We celebrated Christmas at my mom's house today and had a lot fun. One of the gifts I received from my mom was a Chinese doll named Olivia. That is why I titled this post coincidence or fate. I can't believe she found a doll who is Chinese and also named Olivia.
My mom also gave me this really cute t-shirt that describes the wait to anyone who asks.
Another Christmas has passed by without our daughter and this is the third Christmas since we decided to adopt from China that we are missing our daughter. With the wait times increasing I wonder if we will be celebrating yet a fourth Christmas without Olivia. Even though I do not know who she is or where she is in China, Olivia is our daughter and it is hard to celebrate this time of year without her. I am praying for a speed up in 2008.
October 2006 is through review! Congratulations to all of the October 2006 families who have been waiting for this day!
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before October 31, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before December 14, 2005.
Wow, it had been 20 months since our dossier has been logged in at the CCAA. This makes me wonder how much longer we will have to wait to see Olivia's face and hold her in our arms. I know I am praying for a speed-up in 2008.
I really hoped that this month we would finally see a speed up for referrals, but that is not the case. This month there were only 6 days of referrals.
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before September 30, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before December 14, 2005.
There are still 113 days of LID's in front of us and I am now beginning to wonder if we will even get to see Olivia's face in 2008. This wait has been so long and difficult and it is not getting any easier.
Congratulations to all of the families who have received their referrals this month. I am living vicariously through you and holding onto hope.
The CCAA has updated their website and it appears like September 2006 has finally made it through the review room.
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before September 30, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before December 8, 2005.
19 months!
I can't believe it has been 19 months since our LID. Time seems to go so quickly in some ways, but in other ways, the time is just dragging on while we wait to bring Olivia home. I hope that she knows, wherever she is, that she is already loved by her family here.
It's official....
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before August 31, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before December 8, 2005.
I am not really thrilled to see this in writing from the CCAA as I really hoped that they would refer farther into December.
Here we are in November already. According to RQ, referrals began arriving yesterday although agencies on the east coast probably won't receive them until Monday. The first cut-off rumors are December 8, 2005, which absolutely stinks. That means that we will still have 119 days of LID's ahead of us. That means we still have a really long wait ahead of us. I did the math and it doesn't look good for Olivia to be coming home anytime soon.
According to China Adoption Forecast....Our best guess - a weighted average of recent CCAA velocities, guessing that CCAA will perform about as well in the future as they are performing now, but might return to previous trends: 2008-12-09.
That's our best guess for when you might receive your referral. Just at a guess, we can suppose that the CCAA either speeds up or slows down significantly, and show you those dates. If they speed up: 2008-05-19. And if they slow down: 2010-01-09.
See what I mean about the long wait ahead of us...
Last night I dreamt that China really sped up and we received our referral for a little girl who had just turned 2 on October 10, 2007 (weird that I remembered the date). With the wait being so long we let our I171-H expire (which we really did), so we had to hurry up and renew it so we could bring Olivia home. Anyway, I never did see her face in my dream and we didn't make it to China before I woke up, so I don't know what happened after that.
Another month has passed and I have now reached my 18th month of our paper pregnancy. How much longer will this go on? Who knows and with the rate of referrals recently, I hope we don't have to wait another 18 months. But if that is what it takes to bring our daughter home, you will be seeing more posts like this one.
In other news....the CCAA updated their website this evening and it is official:
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before August 31, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before November 30, 2005.
All I can say to that news is....YUCK!
Today referrals began to arrive and it looks like the cut-off date is probably November 30th, 2005. This means that the CCAA only referred 3 days this month (really it was 5 days, but 2 of those days were weekend days). It has taken over 6 months for the CCAA to get through November 2005, so how long will it take them to get through the rest of 2005?
This news has discouraged me, but I am prepared to wait as long as it takes to bring Olivia home.
Congratulations to everyone who has received their referrals for their sons and daughters.
In September 2005 we made the decision to adopt our daughter from China. We filled out our agency application and then began our paperchase for documents for the dossier. We had our home study visits, background checks, and multiple fingerprinting appointments. In March 2006, after finally receiving all of our paperwork from our government and our social workers, we made the trip to Columbus to have everything authenticated by the state. Then, we paid a courier to take everything to the Chinese Consulate to have the papers authenticated by them. On March 23, 2006 our dossier was on it's way to China and on April 7, 2006 we were logged in to begin our wait for our daughter. At that time, our agency (along with everyone else) thought we would wait anywhere from 6-9 months to receive our referral for our daughter.
Now, here we are 17 months later, still waiting. I have had people ask me why we haven't given up on the China Adoption program and there is one simple answer...our daughter is in China. There is not an hour that goes by that I don't think of Olivia and there is never a night that I don't dream about her. How long will we wait...until we get to see her beautiful face. Yes, we are praying for sooner, rather than later, but we will wait as long as it takes to bring our daughter home.
Almost every Memorial and Labor Day we go camping with family. Typically it is very hot with not a lot of shade, so a couple of years ago we came up with a fun way to cool off and pass the time. We jokingly call this water balloon jousting...
The CCAA has updated their website and has referred through November 25, 2007. Of course, this only leaves 132 LID's ahead of us (how sad).
Here is what the CCAA website says:
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before June 30, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before November 25, 2005.
I read this on http://heartmindandseoul.typepad.com/weblog/ and wanted to share it. The blog owner is an international adoptee and also a parent of an internationally adopted child. If you get a chance, check out her blog as she great information that every adoptive parent should know.
They say...
They say I was just a baby, what possibly could I know?
They say I was just a baby, what possibly could I feel?
They say I was just a baby, what possibly could I remember?
They say I was just a baby, how much would I really lose?
They say I was just a baby, and that I wouldn't really notice.
They say I was just a baby, and that I wouldn't really care.
They say I was just a baby, and that it wouldn't really matter.
They say I was just a baby, and that she could be replaced.
They say I was just a baby, and that I wouldn't crave her touch.
They say I was just a baby, and that I wouldn't miss her love.
They say I was just a baby, and that time will heal all wounds.
They say I was just a baby, and that I'd never know any different.
They say I was just a baby, and that life would go on as planned.
They say I was just a baby, and that the pain could be loved away.
They say I was just a baby, and that I'd never feel as if I'd ever lost her.
Copied with the owner's permission.
We just returned from a wonderful, relaxing vacation in Mexico and I realized that I had not updated our blog for our 16-month LID anniversary (August 7). Actually, the date passed while we were relaxing away and I didn't even think about it until we got home. However, not a day went by that I didn't think about Olivia and continue to wait for her to come home to her forever family.
Well, the rumor was true and the cut-off date is November 21, 2005.
Directly from the CCAA website:
The CCAA has finished the review of the adoption application documents registered with our office before June 30, 2006.
The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before November 21, 2005.
Congratulations to all of the families who received their referrals!
I came home from work today and heard that referrals are arriving! Supposedly the cut-off date is November 21, 2005 which means that there are now only 136 days of log in dates in front of us. Even though that is a lot of days, at least now there are less.
