WE ARE APPROVED!!!

Found out today that our I800A was approved and was mailed out today! Hopefully we will get it no later than Thursday!! Then I can get it notarized, and send it to Little Rock for certification and then get it all together to mail to Houston for authentication!!! Looks like June we WILL have a LID!!!

This Friday, my oldest son graduates with honors! Can't believe he's graduating!! He's such a smart, funny, loving, talented and Godly young man! In 2011, my oldest will be leaving for college and my last will be coming home! How bitter sweet is that? I love you, Zackery and am so proud of you!!

So, this month is full of alot of good things! And I see nothing but great things in the future!

Thank you God for the person of Zackery! Thank You for the time You have given him to me to raise. I hope I raised him according to Your standards and that he leads his life with You as an example!!! Be with him as he grows into a man with decisions and help him to make the right ones with confidence! He loves You, so keep him near to You and let him know that You are there for him, no matter what! Hold him in Your hands, as I can't, while he's not with us in our house and we will be confident knowing You take care of your own!!

Be with Zoey tonight, Lord! Hold her close and let her know we are coming as fast as we can! Whisper that we love her in her ear. Keep her well and prepare her even now for us. Thank you for letting us know who she is and thank you for making her part of our family! In Your name I pray both these prayers! AMEN!

WE CAN SHARE WITH THE WORLD!!! PA!!!

What a GREAT Pre-MOther's Day! I can tell already that Zoey is going to be full of great things!! We hear about her on Good Friday and now the Friday before Mother's Day, China has acknowledged her as our daughter, so we can share her with the world!!! WOOHOO!!!

AND we've been assigned an officer, which makes us one step closer, after we get approved which HOPEFULLY is Monday, to sending off our dossier!!!

This is a GREAT day!!! NOw, nothing is private and all can view!!! WHOOHOO

Thank you, God, for this "Good" Friday again! Thank you for our PA not taking very long and us being assigned an officer! It's the little things in adoption that get us to our BIG thing, which is bringing Zoey home! Please keep her well...happy and hold her in your arms at night and tell her that her family is coming REALLY soon to get her!!! Give her kisses and comfort her like only YOU can!! Thank you!!

LOI

We are officially, LOI. This means, Letter of Intent. All our information was sent today. My agency has told me that we should get the pre-approval (which is when we can share her picture publically) within about 2 weeks! Man...waiting is soo hard for an impatient person like me! Two weeks seems sooo long!!!
While we WAIT...we should get our immigration approval this week or next at the latest. Once we receive that, we will get it notorized, certified and then ALL the documents will go to Houston to be authenticated. Once we receive the documents from Houston, we add our pics and passport things and then send it to CCAI (our agency) They will keep it for 9-11 days for translation and then we will be DTC (Dossier to China)
I was told by my agency that since we have a referral, our LID (Log in Date) should be pretty quick...like days to maybe 2 wks. Once we have our LID the wait starts for our LOA (Letter of Acceptance) They say that takes about 2 months (some have had to wait longer, but I'm praying that won't be us!) Then we have to do another immigration paper (800A) and once that is received, we will be boarding a plane 11-14 weeks later! So...
This means that if all goes the way it's supposed to (yeah right!) then we will have travel dates between October and December. We are prayin that it's NOT December bc the flights are ASTRONOMICAL and we don't want to add to the holiday craziness!! So...
Prayers that all goes according to schedule, we get all the money we need in time, and that we travel either Oct or Nov. So..
Next post will prayerfully be that we got our acceptance from Immigration and that we are sending our documents to Houston!!!
One step closer to our Zoey!!!! Praise the Lord!

HERE SHE IS!!!!

Her name is LI (For those of you who remember, Olivia's name has LI in it too!!!!) Yi Fei

So LI YI FEI!!!

Her bday is February 16, 2010...yes, she's only 14 months old!!!

She in from Henan, China (that's 2 provinces above where Olivia was born in Hunan!!)

