New pictures

We just got new pictures of Courtney this week. They are from her birthday party at the orphanage. We sent her a cake and a doll and you will see her enjoying both. The pictures are very tiny and I haven't had any luck with getting them bigger so enjoy and if I can I will get them redone to be larger.

Updates!!!

I heard from the agency today that our LID is 5/5/10. This is so exciting. I have seen LOA's arrive in as little as 43 days and then travel in 2 - 3 months after that. That would put me in China in Aug or Sept!!! I am praying for a fast LOA!!!!! It seems a little more real now that we know that China has our paperwork in hand and it is just a matter of them taking the time to look at it and give their stamp of approval for us to come and get her.

Happy birthday baby girl!

Today was a difficult day for Brent and I. More so than it was to miss Kaleigh's 1st birthday by one day. I think it is because we have know who she is for so long now and because we still don't know when we will get her for sure. Anyway we celebrated by having cake at home and we sent her a doll and a cake for her orphanage. I hope we get pictures soon of her enjoying the cake. I know her sister enjoyed the cake here. We love you Courtney and can't wait to have you home with us!!

Update

I was so excited to get an update on Courtney today. What a wonderful present to receive on our 10 wedding anniversary. It came with one picture that I have not been able to post because it was a part of a pdf file and I can't get it converted yet. She is so beautiful and has the same expression on her face that Kaleigh often has in pictures (the serious one). She looks very well cared for and she looks like she is doing wonderful. Her second birthday is coming in just over a week and I have sent a cake and a doll through one of the care package services so she will have something from her mommy, daddy, and sister on her birthday. Anyway size wise she is just a very tiny bit smaller than Kaleigh was at the same age so that is helping me to guess about her size a little better for when we bring her home (hoping for late summer early fall please pray with me). The paperwork said she is smart, outgoing, can choose her favorite toy, can run, jump, feed herself, drink by herself, wants to be held when she cries and can say "hug". Still wondering if that is hug in Chinese or English! I remember Kaleigh's paperwork talking about how active she was and if this paperwork is as accurate....we are going to have our hands full!

DTC

We finally got notification from the agency that they had all of our paperwork back from DC and that we should be DTC on Monday!!!!!! For those of you who thought this should have already happened let me give you some advice. Make sure you double check all your dates on all your paperwork. My local background check ended up being dated incorrectly and no one caught it until it was in DC and 8 days ago I spent the day getting it redone and taking it thru the state level process of getting it state sealed. The process was not hard but very frustrating and a lot of running to have everything verified before it could go on to the next step. I was lucky that I spoke to people who knew a lot more about what I was doing than I did!! Remember to thank your agency if they take care of these steps for you, I know I did because I couldn't imagine doing this for every piece of paper that has to go to China. Anyway the most important part of this post is that as of Monday we will be DTC and one step closer to bringing Courtney home!!!!

Room progress

Courtney's room is about 2/3 of the way complete. We still have to do some accessories and art work but the furniture is in and put together, curtains are hung and bedding is on. I know some of you are waiting on pictures but sorry to say it was late enough tonight and there is still tools and such scattered around the room that I didn't get the pictures taken.

With each step in the process we are getting more and more excited and we have also met (online) a couple of other people who are with our agency and are within either days or a couple of weeks of being right where we are in the process. This is really exciting for us since we were so close to our travel group when we brought Kaleigh home.

Hopefully there will be good news this week (maybe DTC!!!).

Immigration Approval!!!

Today when I got home from work I checked the mail thinking that Brent and Kaleigh had probably already done it, but just in case.... You can imagine how excited I was to see an envelope from immigration it there. Yes, it was our approval now I just have to get a copy to our agency so our dossier can head to China. We are now waiting on DTC and then LID which will hopefully be followed by a quick LOA. We are so excited and it happened at such a perfect time. We are having a yard sale Saturday to raise money for the adoption expenses and to clear out Courtney's room so we can start getting it ready.