MORE LIGHT or MORE TUNNEL??

My sister in law sent me the pic above which I thought was freaking hilarious! Anyway, since the last time I posted, things have continued to become more and more exciting. Let's see, another set of referrals came out last week, the August batch, which officially went through 1/31/06. Now, no one was logged in between 1/28 and 2/5 but apparantly CCAA wanted some sort of end up month thing going on so there you go. At first look, "real" referrals were only for 2 days 1/26 and 1/27 which showed shockingly small numbers on the RQ polls. But, after looking around it appears that perhaps one of those days was a huge lid day for a european country (France, Italy?? don't remember) and obviously the families from countries besides the US and Canada are likely to not be very well represented in RQ polls. Overall, I see this as a positive as it means that CCAA likely did not refer a tiny little batch this time.

OK, so what happens next??? Referrals for 2/2006 will begin next month. I have my fingers crossed that CCAA will make it to let's say... 2/8??? If so, it would put us on track for an OCTOBER REFERRAL!!!!! OMG!!! Can you even imagine?? I can't. Must control emotions. Breath, Susan, breath. ahhhh. ok.

So, the more likely thing is that they will do less and we won't get our referral until November but even still, that is 12 weeks from now!!! 12 weeks!!! I can totally make it for 12 more weeks. I am an expert waiter, I should get a gold medal in the mentally and physically demanding sport of Waiting. There are still tons of things that can go wrong but I'm trying hard not to let myself even go there. I'm trying to stay "positive"

Also in the last few weeks: the olympics kicked off on 8/8/08. I got to see the opening ceremony on tv and was seriously impressed!!! We enjoyed a quick trip down to sea world in san diego "Shamu, Shamu"!!! We "celebrated" 30 mos of being lid (now at 5 times our original estimate). And, the best news of all, my mom is finally starting to feel human again.

Things are looking up!!!

Below are the lucky families who received referrals over the last two months. Seriously, these kids are sooooo cute!!!

July:

For Chandler With Love

Jodi & Tom Shaw

And Merrilee Makes Three

Littlemisunshine

I dream of Kassidy

Jade

Eva Grace

CaseyWillow!!

A Clear Sign

Landyn

Journey to Annaliz

mcmanusadoptionjourney
Pickalilly

Filling a Place No One Else Could Fill

Notre rencontre d’amour

Waiting for Mia
The following families in the SN program would like to share their news:

Our Leap of Faith

Journey to Della Grace

Hannah

August:

Lily’s Wait

Abigails Journey

Alyzabeth An

Waiting for Savannah

Our Wait for Lily

Our Journey to Sophie

Red thread to Texas

The following families in the SN program would like to share their wonderful news as well:

Here is Jack

Mom2mygirls

Invisible Red Thread

Miles and Miles to Mylei

And a referral from Taiwan!

Precious wonders and little monkeys

Referrals are on their way! Teeny tiny batch --they only did through 1/25. That means 5 calendar days but only 3 lids due to 1/21 and 1/22 being weekends with no families logged in. Whatever. I still get to take 5 paperclips off the paperclip chain and my number officially drops to 19 lids ahead of ours --minus 9 for cny which leaves us with 10! yes 10! real lids ahead of us.

Of course, no one knows what's happening with the olympics or anything else but, without a doubt, we are getting closer not further away. Its just crazy!

The other big positive is that my agency will be receiving referrals this time for their 1/24 lid families. That means, for my agency, we are the next log in group. As long as nothing weird happens with the olympics (again, anyone's guess) we should have our referral no later than november! I'm still hoping for sept (longshot) or october (it could happen) but, for sure, by november. We should at least have a pic of Baby G by christmas. How great is that???!!!

The Stork Has Landed

These are the RQ families that received referrals in June. Most will travel by the first part of August. Congrats to all!

