The Cheeky Robinson Clan: Still here, still waiting!

Hello, everyone!

It's been quite a while since I posted, and I wanted to say hello to all of you!

As of 3/23/12, it will be 90 days since we received pre-approval for our precious daughter. Each day our longing for her grows. I am praying we receive our LOA (Letter of Approval) from China ASAP so we can get this show on the road! After LOA comes the i800 process (next step for US), then finally...TA...travel approval from China to go get our little munchkin! She is now 15 months old.

Meanwhile, we continue to work full-time (oh my goodness, it is HARD to stay focused), pastor our amazing church of amazing people, and get our house ready for our precious girl. We have the nursery pretty-much done (I'll post pix this weekend)—we just need to frame two pictures, get the dresser/changing table from my sister-in-law, and buy curtains. In other news, Andrew is also building a gate for the top of the stairs by the living room.

I have a long "nesting" list of things I'd like to do before our girl comes...cleaning out closets, do a spring yard sale, etc., etc. I'm making my way through the list while I also do other things like keep up with the bills and do laundry and take care of myself!

Did I mention how amazing our church is? Well, they are giving us a three-month sabbatical starting from when we head to China to get our daughter. How ridiculously cool is that??? We are going to have a precious time together becoming a family of three! It will be weird to go to church but not preach, or teach in the kid's class, or lead prayer house sessions, or any of the other things (that we get to do, and are so honored to do!). We will just go to church as a family, and enjoy being a part of the church family!! That will be a blessing!!

As we wait for our sweet girl, we most of all are drawing near to Jesus, thanking Him for His incredible presence, and thanking Him that He first adopted us. We are His adopted son and daughter. When we hold our baby girl in our arms, we may possibly know for the first time, what it was like for our heavenly Father to hold us in His arms the first time we invited Him into our hearts.

For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear,

but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out,

“Abba, Father.”

—Romans 8:15

To my dear heavenly Father: It is so great to be your daughter.

With love,

Heather

Adoption Timeline At-A-Glance

March 28, 2009: Made the decision to adopt from Nepal.
March 30, 2009: Google-searched for an agency that has a Nepal program (there weren't any in 2008 since we had searched at that time), and found Adoption ARK.
April 6, 2009: E-mailed Adoption ARK expressing interest in Nepal.
April 6, 2009: Linda Podas (adoption consultant) at Adoption ARK e-mailed back, and sent the pre-qualification application.
April 7, 2009: Completed the application and faxed it to Linda.
April 8, 2009: Linda lets us know that we pre-qualify, and have been put on the 2010 Nepal waiting list.
April 16, 2009: Linda e-mails letting us know that our name has come up on the Nepal waiting list and we can officially apply into the Nepal adoption program!
April 17, 2009: Linda sends us the official contract, and says that we need to turn it around within 72 hours, along with money. :-) The contract is 35 pages (!).
April 20-22, 2009: Read the contract, filled out all the pages, and sent it in the mail with our money by April 22.
April 23, 2009: Linda e-mails saying our contract has been accepted, and that we are officially in the program. She said our case manager would be in touch with us within 48 hours.
April 24, 2009: Alina Radoslav e-mails us introducing herself as our case manager. Sends us lots of information and lots of attachments to fill out!
April 30, 2009: Phone call with Alina to meet each other and go over what we should be working on right now.
May 1 - June 9, 2009: Worked on our home study.
June 17, 2009: Overnighted our home study packet.
July 14, 2009: Mailed I-600A form to USCIS.
July 31, 2009: Home Study interviews in Seattle.
Aug. 28, 2009: Home Inspection at our house.
Sept. 30, 2009: Heather has her doctor's appointment for dossier medical report.
Oct. 3 and 4, 2009: Psychologist interviews; MMPI-2 test (457 questions!); Rohrschach test; intelligence test; and some other test that I don't know the name of.
Oct. 5, 2009: Meeting with psychologist to discuss report findings and review letters written by psychologist for our adoption agency. (Note: Tests confirmed that we are not crazy. Whew!)
Oct. 13, 2009: Andrew has his doctor's appointment for dossier medical report.
Oct. 22, 2009: Home Study approval reports received in the mail. (!!)
Oct. 22, 2009: Home Study approval reports sent to USCIS for I-600A application.
Nov. 10, 2009: Found out the USCIS address they gave us to send our home study report to was incorrect. Had to re-send to a different address.
Nov. 18, 2009: Sent all of our notarized documents to the Secretary of State for certification approval.
Nov. 30, 2009: Fingerprinting for USCIS approval.
Dec. 1, 2009: Dossier sent to Adoption Ark.
Dec. 7, 2009: Dossier sent to Nepal.
Dec. 11, 2009: Our agency's in-country Nepal represent receives our dossier.
Dec. 15, 2009: We are officially on the Nepal 2009 list! We are #500.
Aug. 6, 2010: The US closes adoptions to Nepal. We plan to keep our file there, praying that the doors will open again. May the Lord move mountains so these precious children can be with their forever families!

