Sharon wanted to do a practice post, so here's a recent photo of the boys just for fun. :)
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
This is a test...
Sharon wanted to do a practice post, so here's a recent photo of the boys just for fun. :)
Monday, June 27, 2011
More great news from China!
Okay, how cute is THIS?
This picture was taken less than two weeks ago. Ellie had her palate repaired on May 30th. We weren't sure whether it would be done before we brought her home, but it's great to have that behind her and it should make the introduction of new foods a little easier. She will almost certainly need more surgeries as she grows, but other than the possibility of ear tubes there shouldn't be anything in the immediate future now that her palate is repaired. And what a smile!!!
Ellie's updated growth report states that she can walk, say "mama", and - perhaps most importantly - she can understand what is being said to her. That is a huge relief, because hearing issues related to excess fluid are common among children with cleft palate who have not been evaluated for ear tubes. Hopefully now that her palate is repaired she will have an easier time learning to say new words. But the fact that her receptive language skills appear to be normal is excellent news.
Our agency is busy finalizing our travel plans. We now have contact information for the families who are traveling with us, so I imagine over the next week or so there will be a flurry of emails as we begin getting to know each other. We'll have a conference call later this week so that our agency can give advice about the trip and answer any questions we have.
We will probably meet Ellie two weeks from today!
This picture was taken less than two weeks ago. Ellie had her palate repaired on May 30th. We weren't sure whether it would be done before we brought her home, but it's great to have that behind her and it should make the introduction of new foods a little easier. She will almost certainly need more surgeries as she grows, but other than the possibility of ear tubes there shouldn't be anything in the immediate future now that her palate is repaired. And what a smile!!!
Ellie's updated growth report states that she can walk, say "mama", and - perhaps most importantly - she can understand what is being said to her. That is a huge relief, because hearing issues related to excess fluid are common among children with cleft palate who have not been evaluated for ear tubes. Hopefully now that her palate is repaired she will have an easier time learning to say new words. But the fact that her receptive language skills appear to be normal is excellent news.
Our agency is busy finalizing our travel plans. We now have contact information for the families who are traveling with us, so I imagine over the next week or so there will be a flurry of emails as we begin getting to know each other. We'll have a conference call later this week so that our agency can give advice about the trip and answer any questions we have.
We will probably meet Ellie two weeks from today!
Friday, June 24, 2011
I am not tech-savvy.
As you can probably tell from the very basic design of this blog. But if you follow this link, you should be able to create a Google profile that will enable you to sign in and post comments. I haven't noticed an increase in the amount of spam email I've received since creating my own Google profile.
We will be updating our blog throughout our trip to China, and while we won't have access directly to the site to see your comments, we will receive email updates containing the text of your posts. Which will be great, because we won't actually be able to see our blog so it will be good to know that what we're posting is somewhat coherent and at least mildly interesting, in spite of our jet lag.
We will be updating our blog throughout our trip to China, and while we won't have access directly to the site to see your comments, we will receive email updates containing the text of your posts. Which will be great, because we won't actually be able to see our blog so it will be good to know that what we're posting is somewhat coherent and at least mildly interesting, in spite of our jet lag.
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Who says the U.S. government can't be efficient?
Okay, well, it's actually our agency that's super efficient - but the U.S. Consulate deserves some credit for confirming our appointment in less than a day! We have a consulate appointment on July 18th - which means we will leave Atlanta around July 8th and can return on July 20th! We haven't booked anything yet, but based on the timing it looks like we will be able to take advantage of the recently-reinstated, non-stop, Shanghai-to-Atlanta Delta flight for our trip home. Hallelujah!