Welcome to Sgroi-land
Yvo-Sanne
The Wong’s Journey
The Davison Family
Copy by Kaplan
MeiMei Lily
Xiao Yue
Gentle Years
Journey to S.
Blessed Journeys
The China Expedition
Of Paths and Errands
Blogging to Brielle
Katie
Dragon Scales and Mermaid Tales
Waiting for Natalie
Our Journey to Ainsley Anne
Loving our Lady Bug
Mae12
The following families have their referral but no pictures yet:
Whatever I want it to be….
The following families in the SN program would like to share their news:
Lost and Found Journey
Love you Forever
We’ve Been Truly Blessed!
Andy and Susan China Blog
God’s Next Chapter
Moore Family (login:moore/pw:faith)
Wall of Precious Stones
Aging with Grace
Northcountry Family
The following sites have music and are not work safe:
Lillian Rose
The Monahan Journey of Love & Life
From Dating to Diapers
We’re coming Bella

I SEE A LITTLE LIGHT!!

So, the rumor of referrals going through the 22nd didn't turn out to be true, or maybe it did?? No one's completely sure and most people, including me, have decided it doesn't really matter much in the scheme of things. The 21st and 22nd of Jan 2006 were weekend days. RQ's poll shows only a few people lid on those days and its likely that those were accidental votes. So far, no one in either my yahoo groups or RQ has come forward to say that they had a 1/21 or 1/22 lid and did or did not get a referral. So I guess its a moot point. People have questioned why ccaa doesn't just go ahead and state referrals went through the empty days. For that there is no answer other then, ccaa doesn't do it that way. They give you the empty days at the beginning of the next month.

OK, now we've cleared that up. This is where things are starting to get exciting!!! We now have only 24 calendar days ahead of us, read it again, 24!!!! Nine of those are cny days = no lids on those days. CCAA was closed 1/28-2/5/2006 for cny so no one is lid on those days. Again, a smattering of votes on RQ's polls, probably done in error (or possibly stupidity). The next referrals willl likely go through 1/27/06, with the next batch covering all the cny days plus a few days maybe up to 2/9??? If so, the next batch would include US!!! Read it again, WE COULD BE GETTING A REFERRAL IN SEPTEMBER!!! We would be home with our new child by Christmas!!!

I cannot even believe it.... after almost 28 mos of being lid and almost 3 yrs after starting this process, we may be only 3-4 mos away from referral. Its almost hard to accept that it could be true. Everyone who has been waiting so long is almost afraid to allow themselves to believe that it may actually happen!!! I've actually allowed myself to hope and believe again. Many months ago, I told just about everyone in my real life that the adoption "just didn't work out" it was so much easier and less painful than having to explain the process over and over and over and over and over again. But, this last weekend, I told one of my neighbors, it just sort of slipped out.

So, there are still things that can go wrong but, for now, there is a glimmer of hope. Its a nice feeling!

Happy Dance????

Alrighty then, this is going to be something you haven't heard in awhile.... let's say about 28 mos or so. I think there is some good news on the horizon. RQ has a rumor on her board that says that referrals are on their way and that they go through 1/22/06!!! Count 'em up folks, that would be 10 days. RQ had predicted 1/23 as the "horrid case" for referral cut off and I thought "YEAH right!!!!, never gonna happen" --I expected referrals to go through the 18th or possibly the 19th at the absolute latest.

So, at this point its just rumor but it does have a little traction. It appears more than one agency may be reporting this but its a little difficult to tell sometimes. Anyway, if true, it would mean that we'd be down to only 22 lids ahead of us!!! 22!!! and 7-9 of those have no lids on them at all due to CCAA closure for CNY in 2006. So it would really be like only having 13-15 days ahead of us. If CCAA does an average of 5 days per month, that would put our referral at Oct or even possibly Sept (slim chance), travel by Dec.

I really hate to even hope, once I stopped doing that the wait became much, much easier to handle. My motto has been "think pessimistically, avoid disappointment" and its been working better than one might imagine.

Anyway, I'll save the pic of a cuter happy dance for when the rumor has been confirmed as fact. Until then, we have the guy above who seems blissfully unaware that there is anything wrong in his world!!!

SHARON STONE IS AN IDIOT!!!

Apparantly, Stone was in Cannes yesterday and she was asked if she had heard about the disaster that hit China recently, and her answer was:

"Of course I have. Well you know at first I thought I'm not happy with the way
the Chinese are treating the Tibetans….and I've been concerned with should we
have the Olympics because they're not being nice to the Dalai Lama who's a good
friend of mine." And then all this earthquake and stuff happened and I thought,
'Is that Karma, when you're not nice and the bad things happen to
you?"

