Still waiting

No referral sightings yet. It's looking more and more like we will have to wait until January 2007 for the next batch and cut off date. My heart goes out to the families who are so close!

Where is my dossier?

The pictures below were obtained from the Love Without Boundaries site. Their motto is "Every Child Counts" This organization has dedicated itself to helping Chinese orphans. The site offers many ways for you yourself to get involved and/or offer your assistance. Please check it out!

So..... Where is my dossier? Hopefully in the New CCAA office building pictured below!



A sign posted by the Entrance to the CCAA.

My dossier should be somewhere in these piles of dossiers waiting to be matched. I believe the dossiers are color coded by the months that they are logged in.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Everyone! I hope your holiday is merry. And a special Holiday shoutout to all my Blogger buddies. It has been one heck of a ride and I don't think I could have made it this far without you all and the support that you have given me! God bless us everyone..........

Erin's gift for Abby

My Niece Erin just amazes me with how in tune she is with Abby's pending adoption. She has closely followed right along with me as I journey to Abby and talks about her all the time as if she is already here. A couple weeks ago while I was at her house she disappeared upstairs for a while. When she returned back downstairs she was holding a wrapped present that she made sure I saw her place under their Christmas tree. Minutes later she had removed it and asked that I open it for Abby.

I wish I had thought to take a picture of the gift before I opened it.

Erin and Aunt Jenny!

More Rumors

It's starting again. The all of September LID's (Or the rest of September I should say) for the next batch of referrals rumors are surfacing again. I'm not falling for them this time though. The next referral batch is due out sometime at the end of this month or begining of January. That's a while to wait and unfortunately a lot can (and probably will) change between now and then.....

On a more positive note, I really want to thank you all for all of your encouraging words! Your the BEST!!!!!

One of those days.

Not feeling my best today. Warning pity party post coming up. ...... I know it has been a rough couple of weeks for all of us in Blogger Land. Not a lot of good news this month and not even any potential good rumors out there.

My day today just plain sucked. Today one of my coworkers told me that several of my other coworkers had commented that I have been in a bad mood lately. Then she tells me but don't worry I told them that's just you being pregnant. Maybe she meant well and even went on to say that she felt that my persistent bad mood was out of character for me so she attributed my mood to being pregnant. She wouldn't say who else had told her that I was cranky though only saying only that she told them they should bring their concerns to me. This really hurts cause that means they just really don't understand what I am going through.

Number one - This is not your average pregnancy! Number two - I work in a very busy but stressful Intensive Care Unit. Number three - We have had a lot of sadness on our unit as of late. Both with sad cases and also several of our coworkers have suffered significant tragedy's recently. Add to that the tension that the Holidays can bring plus all of the recent bad news coming out currently for the Adoption Community and I'm sorry but it's hard to keep up a Sunny personality.

My first concern when she said this was for my patients. I have tried very hard not to let my disappointments affect my care. She didn't seem to think that was an issue thank goodness. I Love taking care of my patients and often bring their problems home with me ie- worrying about them ect. This of course just adds to my stress but also comes with my job.

Not sure where I am going with this but I am putting it out there anyway. It hurts that some of my coworkers whom I also consider friends can't understand what I am going through. My one year anniversary has passed and now It's likely to be 6 to 9 months more of waiting. Everyone at work knows I am adopting so I hear multiple times a day the same questions over and over. I know they care and want to know but when the 20th person asks you in a 12 hr period it gets really hard to answer. I truly don't know anything. As you all know it's also really hard to convey the lack of information that we are given to people not on our ride. If I'm cranky obviously I am hurting..... Not to mention That I live this journey 24/7 by my self. Yes this was my choice and yes I have friends and family to talk with about it but it still not the same as having a spouse to share it with. Again I know this was my choice but it doesn't mean that I don't have to admit that I am hurting as I wait.

My sister happened to call me tonight at the perfect time (Thanks Laurie). She likened my situation to hers when she was going through invitro (it worked twice Thank The Good Lord or we would not have Erin and Christopher). She also felt misunderstood and was hurt by well meaning statements or questions.

So if any of my coworkers happen to read this please bear with me. I will try to be happier but I'm struggling. Sometimes this seesaw gets to be a little much. I will not give up though. My Abby is out there and hopefully getting closer everyday......

LID 12 Months today!