We are sooo excited! She's fair skin like Olivia and I don't even think she has black hair, but the color of Olivia's, but we don't care..she's just so cute! She doesn't have much hair (of course) but we will get it to grow!

There is NOTHING else wrong with her other than REPAIRED cleft lip and small issue with cleft palate that we are sure won't take much to correct!

God is SOOO good! Really, you have no idea. I was praying with all the pain I was in, that God would do something to make me smile and He did that in a HUGE way! We were in the post office in Trumann when I got the call, getting Cameron's passport to go to Guatelmala this summer. It's truly amazing!

For those of you wondering, we are thinking travel between October-December. Not sure. Have more paperwork and MORE MONEY to get done with before we can move forward. China has to accept us to be her family and that takes a little while too, but AS SOON AS WE KNOW..it will be posted on here!!!

I hope you all think she's beautiful and enjoy looking at her! We are over the moon, and Olivia wants to get her NOW!!!!! My mom was able to share in this excitement this time (Her And Anthony thought something was wrong bc I couldn't stop crying to tell them!!!!) So, it's been a great day!!!!!

Thank you, GOD that on this GOOD FRIDAY, you chose to show us our Zoey! You are an awesome God and we saw all the "God" handprints on Olivia, and YOu are again showing those handprints through Zoey!!! You are an amazing God and I'm so glad I worship you and you are my FATHER...giving me all I need, when I need it, in YOUR timing! I love you!!! Thank you for this, our 5th blessing, from YOU!!!!!

Surgery done

Well, last Wednesday (13th) I had my complete hysterectomy! 5 days after and I'm still pretty down. The pain is worse than I thought and I'm not able to do much at all!! I didn't think it would be like this, but I'm sooo glad that my mom is here to help me. I remember telling her I would be fine, that she didn't need to come here, but boy was I wrong! Anthony might have been able to handle it, but he would've had to take off work for a while. I know it's going to take a while and I'm okay with that, well not really, but this is one thing I can't change and it will hurt me more than help me if I try to rush it! So...I'm gonna try to enjoy the time down and just look forward to 6 (well now almost 5) weeks from now! :) Called today and both our fingerprints are cleared! Haven't been assigned an officer yet, but hoping that will be sometime this week!!! FINGERS CROSSED!!!! Will update when we have an officer and are approved!!!!

THEY ARE DONE!!

I called Lee's Summit, MO to tell them that I was having major surgery on the 13th and the drive was over an hour AND my appt was only 14 days after the surgery. I asked them if there was any way I could get them done earlier. The first lady said for me to take my chances and walk-in, but we weren't comforable with that, so we just figured that we would "deal with it" and I would try not to hurt tooo much with the drive. THEN..another lady called and said that she had spoken to someone in Memphis and they told me to come in anytime before the surgery, that it would be fine!! WOOHOO!! ANSWER TO PRAYERS!! 1. I don't have to drive that far in pain and 2. We could get our approval earlier, which means earlier DTC!!!!! We are so excited. SO, got our fingerprints done today (4-8-2011) and can't wait for approval!!! Praying for this government shut-down, but looks like God is dealing with that too, in a postive way! God always shows us that HE is in control of our adoptions...thankfully so b/c if we had to do these things on our own...we wouldn't have our Olivia and soon have our Zoey! GOD IS AWESOME..in the GOOD TIMES and the BAD!!! Thank you God for being in control..ALWAYS!

