These are updated pictures of Lila from April 2011
We have been on this journey for 15 months now. I thought it was finally time to create a way to share this last leg of our journey. For the past 15 months we have done a mountain of paperwork, have been fingerprinted twice, have had 2 sets of background checks (state and federal), have gone to the doctor twice to show we are healthy, have taken our other kids to the doctor to show they are healthy, have gotten referral letters from family, coworkers, priest and local police dept to show we are responsible members of society, have taken our pets to the vet to show they have all had their shots, and met with Amy, our socialworker, 4 times for her to pick our brain and determine if we would be capable of parenting an adopted child. This is commonly called paperchasing with the purpose of putting together a dossier --which in turn gets sent to China. There is ALOT involved in that simple statement listed above "a mountain of paperwork"---at times we felt so overwhelmed at the paperwork---constantly worried about doing something wrong and having to start over. But God led us down this path and he has stayed with us. At times when I feel like my heart is going to explode with anxiety/worry---I have to remind myself that it all happens in God's time. She will join our family when she is suppose to join our family. You see, the chinese believe that an invisible red thread connects family members who are to be together and as time goes by the thread gets shorter and shorter.
We started in April 2010 and our dossier was sent to China in February 2011. We got our referral in March 2011 and saw our daughter for the first time! Her Chinese name is Jiang SongKong. Her DOB is 6/25/2010. She was 9 mths at time of referral. Jiang is her surname and is also the first part of the orphanage name where she currently lives---Jiangcheng Social Welfare Institute. Kong would actually be what she is called. She is in Yangjiang City which is in Guangdong Province. The Province is comparable to our states. This is all located in Southern China about an hour from the South China Sea. Very tropical humid area. If you are looking at a map this is very very close to Taiwain and Vietnam. The doctor at UAB's International Adoption Clinic, who reviewed her medical file for us, said people from this area have a little darker skin and larger eyes. She thinks because their is a large migrant worker population in this area. There are several different languages spoke in China--the most common being Mandarin. This area happens to speak Cantonese. There is a river near her city as well--so alot of the people are fishermen. There is also a huge knife factory in Yangjiang City that makes most of the knives we sell in America i.e, Chicago Cutlery, Ginsu, etc. Pearls and jade are also popular in this area.
I know this probably very boring for any adoptive families that might be following this but we do have lots of friends and family that are experiencing this for the first time with us. So please bear with me.
