Love Internationale

The good news…

The glow-in-the-dark stars came! I was going to paint them on, but I have zero artistic ability so I opted for the sticky kind instead. Here is part of the ceiling with both the sticky-on-the-ceiling stars and a few hanging ones. I have circled a few of the hard to see sticky-on-the-ceiling ones for your edification (because I’m sure this is a life-altering event for you).

Don’t mind the bare light bulb, J needs to hang the ceiling fan.

Think we’ll create an irrational fear of clouds and stars in her?

Also in the realm of good news…

The Hannah Andersen order came. Here is one of the outfits I bought. Yay! Pink sheep! Every little girl needs a onesie with a pink sheep on it!

In the realm of bad news….

It appears that the referrals did not ship from China on Friday. Apparently they are working over the weekend (which is pretty damn nice of them), but are taking the first part of next week off. The bottom line is, who knows when we’ll know about the next batch? We are rapidly approaching a new record for number of days between batches. Whoo! (That was sarcasm)

My expectations at this point are pretty low and I think I need to keep them there. I think it will be a small batch that we had to wait extra long to receive. That’s my prediction. I know I’m a pessimist and that’s supposed to be all bad and I’m supposed to put on my positive happy face, but that’s not what I’m feeling. I have yet to be happily surprised by a batch in the last 15 months.

When I’m happy — When I’m sad — Use the corresponding face for the corresponding emotions.

Anyone who can name that movie quote gets a virtual cookie.

Today is our 15th month anniversary of being LID, btw. We are also close to breaking a record because my agency said the longest anyone has ever waited for a referral was 16 months. (during SARs). Of course, I shouldn’t whine because (unhappily) those who are LID after us will wait much, much longer than 16 months.

Also in the realm of bad news. Damn it! We’re out of red wine.

Now the cute…

He just climbed up on the ladder in the nursery and knocked down a star. But can I be mad at him? You tell me.

My agency hopes the CCAA will mail referrals by the end of this week. Right now it is 3:59 AM on Friday, December 29 in Beijing China. The CCAA opens at 9am. (That also means somewhere in China our future daughter is probably sleeping right now. I always know what time it is there, you know, because I’m always wondering what she’s doing.)

If they mail by the end of this week, the calls won’t start going out from our agency until next Wednesday. We may have an idea about the cut-off date a little before then, though (maybe).

Ugh. This is going to be a lot of waiting and emotional poo-poo just to find out we’re not in the batch. But if we’re not, it’s just four (or so) weeks until we see her face. Four weeks. That’s….

28 days

672 hours

40,320 minutes

2,419,200 seconds

I can do that. I can. Really.

I’m recording this dream because I think it pertains to the adoption. I dreamt J and I lived on a farm high on a cliff. A river ran at the foot of the cliff. I was climbing the stairs on the deck at the back of the house, surrounded by our cats and dogs, when an earthquake struck. I heard it first, like a rumble far away, then felt one little shake and then another. Took a few moments for me to realize it was an earthquake I was feeling.

After the quake, I heard another sound–rushing water growing louder and louder. A huge wave (a tsunami) crashed up over the edge of the cliff, but didn’t flood our land. We were safe from the surprising destruction, but no one in the valley below us was. We ran around trying to save all these people and animals who had been blindsided by the flood.

Kind of an ominous dream.

Here are two things from the world of adoption that made me laff today.

This is a picture of the new CCAA building in Beijing.

(Note the snazzy doorman)

This is a close up of the sign on the building:

Notice anything…strange?

As a writer and editor, I just couldn’t let this slip by. With a husband whose first language is not English and through my own fumbling French, (and sometimes English), I am very compassionate about mistakes like this. However, to actually bronze the mistake…well, that’s just priceless. Also, besides the typo in the word “adoption,” I can’t be sure where they’re going with the “edited by” portion of the sign. *tilts head to side* Hmmm.

On a more serious note, here is the matching room. Is our dossier on someone’s desk or still on a shelf? This was taken on December 11th.

Do you see the collage of little faces on the cubicle wall? I enlarged the photo and every cubicle appears to have one. I wonder if they’re babies to match with families?

