We Made it to Hong Kong!

Our flight was delayed due to the incoming plane being late and needing to be re-fueled for two hours for the long flight ahead, but we got off the ground around 3:15 p.m. instead of 1:37 p.m.   It was a long flight, but we got in around 7 p.m. and then made our way through customs/immigration and to our luggage and then to wait for a shuttle to the airport.  By the time we got in our room and settled it was around 9 p.m.  We skyped with our kids and my mom....so nice, but so hard!  They are already asking when we are coming home...sigh!

We are looking forward to a nice day of sight-seeing around Hong Kong tomorrow before we are off for Fuzhou on Saturday morning.  We found out our guide is Penny.  We have some friends whose daughter who was from the same orphanage who recently had her as their guide and had a great experience so we are excited.   Can't wait to post more pictures tomorrow, but here are a few from our LONG day!

                                          At the Chicago Airport- sorry for the flipped image!

 

View of the polar ice caps north of Alaska- the North pole...amazing!

                                           I had no idea this would be our route to China!

                                                                        Almost there!

Almost Time to Go!

Tomorrow is the big day...well one of them!  We leave home in the morning for the Chicago airport.  We fly out at 1:30 p.m. on an almost 15 hour flight to Hong Kong.  Due to the 13 hour time change (we will be 13 hours ahead of home), we will not get into Hong Kong until 5:55 p.m. on Thursday, July 12th.   We will stay in Hong Kong that night and the next, spending Friday sight-seeing.  Saturday we will fly out early to Fuzhou, Fujian province where we will get settled in and meet Lena the following day- Sunday, July 15th (Elijah and Jonah's 4th birthday)....though it could be very late or in the middle of the night prior to Sunday for those of you back home.   We will be in Fuzhou until Friday the 20th and then we will head to Guangzhou, Guangdong province- home of the US consulate.  We have our consulate appointment on the 24th and take a train back to Hong Kong the night of the 25th.  Thursday the 26th we fly out of Hong Kong in the morning headed back to Chicago and finally HOME! 

The bags are packed and we are ready to go, though we are going to have a hard time saying goodbye for 15 days to our 4 little guys!   Please say some prayers for safe travels and for health for me- I have been quite sick the last 7 days and though I am on the up and up, I am still far from wonderful.  We would also love prayers for Lena's transition and for her grief since we will be taking her away from everything she has ever known, and for our boys' transitions to adding a child to the family and to helping teach their sister sign language, along with learning even more together as a family.

Looking forward to updating you next from Hong Kong!

Flights are Booked!!

We have dates and our flights are booked!   We will be leaving Chicago on Wednesday, July 11th and will have a direct flight on United to Hong Kong.  We arrive on the 12th and stay that night and the next in Hong Kong, with a day to rest and do some sight-seeing in Hong Kong.  From there, we take a flight on the 14th  to Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian province- where we will stay and meet our daughter!   Our gotcha day is scheduled for Sunday, July 15th.  I find it so crazy, but cool, that our LOA was on Evan's birthday, TA on Rick's birthday, and gotcha day will be on Elijah and Jonah's birthday. :)  We had a big birthday celebration this past Saturday for our Landyn who is now 3 and or Elijah and Jonah who will be 4 on gotcha day.  We know my mom will make their real birthday special, but are sad to miss their birthday.  However, we will try to skype with them and they will be getting the best birthday present ever- a little sister!  :)   Back to the travel talk...we stay in Fuzhou from July 14th through the 20th and on Friday the 20th, we fly from Fuzhou to Guangzhou, Guangdong province where we will stay at the Garden and get to meet up with a bunch of other families traveling at the same time as us- can't wait to finally meet them and to see their child/children with their forever families!   There looks to be about 7 families with our agency that week, which would make sense why we had to wait an extra week for a consulate appointment (CA).  Our CA will be on Tuesday, July 24th.  We will then leave Guangzhou (not sure if by train or van yet) the evening of the 25th and head back to Hong Kong where we will spend the night and then take off the next morning on a direct flight to Chicago via United again to Chicago...home sweet home!   We have our hotel booked or Hong Kong and are waiting on travel details from our agency for the in-China part and to see how much we will owe them for that.  We are waiting to hear back from a grant we applied or and should have an answer likely early next week- praying to receive one!   Flights were very very expensive!

So very excited, but so much yet to do- starting my piles for packing and checking packing lists to see what else we will need to bring with us.  15 more days til go time!  Can hardly believe it.   In just 18 days, we will be holding our little girl in our arms- incredible!

TA TODAY!!!

What a coincidence that we would get our Letter of Approval (LOA) on Evan's birthday and our Travel Approval (TA) today...on Rick's birthday!  What gifts! :)   It looks like many people are getting their TA today but the interesting thing is travel dates are all over the place for those people- some leaving as early as June 28th, many leaving the week of the 4th, and it looks like the Lifeline crew and a few others are leaving the week after that- around the 12th-13th, once it is confirmed.  Our agency rep said Consultate Appointments (CAs) were booked until the week of July 23rd- earliest available.   We thought we'd leave right after the 4th, but we are just so thankful to have TA and to know we will finally be going to China to bring Lena home!  Looks like our gotcha day could be on the 16th (15th here at home- Elijah and Jonah's birthday).  That would be one year and about a week from the date we submitted our Letter of Intent (LOI) to adopt Lena!  The time has finally come!!

Now to get packing, booking tickets, preparing things around the house and for the kids we are leaving at home, setting up who is watching them when...the list goes on!

What a great day...would be even better if Rick was home with us to celebrate, but we'll celebrate over the phone!

Lena is Getting Big!