Wow one year today! Not sure how much longer to go. One rumor is that the wait will stabilize at 15 months meaning 3 more months to go. Another rumor has the wait going up to 18 months meaning 6 more months of waiting. I myself figure that if it is going to continue to take the CCAA 3 months to get through 1 month worth of LID'S then I am looking at 9 more months until I get to see a picture of Abby. Finally the Rumor Queens prediction chart has me getting my referral in June leaving my wait at 7 months. So the possibilities are multiple and only the CCAA really knows....... meanwhile I am going to start concentrating on myself while I wait. Time to look out for me and worry about me again. It is my New Years Resolution but I am starting today! My 3 list toppers are to eat better, sleep better and to exercise at least 4 days a week. Ready......Set.......GO!!

Shoot!!!

Oh well, Hopes were dashed again today. The cut off date for referrals this time is September 8th. The 3 months to get through 1 month worth of LID's trend continues. I have accepted it. 9 more months before I am likely to receive Abby's referral.... Add 2 more months for TA (travel assignment) and It looks like I will be in China getting Abby sometime in October. 11 months more to wait. Everything happens for a reason. Yea! for all of you lucky ducks. :D

And the ride continues.....

Referrals may arrive tomorrow or not depending on which rumor you choose to hope for. As for the all of September LID's rumor..... Evidently not so. Now the rumor is September 7th or possibly the 12th? Who really knows??? I think I am going to start wearing one of those motion sickness patches behind my ear. I want off this ride! Please just give me my baby........

POPPED?

No new good rumors right now. In fact the few that are actually out there are gradually contradicting the previous good rumors......

Still hoping...

Rumor has it we may be pleasantly surprised with the next batch of referrals. These much anticipated referrals may include not only the rest of the August LID's but also all of the September LID's as well. Rumor has it they may arrive next week. If this or anything close to this happens it may be a sign that things are finally going to speed up! Crossing my everything!!!!!

Please.......

WOW!!! Good rumors out there right now! Please let them be true.......

Happy Thanksgiving!

I am thankful for many things but especially for all of the kind words of encouragement I have received both on and off my blog as I continue my journey to Abby!

Nothing to post.

Yuck, my yearly "Holiday Funk" (that's what I call it) has arrived. I get sad every year around the Holidays. Mainly because I never thought I would still be single at this point in my life. I have plenty of loved ones to celebrate with so I am definitely not alone but it's still not the same as having that special someone to celebrate with. This year my "funk" seems to have come much earlier then usual. Likely because I thought for sure this time last year I would be celebrating this Holiday Season with Abby. Instead I have uncertainty and the feeling that no one really understands what I am going through as I wait. (except my blogger buddies of course!) This feeling really stinks and I hope it passes quickly.

Dancing with the stars

I love this show! It has really helped the last several weeks pass by faster since I had Tuesdays and Wednesdays to anticipate. From the get go Mario has always been my favorite. (My TV boyfriend :D) As the weeks have gone by though I have become torn. Mario besides being so cute (dimples and all) is very good. Emmitt on the other hand has really come into his own this last few weeks. He also seems so genuine. I think it is going to be darn close but my gut feeling is that Emmitt is going to win. Time will tell.......

Happy Eliza Day Tiffany

Tiffany got her baby today! What a surprise she wasn't going to get her until tomorrow. I follow many amazing family journeys towards their babies so you may wonder why I am singling Tiffany's journey out. It is because besides being a fellow single Mama, Her blog is one of the first ones I started following as I began my own journey to Abby. I have her blog linked in my side bar if you want to follow them along too. I just love the "at peace" look Tiffany has on her face. It just makes me feel like no matter how long I have to wait I know that I will be all right.

Veterans Day

In support of our troops and for those that have gone before them........ This site lets you send a card of your choice (compliments of XEROX and designed by children) to one of our many deserving troops. Look how happy they are. What better way to celebrate and honor our veterans! :=)

FYI

Saw this in the Single Adopt China yahoo group. Not the book but a very interesting and thought provoking article was referenced. It can be found here. The article comes from the book above. It seems like an awesome book. It can be purchased here. They also have some other really cool adoption related items for purchase on this site and they take PAYPAL. It's worth checking out!

LID 11 Months Today

YeeHaaa! What can I say? Not much. No idea how much longer I have to wait. Another fellow single China adopter described her experience with the wait on her blog a few day's ago. She said that basically while each month brings her closer to her referral she also ends up having to push her expected referral time back by yet another month due to the minimal LID's worth of referrals issued that month therefore feeling like she is in a standstill. Well said and exactly how I feel!!

