New Update

We received an update from our agency yesterday. We got a new picture and information on her. I asked them before Christmas for an update so we could get a size so I would know a little more what sizes to take for clothes for her.

It states:

Her current health is good. She does respond to her name and can feed herself.

She can make sounds but can't say any words yet. (which seems weird to me we have a video of her singing but maybe she isn't singing any words??)

She is potty trained. She doesn't know her colors yet.

Her foster family calls her Bin Bin. ( I need to figure out how it is pronounced anyone know let me know please)

Her sleeping time is 9:00 pm. - 5:30 a.m. she doesn't take a nap during the day.

Her meal time is 7:00 a.m., 12:30 and 6:30 p.m.

Snack time: 10:00 a.m. and 3:30 p.m.

She eats noodles, rice and dumplings. She likes meats.

Her current personality is described as extroverted, but recently she has been fussy and a bit bossy when playing with other children.

The orphanage feels that the following information will help in her transitioning to your family: since she can not talk, she can only use crying to express her needs. She needs the people who care for her to observe her needs carefully.

Article 5

We have Article 5. Our agency sent an email this morning saying it was picked up. We are now waiting for TA (Travel Approval). Its taking between 2-4 weeks for TA so hopefully sometime in January. If not before the 12th (I've heard) then we will have to wait until after the Chinese New Year. So hoping and praying but I know that it will be here when its supposed too.

With this whole adoption journey we've had to learn to just sit back and wait for when its supposed to happen. We couldn't "control" anything or make anything happen faster. We know we'll be getting Zoie when we are supposed too and thats all that matters.

Almost Article 5

We are waiting for Article 5. It should be ready on Monday. So we are getting closer....seems like its been forever. For those of you that don't know after Article 5 we wait for TA (travel approval) then our agency will set up a CA(consulate appointment) and then we will be traveling. Right now TA's are taking between 2 and 4 weeks. So looking like January travel we hope. If its after the 12th it may not be til February because of the Chinese New Year.

I asked our agency to see if we could get an update on her size. We haven't had a size update since last November so hopefully we will get something before we travel. I have no idea what size clothes to bring. I'm thinking 3T just because she is 3 years old but don't know if she will be a little smaller.

Provisional Approval

We got our I800 Provisional Approval last week. Sorry I'm behind on blogging again. So much going on with kids, school and some kiddos being sick, sick, sick. I'm hoping they will get over it soon with Thanksgiving just around the corner. I need some sleep and energy for the black friday shopping.

Our next step is waiting to be cabled, then Article 5, then TA (travel approval).

I think I'm in the mood for a treat. Pumpkin chocolate chip cookies sound good.

Happy Halloween

I hope everyone has a safe and Happy Halloween!

We are still waiting for our I800 Provisional Approval. Hopefully we will get it in the next couple of weeks.

I'll keep you posted.

Bruno Mars - Just the Way You Are (Cover by MattyBRaps ft. Tyler Ward)

I had to post this video. It is so sweet and touching. Its so true and we know our little one is beautiful just the way she is too.

News

I'm behind on posting again.

We got our I-797 on October 16th. I was shocked, I thought for sure I would have to re-do my fingerprints after the lady at the USCIS office told me my fingerprints were worn and to not be surprised if I get a letter telling me to get them done again. Well they passed! She did them a couple of times to get the best ones for me. She told me typing, gardening, etc wears them out the most and my pinkies were the worst but they passed. :)
We turned around and sent in our I-800 and our new LOA. So now we wait for that approval, then they cable it to the NVC and pick up our Article 5 then we our inline for TA. I think we are still out 10-13 weeks but who knows maybe things will go faster. I can hope right. Its looking after Christmas to travel or even January now.

Fingerprints,More pictures and another Video

We decided to try to go in early and get our fingerprints done. Our appointment is October 18th. We received our appointment notices last week. Ty was off work today so we headed down and walked in. There was no one in the office so they got us right in. They told me my fingerprints were kindof worn so they might get rejected and I might have to come in again. I guess I have done too much typing ;) and gardening :)

I called and let the USCIS know that we were fingerprinted early and we haven't been assiged an officer yet so they made note of it in the system. Hopefully they will get to it soon. We need our I-797 so we can send in our I-800, get I-800PA, cabled, Article 5 and then Travel Approval. Well at least we have pictures to look at to keep us patient.

Here's the photos I received from another mom. Her daughter is having the party and Zoie was there. I'm so glad we found her and could share pictures. They are such a treasure to have.

Don't you just love that grin.

Had to include some more singing pictures. She is getting into it.

Now she is taking a bow.


Here's thevideo they sent of her singing, its so cute!

Birthday Pictures

Here's some pictures from Zoie's birthday party. The lady holding her is her foster grandma and the man next to them is her foster grandpa. They bring her to the orphanage every day for class. The update we got said:
Zheng Bin is doing great at her foster family. Foster grandparents bring her back to the orphanage every day to attend class. Now Zheng Bin is developing well. Foster family said her mental development is very well. She understands everything. She would go to the grocery store to buy something herself, she can pick up whatever she likes. If the vendor was wrong she would point to the thing she wants vexedly. When she had hard time expressing herself she would hum and point or do signs to others. Zheng Bin is very happy in her foster family. Her foster family loves her very much.

Zoie looks like she loves to sing. I think we'll have to get her a microphone.

Looks like we have a singer in the family.

More birthday pictures

On a side note we found the mama of the little girl in the photo. She sent me some photos she has of Zoie. I'll post those tomorrow.

