August 13/Adventures in Hong Kong

Today we were up nice and early to go on a tour with the travel groups from our adoption agency. Lots of nice families, several with kids along for the ride too. Here are some highlights:

on a sampan boat cruising through a fishing village/the building behind
us is a huge floating restaurant

the view of Hong Kong from Victoria peak

at a jewelry factory

We had a delicious dim sum lunch, which was a new experience for us.  Hong Kong is known for its dim sum.  Kyle liked the dumplings best, but he tried everything.  I’m really proud of him for how well he’s handling our trip so far. 

Later, after a good nap, we caught up with Stewart Hughes, a young man from our church who is studying here in Hong Kong.  He seemed REALLY glad to see us, judging by the big hugs we got!  He showed us some of his favorite places (and foods!) here…

a night-time laser show on the harbor...

...the Hubble IMAX movie at the Hong Kong space museum...

...the Star Ferry to downtown Hong Kong...

...Bubble Tea!  It is this chai-style tea with licorice "bubbles" at the bottom. 

His favorite noodle place in the Mong Kok market… here we are walking behind the vendor stalls to get to it…

Thanks Stewart for showing us the town!

Next stop… Guangzhou!  We will be taking the train there tomorrow. 

August 12/We are here!

A few really good things….

               *We survived an almost 15-hour flight with our sanity intact!  (Thank you Korean Air for the wonderful in-flight entertainment—highly recommend flying with them if you are coming to Asia.)

               *All of our luggage got here too.  Yeah!!!

               *Our agency, CCAI, has got fantastic people working for them here.  Kudos to Matthew for waiting at our hotel until we arrived at 1 a.m.!

We will be touring Hong Kong tomorrow and seeing Stewart!

One of the really big planes (the other one was an Airbus! Chris loved that!)

Kyle making a lotus flower fan in the Seoul airport: a neat way to spend a layover

August 11/Preparing to Depart

We are on our way!  A journey that started several years ago has led us here, waiting to board the biggest plane any of us has ever been on.  After days of “serious” packing, I can say with certainty that the leaving is definitely the best part!  

Waiting at the *first* airport (there are 4!)

As we are counting the hours until we see Lorelei on Monday, I can’t help but wonder about how she is feeling.  She too is preparing to leave and begin a new life.  She will say good-bye to all she knows, her friends, teachers, her city…so that she can have a family. 

Lorelei celebrating with her friends

We are running on very little sleep.  The best laid plans to have everything ready and get a good night’s sleep went a bit awry, and it was not easy to sleep once we tried.  Hopefully we will get a few winks on this long flight. 

Next stop: Hong Kong!

(Drum roll please...) WE HAVE TRAVEL APPROVAL!!

Boy, has this week seemed like the longest week EVER!  I made the mistake of predicting that our travel approval--the last step in our waiting game--might possibly come last Friday, and I have been waiting for the phone to ring ever since.  And checking my email more times per day than.... well, anyone should!  My mom always used to say "a watched pot never boils," (she's so wise!) so I started in on cleaning up the school room this afternoon and wasn't anywhere near my computer when the email came in!  Got to love the timing... I hear you, Lord!  Waiting around the computer is so NOT a good use of my time.

So, yes... we finally have TA (travel approval) and should know our travel dates early next week once we have our consulate appointment scheduled.  The whole trip hinges on when that is, and it's usually the last full day there.   From the choices our agency gave us, we will most likely be leaving around August 10 or 17. 

We are so excited!  As Kyle said, we are now counting down DAYS until we meet our girl!

Here's another new picture to hold you over for a few more weeks :) 

NVC Letter... check!

First, we are one piece of paper closer to Lorelei today.  Can I get a woohoo?!  If you check out the timeline to the right, you will notice that there are just a few more steps to go.  Next we await the "Article 5" that is issued from the US Consulate in Guangzhou.  This should take about 2 1/2 weeks. 

Is it really July already?  We've had a busy month, what with Kyle going to two weeks of camp, then VBS at church.  Kyle learned how to make dumplings and speak a little Mandarin at a Chinese cultural camp held by our local school district.  Now he needs to teach his mom and dad!

We've been working on Lorelei's room too.... still needs a few more homey touches, but it's a beginning!

Hope you all enjoy a wonderful 4th of July!

Awesome!

First of all, the good news!  We received our LOA (Letter of Approval from China) today!!  I've been doing a happy dance for about an hour now... should be burning some major calories.

Though this is but one more step on our way to Lorelei, here is the particularly awesome part of the story.  My friends from college, Julia and Andy, are also on their way to China to adopt a precious little girl.  A few weeks ago, I heard from her that they received LOA in 5 weeks, 3 days.  (The average time to wait is about two months, so that sounded pretty good to me.)  I hoped (and prayed) that ours would come quickly too.....but exactly 5 weeks, 3 days?  WOW!

"But God has surely listened and has heard my prayer."  Psalm 66:19 

PS For those of you who are going to pull out a calendar and check, our LOA would have arrived yesterday if it hadn't been a federal holiday! 

Long overdue update!

What a wonderful month May has been!  We have received lots of updates and pictures about our darling girl.  We are now hoping to travel by the end of August (see the timeline to the right of what steps are left in the process), which does drive us a bit crazy some days!   Somehow the days are flying by and we will be on a long plane ride to China before we know it. 

We are so blessed to have connected with another family who just traveled to China to adopt one of Lorelei's friends, Gianna.  Her mom, Brycie, delivered a few gifts from us to Lorelei and took lots of pictures.  We also now know that.... her favorite color is green (just like her mom!)....she likes to eat McDonald's hamburgers....  is happy when she gets a compliment.... and loves to draw, paint, and dance.  We're counting the days, sweet girl!

Lorelei & Gianna

Lorelei & Brycie (Gianna's mom)

A recordable book--Guess How Much I Love You--read by mom & dad

Thanks to Linda and Brycie for this suggestion!

We also got an update from our agency, CCAI, with this great picture--she is a dancer for certain!

This one may be my favorite, though.  We had sent a photo album a while back in a care package that we weren't sure actually got delivered.   We really wanted to know that she knew she has a family.  Then we saw this! 

The excitement and encouragement that we've experienced from friends and family has been amazing!  We are so grateful to you all and would love for you to pray for our daughter, especially that she continues to feel hope, happiness, and peace as she waits for us to get there.