New picture!!!

We got a new picture! It was taken as per our request, so we are very grateful. We feel very fortunate to know what are little guy looks like right now.

Here he is...

Is there a cuter boy in the world? Not to this mama! When I first saw this picture I just squealed, then I cried, and then I yelled "I love you so much." I mean, seriously, he is so cute.

The Chinese people are known to "over clothe" their children, so that would be the reason he looks a little like Randy from "A Christmas Story." I'm sure it's cold there, but it may not be as cold as he is dressed for. We are happy that he is wearing boy clothes, and by the looks of those cheeks, seems to be healthy. As you can see he has had no surgeries, but like I said, it doesn't appear to have affected his eating.

Needless to say we just love him and think he is absolutely adorable. We will be able to ask for updated measurements as it gets closer to travel, so we have an idea what size clothes he will need, but we are confident he is growing as he should.

New week, new post

So, I am going to try to post something weekly so you have something to read. There will be a lot of down time as we wait for paperwork to be completed in China, so I'll do my best to keep things exciting.

What the next step? Well, we've asked (through an in-country staff member from our agency) for some photos and updated measurements on Xander. We know the request has been made, so now we wait to receive them. Unfortunately, sometimes new measurements can bring some fear, if the measurements seem a bit small or skewed in one direction, but it can typically be explained. Sometimes measurements are taken very quickly, almost just to get a number so they have something to report. It is nothing like measurements taken at a pediatrician's office in the US. The photos will also help with documenting his progress and development, I can hardly wait.

This week we are going to send him a care package. There are businesses that provide pre-made care packages and send them to your child in the orphanage. It is really a great service. We are able to send photos of our family that he will receive in a photo album, and typically the nannies will show him and tell him who the people are in the photos. The hope is that if they show him enough he may recognize us when we get there! We are also including some questions to the nannies and a return envelope, it's not guaranteed, but we hope they write us back. And finally we are including a disposable camera. The instructions are for the nannies to take pictures of him from now until we come get him, give us the camera when we get there, and then we will have pictures of him during the time that we can't be with him. Families do this all the time, and more often than not the cameras get used and letters get returned, hopefully that will be the case for us.

As far as the paperwork goes, we are waiting for our file to be transferred from our first agency to our second agency. Nothing monumental will occur when this happens, but it is a much needed step. We will be notified when it does happen and then we start waiting for the next thing...which is a BIG deal!

PICTURES!

Here are the pictures of Xander! We think they were taken when he was about 6 or 7 months old. We have requested some recent pictures and will be sure to post them as soon as we can!

This is the first picture we saw of him. The one that said to me, "Hi, I'm your son."

Kevin was quick to agree.

Poor guy, has girl clothes and girl toys. We've got girl toys, but we'll make sure to get him his own boy stuff.

Notice the pink pants. We need him to come home, fast!

He is so darn cute!

It's really going to happen!

I'm just busting at the seams to tell people our news. I am writing this on December 31st, but can't post it until, well, who knows when. WE'RE GOING TO HAVE A SON!!! He is just perfect! He is in China right now waiting for us, and we can't get there fast enough. He was born with a cleft lip and cleft palate, and he may have already had his lip repaired, we're not sure. He is adorable, of course. He is also just 7 weeks younger than Macey, we will have virtual twins.

I know, I jumped way ahead, but we are so excited we can hardly stand it. Let me explain the best I can. Since about August Kevin and I have been trying to figure out just what to do about our adoption from China. We knew it was going to be a long wait when we started, but no one could have predicted that it would be like this. We felt certain that we were supposed to adopt, and China just touched our hearts, and we hadn't felt the Lord changing our mind. We looked into switching to a "special needs" adoption from China, just didn't seem like the right thing to do at the time. We even looked into adopting from Ethiopia or Serbia, but still waiting for China. Ultimately, about two months ago, we decided that we weren't sure what we were supposed to do so we would just wait it out and make a decision later.

On the other blog I explained that we had to renew our paperwork and switch agencies, unrelated to this change in direction. So we were looking into all that and trying to get settled in to our new wait. On December 2nd I received an email from an agency that I had looked into about 3 years ago when we were searching for an agency to help us adopt. I had occasionally received emails from them, maybe every 6 months or so. Typically it would say something like "These children are looking for their forever families. If you are interested please contact..." And sometimes it would have pictures and sometimes a link to a picture. I would often look at them and think how cute they were, but these were all "special needs" kids and that just wasn't what we were doing. Well, on December 2nd I got an email that briefly described a boy as 1 year old with a cleft lip and palate. I looked at the picture, getting ready to think how cute he was and move on. Only this time I looked at it and thought "Oh no!" He was THE cutest little boy I had ever seen, and I mean that! His little round face, almond eyes and wide smile were all I could take. I quickly closed the email and tried to convince myself that I was crazy to think that we could actually adopt him.

Well, as you can tell by the way this post started, I could not look away. I sent the picture to Kevin. He doesn't usually say much about stuff like this, I think he just hopes I'll stop obsessing and move on. By the time Kevin came home from work I told him "I'm very serious about finding out more about this little boy." He just said "I know." Now, as silly as that sounds, that is a statement of approval from Kevin, trust me, I know! The next morning I requested his medical info, we received it the following evening. Over the weekend we agreed to spend alone time praying and talking to God, trying to figure out just what we were supposed to do with this. By the end of the weekend we were both excited, scared, and truly in awe of what God was asking us to do.

So, here we are, adopting a BOY from China! We feel so lucky. As of today (12/31/09) we are waiting for China to accept our request. That doesn't mean they "approve" the adoption yet, it is just the first step of many before we can go get him. If we had to predict when we would bring him home, I would say mid-April, basically right around the corner. We have not given him a name yet, but we lovingly call him Brother, Little Dude or Little Guy.

Update: 1/19/10

We got a letter from China today that basically says they recognize that we want to adopt this certain little boy and will proceed when our "application file" has arrived. The first step of about 4 to bring our boy home!

I still do not have permission to post his pictures for the "public" to see, so I will have to wait...bummer. However, he has a name! Drumroll please.......

XANDER ROSS

Oh yeah, I changed blogs because the other one said a lot about "her," come to find out "she" was really he!!! So he can have his own blog!

oops...I am not allowed to post publicly what province he is in...sorry I had to remove the clock.