TRAVEL APPROVAL

WE GOT IT!!!!!!  I was on the phone with my agency today telling them how frustrated I was that it was taking soooooo looooong to get our Travel Approval.  Laura, one of our facilitators, was telling me that she understood and that because China observed a holiday the week before last that it might take another week or 2 to get it in.  She said if it wasn't here by the end of October they would call about it.  My heart was sinking as she was talking to me...darn holidays!!!  Then I asked Laura what time the mail usually came in so that I wouldn't be waiting around all day on their call.  she said it normally came in around 3:00.  She said they use DHL so they are always looking for the yellow truck and yellow envelopes.  She assured me that they were as anxious to get them in as we were.  About that time she said "Oh my goodness, I see our assistant walking towards my office with 2 yellow envelopes in her hand.  I guess the mail came early today. Wait here on the phone with me and I will open these right now and see if one of them are yours...Isn't your husband's name David?"  I said "What???  Is that our TA you just opened???"  And sure enough it was!!!!!  How CRAZY is that!!!!  Laura said that for all the years she had been working there she has never had anything like that happen!!  Of course, she got to hear me yell and scream with joy - then Ian came in the room to see what was going on - so I told him and yelled and screamed with joy too!!!  Laura said our phone call made her day - she couldn't wait to tell everyone!!  God is so good!!

So...onto the details!!  We have requested our US Embassy appt on November 26.  We hope to hear back from the Embassy tomorrow.  Our agency is about 99% sure that we will get that appt since it is so far off.  That means that we will leave here on Thursday, November 15 and we should be able to leave China on November 28.  The agency said that we should be traveling with 2 more families from their agency!! This is GREAT news because we thought we might be traveling alone!  One of the families lives in GA not too far from us so I am super excited to meet them!  We will all be flying into China on the same date.  We will sight-see in Beijing together - then we will separate from the other families as we all fly out to our child's province.  Then we meet back up together again in Guangzhou for our US Embassy appt. 

OK - so now I am going into super-get-ready mode!!!!  Holy Cow - this is all feeling sooooooo real now!!!  We have a daughter!!! 

Travel Approval Angst

 

Well...I am STILL waiting on our Travel Approval to come in from China.  I was told that China celebrated a holiday the week before last and all govt. offices were shut down.  So, I am guessing that is the hang-up.  I am PRAYING we get it this week!  I am sooooo ready to book our tickets!!!  Please pray that we get it this week!  I hope I post on here real soon with the news that we have TA!!

 

These are the most recent pics I have of Grace - I got them about 3 weeks ago.  I don't think I will get any more before we travel - but I pray I am wrong!  She looks HUGE in these pics - but I know these pics are decieving.  I am traveling with 12-18 month clothes but I am thinking she will be wearing 18-24 months during the winter and 2T in the summer.  I could be wrong but that is what I am thinking now.  Thanks for you prayers!

Onto the last step...

Well...we heard from the US Embassy in Guangzhou that they completed Grace's US Visa!!!!  Woohoo!!  Our agency's facilitator picked up Grace's paperwork from the Embassy and it is now at it's final stop...the CCCWA in China.  They will issue us a travel approval in a few weeks!!! Woohoo!!  Once we get travel approval, our agency will contact us to set up Grace's Visa appt which will happen the final week we are in China.  Once we have that appt. set then we can book our tickets!!!  Woohoo!!!  We are almost there!!! 

We are painting her room this weekend...I can't wait to start getting everything together for her!  I finished her registry today - it is all feeling soooo real!!! woohoo!!

Here are some more pics from what I posted yesterday...these just make me laugh out loud!!  Poor Grace - sharing is such a hard concept to learn :o)

New Pictures of Grace!!

 

 

We got some new pics of Grace last week!!!  She is changing so much!  I just can't wait to get my hands on her!!  She is so precious!! Enjoy the new pics!

The many faces of Grace

These are just a few of the many pics I have of our sweet Grace!  As you can tell by the pictures, she is getting so much love and attention in her foster home.  That is part of the reason we just couldn't change her name.  God's grace is surrounding Grace everyday by the love and care she is receiving from her nanny and the other volunteers at the Starfish Home. 

USCIS Clearance!!