A New Beginning - China
Mar. 21, 2011: Chose Lifeline Children's Services as our agency.
Mar. 22 to Oct. 5, 2011: 10 months of all of the same stuff as above. :)
Oct. 21, 2011: Received USCIS approval to adopt from China.
Nov. 9, 2011: DTC! (Dossier To China)
Nov. 23, 2011: Our agency confirmed that CCCWA has received our dossier.
Dec. 20, 2011: Matched to our amazing 12-month old daughter!!
Dec. 30, 2011: Pre-approval received from China for our daughter!
April 24, 2012: Letter of Approval (LOA) from China
May 16, 2012: i800 approval (USA approval) for our daughter
May 25, 2012: USA approval cabled to US Consulate in Guangzhou. Now the Consulate will prepare the "Article 5."
June 11, 2012: Article 5 picked up from the Consulate and taken to the CCCWA.
June 25, 2012: Travel Approval (TA)!
July 13, 2012: Leave for China!
July 16, 2012: "Gotcha Day" – family of three!
July 17, 2012: Official adoption day with China.
July 25, 2012: Consulate appointment – Abigail became officially ours according to the US, and officially an American citizen!
July 28, 2012: We returned home to Walla Walla as a family! Abi also became an American citizen the moment she stepped on American soil.

Adoption blogs I follow (all but the first one are Nepal adoptions):

http://hernkekid.blogspot.com/ http://achairtospare.blogspot.com/ http://aboyfortheharrells.blogspot.com/ http://pebbletostone.blogspot.com/ http://apennyanickeladollaroradime.blogspot.com/ http://themelsersfaith.blogspot.com/ http://yoloholloway.blogspot.com/ http://bfsmoms.blogspot.com/ http://oak2ktm.blogspot.com/ http://nepaladoptionadventure.blogspot.com/ http://bugbeanandreed.blogspot.com/ http://kjernald.blogspot.com/ http://www.nepaladoptionblog.com/ http://jsjobeadoption.blogspot.com/ http://whenwebelong.blogspot.com/

7 comments:

KristenMarch 23, 2012 at 6:44 AM
Heather! This brought tears to my eyes! You are so right- this journey has opened my eyes to the deeper relationship I have with our Father! I will be praying for a SPEEDY process- You are in the home stretch!!! Yeah!!
UnknownMarch 23, 2012 at 9:29 AM
Congratulations! What a beauty. Those chubby cheeks are wonderful! Love it! Best of luck through the waiting... So hard, so worth it (as you know)...

Suzie from RQ
UnknownMarch 25, 2012 at 7:18 AM
Thanks for following my blog. I look forward to following your journey to China for that precious little girl. You're church is awesome, a 3month sabbatical sounds wonderful and will really give you some needed bonding family time. Many blessings to you and yours.
Kjernald Family AdventuresMarch 26, 2012 at 7:12 AM
Heather,

I am so excited and still praying. I understand how hard the wait is....believe me I understand. So am so glad to hear that you are pulling closer the the Father and understanding how beloved you are in your own adoption. May I suggest...if you have a little restless time on your hands...reading ''Toddler Adoption..The Weaver's Craft''. Has a lot of good things in there to think about when adopting a toddler.

I am so happy that your church is honoring you guys with that time. What a blessing the family of God is. I am sure they feel the same way about you that you do about them.

I can not wait to hear the rest of the story....I can not wait to see the pictures....I can not wait until there is one less orphan and she is in your arms.

Praying from Sweden,
Laurie

The Cheeky Robinson Clan

Still here, still waiting!

7 comments:

Blog Archive

Labels