Kate 4-6 Months

The first months of Kate's life were precious but the next few months started to get FUN!

She was belly laughing and squealing, saying Ma & Da and doing raspberries. She began eating baby food and putting everything in her reach in her mouth. She was loving her Excersaucer and swing but still hated being placed on her tummy. She could roll from her back to her side and from her tummy to her back. She was not interested in even thinking about crawling yet. By her 6 month check up she was 18lbs 10oz and 27" long. 90th percentile in both. Wearing 9 - 12 month sizes and size 3 diapers!

Chris got to begin a new school year as a brother, we got to dress her up for her first Halloween! Here are a few pics of her during these months!

Kate's Baptism

Like a wedding, this day in the life of my daughter, was highly anticipated. Many years ago, it was during a baptism I sat in our church feeling immeasurable grief as I was nearing my last months of infertility treatment. It was on this day, I prayed. I made a promise, that if I were to ever be blessed with a daughter, I would baptise her there and name her Hope. That I would share my faith and my story.

Here we are, still waiting for our Hope, yet I now know that God's plan was even greater than I could ever have allowed myself to ask for. In my long wait for another child, God was planning that we be open to adopt not one, but two little girls. I have no doubt that Hope is still coming and it is because of her that we are now blessed with Kate. A miracle. A blessing in disguise. Double Happiness! I am overwhelmed by and unworthy of His goodness.

In late July we found that Jim's mother was going to be able to visit and see her first grand-daughter for the first time! We were so excited we scrambled to see if we could baptize Kate while she was here. It was such a blessing to have both of Kate's grandma's there for her Christening!

It was a dream come true to design and make her gown, with my mother. Just as we spent weeks planning and sewing the nursery bedding and drapes now we were going to create specifically for Kate. We took the children to Royal Oak for lunch and shopped at the famous Habermann's Fabric store. We selected a beautiful cotton silk and an exquisite organza embroidered with ribbon rose sprays and a beautiful lace trim. I spent the next 2 weeks making a mock up out of muslin until I had the perfect fit, then finally cutting into the gorgeous fabric and putting together the most breathtaking gown I had ever seen. (If I do say so myself!) It was truly a joy to have my mother with me every stitch, to help keep Kate happy and for her expert guidance, just as she has guided me not only in my sewing since I was a little girl, but in all aspects of my life. A dream come true.

Once the dress and bonnet were made, I went to work on designing her cake, (yes I made that too) planning the menu and decorations. We even got to choose the music for the service. Yet, the most important part of the day was officially promising to raise her as a believer, a follower of Christ. To publicly show that she is ours, yet that she is truly God's child.

It was also an incredibly easy and sweet decision to ask Chris to be her Godfather. We know he will set such a Godly example to his sister and he was very proud and eager to accept the honor.

It was a wonderful day, full of joy, family and love. My heart is singing!

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life... Proverbs 13:12

Kate's First 3 Months

(Kate - 8 Months)

I'll try and catch everyone up to speed a little each day...

Kate came to us in such a whirlwind and now we can't imagine life without her. She was so incredibly tiny when I held her for the first time and now today... she is a whopping 22lbs at 8.5 months. 90th percentile in height and weight.

Watching her grow has been such a blessing we are ever grateful for. Once we brought her home she put on weight very quickly, 10lbs by her 4 month checkup. Weighing in at 15lbs 12oz.!

She started sleeping through the night at 2 months, still needing a pacifier check here and there but no feeding. However, she rarely made it more than 2.5 hours between bottles and barely napped between them! A couple 20 minute cat naps was all she needed. She was on a mission to gain weight! She did go through a colicky period that was easily corrected with a formula change.

In her first months we watched this helpless tiny thing grow into a baby who could reach for toys and put them to her mouth, chew on her fists, kick in her bath, roll over, coo, babble and smile and laugh. We lived for every new little thing she achieved and found it an absolute wonder!

Her temperament is just amazing, she is a very happy baby! People are always asking if she is 'always this happy', and it's true she really is... and so are we!

More tomorrow! Gotta go!

It's A Girl

After an excruciatingly long wait, I can finally share the news of the birth of our daughter Kate. We were advised to wait to share our news until her adoption was final. Then we just waited until the holidays were over and today we were given the go ahead. I HATED not being able to shout it to the world!

I have a million things to say - I will try and post a little of our story every day so everyone can catch up.