Well - we found out today that Grace has been cleared through USCIS (immigration)!!  This means that the US has declared her to be a legal orphan and they have approved her to come into our country and will be a US citizen!!  We are so thrilled!  This is the completion of a HUGE step in this adoption!  Praise God!!  I have been so worried about this particular step but God really convicted me yesterday during our church service to just give it all to him...holding onto this fear of things not turning out right with this adoption was hurting my communion with Him.  Grace is first and foremost His daughter and He has her future under control.  I am taking on a worry that is not mine to have...God has her under His protection. Wouldn't you know that God's timing in perfect and we got word TODAY that she has been cleared...after I finally released my fear and gave it to Him.

What comes next???  Well, the next step in this adoption puzzle is for Grace's clearance to go to the NVC (National Visa Center) where she gets registered in the computer.  Once she is registered they send me a letter in the mail which usually takes a week to receive.  Then when we receive that letter we email it to our agency and they then email it to their facilitator in Guangzhou, China. Once she gets the emailed letter she takes it to the US Embassy in Guangzhou and they work on getting her Visa completed.  Once we have word that this step is done I will update again and inform everyone about the next step.  Oh they joy of adoption red tape!!  It will all be worth it once she is in our arms!!

Our little girl!

I have decided to start a blog for the remainder of our journey to get our daughter from China.  Let me introduce you to Grace Camille Gaffney.  She is 18 months old and is living in foster home in Xian, China named The Starfish Foster Home.  The Starfish Home named her Grace when she came to live there when she was 1 month old.  We decided to keep her name since it fits her perfectly, and it fits her situation and God's provision of her perfectly!   She is getting so much love and care in her foster home!  I am getting tons of information about her and many pictures of her!  I feel as though I already know her even though I am a world away!  We have been able to skype with her a few times and hope to continue to skpye with her until we travel.  We are very smitten with her!! 

We started this adoption journey at the end of October 2011.  It took us quite a while to complete the paperwork (in the adoption world we call this our dossier).   By March of 2012 we had finally completed our dossier and we were ready to send it to China.  On March 22, 2012 we had our Log-In-Date (LID) at the CCCWA (China's Center for Children and Women's Affairs).  Once we had our LID we were told by our agency that we were eligible to receive a referral.  We were told that it might take up to 6 months to receive our referral because we were asking for a young female with a minor special need.  However, 3 months later on Monday night June 25th, our phone rang with a referral of this precious girl!  We had 3 days to decide to accept this referral or pass on it and wait for another referral.  Grace has a minor heart condition.  We received very good information about her heart and sent her info to a pediatric cardiologist who gave us great news about fixing it.  We took the 3 days that were given to us and spent the majority of it in prayer to be sure this was truly the child God had chosen for us.  On the 3rd day, June 29th,  I called the agency and told them we wanted to continue with this referral.

At this point they told us that in about 8 - 10 weeks we would receive a formal Letter Of Acceptance (LOA) from China and that is when China basically approves us as Grace's soon-to-be parents.   However, on July 31st, I got a phone call from our agency saying that we had received our LOA from China and could move on to the next step in this adoption!!!  It is sooooo very rare that anything is done quickly in international adoption!!  So I was SHOCKED to have gotten our LOA so fast!  In fact, I thought we had so much time before we traveled to get Grace that we really hadn't started doing anything to prepare for a second child!

Now that we have received our LOA we should only have about 8-10 more weeks until we get permission to travel to China to get our daughter.  The next step in this adoption is to send Grace's paperwork to USCIS (immigration) so they can check it over to make sure she is a "legal orphan" according to Hague standards.  We should have that clearance in about 2-3 weeks.  Once her paperwork clears, then we wait to receive word that they are preparing her US Visa.  Then after that China will issue us permission to travel.  The final step before we buy plane tickets to China is to request a meeting at the US Embasssy in China to pick-up her US Visa.  Once we get the date of that meeting we can buy our tickets to China!! 

We are at the final stages of this adoption and we couldn't be more thrilled!!!  We are cautiously optimistic that all of her paperwork will go through without a hitch!  After what happened to us with our first adoption - we won't be 100% optimistic until we have her home!! 

I will update this blog everytime we get a new piece of news about our journey, and of course, I will be updating this blog when we are in China!