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The second thing to make me laff today was the post “She Asked for her Bottle but I was Already There” over on Pomegranate. Since I also have a definite lack of baby song knowledge, I’ll probably end up “baby-izing” songs like they did.

Heh heh. Pour Some Congee on Me…. *snort* and You Cried All Day Long (you know, She was a milk machine/ she kept her tummy clean/ she was the best damn baby that I’ve ever seen …). Heheheheheh.

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Finally…these pictures were taken from the Love Without Boundaries site. It’s one of my favorite charities (if you’re looking for another worthy one and need a recommendation). They do good work.

James and I both dreamt of FD last night. James dreamt she was with us at the North Sea at Belgium, on the beach. We were introducing her to his relatives. (The Belgians say you’re supposed to bring all babies to North Sea for several months so they can partake of the good “ions” in the air.) James said she was beautiful.

I dreamt I was (heh) shopping for toys with her.

I also dreamt of her the night before last, but it was just a flash of her face and nothing more.

EDIT: Good public interest piece about the new regulations.

Dear Universe and the FTB -

Please let this be the last Christmas we spend childless. Please? I asked this same thing last year and you didn’t grant our request, so I’m asking again. The last one hurt. This one hurts more.
Thank you.

Merry Chrismuhanukwanzicayule!!!!

China is trying to project an image to the world of a declining number of abandonments. The Chinese government has shown a history of sort , erm…okay… lying in the two years we’ve been through this process. I’m not presenting a conspiracy theory here. To anyone who has watched this situation unfold as closely as I have, it’s pretty much obvious. We saw it all first hand because China drastically slowed down in its referrals only a month after we were LID. We were timed perfectly to see the whole deal go down.

It is my belief that they are attempting to save face in preparation for being in the world spotlight for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and also because of the ever-increasing economic development of the country (which, as I stated before IS likely resulting in less orphans overall, but not the drastic reduction they’re attempting to claim). I also believe they know they’re in a fine pickle with the rising gender imbalance and need to take steps to address it.

I truly hope domestic adoptions pick up and/or they ease the one/two child policy. I don’t share some fellow adopters feelings that all the children should be adopted internationally to lift them out of poverty, ect. I think all steps should be taken to allow those children to stay with their birth families, if possible, or be adopted domestically. That’s the best case scenario for these babies. You know, like, the best case scenario for the babies in Africa is not for Madonna or Angelina Joile to come in and adopt them, it’s for the country to develop enough to allow them to stay with their birth parents. Obviously.

It is my hope China can achieve this in the future. In the meantime it appears that many, many little girls are going to end up growing up in the SWIs. May they find foster parents, learn a trade and have good lives. I hope so.

Back to what I said about the best case scenario…I know J and I are going to do everything in our power to be the very best parents we can. I think FD is coming into a very good, safe, loving and stable situation. I believe she will flourish with us and grow up strong, smart and beautiful in all the important ways. Obviously I believe this, or we wouldn’t be adopting.

I hope that we’ll be good parents. I hope we’re doing the right thing. I hope we can walk that very fine line between integrating her birth culture into her/our life/lives while not “appropriating” it. I hope she doesn’t resent us when she grows up.

Anyway, I have a lot of hope.

….what I said about not all SWIs in China participating in the IA program.

I’m on a Yahoogroups list hosted by Dr. Jane Leidtke. She founded the Our Chinese Daughters Foundation (OCDF) and lives in Beijing. On her list she answers all kinds of questions about China.

She responded to a query about CCAA’s claim that there were not enough children to meet IA demand. According to Jane, there are about 1000 SWIs in China but only 250 of them participate in IA.

So…250 SWIs out of 1,000 are open to IA.

The other 750+ institutions do not participate in IA and are filled with children. Jane says there are perhaps up to 600,000 children both NSN (non-special needs) and SN (special needs) waiting in SWI’s that don’t participate in IA.

So…600,000 children. I really hope China can make the domestic adoption program flourish.

Uhm….Hannah Anderson is having a 60% off sale. I may have slipped in my vow not to buy clothes until the referral. Ooops. But I got stuff that will work for spring and bought large enough that she’ll have a while to wear them.

I hope FD doesn’t turn out to be FS, ‘cuz he’ll be wearing a lot of pink if that happens.