Break Out The Kleenex

I came across this very sweet "Receiving Day" video today while poking around online. I know I'm supposed to be working but a girl's entitled to a break.

Seriously...do not watch this unless you've got tissues handy.

http://clik.to/konyn - click on "Miyah's Movie" on the left.
(Those who don't dig Christian Rock - turn your sound down.)

We are SO excited this will be us some day soon!

How The Matching Process Works

Thought it might be of interest to post a little primer on how the matching process works in China. I picked up this info from another blogger (RQ) who is well-known among a lot of adoptive parents waiting for China. Keep in mind this is a bit of a guesstimation (FYI: "guesstimate" is in the dictionary) as they don't say EXACTLY how it's done...

First, the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA) reviews the baby dossiers they've received from the orphanges at the end of each month and makes sure there are no issues with them. Parent dossiers were reviewed months before. Baby dossiers are reviewed when they arrive and then immediately matched.

So now they have a stack of baby dossiers. They look to see how far this stack will go without sending a partial day of log-in dates (LIDs) and they pull all of those files. Sometimes something happens and they aren't able to match all those LIDs. Sometimes something happens and they match more.

Next they match orphanages up with agencies so that parents from the same agency can travel together. (For example, this orphanage has six babies, this agency has six families. These two orphanages are in the same province and have a total of 12 babies, this agency has 12 families.)Then they start matching individual babies to individual families.

At some point during this part of the process, most agencies hear from their contact person in the CCAA matching room letting them know how many referrals they will be receiving and from what province(s). Some agencies share this information with their clients. Some choose not to. I'm pretty sure our agency shares this information with their clients, though in general, they are pretty tight-lipped. I would imagine they don't want to risk being wrong and causing undo heartache for parents who are already anxious and stressed.

Please ignore that loud banging noise you hear, it's just me knocking my head against the wall...

Now you've all been introduced to the ups and downs of this process - the rollercoaster...the journey, as we like to call it. Seems the rumors we were hearing oh so long ago - 6 days - have proven to be not exactly false but not exactly true, either. Won't tire you with the details but just know that these encouraging/good rumors are usually followed by equally discouraging/bad rumors a few days later and the cycle repeats every month or so.
Bottom line: we thoroughly enjoyed the few days we thought we might see our referral in four months time! We're back to square one now, so pretend that last post from 7/12 never happened, ok?

Matching Rumor

Today's awesome online RUMOR:
Allegedly...some officials from China are visiting Australia this week. One of the officials told a couple of adoptive families with late November LIDs (like us) that they would only have to wait for their match (match = baby photos/info) for FOUR more months!!!!
For months now, we'd been hearing nothing but increasing wait times possibly extending to 18-24 months, etc. Even though we knew we needed to guard our hearts and prepare for a much longer wait then expected, I couldn't help but hold hope that we wouldn't have to wait more than 14 months - meaning an end of January referral and March to bring her home. I had nothing to base that on, just a gut feeling. So this news is so good - better then hoped for - we can hardly believe it, but we really really really really want to! :) Even if it eventually turns out not to be true in the end, it feels wonderful to say that today is a GREAT day!
...I may just have to go buy something pink on my lunch hour...

Review Room

Today, we're starting to see online RUMORS that November (that's us!) may be finished in the Review Room at the China Center for Adoption Affairs! If this is true, it's huge. It would mean our paperwork (in this scenario, our paperwork = us) has been approved by the CCAA and moved forward to the next step - matching!
Just waiting for confirmation of this rumor, which could take awhile...

Adoption Timeline

• December 5, 2004: We attended a Children's Home Society (CHSFS) information meeting on China adoption hosted by an adoptive family.
• December 24, 2004: Decided to tell our families while home for Christmas about our plans to adopt.
• February 2, 2005: CHSFS received our adoption application.
• March 9, 2005: Adoption application was completed.
• March 17 & 18, 2005: Attended Pre-adoption Classes at CHSFS. These classes included topics like attachment, identity formation, racism, openness; parenting expectations, early adjustment, adoption terminology; health/risk factors; and post adoption issues.
• March - June, 2005: Gathered and worked on necessary paperwork including local and state police background checks, fingerprints, financial statement, marriage and birth certificates, physical exams, letters from employers and friends, and preparing for our home study.
• July 18, 2005: Home study visit with our Social Worker, Julie Hart, in our home. (She did NOT look under our beds but we were prepared for her to do so.)
• July 28, 2005: Second home study visit with Julie in her office. Our home study is finalized and we are recommended by CHSFS to China as approved adoptive parents.
• August 1, 2005: Sent I600A application to CIS (Citizen and Immigration Services, formerly INS) for advance processing of an orphan petition and to bring a foreign orphan to the United States.
• August 13, 2005: Fingerprinted at CIS for FBI background check related to I600A application, passport photos taken, and passports applied for/renewed.
• October 19, 2005: CIS approval received!
• November 7, 2005: All dossier documents certified/authenticated and CHSFS sent our completed dossier to China!
• November 21, 2005: Our dossier was logged in at the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA)! 11/21 is our official log-in date, called our LID. Now we WAIT!
• June 22, 2006: Our dossier is "In Review", meaning the CCAA is looking over our paperwork to make sure all is in order.
• July 7, 2006: Heather's first appointment at the International Travel Clinic to begin Hepatitis B series.

We chose China for a number of reasons. The main reasons being the adoption program there is centralized, formalized and pretty stable; the children are generally in very good health and are available for adoption at a young age; and China has a large number of girls available for adoption. The factors leading to the latter are varied and complex. For anyone interested in learning more on that topic, I recommend reading The Lost Daughters of China, by Kari Evans.

As you may know, when we started this process, it was taking about 6-7 months upon LID (see above) to receive a referral. Referral refers (ha!) to a child's information packet received by the adoption agency from China. This packet includes photo(s) of the child, location, name, and basic health information. The day we learned our dossier had been logged-in in China was also the same day we learned that the wait for referral had extended to 9-10 months. The wait has steadily grown since then and currently sits at just over one year from LID for all adoptive parents, worldwide, waiting in the China program. As of the date of this post, we've waited 7 1/2 months. If the wait holds at around one year, we hope to see something by the end of the year. Travel is usually 6-8 weeks after the referral is received. Stewart and I will both travel to China to pick up our daughter - the trip will take about 2-3 weeks, hopefully including some sight-seeing. A trip of a lifetime!

While it's so hard to wait, we understand that waiting is part of this process and if all we have to do is wait in order to see our daughter's beautiful face - then we will wait. Patience while waiting is another post all together...!