Now what?

Well, we have lots to keep us busy, which is a good thing because we are aching to go get her.  Tomorrow we mail our Letter of Acceptance to our agency.  After they received our signed copies as well as those from the ministry the documents will head on over to China.  China then will issue a TA (Travel Approval) anywhere from 2-4 weeks later. Once we have those documents we can book our Consulate appointment and book all of our travel plans. We will plan to travel 6-8 weeks from the time of booking.  I know it will be tight but we are praying to travel in March or early April.  The sooner the better!  

Lily grew up at the Children's Welfare Institute of Beijing City.  For the last 6 months she has been living with a foster family.  We hope and pray that she is loved and kissed goodnight every night!  We will travel to Beijing to complete our adoption.   We feel like the luckiest people in the world.   

Our Girl!!!

We are proud and honoured to present our daughter Qiuyu. Her Canadian name will be Lilian Rain Marie.  We will call her Lily for short. (Ken is humouring me and letting me name her Lilian - his pick is just Lily).  Her Chinese name means Autumn Rain - describing the day she was born.  Rain also means abundant blessing from God.  We feel so blessed and overjoyed that we have found our little girl!

Lily is 3 1/2 years old.  She was born on August 14th 2005.  She is 89 cm tall. She is a moderate sleeper and is said to be fairly outgoing.  She loves music and dances to the beat.  When she swings she giggles out loud.  She is beautiful, her cheeks are so kissable - we can't wait to smooch her all up!

Ethan and Dylan are so excited!

Our story from the beginning... (shortened version)

3 and 1/2 years we began the journey to China.  We decided that we wanted to adopt a child from there.  After many meetings with our social workers and copious amounts of paperwork we were ready to send our file to the Ministry to see if we would qualify for adoption.  After we received our approval from the Ontario government, our dossier (file) headed off to China.  We were logged in July 5, 2006.  Phew!

Over a year later (September 2007) CCAA dusted off our files and reviewed us...and we were approved!!  With a great sigh of relief we settled in for the long wait. When we started this journey the wait times were about 9 months and beginning to grow and grow.

When it was time to update our home-study and our official documents the wait had grown up to almost 3 years and was increasing every month.  Our social worker suggested to look at the special needs program - we did our research and prayed a whole lot.  We sent our updated home-study and approval for the new program. Thinking we still had another year wait we were pleasantly surprised (OK - completely shocked) to receive a call Saturday, January 5th, at midnight saying their was a little girl our coordinator thought was perfect for us.  After receiving the files - we saw Wei Quiyu and knew in our hearts that this little girl was our daughter. 

We sent in our LOI on January 6th and received our approval (LOA) on January 23.  We are getting closer!! China - here we come!