We've had people ask why it takes about 2 weeks to complete the adoption trip. Why can't we just pick up Ellie and come home? Well, the adoption itself is completed in Ellie's home province, Henan. Zhengzhou is the capital of Henan, and that is where we'll meet Ellie - but we need to begin our trip in Beijing, in order for our agency to accomodate flights from various places in the U.S. Our stay in Zhengzhou involves receiving Ellie (an event often referred to as "Gotcha Day"), finalizing the adoption (could be the same day or the next day), then waiting for Ellie's passport to be ready. All of that takes about a week. Then we travel to Guangzhou, where Ellie will have a medical exam at the consulate, followed the next business day by our official "consulate appointment" (during which we will take the oath of citizenship on Ellie's behalf). The next day, her visa will be ready. We can fly home the day after we pick up Ellie's visa.
We've had people ask why it takes about 2 weeks to complete the adoption trip. Why can't we just pick up Ellie and come home? Well, the adoption itself is completed in Ellie's home province, Henan. Zhengzhou is the capital of Henan, and that is where we'll meet Ellie - but we need to begin our trip in Beijing, in order for our agency to accomodate flights from various places in the U.S. Our stay in Zhengzhou involves receiving Ellie (an event often referred to as "Gotcha Day"), finalizing the adoption (could be the same day or the next day), then waiting for Ellie's passport to be ready. All of that takes about a week. Then we travel to Guangzhou, where Ellie will have a medical exam at the consulate, followed the next business day by our official "consulate appointment" (during which we will take the oath of citizenship on Ellie's behalf). The next day, her visa will be ready. We can fly home the day after we pick up Ellie's visa.
It's official!
Our agency received our travel approval yesterday! They have already requested our consulate appointment, according to the travel options we were given yesterday morning. With that information sent, we should hear back from the consulate Monday or Tuesday of next week - at which point we'll know for sure when we're traveling and finally be able to book our flights. We may be leaving two weeks from tomorrow, and meeting Ellie just a few days after that!
We also have a terrific opportunity to help the Hope Foundation, the charity that has cared for Ellie since last summer and provided her with expert surgical care and lots of TLC. There is a woman named Rebecca who lives in Tennessee and is the U.S. contact for the Hope Foundation. She has some medical supplies that need to be sent to China, and it is far more economical (and secure) to have travelers bring them over as baggage than to ship them. So once we're certain of our travel plans, Rebecca will ship us a couple of suitcases full of much-needed medical supplies, and a Hope staff member will meet us at the airport in Beijing to pick them up and take them to the Hope Healing Home. We wish we could visit the Healing Home in person, but since we are traveling with a group (and probably not spending that much time in Beijing), it seems unlikely that we'll be able to do that. But we're very pleased to have a chance to help them in a tangible way.
We also have a terrific opportunity to help the Hope Foundation, the charity that has cared for Ellie since last summer and provided her with expert surgical care and lots of TLC. There is a woman named Rebecca who lives in Tennessee and is the U.S. contact for the Hope Foundation. She has some medical supplies that need to be sent to China, and it is far more economical (and secure) to have travelers bring them over as baggage than to ship them. So once we're certain of our travel plans, Rebecca will ship us a couple of suitcases full of much-needed medical supplies, and a Hope staff member will meet us at the airport in Beijing to pick them up and take them to the Hope Healing Home. We wish we could visit the Healing Home in person, but since we are traveling with a group (and probably not spending that much time in Beijing), it seems unlikely that we'll be able to do that. But we're very pleased to have a chance to help them in a tangible way.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Getting warmer...
Got an email this morning from our agency - they believe the Chinese Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption has mailed some travel approvals, and based on the date our Article 5 was submitted they expect that ours is one of them! Hopefully we will know for sure tomorrow - the suspense is killing us! - but in the meantime, our agency has given us some possible travel dates so that they can be ready to request our consulate appointment just as soon as they have our travel approval in their hands...
We might leave around July 6-8 and return around July 20-23. Or, if our agency is unable to get consulate appointments that will work for those travel dates, we would leave around July 13-15 and return home around July 27-30.
So for now, the uncertainty remains, but our agency is so professional we have to believe there's an awfully good chance our travel approval will arrive in the next couple of days or else they wouldn't have suggested otherwise. We won't truly know our itinerary until our consulate appointment is confirmed and we can book our flights. If our travel approval arrives at our agency's office tomorrow or Monday, we could have a confirmed consulate appointment by the middle of next week. Then the real craziness begins.