Are you freaking kidding me!!! First of all, why do we care what Sharon Stone thinks about this? Second, the only good thing about her having said something to damn stupid has been the outcry for her having said it. How awful.

Listen up Sharon, 5 million people are now homeless and about 80,000 are dead due to this horrible natural disaster. What awful thing do you think those people have done to deserve this? Whatever you think about the Chinese government, Tibet, etc the dead and homeless in China did not deserve this.

What a fool!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY..... TO ME!!!!!

Well, its here, I'm officially 42 yrs old today. Weird. Bobby asked me this morning "so, do you feel any older today?" --uh, yeah, I feel a little older every day LOL!!! But really I don't feel any older, I still feel pretty young. I find it a little hard to believe that I'm not only 40 but in my 40s!!!! Geez, where did the time go?? I used to be in my 30s, I vaguely remember being in my 20s. Hmmm. I hope the next 40 yrs doesn't seem to fly by like the last 40 has.

Anywho, no special plans for the day but I did play hookie from work!!! Yippeeee!!! Normally I might spend a little of my time cruising the RQ forums but, alas, the forum is down. Sigh. My mom's still in the hospital so I will be stopping by for a visit. Pretty basic day really.

So, here goes:

"Happy Birthday to me,

Happy Birthday to me,

Happy Birthday to me,

Happy Birthday to me"

5/5/08
May referrals are out. They only did 3 days (through 1/12/06) its depressing but not surprising. China adoption forecast estimates us getting a referral on 10/17/08 now so I guess that would mean November. CCAA is really not working the month of August, I believe. There are varying accounts, of course, but I've heard from more than one source that Beijing is going to very difficult to navigate and the chinese government really doesn't want anyone traveling unless its for or related to official Olympic business. So, they'll probably be working but not everyone and not a lot, I'd imagine. So, what does that mean? I think they'll send out referrals in August just before the olympics start. Then, in september, there will be few if any referrals. That puts us at dec for referral if they were to go at about the same speed. But, I don't think its going to go at the same speed. I think it will do what its done every month for the last year or so and slow down further.

Bottom line: I don't expect a referral until 2/2009 --9 mos from now. That would be 3 yrs lid to referral for us. We'd travel in april. Yikes! When we originally logged in I expected the wait to be about 9 mos which would have been nov 2006 --we're still 9 mos away. Always have been.

32 lids to go--9 of them with no lids due to closure for CNY in 2006. Sigh.

Here are the blogs for this month including some special needs referrals. There was a referral for twin girls, very exciting!!! Congratulations to the lucky few who made it in this month!!



Where is Lilly?
Sunflowers and Ladybugs
As we wait for LilyKate
roysamuel
Our Journey to Georgia
Baby Izabella
Strawberry Blond??? Yes, Strawberry Blond - From China!!!
Baby Sis
Ladybug Happenings
Our Expanding Family
On our way to Olivia
The following families in the SN program would like to share their news:
Our Joyful Journey
Making Room for Mallory
Journey to our son in China
williamsfamily1990
Baseballs and Ballerinas
Our Journey to Sophie
Journey to China AND Vietnam

CATS AND KITTENS!!!

My mom loves to go to the theater. I do too. But, it is always soooo expensive and a little bit of a pain to have to haul our butts out to LA, find parking, etc. There's this old theater in downtown San Bernardino called the California Theater. It's probably about 100 years old. I've been driving by it on my way to and from work for years now. I finally looked it up and found that they do a musical series there each year. Because it was very reasonably priced and so close, I thought it would be fun to give it a try. So, I bought tix for mom and myself. So far we've seen Peter Pan (good but, you know, aimed at a younger audience), Pirates of Penzance (it was OK but, I guess I'm not really a Gilbert and Sullivan fan), and most recently CATS.

The CATS performance was wonderful-- very professionally presented with great sets, costumes and singing. This was a very quality performance. Its weird because I'm pretty sure that CATS is one of the most popular of all the Broadway plays but I'd never seen it. I remember asking someone once, "What is CATS about?" To which they responded "Its about cats." I remember being a little annoyed at what seemed like kind of a smart ass response. But, I have to say, if someone asked me the same question, I guess I'd have to give the same response.

Anyway, it was really great and mom and I have only one more performance to go --The Music Man --another really famous musical that I have never seen. Can't wait!

