My Kid Circus

We hit a few milestones at our house in the past week.  For one thing, the tooth fairy came for a visit.  TWICE!!  Mr.Z is now in the adorable stage of  no front teeth.  I love it!

Our next milestone is Miss K has started potty training!  I have known she was ready for a while.  She knows when she needs to go.  She knows what to do.  She just doesn’t want to.  Finally, we got into a stand off the other day.

Me:  K, I know you need to go potty.  Let’s go now.

K:  No.  Put diaper on.

Me:  No, let’s use the potty.

K:  PUT DIAPER ON!

Me:  POTTY!

K:  DIAPER!!!!!!

It went on like this for a little while.  I have always heard that girls are easier to potty train than boys are, but I don’t think whoever said that had a girl with a will as strong as K’s.  So, we were at a standstill.  That was when I decided that I was just not going to put a diaper on her for the next few days.  She is going commando.  We have had a few accidents, but she really doesn’t like that, so she is accepting the idea of the potty.  She might still have some tricks up her sleeve though.  We will see…

(K jumping on her big girl bed!)

Unfortunately, there is no milestone to report on the adoption.  We are now on day 45 of the wait for the letter of approval that we are waiting for from China.  The wait is just excruciating.  This stage has taken so long that it is unlikely that we could travel before September.  It is really hard for me to put that in writing.  Several months ago I thought that we would absolutely be traveling this summer.  Then things have just dragged out and dragged out.  Please keep sending us good thoughts and prayers!  We want our girl!!!

One of the sad things that I found out when we got our last update about Hannah was that she had not received our first care package. I was really sad when I thought about her not receiving the special things we sent her with love for her first birthday. 🙁  Most likely she didn’t get it because we had to send the package to the orphanage that has physical custody of her.  That orphanage is in one city, while she is actually being cared for at a Lily Orphan Care Center in an entirely different city.  She was  moved there because of her heart condition (and it seems to be a wonderful place, so I am very thankful), but the original orphanage will retain legal custody until the adoption is finalized.

All that to say, we finally got it together to send her another care package today.  Many of the items are repeats from the first care package, since she never got that one.

For those of you who are counting, we are now on day 36 of our wait for our Letter of Approval (LOA).  I have all fingers and toes crossed that it comes next week!

In other news, we are doing well.  Summer has begun.  Z’s top front teeth are loose. Z and D are now sharing a room to get ready for Hannah’s arrival, which is fantastic for D. K makes me smile every day with her singing, dancing, and just plain cuteness; but yet she currently has the most frequent time outs in the family.  I definitely have a love/ hate relationship with the age of 2!

I am really just trying to savor every minute with our family this summer.  I can hardly wait for Hannah to come join us, but our day to day life is so wonderfully full that it makes the wait more bearable. 🙂

People frequently ask me if I have gotten any new news about Hannah.  Unfortunately, I have no way of knowing when we will get updates.  So far the 2 that we have gotten have just been surprises in my inbox. I received one of these surprises this past Wednesday. 🙂

So here is the picture that came with our most recent update:

I’m totally in love, and I want to feel overjoyed by the new picture, and by the wonderful accompanying news that she has grown several centimeters, has yet another tooth, is learning to stand, and can say “mama”.  I feel so incredibly fortunate to hear that she is still in the same orphanage where she seems to be receiving such a high level of care.  I am also incredibly thankful that her health status is simply listed as “healthy”.  Knowing that many babies with heart conditions in China will never get to a place in their life where they can have this label.

I want to focus on all of these good things, because what I really felt when I got this picture was sad.  Every day since the end of February, when we got the last update, I have stared at her picture.  I have looked at her big brown eyes and sweet baby cheeks, and wished so much that I could hold that sweet baby.  The wait has been hard, but really okay, but I think that somehow in my head I had figured that she would  stay frozen in time as the sweet  baby in the picture.  I know that doesn’t make any sense at all, but when I saw this new picture, I was truly startled.  She looks so much bigger!  Her hair is growing in, and she has lost some of the baby look in her face.  I just can’t believe that I have missed it.  I missed these precious months of growing.  I understand that she can say “mama”, but I know that she can’t have any true understanding of what that word means, because her mama is half a world away.

I knew this wait would be hard, I really did.  I just didn’t realize that there would be some days that are overwhelmingly hard.  Hannah is already such a part of our family, and has such a part of my heart.  I just ache for the time that we are missing, and for this crucial time in her life that she is missing out on knowing the love of her family.

Right now, our paperwork is in China, and is being processed.  We are waiting for our official Letter of Approval (LOA).  This is the first time during the wait that the timeline is really unpredictable.  Some people describe it to be like the grocery store check-out line; some people make it through the fast lane, and some people are in the slow lane.  We are hoping and praying to be one of the lucky ones in the fast lane.  After we receive our LOA, we have to go back through U.S. Immigration to seek permission to bring Hannah in as a U.S. citizen.  After that happens, we will really be in the home stretch.  I know the end of the wait is out there, but I can’t wait until I can see it!

There is so much of our daughter’s life that will forever be a mystery.  I think it is going to take me a number of years before I can even try to understand the pain that comes with the not knowing.  There is so little I will be able to do for our sweet  girl to help give her any answers.  However, I was able to find a man who finds the “finding ad” for children in China.  Every child who is abandoned in China must have an ad placed in the newspaper, in an attempt to encourage a family member to come forward for that child.  I imagine that those times are few and far between.

Anyway, here is a picture of our Hannah’s finding ad.  This will probably always be the youngest picture that we have of her. You can see that it states her birthday (3/17/2010), as well as the day that she was found (5/14/2010), in addition to the details about where she was abandoned.

Precious, precious child.  I have been reading everything that I can get my hands on about adoption from China and the cultural norms that have made it so common to abandon baby girls.  As a mother, I just can’t understand it.  I have no idea how a parent could take their beautiful baby and leave her on the side of a street, or in front of a store.  In Hannah’s case, she was not left until she was 2 months old.  I can only speculate, but I think that is probably around the time that her parents learned that she had a serious heart condition.  It is very possible that her parents loved her, and couldn’t afford surgery for her, and therefore did the only thing that they could think to do for her;  an ultimate sacrifice in love.  We will most likely never know the true story that led Hannah to our family, but I plan to tell her that I believe that her parents loved her, and wanted the best for her.  And we will be forever grateful.