Care Package #1

I titled this care package #1 because we fully intend to send Lyla at least one more package, if not two, depending on how long it takes to bring her home.

Items included: Candy to share with her friends, photo album (photos below), disposable camera for pictures of her and her friends, tea for the nannies, Hello Kitty toy, bouncy ball that lights up and a letter (telling her a little about us and that we are coming!)

This will most likely be the first time that the orphanage and Lyla hear that she is being adopted. There is a chance that she may not get the items we sent, usually they are delivered and given to the kids, but there are instances when that does not happen. Mostly, we hope she receives the photo album, so she can be familiar with us when we get there, and the letter telling her about us and how we can't wait to come to China to meet her and bring her home.

Here are the pictures included in the photo album.

Getting to know Lyla

I thought it might be fun to start sharing some of the things we know about Lyla with the rest of you folks! Since she is our big girl there is a lot more that we know about her than we knew about Xander before we got him. In her file she has "background reports", these are in paragraph form and it is a description of daily life and some milestones that the child has reached, it also can give a glimpse into personality.

I'll start at the beginning, and quote a few lines of the description of Lyla from the first report. We've received a total of 3 background reports, and as we wait we should get some more, so I'll share as we wait.

*side note: these are actual quotes and the Chinese to English translation isn't always perfect

From a report dated September 2009:

"..., likes to be in the classroom and play room with teacher and kids to play games, she is cute, likes the outdoor activity,"

In her orphanage there is a program called Half The Sky and she is a part of the Little Sisters program. From what I have learned it is similar to a preschool setting, I'm not sure how much time she spends there or how often she attends.

"sometimes she is obstinate and impatient"

Oh, no.

"she likes the noise environment"

Oh, good!

"she is cute and likes to be cuddled by adults"

Um, second reference to her being cute and my Mommy heart is smiling big time, because I like to cuddle too!

Baby steps and surprises!

So today we got fingerprinted. It is a step that we have to complete, and one that Kevin and I have perfected in the 4+ years that we have been involved in the adoption process. We have been fingerprinted 2 times for FBI clearances and 4 times for USCIS approval, I actually had an extra time in there because one of mine didn't take, so I got to redo them. We have been the to immigration office so many times in the past few years that we have now made friends with the guard/clerk. She has been there every time we have come in and today I made small talk with her while she was looking over our paperwork. On our way out the door she said "See you next time." Hahaha! I bet she will!

Now we wait for the I797 approval from the USCIS, the one that says we are allowed to adopt a foreign child. Once we get this we send it, with our homestudy and our adoption petition (asking the Chinese adoption officials for permission to adopt Lyla and promising to love and treat her like our own) to China. Then we wait again. Hopefully all of this stuff will be on it's way to China before the end of August, that can be your prayer for us!

And now to the surprises! I am a member of a huge adoption forum on a blog called Rumor Queen. It is a great place to get advice, support, complain and make friends, seriously, I really have friends that I have met there. Yesterday someone noticed that Lyla was from Jiangxi and emailed me to ask what orphanage because she was adopting a little girl from an orphanage in Jiangxi. It happened to be the same orphanage, our girls are the same age and we have chosen the same American name for them! CRAZY! It gets even crazier, she had two pictures of our girls posing together, SO COOL! So she sent them to me. They were taken about a year ago, which is really cool because we have some pictures of Lyla from late 2009 and from early 2011, but nothing in between, so now we have some from late 2010.

It was just enough excitement to give me hope that this adoption really will happen. Sometimes during all the waiting it seems like there will never be a day when we get to hug her for the first time, but today put a big smile on my face and more hope in my heart!!!