approval! We are going to China! So excited. So thankful to have something concrete. We are coming for you Mary Carson!

We are scurrying now to try to book tickets but will leave around December 14th and will return probably late on December 29th. We will meet Mary Carson for gotcha day / family day on December 19th. It cannot.come.soon.enough. (But so so much to do!)

no TA

Well... yesterday came and went and we did not get our travel approval by the 18th as we had hoped. It was disappointing to have prayed so much for something, to have hoped and truly believed that God would do this, and then to realize it wasn't His plan for us. But we do not lose heart. We are perplexed by this, but definitely not driven to despair. One thing that I just keep thinking is that God knows the entire situation. He knows Mary Carson, knows her heart, knows her circumstances. We don't know her yet. We thought this would be the best situation. But since we know that "no good thing does he with withhold from those who walk uprightly," (Ps 84:11), we know that if it was good for us to travel for Mary Carson and be back by Christmas, we would have. But for whatever reason that would not have been good. Even in the midst of disappointment, He has already been helping me to see some of the possible good from traveling a week later - such as - the big kids will miss less school (there was a concern for possible need for re-enrollment upon our return due to so many consecutive absences and that they could be put into different classes - so now this is no longer a concern) and since we'll be gone over Christmas, there will be less (fun) chaotic gatherings to navigate when we get home with Mary Carson since we'll need to keep her close to home for awhile as she acclimates to family life. So God is working on my heart. And we just continue to trust and submit ourselves to the One who fully knows us, all of us, including Mary Carson. We will keep praying for a timely travel approval. We need to have it by December 2nd to travel to get her in December (likely leaving Dec. 14). We fully expect and trust that this will be the case and are so excited. This means that (baring any unforeseen circumstances) we will meet our little peanut one month from today. God is so good. So excited to celebrate her today with a sweet adoption shower for her thrown by some of my friends.

where we are now and what we're waiting for

So after we received our LOA - letter of acceptance, that triggered somewhat of a paperwork cascade, with each step having to be done before you can move on to the next step. And all of these steps are working toward to final ultimate letter from China which is called Travel Approval. So the paperwork cascade culminates in the travel approval. 

It's all very confusing. Before we started this final 'cascade' Adam and I had to listen to a travel call with our agency that gave us an overview of what the next 2 months would look like leading up to travel. In that call they threw out all these terms like I800, DS260, GUZ, NVC, RTF, Article 5, and TA. After the call, Adam was like, "Do you know what all these acronyms mean?" Well... at that point, yes, kind of, mostly because I am majorly organized when it comes to paperwork (I secretly kind of love it. As a kid I actually loved filling out forms and would do it for fun. Yeah, I'm weird.) Actually if you're thinking starting an adoption, they say that one spouse is usually the paperwork person, and for sure I'm that person in our marriage. I lay out all the forms that Adam needs to sign and put little stickies where he needs to sign. Maybe I should've been a secretary instead of a pharmacist. Anyways, I digress. So we are in this paperwork cascade. It looks something like this...

Clear now, yes?

Basically if anyone out there cares about the details, after we got our LOA, we had our I800 filled out and ready to send the day that we received our LOA. Unfortunately we had to wait another week before we could send in our I800, because we needed one sentence added to Mary Carson's finding information. This was done and we prayed like crazy and the Lord provided that it would be received a week after our LOA, the day before China shut down for a week long holiday (the Golden Week). If we wouldn't have gotten the additional information by 10/30/16, it would have delayed us to travel over Christmas or after. But God graciously provided. 

God really used that week to strengthen my faith that He was absolutely able to do this thing (Eph 3:20), and that no good thing would he withhold from us (Ps 84:11), thus if it was good for us to receive this additional information by 10/30, we would, and if not, then His plan is good and His ways are higher than my ways (Is 55:8-9). 

So we received the additional finding information on 9/30/16 and mailed our I800 that day. The I800 is Mary Carson's first step to US citizenship - it is the form to classify her as an immediate relative to us. We had previously done the I800a which was a provisional approval for us as a family to adopt, and the I800 is the petition to classify this particular child as our immediate relative. So we sent this to the NBC - the National Benefits Center (Department of Homeland Security). It was received at the lockbox on 10/3 and it was approved on 10/17/16. After this I800 approval, our paperwork was mailed to the NVC (National Visa Center) in New Hampshire and logged into their computer, which generates something called a GUZ number. We received that on 10/26/16 and immediately filled out the DS260 that afternoon. The DS 260 is the online application for Mary Carson's US immigrant visa. We had to fill this out from Mary Carson's point of view which was kind of strange. On 10/27/16 we got the PDF of our NVC approval letter and our agency forwarded this to their representative in Guangzhou, China. 

After the representative in China receives our documents, they are able to go to the US Consulate in Guangzhou and drop off Mary Carson's documents. This is the final visa process and it's called Article 5. Article 5 drop off and pick up can only happen on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. So our Article 5 was dropped off Monday 10/31/16 in Guangzhou. The Article 5 process always takes (at least) 10 business days and this is where we are now. We are waiting for Article 5 pickup which is scheduled for 11/15/16 (and yes, if you counted, that's 11 business days). 

After Article 5 pickup, our packet gets couriered/mailed/sent somehow (?) to the CCCWA in Beijing. This is the same organization that our dossier went to. They are the China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption (kind of like a bigger, centralized type of DSS) and they are the ones that will make sure everything with our file and Mary Carson's documents are in order so that when we come to China to get her, there will be no hiccups. Once they make sure that everything is in order they will issue travel approval for us.

We are seriously cutting it down to the wire with travel dates/Christmas. 

Our agency sends travel groups. So there is a group traveling on December 7th. The cutoff to join that group requires having travel approval by November 18th. That would be a 3 day TA. A 3 day TA is the fastest I've ever heard of. They can run up to a week or more. But it's possible. And if it happens it will be totally God. We are praying so much for this group. For one it would allow us to travel and be home a couple days before Christmas. Otherwise we are looking at being gone over Christmas and the week after. It's not the end of the world, and we will absolutely do it, but since we're leaving our little two at home, it will be somewhat sad to be apart from them for Christmas. Secondly, there are a couple other families that will be traveling to our same province in this group and one of the families is taking their two older bio kids like are planning to. Please keep praying with us that we will receive a lightening fast TA and will be able to travel in the December 7th group - this is the desire of our hearts, but we know His plans are for good and whatever He chooses for us, we'll joyfully do. Can't wait for this adventure!