It's almost hard to believe that it's actually going to happen. In less than a month!
We might leave around July 6-8 and return around July 20-23. Or, if our agency is unable to get consulate appointments that will work for those travel dates, we would leave around July 13-15 and return home around July 27-30.
So for now, the uncertainty remains, but our agency is so professional we have to believe there's an awfully good chance our travel approval will arrive in the next couple of days or else they wouldn't have suggested otherwise. We won't truly know our itinerary until our consulate appointment is confirmed and we can book our flights. If our travel approval arrives at our agency's office tomorrow or Monday, we could have a confirmed consulate appointment by the middle of next week. Then the real craziness begins.
It's almost hard to believe that it's actually going to happen. In less than a month!
Monday, June 20, 2011
Any day now...
We've entered the third week of our wait for travel approval, so we could receive an email from our agency any day letting us know that it's arrived and that we can request our consulate appointment. Once the consulate appointment is requested it is usually confirmed within a day or two, and then the trip itinerary is planned around that date. Things seem to be back to normal following the Chinese holiday a couple of weeks ago, but I have to admit that this part of the wait has been particularly hard. We know we're leaving soon, but we don't know when. We haven't been able to get any updates on Ellie. The logistics of planning a trip to China, being away from the boys for two weeks, and preparing to take custody of a toddler with a medical condition who has never laid eyes on us... it all feels a little overwhelming at times. But we're enjoying the summer, and it's going by fast. This is Patrick's last week of camp, and this one's a full-day camp - so things are blessedly quiet around here while Samuel naps. It would be much more enjoyable if it weren't so nerve-wracking.
Ellie is 17 months old today. I hope this is the last milestone she passes without us.
Ellie is 17 months old today. I hope this is the last milestone she passes without us.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
And then there was no news...
Haven't heard of any travel approvals being received in recent days, probably due to the national holiday that was celebrated in China earlier this week (known as the Duanwu Festival in China, often referred to as the "Dragon Boat Festival"). So if that's the reason for the slowdown in travel approvals, it shouldn't last long. Hopefully those just ahead of us in line will start receiving theirs later this week or early next.
A few people have asked whether there's anything that could be done to speed up the process. The short answer is, "No." Other than rare exceptions for urgent medical problems, every adoption in China follows essentially the same timeline. Ours has been much faster than the non-special needs program (which now has a wait time of more than 5 years), but only because we received a quicker match. We've done the same basic paperwork, which has worked its way through the same bureaucratic labyrinth as that of every other family who is adopting from China. The process is governed by Chinese and U.S. laws, as well as the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption. It is tedious almost by design, because corruption has been the downfall of many international adoption programs over the years.
I've seen a few disturbing articles recently accusing Chinese family planning officials of engaging in illegal practices related to the placing of children for international adoption. These accusations stem from incidents that allegedly occurred several years ago. They have not been connected in any way to Ellie's province (which actually is relatively new to the IA process), nor have they apparently involved any children with special needs (of which there are many in China, in fact constituting the majority of children living in orphanages and the majority of Chinese children currently being adopted by Americans). Unfortunately, there is no perfect human endeavor under the sun, and whenever money is involved it has the potential of bringing out the worst in people.