Now, on to the KITTENS!!


Bobby and I have been wanting to get a kitten. Our last effort at pet adoption didn't go very well. We tried to adopt an older cat (about 3-4 yrs old) thinking that an adult cat would be fine for us. That turned out to be somewhat of a nightmare. Poor little Delilah, she was very sweet but had obviously been abused in the past and had some weird issues. Plus, she wouldn't use the litter box which turned into a nightmare. Unfortunately, after trying tons of things, we finally had to return her to the rescue after having her with us for almost a year. I felt awful but it just wasn't working.


So, we decided to try again but this time with kittens. We figured this way we can get a fresh start. We're now "fostering" 4 little kittens who were abandoned at about 4 weeks. Here are pix of their cute little faces:

The little siamese one is Henry. We chose the name because he is the sweetest, calmest little kitty you could ever imagine. Like an old soul. So precious, he'll come and sit with me for hours. Love, love, love this little guy!!! Very gentle and pleasantly playful.

Next is Zorro!!! Bobby picked his name because when we went to pick them up, the were all in a pet carrier. The other three were hiding in the back but not Zorro. He was right out front protecting his siblings with all his tiny little might. Z has a permanent look of surprise on his sweet little face and is by far the most playful and aggressive. He's an ADHD kitty, constant motion until he gets exhausted. Then he'll settle down and let you hold him. Sooooo, cute.

Next is Petunia. She is such a sweet and gentle little thing. She is just precious and so lady like. That's why she has a flower name. Plus, we'd just planted some petunias in the yard that day so I had flowers on the brain!

And finally, last but definitely not least Ink a Dink (Inky). Of course he's just about completely black so he's like a little ink spot but, and I don't think you can tell this from the pix, he is the tiniest little thing you've ever seen. Just about as skinny as can be. Yes, the runt. But so tough!!! Because he's so tiny we've been bottle feeding him to make sure he's getting enough nourishment. He wasn't a fan of the kitten formula but seems pretty happy with warmed goat's milk. Ahhh, my little sweetie. He loves to be held right on your chest and will stay there for hours!!! If I sit down, he crawls onto my leg. If I'm standing somewhere, he'll come over and stand on my foot!!! With careful feeding, Inky is getting bigger and a little more confident. He pretty much always has that same shocked look on his face as he has in the pic.

April referrals:
Not much to say. They only did 5 days including 2 weekend days. Its the tiniest batch I think they've ever done. Its probably less actual referrals than last year when they did the 2 day batch. They've now referred through Jan 9, 2006. They're crawling like a snail through Jan. My latest chinaadoptionforecast.com estimate is Nov 2008, I think. I don't think it could go much slower unless it actually stopped which it could (may??) do during the Olympics. I hope it doesn't stop. Its agonizing to have it move so slowly. Its as if you were dying of thirst and attempting to drink through a pinhole. So, anyway, here we are. There are 35 calendar lids ahead of us but 9 of them have no dossiers logged in due to CCAA's closure for Chinese New Year (CNY). So, we really only have 26 days ahead of us. How sad is it that as close as we are I'm still not sure this will work out for us??

Anyway, here are the new families from RQ:
Our Journey to Adopt Grace
My Answered Prayers
Zoe Chronicles
Journey to Adopt Lucy
Waiting for Molly
Lookin’ for Number Four
Jade Carroll
Precious In My Sight
Journey to Alice
The following families in the SN program would like to share their news:
Chloe Brown
Andy and Susan
Parenting Cubed
Our Journey to Macey
Our Journey to Michael

25 months today.

I've been pretty busy and haven't had time to post in awhile. My 2 yr LIDversary came and went with little fanfare. I wasn't sad, glad, relieved, or anything at all. I don't even think I was numb. I believe I have just resigned myself to this wait. It just is. I hope it happens for us, I really do. I'm not sure it will and I've accepted that it might not. I guess I'm at the point where, emotionally, I've stepped away from it. As Doris Day would say "Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be. The future's not ours to see..."