Warm Fuzzies

I am always looking for new blogs to read or anything involving China adoption for that matter. Here are two wonderful blogs worth checking out. Both of them leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling........ Blog one is the latest Love Without Boundaries Travel Blog. They do wonderful things (similar to "Operation Smile" around here. The children are beautiful. Blog two is about a wonderful woman who is living over in China and fosters quite a few babies all on her own with the help of volunteers. She actually seeks out babies from various orphanages that she hears about. These are babies that would benefit from any extra TLC available. She and her team of volunteers do amazing work!

100 Good Wishes Quilt Update

Here are the Pictures that Karri sent me of the top of Abby's quilt. I think it looks great so far. She still needs to do the backing. I want to again Thank everyone who took the time to send Abby and I a quilt square and a wish! This quilt represents a part of Abby's heritage. I promise to make sure that she will always know and cherish the Abundance of Love and Good Wishes that helped make this Quilt So SPECIAL. Now go ahead and scroll down. If you click on the picture it will get larger. Can you spot your square????

They are coming!

Congratulations to all you lucky Mommy's and Daddy's. I can't wait to see the pictures posted! For the rest of us according to Rumor Queen things may be looking up! I am crossing my fingers!

Referrals

The roller coaster ride continues. No referrals yet. Rumor has it maybe Thursday they will arrive. We all wait and hold our breath to see what this months cutoff date will be. Hang in there all you August LID'ers. This has got to be awful for you. My prayers go out to you as you wait...

Mean while it has been speculated that even though no referrals were received during the month of October this may not necessarily mean that the CCAA has skipped a month. I won't try and explain the rationale behind that statement because frankly I just don't get it. No referrals issued in October seems to me to be a skipped month no matter how much you try and sugarcoat it. Unless maybe........ a batch of referral's are issued the first AND the Last week of November. So the cliffhanger continues.............

Patience and Tolerance

Where are the referrals?

Gosh the rumors are all over the place right now! Not sure what to believe. Oh the power the CCAA has over us. Anyone else feel like this?

Christmas Stocking

Here is Abby's Christmas Stocking. The women who is making her 100 Good Wishes Quilt made it for her out of the left over fabric I had saved. I got the idea from another blog that I had read a long time ago. I asked her if she would be able to do this for me and she had no problem.



She sent me some pictures of the stocking today. I love it! It turned out beautifully don't you think?

She made the stocking reversible. I can't wait to see the quilt.......

Homestudy update done

My Homestudy update today was quick and painless. All in all I would say our meeting was 15 or 20 minutes long. Wow 500 dollars for that????? I think I may be in the wrong profession. I also told her that I had been thinking about moving. Still in my neighborhood but into a house verses the condo I currently live in. I really want a yard. So I asked her if it would be another 500 dollars to update my homestudy again for the move. She said, " Oh no! It would only be 300 dollars for that." ????????? Again I think I am in the wrong profession.

As far as any new info that I was able to get out of her...... Not so much! She told me that right now the wait for China referral was running around 11 (I don't think so) to 14 months (duh). I asked her to clarify some of the rumors that I had heard. She hadn't heard or didn't think the wait would go to 2 years. She hadn't heard that China was going to close down to singles but did seem to think that they were going to lower the quota for singles. She did not seem to know why the wait has gotten so long either but did tell me that It seemed like China was getting pickier with their approval process. With that being said though I wouldn't count on any of that being accurate. She is on the ditzy side. She thought I already had my referral! HELLO!!!!

Anyway one more bridge crossed! Now on to my refingerprints.

Home Study Update tomorrow!

I have been cleaning like crazy! I have my home study update tomorrow morning. I have to admit that redoing the required documents was a lot easier this time around since I didn't have to have them notarized. Still I'm just plain nervous. I haven't seen her in a year and with my added pseudo pregnancy pounds I am afraid she will say something. When I was in high school and stressed I didn't eat. Lost mega weight on my post "breakup diets". Okay now I know that was not healthy. Not to worry though cause now I eat when I am stressed and we all know there is a lot of stress going on right now. I also have a little more debt then before with adoption bills, home improvements, and the all important retail therapy. My net worth is still way positive and I also have more in my savings and retirement then I did last time so hopefully I will break even.

Oh and I most definitely plan on pumping my social worker to see what she knows or what her thoughts are about this ever growing wait.

On the lighter side

Surely none of our children will ever do this :)

In Need of an Attitude Ajustment!

