Let me introduce you to our daughter!

This is our sweet girl! We received our PA (pre-approval) last night. We can now share her pictures and her story.

Her Chinese name is Tu JieRun. She lives in an orphanage in Ningbo City which is a few hrs from Shanghai. She was born on Nov. 1,2010 with 3 issues in her heart. These made her very sick and extremely weak. In Jan., 2011 her mom and dad decided to abandon (its illegal to put a child up for adoption) her in an ER. She was then turned over to the CWI (Children's Welfare Institute.) In March 2011 the hospital performed surgery to repair her heart issues. Since then she has not had any complications and shes had several followups and echos. They released her to become eligible for adoption and now she's our sweet one!

We are thinking this picture was taken when her last medical report was updated which was Dec 2011. Plus she's in several layers of clothing so it was during a time that it was quite cold!

Now we are waiting on our LOA (Letter of Acceptance) which takes approximately 3 months. We hope to receive an update on her during this time and we will send her a package.

Can't wait to hold her in my arms!

Much love,

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We saw Grace!

Good news! We met Gracie bug!! Well not officially but we saw her picture and learned very important information about her.

This is how it all happened...
We got word from a good friend this past Friday that the Shared List was coming out on Monday. Then we heard from our case worker Sunday and she confirmed the news. She said Monday night the list would be released and we would receive an email if we had a referral. If not, she would call Tuesday morning. So Monday night Jeremy and I decided that we would go to bed at normal time considering we both had work Tues and we weren't sure we would receive a referral. After all, we didn't receive one last month. I even put my phone on vibrate so I couldn't hear the "dings" every time I received mail. I knew I would sleep light! I woke at 12:47 and decided to take a peak and noticed 2 emails from Karla. The first said, " Call me if you are still awake.". About 45 min later she sent the actual file with pics and all. It said call me in the morning! Before I opened it I whispered to Jeremy, we have one! His head popped up and said open it!! We immediately read through her file and instantly fell in love. I felt so strongly that this is Grace. Now we just needed Dr. Wang to give a doctors perspective and a good feeling. Tuesday was stressful. Working, gathering all paperwork for acceptance, and making major decisions. We had barely any sleep Monday night and very little Tuesday. This morning we finished up all paperwork needed
for our LOI (letter of intent.)

Now we wait for our PA ( pre approval) from China. This could take up to 2 weeks. When we receive that we will be able to share her pictures and her personal information with you!

Can't wait!!

Much love,

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Sale Dates are Set

We will be having our fundraising yard sales finally! We plan on having the first sale at our house in Trinity on April 21st. Since we have so many donated items, we will probably need to have a follow up sale. This is scheduled for April 28th at Aunt Lisa's in Decatur. I am not certain if we will be having the sale on the Fridays before. We are still trying to determine if we will be scheduled off work and have enough help.

If you have any items that you'd like to donate to us, let us know! We will pick them up!!

We have been so fortunate to have so much support! I knew that we have received a lot of items but when we started pulling everything out again and categorizing, I was shocked! It takes up half the garage. This is even stacked in boxes on top of each other.

We have a few more pick ups this week/end and then it's on to the set up.

Much love,


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It's official!

Karla emailed us yesterday and said she had received our official "log-in" date with China!  We are LID in adoption terms.  This simply means the date that China officially logs our dossier in and we are listed as adoptive parents.  She told us before that in the event that we receive a referral the LID would be expedited that day.  However we didn't receive a March referral so there was no need.  This milestone was set on 3/31/12! (Jeremy's birthday)

Now we patiently await a referral.  We hope to have a couple options this month.  Maoming orphanage is releasing a list sometime this month.  If that doesn't work out,  there is also the shared list that releases at the end of the month.  I am feeling like this month will be a major blessing for us. 

Continue to thank Him for all the blessings and say sweet prayers for Grace and her little friends!

Much love,

Love this time of year!

This has always been my favorite time of year.  The grass turns green, we work in the gardens, put out all the bird feeders, and stay outside til dark. The spring days just seem to put a permanent smile on my face.  Spring brings new beginnings and new life to everything.  Not just to my attitude after my "winter depression" I seem to face every year (now that I'm old!)...but everything comes alive! 

One of my favorite things is that Easter typically kicks off the spring season; and not to mention Jeremy's and my birthday all in the same week!  I love the weeks leading up to Easter.  I'm not referring to the egg hunts (although those are a blast) or the baskets full of chocolates and goodies.  I love the sermons at church.  Palm Sunday, Good Friday, and Easter service are probably my favorite sermons to hear during the year!  Every year since a young child I have listened to the sermons about when Christ is Risen and every year it still moves me and brings tears to my eyes!  New life and new beginnings!

This year, Jeremy and I will be starting a new beginning in our life.  We will soon meet (via picture) our precious daughter. (Wow, I'm going to be a MOM!) We will prepare for her arrival home, prepare for our trip to China to pick her up, and most importantly prepare ourselves to become parents for the first time.  What a blessing this sweet girl will be in our lives and she will be an orphan no more!

Much love,