So, there you go. I still visit RQ every single day to see what could be going wrong (or right of course but that never seems to happen:-). Today brought news that a Dutch documentary on child trafficking may bring adoptions to a permanent or temporary halt in the Netherlands. Brian Stuy of research china has made a claim that he knows of at least one chinese child adopted to an american family who was stolen from their parents. Who knows?? With the Beijing Olympics on the horizon and the world's interest and concern with the human rights offenses in China, the next 6-8 mos will likely be filled with talk of China, their economy, product recalls, the government's abuse of power, etc. I'm trying to just let it roll over me because, like most things in my life lately, there's nothing I can do about that.

In other news, Casey got his driver's license!!! OMG!!! He's had his permit for over a year and has been driving with Bobby on nearly a daily basis but now he has a license and he drives on his own!! Its pretty intense driving too. Not like when I first got my license and all I had to do was drive 2-3 blocks down some residential streets to get to school and then a few more blocks to friends houses and the local Del Taco. Casey drives up and down the 210 freeway in peak traffic hours. He's a very good driver so I'm confident in his abilities but still, its very scary for mom and dad!! I guess it was time to cut the apron strings a little, he is 17 and half and will be senior next year. Sigh.

Brett is starting the last quarter of his first year of college. He's decided that engineering is not the path for him --way too much math!!! Next quarter he'll be taking what he considers fun classes including Greek Mythology and a critical thinking class. According to him he just wants to read a book and have a test anything but MATH!!!

Me. I've been working on having my closets redone. Finally, they're coming tomorrow to do the tear out and the install on Sat. I am going to have the closet of my dreams, sort of. I've been shopping and shopping for the perfect chandelier to go over my tub --soooo girlie, I know. I'm very glad to be married to a man who is very confident of his sexuality and is not in the least bit threatened by all the flowers, pink and purple he's forced to live with!!! In my free time I've been fairy shopping with a vengeance. I've picked up some really hard to find figures for some really good prices. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE ebay. Honestly, how did I ever buy anything at all before ebay.

So that's all for now. I've posted the latest Babies blog from RQ for the last referrals. They did 8 days, they're up to 1/4/06 --only 40 more lids before ours!!

The following blogs have pictures!

Ellie Morris Journey

Countdown to Aubriana

Journey to Double Happiness

Finally A Family

Lily Rolaine

Koss Family

Voyage to Karson

Journey to Grace

Marossie Comes Home

Pearls from China

Peacocks can fly

Much about Marlo
The following families are expecting referrals this month:

And Ella Makes Three
The following families in the SN program would like to share their news as well:GracieOur Journey of Love

She Burbles at Happy

Little Latham

East and West Kids

Blessings from China

Minarovic Family
And here is a happy domestic interim adoption:

Tree and Dave
The following blogs have music and are not work safe:

One More Ladybug

Beach Baby Blog

Pix of Casey's room. Just thought I'd post them. I did it about 5 yrs ago.

Referrals!
They started coming in on 2/3/08 it seems. The official cut-off was known a few days later when the internal CCAA box was apparantly updated. CCAA used to do this on their web page but pulled it last month. There's been lots of speculation about the reasons that CCAA no longer posts this info but no one knows for sure. CCAA works in mysterious ways sometimes. Anyway, for now, I don't think the "no box" thing is that big a deal.

They did 8 days of referrals. Not bad. Combined with last month's truly horrendously small referral batch it comes out to 2 rather small batches. Apparantly, 12/20 was a big log in day, lots of families. Some, including myself, believe that CCAA probably didn't have enough baby dossiers to match all of 12/20. They may have had enough to complete most of the day. In the past, CCAA has not done a partial day. So, it is possible that they had to wait until the Feb referrals to finish up 12/20. It seems logical. Anyway, there are now 48 lids ahead of ours. The one piece of good news is that during Chinese New Year (CNY) CCAA closes so there are no families logged in on those days. In 2006 CCAA was closed from 1/31/06-2/5/06 (I'm pretty sure) so 7 days, no lids. That means we only really have 41 lids ahead of us that have people logged in on them. Generally, CCAA logs in M-F but there are usually a few families lid on the weekends as well.

So, if they do an average of 7 lids per mo (which is about what they're averaging) we would receive our referral in 6 mos which would mean Aug. No one knows for sure, they could speed up, they could slow down, they could stop adoptions for awhile during the Olympics, they could stop all together. Anything is possible. Bobby and I have talked about it and decided that if this works out for us WONDERFUL! It will be a dream come true! If not, we won't be pursuing any more options. I just wouldn't be able to do it again. The uncertainty and pain of the process will be completely worth it if it works out for us. But, if it doesn't, we will not put ourselves through the emotional roller coaster again. For now, I am cautiously hopeful.