Rumor has it that referrals due out sometime next week will only be issued for those logged in through August 23. While I am HAPPY for all of those lucky families, this is not good news for me. Remember I was logged in on December 7th. This means that I still have all of the waiting families that were logged in from August 24th through December 6th ahead of me. 2 months have now passed with August referrals issued. That means it will have taken the CCAA 3 months just to get through all of the referrals issued to families that were logged in during the month of August. That is ASSUMING that the CCAA finishes the month of August next month! So take 3 months for a months worth of referrals times the roughly 3 months left until my log in date plus next month for the rest of August and possibly another month to actually get into December and I am looking at 10 MORE months!!!!

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, D*@# I hate this freakin uncertainty! Sorry but sometimes you just have to vent. Going to go be sick now........

100 Good Wishes Quilt Update

I'm so excited. Tomorrow I am sending off all of the quilt squares Abby and I received for her 100 Good Wishes Quilt. They are off to a wonderful lady in England who specializes in making these quilts. Pictured above is the fabric I finally found for the backing of the quilt. I found it on Ebay. The front of the quilt will be bordered in red as well. I can't wait to see it completed.

Thank you everybody that sent Abby and I all of the wonderful wishes and quilt squares!!!! We will treasure this quilt forever! I will be sure to post pictures once the quilt is completed. I will also be sure to post a picture of Abby wrapped up in her quilt once I finally have her home. I can't wait for that day!!!!

Somewhere................

FYI

If you go to abc.com you can watch entire episodes of some of your favorite shows that you may have missed. Pretty cool!

A new McDreamy fan

Okay so where have I been? I always find the good shows late. I watched the seasons premiere of Grey's Anatomy this year and got hooked. I bought the first season and watched it in 2 days. Then I rented the second season and finished that up yesterday. Now I am all caught up. Don't know how I missed it before. Even though it is a little unrealistic at times I really like it.

Another Halloween without Abby

I thought for sure that I would have Abby home with me for this Halloween. We all know that didn't happen...... Not to worry retail therapy always makes me feel better. I found these Treats for my future little Gremlin to wear next year.

This is Crazy!

How Smart Is Your Right Foot?

This is so funny that it will boggle your mind. And you will keep trying it at least 50 more times to see if you can outsmart your foot.
But you can't!!!

1. While sitting at your desk, lift your right foot off the floor and make clockwise circles with it.

2. Now, while doing this, draw the number "6" in the air with your right hand. Your foot will change direction!!!

I told you so... And there is nothing you can do about it

LID 10 Months Today!

Wow! Ten months have now passed since I have been logged in with the CCAA. Now I'm smack dab in the middle of updating my homestudy and still have the redoing of my fingerprints and my I 171 to look forward to as well. I'm not liking the rumors or shall I say the speculations that are out there right now. If they prove true and it really does take the CCAA 2 or 3 months to get through each 1 months worth of LID's then I may very well have to update and redo the above paperwork yet again. Say it isn't so!!!!

Happy Moon Festival

The Autumn Moon Festival, also known as the Mid-Autumn Festival, is a popular celebration of abundance and togetherness dating back to China's Song Dynasty over 1000 years ago. It traditionally falls on the 15th day of the 8th lunar month, a date that parallels the Autumn Equinox of the Western calendar. At this time, the moon is at its fullest and brightest, marking an ideal time to celebrate the abundance of the summer's harvest, and reminding many of the lore of the mythical Moon Goddess, Chang O.

On this special day, people worship in temples and hold happy reunions at home. Sons and daughters will bring their family members back to their parents' house for a reunion. Sometimes people who have already settled overseas will come back to visit their parents on that day.
After nightfall they stroll under the stars to view the brightest and fullest moon of the year. Children run around with bright, colourful lanterns in many different designs and shapes. The adults usually indulge in eating many varieties of moon cakes with hot tea. Other traditional treats include pomelo, persimmon, steamed taro dipped in sugar and roasted chestnuts.
Families, relations and friends gather to enjoy the full moon, a symbol of promise for abundance, of harmony and luck. Some will beseech the beautiful Moon Goddess of Immortality for protection as well as family unity.

The traditional food of this festival is the moon cake, of which there are many different varieties. Moon cakes can be bought in Chinese grocery stores and bakeries. The small cakes are very rich, with fillings made of lotus seed paste with anywhere from one to four salted egg yolks in the centre, lotus seed paste with melon seeds, black bean paste with mincemeat (like the filling of a Christmas pie), and all of the above with assorted nuts. Prices vary depending on the ingredients