bodner004

I have to start out this post with some of the beautiful pictures we just received of Lily at the end of last week! (they are letting her hair grow out after having kept it nearly shaved for months! :) I just can't believe we are almost there and will soon be holding this precious little girl - we will be a family! Well, it has come to this....my last post before I head out to board a plane that will take us half way around the world to meet our daughter in China.  And it's now less than 24 hrs away!!  It is surreal to say the least. This journey has certainly had it's ups and downs and major life changes all throughout the process and now we are just hours away from the ultimate end goal of this process...traveling to China and bringing home our little girl. When we leave here tomorrow morning things will never be the same in this house again. I have spent much of the last week preparing to leave, of course, and also preparing my kids for school. We have been so incredibly...

As many already know we received our travel dates last week!  We leave for China on August 27, 2014...I can hardly even believe it is really almost time to meet our daughter :) This last week has really been a whirlwind of activity around here as you might imagine.  We have been doing lots of planning and preparing to leave behind 3 of our kiddos for 2 weeks. As well as, preparing the cat care, the dog care and preparing for school to start the day before we leave...Whew! It has been exciting to pack up Lily's suitcase - which is by the way the ONLY one I have yet to even start packing.  Just to put the clothing in there that she will be wearing with us in about 2 weeks is so fun.  I am sure that I have over packed, but it is so difficult to know what to take since I am not 100% sure what size she is. I have packed 12 month sizes to a size 2t. Hopefully something in there will fit! I plan to give the orphanage whatever clothes won't work for her when we go to visit t...

We have been waiting almost 5 loooooong weeks now for our TA (travel approval) so we can finally go get our daughter. I feel like I have been dying a very slow death over these last few weeks (seriously!). In a move of desperation I decided to call my agency and speak with my rep so I could just get it off my chest more less. As soon as she got on the phone I basically started crying to her that I didn't know how much longer I could do this (Of course I can do this as long as I need to, but she "gets" it!!) and that I just needed her to talk me off the ledge so to speak. After I got done whining to her she calmly said that she was actually getting ready to call me and tell me that she had some news: "We got word that your TA has been approved"! I could hardly believe my ears! My agencies on staff Chinese director had actually made a call the night before to the CCCWA (China's children's welfare authority) to inquire about our TA.  Knowing we were coming ...

Still waiting on our TA.....I can hardly believe I am even typing that. It hurts to the core to watch each day slip away and feel no closer to getting to our daughter. It has felt like nearly every turn since getting her referral has taken longer than expected and often hits snags that even surprise our agency.  I don't understand why this is happening, but I do trust that God is in control  I am trying so hard to remind myself constantly of this. As each day passes it does get harder and harder. I just want to get to my little girl so badly and patience has never been a virtue of mine.....perhaps God wants me to work on that?! In addition to the TA from China we have been waiting on our update finger print receipt to arrive and our visas for travel. We were so excited to receive our visas via FedEx on Wednesday!  With all the craziness going on with the State Department issuing visas we were unsure if it would hold up the issuance of ours for any reason.  Our friend...