Care Package, New Pictures, and an Update

When we met up with Adam (Di Di) 's new family, we gave them a few things put together as a little care package for Chayah since they are from the same orphanage. They now have Adam "Di Di"!!!! And when they got him, they were able to spend a little bit of time with Chayah and give her a few things from us! Here are the things we sent to her:

Me and the outfit we sent to Chayah- a cute size 4 pink leopard print outfit

Me and the toy we sent to Chayah- a little stuffed black labrador retriever toy that looks like our two wonderful black labs :)

Me and the picture book for Chayah

One thing that I loved about this book since the first time I saw it at Target, it has Chinese characters written on the front, I believe they say "photos", plus it is super cute and has a great fold behind each picture to prevent it from falling out.
We put Chayah's picture in the front picture so that she and the nannies would know who it was for.

The first two pages: A family picture (dogs included) , and Mom, Dad, and Sarah

Sister pictures: Rachael, Me, Sarah, and Chrissy, and Sarah and Chayah

And on the back page we put one of Mommy and Daddy :)

Now, what you really want to see... New Pictures of Chayah!!!!!!

Chayah in her new outfit from us, holding her black lab puppy toy from us, and her photo book from us! It is so hard to believe that something that was in my hands (pictures above) are now in Chayah's hands! Wow!! That is just too cool! It makes her seem much closer!

Chayah smiles :) My beautiful mei mei!

This week, our wonderful agency also gave us an update on Chayah!
Here is a little of what we know:

• She likes to play with stuffed animals (We were right on with the black lab toy! We got it for her before we knew this!)
• She is affectionate and likes to be held (Awww!)
• She knows that she is going to be adopted
• She likes girly things like dresses, hairbows, playing house (Awww!!!)
• She likes singing (just like Sarah)
• She likes to look at picture books
• She has been around some pets. She likes them. (Yes! This has been one of my worries- how she will do with our two labs... I know this doesn't really tell us anything, but it helps to ease my fears)

We also received a size update on her and she is almost (to the cm) the exact size as Sarah! From the picture of her in her outfit, it looks like the 4T is fitting pretty well right now, just like Sarah!

Wow! I love this girl so much already! What I am going to do during this wait? Still no update on our paperwork. We are expecting our home study update draft to be done any day now, so that's almost done! After that, we need one particularly slow state to hurry up with a birth certificate, then get our I171H and we'll be ready for DTC (Dossier to China)!

The Paperchase

The paper chase is well underway and we are expecting our home study draft very shortly! On Wednesday we had out USCIS fingerprinting early in the morning at 8am. Of course, it is 2 hours away from where we live, which made for a very interesting morning of all getting up by 4am, piling into the van, and being on the road by 5 to be able to make it there in time, leaving some extra room for the ever present Chicago traffic. We ended up getting there at 7:45 with 15 minutes to spare. We were all pretty nervous about the printing due to the fact that my Mom's prints had just been sent back from the FBI, unable to be processed. Thankfully, due to lots of lotion and very careful care for a week, we are almost sure that Mom's prints passed this time! Yay! After that we were on the road again to finish off with our very last home study visit. We are now expecting our rough draft within the next week or so, and then, we'll be almost done with the paper chase! Last week Chrissy, Sarah and I had to go in to the doctor's for more dreaded stabbings, aka our TB tests, or as Sarah Lu calls it, a "TV test". ;) When the nurse asked who wanted to go first, Sarah was such a brave girl and with tears running down her face, she enthusiastically raised her little arm up in the air. Next it was my turn and last it was Chrissy's. Sarah was a very brave and perfect little sport about it. Of course, getting to go to the store to pick out her very own Starburst Jelly Bean Egg with a Kitty picture on the front did help cheer everybody up! ;) She has been very proud the little spot on her arm from where the needle went in, and just loved to constantly compare hers to mine and to Chrissy's. I think it helped that we all had to get them- not just her. We all had to do it together, even though none of us wanted to at all. Other than that, all of the documents for the dossier are all coming together pretty quickly. We had a bit of a slowdown with a birth certificate from California, but it finally made it's way here. I am really hoping to be DTC in mid April! After that, the time line for others seems to be around 4 months which will put us somewhere around July-September for travel. I actually think August would be the time, but due to the Olympics, I don't think that will be a choice. I'd love to have everything go a little bit quicker and get her in July, by her 6th birthday! If not, then I'm expecting travel in September, which is still only 6 months away! I am so excited!

Earliest Photo

This is our earliest photo of Chayah.
We guess that it was taken when she was about 18 months old.
Isn't she precious?!

When Love Takes You In: The Song Behind The Name

If you know of Steven Curtis Chapman, chances are you know why this blog has the name that it does. "When Love Takes You In" in the name of a song that SCC wrote after adopting his first daughter, Shaohannah. He has since adopted two more daughters from China, Stevey Joy and Maria. This song is about adoption and I have always loved it. When I started this blog, I knew that it would be a perfect name as it truly tells our story on our journey to Chayah.