Surgery

Well, I found out that I will have a compete hysterectomy April 13th! In the hospital for 3 days with 6 wks recovery! YUCK! But so looking forward to feeling better...forever! HA I'm thinking alot about Zoey! I am NOT a patient person, as most of you know, but I so want to see her, how old she is, what her special need(s) is/are, where she is from and all that good stuff! I know it's all in God's timing and I'm okay with that, it's just hard! Got Zackery's graduation invitations in Monday! They are exactly what he wanted. I think they turned out pretty good! Now we have ALOT left to do for these last 5 weeks! UUGHH!!! 5 WEEKS and my first-born will graduate! I'm so proud of him and sad at the same time! Just praying for God's hand to be ALL over him!!!! Well, I guess it will be about 4 weeks before I have anymore news on Zoey! I wish it could be sooner, but it won't be! Just stay tuned...getting closer and closer. Pray for Z to be well, stay well and already get her heart ready for us! Pray that she's revealed to us soon!!! :) Pray for our family with this surgery. God is amazing and we put all our concerns, questions and trust in Him!

FINGERPRINT APPTS!!!

They came in today!! Our appts are April 28th at 11 and 212 (but we will go in at the same time!) They are saying from receipt date to approval is running 45 days right now. Don't know if that will change by the time we get our appts done, but if that's still how it's going, then we will be approved the first week of May, get our papers authenticated and have them back by the 3rd week of May and hopefully be DTC by the time Anthony leaves on his mission trip (June 2-8)!!! I am even thinking we could be LID by the end of JUNE!!!!! AHHH, it's getting closer now!!! PLEASE keep praying that everything is ok and goes through smoothly and we get to see Zoey fast!!! ANd leave to go get her!! :) Thank you!!

Certification

Well, we got our certification papers from Little Rock today! YAY!! Now we are just waiting on our fingerprint appointment, which I think we will have by next Friday..the 8th! But now we have all but one paper and then once that's back, we have authentication then we will be sending it ALL to the agency and hopefully be DTC!!! So, moving right along! Had some bumps here and there, but it's going fine!

Privacy!

This adoption is different from Olivia's. It is illegal for us to post a picture or information about our daughter on a public website, and that's going to be HARD for me. How will they find out??? Who knows, but I will do NOTHING to jeopardize this adoption, therefore, I will follow the rules!
That being said, I need all the emails of people that would like to see her and her info and follow us in China because this will become a private blog as soon as we have info or a picture. NO! We know nothing, but you never know with the special needs adoptions! But if I have your email, I can add it to the privacy setting and you WILL be able to see it, so if you want to be added, just send me an email to mystyfy@rittermail.com, leave it on here or message me on facebook. Sorry about this, but I know you all understand!

One more step down!

We received our notice in the mail that our I800A paperwork has been received. NOW, all we can do is wait for our fingerprint invitation. Looks like it's taking about 3-4 weeks to have your appointment date then just days to get approved. So, that's a plus!
I have some documents already certified, and should receive the others in the mail this week. Then I have to send all those papers off to Houston to be authenticated (A PAIN WITH MORE MONEY NEEDED NOW!!!) and then just wait on our approval to come back...send that to be certified and authenticated, then mail it all to CCAI. Then, 7-11 days later, our dossier is OFF TO CHINA!!!! (DTC) We will then wait for our LID and pray that a referral comes in QUICKLY after that! So, as confusing as all this is...it's still looking like we will be DTC the end of May, but we can always pray for sooner! Our God is a BIG God and HE knows who our "Zoey" is and when she will be ready for us to come and get her! Although patience is NOT a virtue of mine, I know from experience that GOD is in control of this situation and I just have to sit back and wait for HIS timing!! (Although I do pray for speed! HAHA)
But...one more thing down! WOOHOO!!!

IT'S DONE!!!

WOOHOO!!! Our homestudy has been Approved!!!! This is a BIG step because until this was done, we couldn't get an appointment to get our fingerprints done, which this step is taking up to 60 days, which it's taking almost all 60 days!! So, while we wait for an invitation to do this, we will notorize, certify and authenticate our paperwork which will take about 4-6 weeks for all of this! It all goes well, my goal for being DTC in May will become a reality!!! WOOHOO!! Thank you Lord!!

WOOHOO!!!!