Now, the good news... the new families from this last group. So, so beautiful.

BABIES!!
LauraSmith
Adoption & Fire
Stafeil Family
Over the Moon to Home
Chasing China Dreams
The Blended MCDS
Harper Lee Wieland
Waiting for Violet Cassandra
Kayla
Our Lil Livvy
Sophia Emerle
Adopting Hannah
One World One Love
Waiting for Eliza
The Harrells
Journey to Leila Grace
Arturo and Olga

Traveler IQ test

It's kind of a geography test too! Funny thing is, I don't think I ever learned any geography. I swear I cannot recall ever learning that in school. Did I miss those days or something???

I wasn't good enough at the test to get past 6 levels-- there are a total of 12! My score was around 158,000 and my travel IQ was 90. I guess that's no so bad :-)

Give it a try (Hint: guessing is good!)

http://www.minijuegosgratis.com/juegos/hwdykyworld/hwdykyworld.html?a456=c6ba

Twenty-three ......
Another month down. I wish I could think of something profound to say. I wish I could think of something profound to think. But I can't, it just... is.


Twenty three months is a really long time. When we first applied in 8/05:

1. Bobby and I were both 39 --I'm now 41, Bobby's 42 (tomorrow).
2. Brett was just starting his junior year of high school --he's in college now.
3. Casey was starting the 9th grade --he's now halfway through his junior year.
4. Bobby's dad told us how much he looked forward to meeting "that little girl" --sadly Donnie passed away a year and a half ago.

If this adoption does ever happen, which is still a pretty big *if* at this point, I wonder what else will have changed in the meantime??

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES

and not in a good way. Last time I posted was on 12/17, I was, at that time lamenting that the CCAA was only doing an average of 7 days per month. I was complaining that this meant that we would have to wait another 9 mos or so for referral and another two months for travel. I WISH!!!

So, they only did 5 days this time. Not too much of a difference you might think, but those are 5 really small days, 2 or 3 of them had no LIDs at all. If they would have gotten to 12/20 (a big day) things would be fine, sort of, I mean not great but, you know, OK. Getting to only 12/19 is not fine, not fine at all. Getting only through 12/19 sucks, really bad. What this now means is this: CCAA has cut the quota or whatever you want to call it for how many NSN kids they're going to refer in a month again. They're only referring about 25%-30% of the babies they were referring 2 yrs ago. If CCAA continues at this rate, and doesn't cut any further, and doesn't shut down for the Olympics, and nothing else goes wrong, we'd now be looking at referral in about 18 mos, from now. That would mean a total of 41 mos or so from our LID until referral, that would mean we'd get our rferral in June 2009 or so!!! And this is the "good" case. The "bad" case, I don't even like thinking about it, but her goes... The bad, and sadly more likely, case is that referrals will continue to slow, the quota will drop further, more and more SN referrals will be made per month pushing the NSN people back further and further. The bad news is the NSN program in China appears to be quickly winding down. The bad news is that if things slow more we may not get a referal until 2010, or even longer. The bad news is, I think its likely we may not come out of this process with a referral.... ever.

I cannot completely put into words how incredibly devastating this is. This child that I have dreamed of and hoped for, named and imagined spending time with is disappearing before my very eyes. I've gone through a fairly substantial period of depression. I've been sleeping a lot. Its not healthy really but, for awhile, its felt good. I'm coming to terms with the fact that it may not work out and it hurts like hell. Today, I feel numb, I don't really want to think about it anymore but I can't help it. I think about it all the time. I'm on the RQ site constantly looking for something that will make feel more hopeful about the sad state of affairs we find ourselves in: 2-1/2 yrs after beginning the process, 2 yrs after submitting our paperwork to China and I feel further away from completing the adoption than I did then. Pathetic.

