Journey to Harris Five: June 2016

Our first paper chase was for our home study, which is completed! It had to be written, go through the review committee, corrections made, more documents and letters obtained, reviewed again, and signed off and notarized by our agency, but it's done! We received the official copies via FedEx today! Our I-800a immigration application was overnighted by our agency today as well, so it's been a busy day! We now wait about two weeks for the letter of receipt from immigration and then another week or two to receive notice of our biometric fingerprinting appointment. We have learned that in the world of adoption, there is a lot of hurry up, then wait. Oddly, we are in both stages right now. We're waiting on the immigration process and approval, but we are on to our next paper chase! We have started on our dossier! This is the set of documents that will be sent to China, translated into Mandarin Chinese, and (hopefully!!!) approved by the Chinese government. We had to obtain some of the documents for our home study, so that makes things a little easier. We have had to request extra copies of our birth certificates and marriage license, since we only have one certified copy of those and our dossier requires its own originals. We need to get more passport pictures taken (Costco does it for the best price, in case you ever need them!) for our dossier and visas. We also have to pick 7-10 pictures of us that depict our lifestyle. It's been fun going through pictures, but a little nerve wracking as well to think about what someone in China will think of each picture and what they will infer about our family from them. How do you convey your family's life in 7-10 pictures? I will have a phone meeting with our social worker in Alabama later this week to go over everything. If the documents that we already obtained can work like I'm thinking they can, we should be able to have all our dossier stuff, except immigration approval, in the next week or two. Then, once our immigration approval comes through, we can get everything authenticated by the government and ship it to China! I simultaneously can't believe we are already at this point and we are only at this point! We are making progress towards bringing our little one home, and that's what matters! The current plan is that we will have another social worker visit when Charlie is three months old. We will then update our home study and once that is completed, we will be ready to match! The process will still take some time after that, but we could know who our child is as soon as December (though probably a few months later than that).

At 29 weeks, Charlie is doing great! Routine prenatal tests have been good so far (except I'm apparently anemic, which is super common and no big deal). We are already at the point of doctor's appointments every two weeks. This pregnancy has really flown by and he will be here before we know it! He moves around a lot, especially in the evenings. It's fun to learn about his little personality before he's even born. He's definitely a night owl, being most active around 10-11pm. He doesn't like to be cramped, so he kicks if I sit hunched forward. If I listen to music in the car, he is very still for a while. He likes to kick his brother in the back when Graham sits in my lap, but Graham doesn't quite understand that it's Charlie kicking him! Tom has been able to feel/see him move quite a bit. Graham has been very interested in babies lately, so I think he's starting to understand a little bit. We haven't talked to him about adoption yet because I think that would be information overload for him at this point. Baby brother and potty training are enough for him right now! Graham amazes me everyday as he is really turning into a little boy, rather than my baby.

My original plan was to continue working the schedule I am (25 hours/week) for as long as possible, then cutting back when we get home from China. Due to some changes in my office, the hours change will come sooner than planned. I will be down to about 10 hours/week starting when I come back from maternity leave. I will no longer carry a case load, which will be tough for me, as I love the relationships and teamwork I have with "my" kids and families. I knew this would happen eventually, but I was really bummed about it. I truly love my work, so I wasn't ready to cut my hours back quite yet, but a friend pointed out something that has really changed my thoughts on it. She said "I was praying for you about this and it occurred to me: You would have never voluntarily decreased your hours. This is God's way of saying, 'You're about to have three kids. You need to slow down for a while'" It's true. Life is getting hectic and I would have just kept trying to juggle it all. Her perspective has really helped me see that this may not be what I want right now, but it's definitely what I need for this season in life. I'm even starting to look forward to the prospect of having time to get involved with some new things and meet some more moms in town.

Please pray for us:
-Charlie's continued health, growth, and development!
-Graham as he adjusts to potty training (he's really doing well!) and becoming a big brother
-Our "China Baby". I know, we're still working on name. Pray that she is feeling nurtured and loved and that she has supernatural peace that we are working on getting there to bring her home!
-We are able to get our dossier completed without too many hiccups or hold-ups!