Have just been notified that our first draft of our homestudy has been sent to our agency!!!! That's a HUGE deal! Now, we need prayer that there are NO mistakes and that it gets approved on the first try bc that means we can apply for our fingerprints and it's closer to getting that back to have things certified and autenticated to be sent to CCAA (China) If we don't have a baby picked out by then, it's the CCAA that will choose our baby girl a few months from the time of receiving our dossier!! So, the faster this gets approved, the faster we are DTC and get to see our baby girl!!! In reality, all this could happen (things mailed off, DTC and seeing our baby girl) by September...then we just have to wait to travel after that!!!!! WOOHOO!! Please pray for first time being a charm!! Thank you in advance! We are coming, Zoey....as fast as we can!!! We love you already!!!

Im SoOOO excited

I feel pretty safe in saying this on here and I have to say it somewhere!! I AM GOING TO BE AN AUNT TO IDENTICAL TWINS!!!! AHHHH My brother and his wife found out today. They have tried for 5 years and it finally happened and God gave them TWO!!! AHHH I am so excited and feel so blessed. Now I can't wait to find out what they are!!!! WOOHOO!!!!

UPDATE!!! Found out at a later ultrasound, when they are now bigger, that they are NOT idential! There are two of everything and that takes Kristi out of the high risk category! It would have been cool for them to be identical, and they still might be (confusing to explain) BUT we are happy that Kristi is no longer on that list! We just want TWO healthy babies to love and spoil, so we don't care if they look alike or not! We find out (if they cooperate) on April 18th and if not then, she has an appointment in Mobile the next month, so we will know by the end of May what they are!! CAN'T WAIT!!!!

WOOHOO!!!

I just got the message that our Mississippi forms came in the mail to our social worker today and we will meet with her on Saturday to finish our part of the homestudy which means....PROBABLY sometime next week, our first draft will be headed to our agency!!! woohoo!!! I sooo needed some good news today and God provided!!! Thank you God!!!

Well, it was a possiblilty

I know I haven't updated in a while, so here it goes.
We have our last homestudy this Friday (Feb 5th) and we are still waiting on our Mississippi clearance form for child abuse. Once those two things are done, we are hoping to have the homestudy finished and on it's way for the first look-over by the first week of March!
We had been looking at a little girl with hydrocephalus, but unless we get updates, she will not be the one for our family bc of her condition being much more than hydrocephalus (as of the info that we have now) She will be 2 in April and she is gorgeous, but we have to wait to see if any updates will be sent (Her orphanage has to send them and they don't always comply) so we will wail, bc that's all we can do! If we get more info that's positive, we will send them to the neuro's that have been looking at her file and get their opinion and go from there, but for now, we still wait!!
Please keep praying for Zoey and that she stays well and that she's presented to us soon! We are so ready to see her face and get this ball rolling!!! We know waiting is part of the process, but it's so hard...still! So, your prayers are coveted!!!
So, until I have more news!!! Zoey, we already love you and are praying that you are shown to us soon! Stay well and know that your family here are waiting on you and can't wait to see you!

More papers came in

Well, Lori received our Child maltreatment forms from Louisiana and Arkansas. Mississippi is being a pain and I will mail those forms Monday. We got our certified birth certificates and marriage license in week before last also.
I have gotten all the papers that I could get together for the dossier. I am waiting on Anthony to do two papers, the homestudy (that we hope will be done by the end of this month) and then we will wait on our I800A. Then we can send all this off to be certified and authenticated! Then...well, not sure when but the dossier is sent to China (DTC)
We are still praying for a phone call from our agency for a referral before we are DTC so if there is anything you would like to pray about, that would be it. It would shorten our wait time to go and get Zoey and save us a few hundred dollars which is NEEDED in an adoption!
So again, I just sit and wait! I'm not good at patience things, but in an adoption you have to wait!! The best is yet to come! HA
So...until I know more...that's all for now. Prayers are appreciated and needed!!!

WOW! What a week!