I'll start with our first few days:
We began our journey in domestic adoption a year ago, actually applied with an agency one year ago today. Our paperwork and profile were submitted by Valentines Day and we started receiving calls the following week. We were called about Kate's birth mom in the end of April, a week later we accepted her and the next day she was born. She was 26 hours old when she was placed in my arms. She is a miracle.

HOPE:
Yes, we were given the approval to continue with our adoption of Hope. We NEVER intended to only adopt one child. I know of many people who are or have only children and they are perfectly happy. But our experience with our son growing up most of his childhood without a sibling was lonely, and we wanted Hope to have a sister and now our girls will have each other, an a big brother that is amazingly happy and proud to be called just that - brother.

SO VERY SORRY:
I want everyone to know that I realize that our good news might bring sadness to others. I understand. I waited 9 years 5 months. Watching family members, friends and neighbors give birth to child after child. I watched while those a year or more in line behind me, switched to SN or changed programs and were able to adopt. While I was truly always happy for them and wouldn't want their situation changed, it brought on the pain and loss of infertility each and every time. So I truly apologize, if my joy will bring sadness to anyone.

34 Months!

So when we started this process Labor Day 2005, we were interested in finding the 'fastest' possible adoption avenue. We found that Chinese adoptions were taking 6-8 months at the time! Immigration did it's part to delay our dossier completion and 5 months later we submitted our paperwork to China, on March 9th 2006. Here we are 34 months later and China is predicted to be matching the smallest batch EVER after being rumored to match one of the biggest batches in recent years!

I'm good though... I'm just glad my LID isn't the 3rd... I would be very disappointed right now. Yet I would know with certainty that I would be next!

So I'm just hangin' in there.... cause I know our turn is (relatively) just around the corner.

Hyperventilating

I am very excited to announce that the first rumor for this month eludes to us being referred this month!

That referrals should be coming out well before the end of this month due to the Chinese New Year and that the atmosphere in the CCAA office has been very upbeat compared to recent months. (all paraphrased from my favorite point of information - Rumor Queen)

Now, I do not for any reason believe that we will see Hope's face in the next two weeks but I do believe that there will be more families matched in the next months than there have been in the last 6 months. So in my mind, a slight speed up.

All very exciting and feeling like we will be going to China sooner than expected.

Update: I'm beginning to think that the '23rd' rumor was for January 23rd being the date referrals to be mailed...

Watched Pot - Alert

BUMP!! Thought it was appropriate to re-post this one!!

It's that time of month again...

I don't mean PMS but PRS or Pre-Referral Syndrome. This is a much more dangerous time of month than PMS is for most women, even worse than PMDD.

Typical Symptoms:
Women in the process of Chinese Adoption will sit in front of their computers, for days on end trying to find one tiny shred of fact regarding the latest LID cut-off or actual date of said referrals; either through forums, chat rooms or blogs.

Most women WILL lose some sleep during this time by choosing to surf for clues until the wee house of the morning, get a few hours of sleep only to get up extra early to see if anything has surfaced in the 3 hours they were asleep.

Most women feel anxious, go through bouts of excitement and depression and appear to be losing her mind to those around her. When she will allow herself to be torn away from her cyber hunt, she will be prone to bouts of sobbing, shopping spree's for baby items (mostly in pink), and will tend to eat copious amounts of Edy's Slow Churned ice cream.

In extreme cases some women will lose short term memory, they will forget to take care of their daily responsibilities such as letting the dog out, planning dinner, going to work, etc. Some women will even forgo hygienic rituals, skipping showers, putting hair in ponytail, or wearing sunglasses to the grocery store to hide the dark circles and pale complexion due to lack of sleep and make-up.

Cycle Duration:
Women usually experience PRS symptoms from 2 days to 2 weeks before the onset of Adoption Referrals being received at adoption agencies and can show continued symptoms for 2 days to 2 weeks AFTER referral information has been officially announced. Warning: Those experiencing symptoms 2 weeks before AND 2 weeks after SHOULD SEEK MEDICAL ATTENTION or at least have an extremely supportive network of family and friends who can make sure that she doesn't go to work in her underwear or fall asleep in unusual places.

Life-time Duration:
This is a chronic disorder that will continue on a regular basis until the cure* is administered. Years ago experts in this area believed the duration of PRS to only last 6-8 months. Then 10-12 months, 22-24 months and now some believe it could go as long as four years. As you can see there is not a definite end to this syndrome and those considered experts actually have no idea either.

*Cure:
One adopted daughter, home in her mother's arms.

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