Little things...

Little update here.

I am working on a bigger post but for now...

First...I just got my half of the mother/daughter jade bracelets that we bought. I am told that YiMan received hers two weeks ago. I do hope they let her wear it. I will wear mine until we meet. The bracelets have light jade beads strung on a red thread. For those of you that don't know the significance of the red thread:
there is an Asian belief that there is an invisible red thread that connects you to those you are destined to have in your life, the thread may stretch or tangle but it will never break.
The red thread legend is very popular in the adoption community (obvious reasons).
Many thanks, again, to Ann at readthreadchina.com

We met our social worker for our first face to face yesterday. LOVED HER.
We both found her super easy to talk to and it wasn't at all as scary as we thought it would be.
We look forward to the rest of the homestudy now.
Pete said I talked waaaaaay too much. Funny, I thought he did.
Lol...anyway, I had so much more to say! HA!

We are really, really excited right now because Disney.
We are thinking about adding a Hong Kong Disneyland Day at the end of our China trip. It is insanely affordable. The HK Disney hotels are cheaper than many other hotels in HK. Park tickets and character meals are a fraction of the US cost. We are not sure where YiMan will be with her comfort level, attachment and handling big outings so we are thinking about booking the HK Disney Hotel for our two days in HK and probably booking a character meal (they have a Chef Mickey's)...if YiMan is doing well we will venture in to the park. If not...quiet day at the hotel.
(BTDT parents: your advice is welcome.)
Also, there is some talk about a Disney cruise with the families from our adoption agency. It will probably be sometime in 2015.
We are really excited about that prospect!

So busy today...this blog post is a little digression to help me get all of my happy thoughts out so I can settle down and focus!

Happy Thoughts:

Updates, News and Pictures!!!

Okay...who remembers the care package that we sent in March?

We tracked that package to Beijing and it arrived there on 4/5/2014. That's where tracking ends.
We never heard if it was delivered or if our sweet girl received any of her things. We asked around on our private fb group for families that have adopted children at the Rehab Hospital and the consensus was clear that children did not receive their packages until they were sent back to their home SWI to prepare for adoption day. That's months off. All of the wonderful people in the group were kind enough to note that packages and parties sent directly to the hospital via the third party providers in China made it through. There were a few recommendations and we chose to work with Ann at Red Thread China. Please look at her web site.She came highly  recommended and I cannot stress enough how happy we are with her service. Truly. She was very patient with our questions, she was helpful in determining which items we should choose and personally attended to every detail! I just love her! On Friday May 9th we sent payment for a Forever Family Cake Party. On Saturday May 10th I received an email that said "Happy Mothers Day" in the subject line. I opened it to see this:

 Could you just die? I almost did.

 Our girl LOVES her cake!

 So pretty in pink.

There is a 1:46 video but blogger is not letting me upload it. 

Basically, we see that she is a lefty! They keep trying to make her put the fork in her right hand but she transfers back. She has nice table manners. She is calm and very observant. She sticks up for her little friends! The little girl in yellow that is to her right had an empty plate and our YiMan got the Nanny's attention and got her some cake! Such a good girl. We clearly hear a man in the room calling her "YiMan" and she responds to it, so we know that she knows that name. 

Her motor skills and self care skills are awesome. 

We are so blessed!

Along with the cake, she also got this:

In the bottom right hand corner of this picture there is a jade red thread bracelet. It's one half to a mommy/daughter set. The other half is en route to me. I really hope they let her wear it and we will both have them on when we meet. The picture pillow is designed to help her get familiar with our faces. There is a translated letter to her and to the nannies. A flash drive with instructions for pics and files. A can of biscuits for the nannies and the panda's. So cute! I hope she gets to enjoy these things.

If that wasn't enough for ya' - there is a BONUS!

I randomly checked my email yesterday and saw a message from the Waiting Child department at our agency...WE GOT AN UPDATE!!! She is still at the Rehab Hospital. We got measurements, pictures and development updates! What we are told: She is 28 pounds (2 pound gain since February). She is 34.25 inches tall. (1 inch gain since February) We got our first foot measurements! We can start thinking about shoes!!! 12 cm (about 4.7 inches) sooooo tiny!!!  They say that she does not need a diaper. She can take her shoes off/put them on independently. Feed herself. She has three meals and three snacks a day and sleeps from 7:30 pm thru 6:30 am (but one of her snacks takes place in that time frame??? GeGe Peter just said that he can help her out with that! LOL)  She is introverted, has stranger anxiety and answers to YiMan or ManMan.  She continues to attend ST and OT. She puts 3-5 word sentences together. The best part:

 We are going crazy now! 

We really cannot get through this process fast enough!

Her hair is growing so fast!

(is that a P and an H on the mittens on her shirt?)

Kid's got a mean poker face!

She is going to give GeGe Taylor a run for his money with that stare down!

Seriously?

Can't stand the cuteness.

The face!!!!

We are so in love.

P.S. We are also playing the name game! 

Shhhh! Don't tell!

Fundraising Progress and Our Current State of Being...

We had a few big fundraisers over the last two weeks. If you follow along on fb you have seen the posts.

On Saturday 4/26 I did a vendor fair at my son's high school and on Saturday we had our first Garage Sale. We raised some money for our adoption fund and we are pretty excited about that. We got a few flat out donations and "keep the change" customers that really touched us with their generosity. In total we raised about $600. Our Fundraiser Thermometer is starting to move!

We met some terrific people. We had a banner with this blog name on it at both events and we handed out story cards to people that expressed an interest. We met people in our community that have been touched by adoption, that are interested in adoption and that support our adoption. We met a woman whose sister left the corporate world to start an orphanage in Haiti. So many people shared their stories and expressed an interest in ours. Many people told us that they will keep us in their prayers. We had a really great time. It fills your soul to have people from all different backgrounds be so happy and supportive and caring...for us, for our family and for our little girl.

We plan to do a few more yard sales. It was a nice way to enjoy the beautiful weather and get to know some of our neighbors. We owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to both of our Moms for staying all day and helping us out and to Michael for being there all day to carry things to cars for people, set up, pack up and he even made some sales! Very importantly we owe BIG to our friends and family members that donated items for us to sell! Christine, Tanya and Lu, Cathy and Gil we sold every donated item!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH for your generosity! Each of the people that donated to our fundraiser will get puzzle pieces with their names on them as they are all definitely a big piece of our journey!

Adoption process wise...it's a waiting game. We have paperwork pending, child abuse clearances are out and I am obsessively refreshing my feed for updated photos of Delilah or some news that she got the care package that we sent her. The hospital and/or the orphanage is under no obligation to take photographs or send us an update but many people do get pics and they are PRECIOUS! So we are hoping!

The Vendor Fair

 

Our First Yard Sale