Video

We received lots of pictures and a couple videos from Zoie's birthday party. I'll try to post the pictures later. I need to edit some of them, split pants, need I say more ;)

Here's the video singing her Happy Birthday with the cake we sent her:

News

Our check was cashed on the 8th from USCIS so we know things are starting to happen. Saturday, we received a Notice of Action from USCIS. It's like a belated birthday present for Zoie.
They will be sending us our paperwork with our fingerprint appointment on it. I talked to our agency today and they said we should be getting the paperwork next week. That it usually takes 2 weeks from the received date. We are getting closer !!! I'm still hoping we get some pictures of her celebrating her birthday.

HaPpY BiRtHdAy!!

Happy Birthday Zoie! Today (which would have been last night for her) is Zoie's Birthday. She turned 3 today. It's been almost a year since we saw her sweet face. It's been agonizing at times with the wait, especially since we have seen her picture and her file. We accepted her file in October last year. Hopefully we will get everything we need to travel soon and make her apart of our family. I sent her a birthday care package through Ladybugs n' love. They are sending the orphanage money and have contacted them to arrange for them to buy a cake and have her foster family bring her to the orphanage to celebrate it. They are supposed to email them pictures so hopefully we will get some new pictures of her soon.

Happy Birthday beautiful girl!

We are still Moving Forward

This is an update picture we got of her a while back. She looks like she loves the bath.

Keep moving forward.... Don't you just love the movie "Meet the Robinson's" I love the motto Keep Moving Forward from it. In life you must keep moving forward or you will never learn, never progress. The adoption process at times is very slow but we keep moving forward. Sometimes its ever so slowly, sometimes quickly. Lately it seems like very very slow but at least we are moving forward. Once in a while you take a step back and then keep moving forward. Here's our step back:

There was an error on our homestudy, I caught it right before we were going to send it in. I thought I had better read through it just to make sure. Well my name in one spot was a different name. I contacted our social worker and she said she must have been talking to her neighbor with that name when she was doing that part. I laughed and told her I do that sometimes too. We also had to add something on Dakota's part since he is 18, he will need to get fingerprints and his stuff has to be added on there as well. We just got the error fixed and his stuff added and now we should be filing for our I-800A. I swear its always something. So now we are moving forward again after a little kickback.

Our agency said we should travel in about 10-13 weeks (knock on wood)

I found a picture that our agency sent in an update we have one other one of Zoie in a little dress with a necklace on but I can't get it to save in jpeg format. It was included on the end of an update in a word document so if you know how to get a picture to save from Word or Adobe to a jpeg so I can post it let me know.

Homestudy Approved

So our SW emailed and said she finally got approval of our homestudy from our agency. They didn't have it the first week so I emailed them and had to have the SW email it again last week. They reviewed it and gave our SW the Certification of Approval on Monday. We are picking it up on Friday and then can apply for our I-800A.

Now we will apply for the I-800A and wait again to get everything. It is such a waiting game adoption really tries your patience sometimes but you just have to remember that we can't control it and the paperwork will work out and it will happen when it happens.

Keep moving forward

Our SW emailed me to make sure of changes for our homestudy on Monday. I made sure everything was correct and she submitted it for review with our agency. Now we wait for them to approve it and then we will get a certificate of approval. Then we can file our I-800A. I guess I better hurry and get if filled out. I've slacked off doing it since its quite a few pages and I thought we would be waiting for clearances. My DH Hawaii clearance came back on Monday so we are good to go.

Good News

Our SW emailed me Thursday night. She got all but one clearance back. The California one came back in record time. She was even amazed. She set up an interview for yesterday so we might have to do one more. I think our agency said we only needed one more but our SW is checking to make sure. Once we get the other clearance back from Hawaii then we can file our I-800A application since our SW will have our homestudy finished. All she is waiting for is the clearance. I guess I better get the application filled out. I was thinking I had more time but I guess I don't.

So I'm doing a little bit of celebrating since we have some movement instead of being in limbo for so long.

I'm behind in posting. It looks like we are not going to get our I-171H renewal. We talked to our senators office and tried to get a meeting with our local USCIS office. They wouldn't even meet with us. I was tired of all the back and forth emails. They won't talk to us so that's why we got the senators office involved. They came back and said we didn't get our homestudy in on time....I'm tired of fighting with them, I'm tired of it all but I guess we have to move on.

So it looks like we are going to have to start the I-800 process. We've already contacted our SW and she has started our background checks again and we sent the paperwork to get our child abuse clearances. DH had 2 besides our state so it could be a while since one is CA. I've heard it can take up to 30 days to get the clearance from there. It's been sent in so hopefully we will get it back soon. If we can hurry and get everything back we won't have to start everything over since it will be within 6 months since we did our last home study.

Still Waiting...

I emailed our Senators office 2 weeks ago didn't hear anything back and so I emailed again last week. The person that is helping us was on vacation so she said she would contact USCIS again to find out anything. Still haven't heard back. It's really getting quite ridiculous now!!

I am about at my ropes end. Its so hard when you know you have a little one, you can see her face but don't know when you're going to pick her up to bring her home to be apart of our family.

If things don't work out with the senators office and USCIS then we will have to start the I-800 process and that could take who knows how long. With all the background checks from a few different states its not going to be quick.

Nothing much going on

Haven't posted for a while. We haven't heard anything yet. We are still waiting on our to get our extension for our I-171h from the USCIS. We've had to get one of our senators office involved and now its being reviewed again.

Hopefully they will give it to us if not we will have to start the immigration process over with the I-800 which will take us a few months longer and more money. Please send any prayers our way that we won't have to do this.

I really shouldn't say nothing much going on. School is out and the kids are anticipating us going and doing things but the flu has hit our house so we will have to wait til next week.

Hopefully we will hear something this week.

We received an update

In November we received an update and a couple of pictures.

Introducing Zheng Bin

Here are the referral pictures:
Chinese name: Zheng Bin

I finally started a blog to follow our journey to adopt our little one from China. We are so excited to bring her home to be apart of our family.