Adoptive parents do pay fees for the privilege of adopting a child, which causes some people to assume that the process is automatically corrupt - but social workers, agency employees, translators, government bureaucrats and travel guides don't work for free. Neither did I when I was teaching - does that make me some sort of evil opportunist taking advantage of the ignorance of young children? Is it wrong for a doctor to accept fees for taking care of sick people? Or a lawyer to be reimbursed by the state for representing an indigent client? We all have jobs to do, some of them in the helping professions - but other than the work that we do for our families, most of us expect to get paid. Many of the fees for Ellie's adoption have gone to government entities to cover the cost of processing of our paperwork. Should other taxpayers foot the bill instead? Our agency has received payment for doing our home study (which is mandatory for any adoption, domestic or international, but the requirements vary and the social worker spends many hours gathering information and writing her report), and for reviewing and translating our dossier. Very specialized work, to say the least. The largest single expense will be the trip to China, much of which goes to the airlines and hotels. A "child-rearing fee" is collected at the provincial level, which is personally my least favorite aspect of the fee structure - but there is an appreciable difference between orphanages in China that participate in international adoption and those that do not, in terms of the care the children receive and the resources the staff has to do their jobs. Can we be certain that every dime of the child-rearing fee is used to care for the children who remain institutionalized? No - but we do know that the process of matching children from orphanages is handled at the national level in China, so there is a record of how many children from each orphanage have been adopted abroad and therefore how much money each orphanage should have received. The fee itself is standard throughout China. Chinese parents who adopt domestically pay a fee as well.
What's interesting is that most orphanages in China don't even participate in international adoption - so if it's supposedly so financially lucrative due to widespread corruption, why don't they? And why has China decreased the number of referrals in the non-special needs program and not adjusted the fees all that much, even though there is a line of dossiers stretching back several years? If they're only in it to make money, well, they're certainly not doing a very effective job.
We chose the China program in part because it's been a relatively stable program over the years, and because it has an orderly, centralized process for placing children for adoption. So through the labyrinth we chug along, and we are happy to do it.
A few people have asked whether there's anything that could be done to speed up the process. The short answer is, "No." Other than rare exceptions for urgent medical problems, every adoption in China follows essentially the same timeline. Ours has been much faster than the non-special needs program (which now has a wait time of more than 5 years), but only because we received a quicker match. We've done the same basic paperwork, which has worked its way through the same bureaucratic labyrinth as that of every other family who is adopting from China. The process is governed by Chinese and U.S. laws, as well as the Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption. It is tedious almost by design, because corruption has been the downfall of many international adoption programs over the years.
I've seen a few disturbing articles recently accusing Chinese family planning officials of engaging in illegal practices related to the placing of children for international adoption. These accusations stem from incidents that allegedly occurred several years ago. They have not been connected in any way to Ellie's province (which actually is relatively new to the IA process), nor have they apparently involved any children with special needs (of which there are many in China, in fact constituting the majority of children living in orphanages and the majority of Chinese children currently being adopted by Americans). Unfortunately, there is no perfect human endeavor under the sun, and whenever money is involved it has the potential of bringing out the worst in people.
Adoptive parents do pay fees for the privilege of adopting a child, which causes some people to assume that the process is automatically corrupt - but social workers, agency employees, translators, government bureaucrats and travel guides don't work for free. Neither did I when I was teaching - does that make me some sort of evil opportunist taking advantage of the ignorance of young children? Is it wrong for a doctor to accept fees for taking care of sick people? Or a lawyer to be reimbursed by the state for representing an indigent client? We all have jobs to do, some of them in the helping professions - but other than the work that we do for our families, most of us expect to get paid. Many of the fees for Ellie's adoption have gone to government entities to cover the cost of processing of our paperwork. Should other taxpayers foot the bill instead? Our agency has received payment for doing our home study (which is mandatory for any adoption, domestic or international, but the requirements vary and the social worker spends many hours gathering information and writing her report), and for reviewing and translating our dossier. Very specialized work, to say the least. The largest single expense will be the trip to China, much of which goes to the airlines and hotels. A "child-rearing fee" is collected at the provincial level, which is personally my least favorite aspect of the fee structure - but there is an appreciable difference between orphanages in China that participate in international adoption and those that do not, in terms of the care the children receive and the resources the staff has to do their jobs. Can we be certain that every dime of the child-rearing fee is used to care for the children who remain institutionalized? No - but we do know that the process of matching children from orphanages is handled at the national level in China, so there is a record of how many children from each orphanage have been adopted abroad and therefore how much money each orphanage should have received. The fee itself is standard throughout China. Chinese parents who adopt domestically pay a fee as well.
