Approval Packet

February 18, 2008, we received an email from CHI that we are approved and our approval packet is on its way. I also spoke to Tina Qualls about the process.

We received our approval packet on February 22, 2008, with all instructions for the home study and dossier. We also received our first China Program Update email from CHI. They are saying that the current wait time is 25-26 months and expect it to grow over 2 years in 2008 and climb to possibly 4 years. That's quite daunting.

Tony left today for the Matco Tools Expo in Orlando so this morning we got our signatures notarized (for FREE!) at Pinnacle Bank downtown in the Home Study/Post Adoption booklet so that I can get it to Dick on Monday.

Children's Hope International

On February 13, 2008, I emailed CHI about our application and received a reply that it had been received at CHI in Kansas City (our regional office) and it was being mailed to St. Louis (the main office).

We received a voice mail at home from Diane at CHI/KC that Tina Qualls would be our contact for questions and any help with paperwork. Tina is in St. Louis.

After supper on February 17, 2008, we told all of Tony's siblings and spouses about our new direction. They are quite excited. They have questions and we hope we'll be able to answer them over time. Adoption (and specifically International Adoption) questions can't all be answered at one time. All of the information would be too overwhelming. We hope they will all be open-minded about all that our journey has to offer.

Chinese New Year 2008

Yesterday we attended the Chinese New Year celebration with the Families with Children from China (FCC) group in the Omaha/Lincoln area. Our friends, Tammy and Brad, had invited us. Their daughter, Mia, was adopted from China in 2006. We enjoyed meeting some new people and we actually found out that we could survive on Chinese food for a while! The lion dancers were fun to watch, too!

Afterwards, Brad, Tammy and Mia, came to our house and we visited quite a while. We had lots of questions. They also used Children's Hope (CHI) when they adopted Mia. We also got to see their pictures of their trip to China. Here's a picture of Mia and her friends at our house:

Today, we had dinner with Tony's parents and told them of our new direction. They seem excited.

Starting out

On February 8, 2008, we sent in our application and application fee to Children's Hope International to start the process to adopt a little girl from China. We prepared for this by attending an International Information Sharing Meeting at the Nebraska Children's Home (NCHS) in November of 2007. We heard a lady speak who had adopted two brothers at different times from Romania and earlier that year had adopted a little boy from China.

We had also sent the form and check in to get 3 copies of Sue's birth certificate as we knew we'd need them. We already had a couple copies of Tony's.