We just got an updated photo and updated measurements on Lena today!   She sure is growing!
If her measurements are accurate, she is 37.4 inches tall, 27.5 lbs, and with a 5.9 inch foot.  She seems tall to me and has big feet, but still seems fairly light.  I will have to measure all my boys when they wake up from a nap now! :)  Evan is short for his age- but he just turned 5 and is 41 inches tall.  She just might end up being taller than some of her big brothers!

We are still waiting on our travel approval- still looking good for leaving shortly after the 4th of July.
We received our passports with our visas in them in the mail so we're good there.  Once we have a confirmed consulate appointment (a few days after TA), we will be booking flights.  :)

We are coming Lena!!

Finally waiting for the LAST step!

A lot has happened since I last posted.  We got the pdf we needed for our agency so that they could have their in-China rep. drop off our Article 5.  We waited the standard two weeks and our Article 5 has officially been picked up by our agency rep. and couriered to the CCCWA where we will wait for the infamous Travel Approval (TA).  This can take 1-4 weeks, but it seems to be about 2-3 weeks right now.   Once we are issued TA, we wait a couple days to set a consulate appointment date and then once we have that we can book our trip!  Very last minute and expensive of course, but very exciting!

We had a rummage sale over Memorial Day weekend!  I owe the biggest thanks ever to my mom- she was amazing!  She helped price things with me all week, she helped watch the kids and get them off to school that Friday, and she helped run the sale all weekend and pack things up every day.  Couldn't have done it without her!  And a huge thanks to so many friends- I don't want to forget anyone...you all know who you are!  Thank you for your donation of items for our sale, for baked goods, for your time helping us get set-up, organized, or pricing, and to the wonderful friends who just made a donation out of the kindness of their hearts.  We are blessed.  Between Friday and Saturday and half a day Sunday (after church)....minus a few hours of a rainstorm Saturday morning, we made about $1,000!  Not bad!
Enough to pay for our visas, which we mailed out for on Saturday and should have back in a little over a week or so.   It should also help us cover another piece of the astronomical travel costs as well.

Tonight we went to a concert in a local park- our local school for the deaf's SIGN SONG Dance Team.  It was a lot of fun (minus chasing after the little who were antsy).   The kids were amazing.  I kept thinking about Lena maybe having that opportunity some day!   We got to practice a little signing- some vocabulary and some finger spelling of our names.  I learned some more that I had been wondering about from a friend of a friend's daughter.  :)   The deaf community here is so united and supportive- I loved witnessing that and look forward to future events WITH our daughter!  Pictures to come.

Now to get Lena's closet totally ready and to preparing for our trip- for leaving 4 of our kiddos to packing for myself, Rick, Evan, and Lena.   A lot to do, but it will all come together!  Come on TA! :)

We have our I-800 Approval!

After our paperwork was sent off to USCIS (immigration), we found out we had a receipt date of 4-26-12.  I called on Friday, May 11th to check in with our officer assigned to us because families who were a 1-3 days ahead of us had gotten their approvals last week.  She said it was on her desk and that there were 5 or 6 families in front of us, so she'd probably get to it on Monday or Tuesday.   It looks like she approved it that day though based on the approval we got today- it says we had approval on 5-11-12 and we just got it today...seems to take forever for us to get immigration documents in the mail.   What a nice lady to do that for us! :)  

So now, for those of you who haven't adopted from China before- you are problem saying, "What happens next?"   Well because this is a very foreign part to me- I feel clueless really....I will just post what this amazing resource of a website says happens next and follow their directions closely! :)

Once you know that your application has been approved, you are ready to move on to the National Visa Center!

After approving your file, your officer will mail your approval to the National Visa Center by 2nd Day UPS Air. However, the approval isn't always mailed out the same day it's approved, so applications can take up seven days to arrive at NVC. Upon receiving your approval, the National Visa Center (NVC) will enter your information into their computer system.

Within 1-3 business days, the NVC will "cable" (basically emailing/sending electronically) your file to the US Embassy in Guangzhou, China. This is approval of your visa petition.

Upon doing this, the NVC will then mail you a letter stating that your petition has been forwarded to the Embassy. Your agency needs this NVC letter in order to proceed with your adoption! Unfortunately, this letter can take up to a few weeks to arrive in the mail. So instead, ask the NVC to email you the letter as a .pdf attachment.

After you have received I-800 Approvaland have been cabled (and gotten the NVC letter),it's time for your Article 5 letter to be issued by the US Embassy. This is a step that you don't have to really DO anything about, but it is helpful to know what is going on.
Once you have emailed your NVC letterto your agency, they will forward it to their in-China representative.

The in-China rep will take the NVC letter to the US Embassy in Guangzhou along with your DS-230 application and Parental LOA. The US Embassy only allows representatives to drop off the paperwork on certain days.
UPDATE: Effective February 28th, 2011, pickup days will changed. Article 5s will now be picked up and dropped off on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday!!! This is GREAT news for families!!! Monday will no longer be a pickup/drop off day.
Why is my paperwork going to the consulate?
The consulate needs to review your new child's visa application (the DS-230), make sure it meets the qualifications for an immigrant visa, and then signs off that everything is in order for the adoption to be completed. This is called the Article 5 letter. You cannot obtain custody of your child until the Article 5 letter is issued!
The consulate takes a standard two weeks to complete this process. If your paperwork is dropped off on a Monday, it will be picked up from the consulate by your agency rep two Mondays later.
Once it's picked up from the consulate, it will be delivered directly to the CCAA for Travel Approval!

And once you have Travel Approval (TA) you usually leave 2-3 weeks later, depending on when your consulate appointment is at the US Embassy in Guangzhou, China.

There it is in a nutshell -- it is all going to happen quickly and be here before we know it, but it seems complicated having never gone through it before.

Another step down and one big step closer to Lena!  :)