I've started investigating other options. Its not that pretty. China has been the most common sending country for international adoption for several years. Now that China has become so unpredictable, families already logged in are doing several things including interim/concurrent adoptions from other countries while staying in the China line, ditching China for other countries and switching to SN in droves. People just starting the adoption process are also choosing other countries and going directly to SN. This means that the other programs are also getting over burdened. I feel like we're a day late and a dollar short, 3 hrs too late to the party, etc. We're also starting to age out of some of the programs. We're not too old to adopt necessarily but we're often too old for a child under the age of 2, some programs do not let families choose gender, some countries are less predictable than China!!! Now that's kinda scary. Domestic doesn't work for us for a number of reasons.

I would gladly consider a SN adoption, have been interested in doing so for over a year and half but, guess what, my agency has this ridiculous policy that families who are logged in over 6 mos cannot switch programs. Its a ridiculous and stupid rule which allows families who are just starting the adoption process NOW to choose and bring home a child while we will may find ourselves never doing so. Does anyone else see the insanity of this situation? Why do they do it?? My personal belief is that new families coming into the agency mean new dollars coming into the agency. They already have MY money so its kind of a fuck you!!!

So, here we sit, waiting 1 yr, 10 mos, 3 weeks and some odd days so far, ever "hopeful" that this process will not shut down before we recieve our referral. Hopeful but not secure.

Today's a bad day, tomorrow's not looking so good either.

22.....

As you can tell from my last post, its been awhile since I've blogged. Each month just brings more of the same. We're at 22 mos since LID now with 61 more LIDs to go before ours. CCAA is referring an average of 7 days of LIDs per month, we have 9 more weeks of LIDs to go which may mean 9 more months til referral. That would mean September for us. I cannot believe it! A year into this wait I was empathizing with those families who would/could get caught up in the Olympics issues. Never thought we'd be one of them, for sure. And guess what??? I do believe I'm right. If things continue to move along at this dismal pace, the Olympics will be over and done by the time we get to China. September referral would mean possibly November travel.

Right now, I'm just concentrating on trying to get other things accomplished like work, kid stuff, Christmas, etc. I really want to get to Baby G's room but haven't quite gotten there. We'll see.

5 DAYS??? SURELY THIS IS SOME FORM
OF TORTURE.

4 days, ugh!
So, I knew it was likely to be a small batch but I was really, really hoping they'd get to 11/27. There are hardly any RQ families logged in 11/26 and 11/27 and psychologically it would have been soooo much more satisfying. However, as I'm sure I should have learned by now, the CCAA is not too interested in being psychologically satisfying. There it is.

One good thing is, the monster month of November has just about been completed and we will most definitely (well, as definite as you can get in this horrendous process anyway) move into December with the October referral batch! Dec is smaller than Nov--as just about every month in the history of China adoption has been--so should, logically, go more quickly. I hate to use the word "logic" when discussing IA because there doesn't seem to be much involved but there it is.

My guess for next month's referrals are Dec 7th, that's being more optimistic than many other RQ'ers but I believe getting up to Pearl Harbor Day would be pretty good.

I cannot even express in words how excited I will be to see the first 2006 LID received their referral!!! We've been logged in for almost 19 mos now and the only thing that gives me any solace at all is looking at the line behind me. I do not for one second wish this wait on anyone else but I have to say it did give me some comfort to check out our agency info and see that there are only 4 of our agencies LID groups ahead of us and 41!!! behind us. OH MY GOD!!!!

Of course, people are jumping ship right and left. Many are finding their children on WC lists and many, many are switching countries. Vietnam seems to be the country of choice at this point in time with the referral times being pretty impressive. We would have considered Vietnam when we started but it was closed. Now there are people who switched and were DTV in 2007, referred and already traveled. I'm happy for them but pretty envious of the timeline. We're still waiting, and waiting, and waiting....

I cannot wait to get off this fricking ride!!! Until then, here are some ultra cuties to take my mind off my own troubles. Of course, I'm usually in tears by the end of the list.

Our Journey to Alice
A Mothers Joyful Heart
Rocking Chairs and a Tricycle
A Day in the Life
A Red Thread to China
Okie Angel
Journey to Sarah
Journey to Mya
Our Whole World in His Hands
Chasing Kayla
Journey to Lily Ann
Pelton Adoption
Going for Gracie
Our Sweet Melissa
Meet the Hintons
Afraine
Kenli’s Korner
Our Georgia Peach
Long Awaited Rose
Journey to Parenthood
Pension Cheques and Preschoolers
Kati