Paperwork in China!!

We made it past another hurdle. Our paperwork is finally in China! We had been waiting for the agency to send us an email letting us know that our dossier was sent to China.(DTC- dossier to China)

We were told that they were waiting for several other families' documents to be translated and we would be sent over in a group of five. When we did not get the email notifying us that they were on the way to China I sent the agency an email. They reported that the coordinator of the program decided not to wait and sent the two families that were done! We are in group number 28 with one other family.

The next day we got the official email from the agency stating that our log in date (LID) was June 13th, 2005. The email went on to further explain that the estimated time table is as follows: we will review paperwork for updating in November, attend a travel meeting in December, get our referral in January, and travel to pick up Sophie in March. We will also be starting our travel vaccinations soon, as well as, take one parenting adopted children course through the agency.

The waiting is horrible. Chinese New Year is the end of January. Everything shuts done for two weeks which can further slow this process. We are hoping that the craziness of the holidays will make the time pass quicker but that is yet to be seen.

We are very excited about being one step closer. We will keep you posted as the journey continues.

Update from Steve

The last few weeks have gotten us even closer to Sophie coming home to us in Maryland. Both Anne and I drove all over the Baltimore-DC metro area to get paperwork stamped and prepared for China. Just as we had finished up with those papers, our INS approval came in the mail. The folks at ATI tell us we have been very lucky, our papers only took five weeks and other folks are still waiting after twelve! We are looking forward to the summer and being able to get Sophie's room ready and baby proof the house.

It's very different becoming a parent through adoption. There are no "signs" of the baby's arrival, like an expanding waistline, so when Anne picked up some baby clothes at a yard sale last week, it made every thing seem a little more real.

Soon we'll be starting to look at flights to China and I'll begin my attempt to convince Anne that we'll be in real bad shape if we fly all that way in coach. Please send any horror stories you may have to her and help me in my cause.
Anne just told me that she's not mentioned that Sophie will be named Sophie. We had originally thought about Allison, but one day I came home after seeing a large sign near our houses which says Tai Sofia, and declared the baby's name to be Sophie. It's just stuck, and beats CTB (ask Anne).