On Friday, November 4, 2011, my second mom, Sheila Taylor, went home to be with the Lord. She found out almost 4 months ago that she had brain tumors and lung cancer. We all left on Monday (the same day I found out that I had the FLU!!) and drove for the services. Zackery was a paulbearer and Anthony did the service. It was a very hard service for my family and the Taylor's and it will be a long time before pics of Sheila stop running through my mind. My mom said things for her best friend and sang and Anthony preached. They both did an amazing job under the circumstances! Continued prayer for everyone who knew and loved Sheila would be appreciated!!! She was a very precious woman and she will NEVER be forgotten but ALWAYS missed!!!! I love you Mrs. Sheila!

Almost there!

I have gotten all the papers together to be certified and authenticated that I can do. Got to wait on the I800A and our dossier to be finished. Can't do I800A til dossier is complete, so it will be about another month before that paper will even be accessible. We are hoping that the dossier will be complete by the end of this month so that maybe we can get our dossier to China (DTC for future reference) by....May sometime!! That's hoping! Right now, I need you to pray for Zoey. We would really like to have her picture before we send off our dossier. If it prolongs sending our dossier, then we will just wait, but if we have her picture before we are DTC then we could travel before the end of the year!!!! That's what we are praying for (and the money that needs to go along with the whole process, of course! :)
Things are going great with the adoption right now though. Things are right on tract. It's always hurry, hurry, hurry and wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait! But we knew that coming in! So..we are good!
Please pray for my parents LONG time friends, Jimmy and Sheila and her 4 kids, their spouses and grandkids and of course my parents. Mrs. Sheila was diagnosed with cancer in Sept. and they think we are at the ending days now. She is only 56 and such a special lady to my family. Please pray for either miraculous healing (Which I KNOW can be done) or that when God takes her, that HIS arms are wrapped around the family (and my family is considered family) to get through this! It's going to be hard! Anthony is preaching and Zackery is a paulbearer!!! So, it's gonna be a tough service! Thank you for your prayers in advance! Love you Mrs. Sheila! And Love you Zoey! Stay well in this weather. Mommy, daddy, bubbas and big sister are coming as fast as we can!!!

Legacy of an Adopted Child
Once there were two women who never knew each other
One you do not remember, the other you call Mother

Two different lives shaped to make you one
One became your guiding star, the other became your sun

The first one gave you life, and the second taught you to live it
The first gave you a need for love, the second was there to give it

One gave you a nationality, the other gave you a name,
One gave you talent, the other gave you aim.

Once gave you emotions, the other calmed your fears.
Once saw your first sweet smile, the other dried your tears

One made an adoption plan, that was all that she could do
The other prayed for a child, and God led her staright to you
Now, which of these two women, Are you the product of?
Both, my darling, Both, just two different types of love.
unknown

SNOW!SNOW!SNOW!

We didn't get to do our last homestudy because of the 4 inches of snow we received Thursday night! Kids got out of school early because of ice and stayed home Friday. They say more is to come Sunday and Monday, but we will wait and see if it comes true!
I went and had my physical done. Olivia DID NOT like it when they had to take my blood. She said, "No mommie, it's gonna hurt you. I don't want it to hurt you. You will have a bobo!" So sweet! I told her daddy and I had to do the same thing when we were trying to get her. She just looked at me at that point and didn't say anything!! Then all day, when she would get beside me she would look and say,"I don't want to hurt u's bobo...am I touching it!" HA I told her it didn't hurt, but she was still concerned!
So..I've done all I can do on my side. Waiting on clearances to come in, homestudy to be done, certified birth certificates and marriage license to come in. But...waiting while in the process of adoption is part of it! (esp from China...they are soo thorough!!!)
Well, Livy is in the bed for a nap, Zackery is at work, Cameron and Jake are in Cam's room and Anthony and Chase are getting a hair cut so I guess I will try to find something on TV. I don't feel like doing much, on ABX for a slight infection, so I'm just going to be lazy today! Perfect day for i! :) Until next time!!!