What's interesting is that most orphanages in China don't even participate in international adoption - so if it's supposedly so financially lucrative due to widespread corruption, why don't they? And why has China decreased the number of referrals in the non-special needs program and not adjusted the fees all that much, even though there is a line of dossiers stretching back several years? If they're only in it to make money, well, they're certainly not doing a very effective job.
We chose the China program in part because it's been a relatively stable program over the years, and because it has an orderly, centralized process for placing children for adoption. So through the labyrinth we chug along, and we are happy to do it.
Friday, June 3, 2011
News from Guangzhou!
Our agency's staff in Guangzhou sent notice yesterday that they've picked up our "Article 5" letter from the U.S. Consulate and sent it off to Beijing. This means that the U.S. government has approved our adoption of Ellie and determined that she is eligible for a visa as an adopted child and soon-to-be U.S. citizen, and that all of the necessary paperwork is at the consulate awaiting our arrival. While we're in Guangzhou (the second week of our China trip), Ellie will have a medical exam at the consulate, then we will have another appointment there a few days later so that we can take the oath for Ellie's citizenship. So we're not completely done with the U.S. side of things, but the Article 5 letter lets the Chinese government know that we have everything in place to bring Ellie home, other than Ellie herself. :)
So now our agency is officially waiting for a document known as Travel Approval, which comes from the China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption. This usually takes 2-4 weeks, although recently I've seen people getting them as quickly as 10 days. We will go ahead and assume, however, that we will not be on that lucky end of the travel approval spectrum, and maybe we'll be pleasantly surprised.
Another bit of good news is that we will likely travel with a group, as there are currently several other families with our agency who are adopting from Henan province and also awaiting travel approval. Group travel is less expensive, and being around other families will be a lot more fun than being by ourselves. If we do end up with a group, we will leave on a Wednesday if we opt to tour Beijing, or a Friday if we opt not to. We're leaning toward not touring Beijing, because as much as we would love to see the sites while we're in China, we want our time away from the boys to be as short as possible. Someday we will return to China as a family and learn more about Ellie's birthplace - but for now, our priorities are to get Ellie, complete the adoption, and get back home as quickly as possible. We'll still have about a week in her province and a week in Guangzhou, most of which we'll spend waiting for various paperwork to be completed, so there will be lots of down time to experience a little of the Chinese culture. Whether we tour Beijing or not, we will receive Ellie on the same day the rest of the group meets their children - so for us, the extra days in Beijing are not all that important. We'll meet the group in Beijing on a Saturday, then fly to Zhengzhou (probably the next day) and likely meet Ellie on a Monday or Tuesday. And then she'll be ours.
So now our agency is officially waiting for a document known as Travel Approval, which comes from the China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption. This usually takes 2-4 weeks, although recently I've seen people getting them as quickly as 10 days. We will go ahead and assume, however, that we will not be on that lucky end of the travel approval spectrum, and maybe we'll be pleasantly surprised.
Another bit of good news is that we will likely travel with a group, as there are currently several other families with our agency who are adopting from Henan province and also awaiting travel approval. Group travel is less expensive, and being around other families will be a lot more fun than being by ourselves. If we do end up with a group, we will leave on a Wednesday if we opt to tour Beijing, or a Friday if we opt not to. We're leaning toward not touring Beijing, because as much as we would love to see the sites while we're in China, we want our time away from the boys to be as short as possible. Someday we will return to China as a family and learn more about Ellie's birthplace - but for now, our priorities are to get Ellie, complete the adoption, and get back home as quickly as possible. We'll still have about a week in her province and a week in Guangzhou, most of which we'll spend waiting for various paperwork to be completed, so there will be lots of down time to experience a little of the Chinese culture. Whether we tour Beijing or not, we will receive Ellie on the same day the rest of the group meets their children - so for us, the extra days in Beijing are not all that important. We'll meet the group in Beijing on a Saturday, then fly to Zhengzhou (probably the next day) and likely meet Ellie on a Monday or Tuesday. And then she'll be ours.
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