Almost Ready

It's almost 1:00 a.m. and we are almost packed.  Our ride to the airport comes at 7:00, so we will get five or so hours of sleep.  But hey, we can catch up on that when the girls are grown!  Amelia/AJ/Amy's room is ready (thanks to Mag and Dave) and Maddie finally has the purple walls and zebra stripes she has longed for.  Whatever we forget, we can just buy there (except clothes for Chuck!).  We keep telling ourselves that and we keep adding things to the suitcases!  Both Maddie and the baby have way bigger stacks than I do!

 

Two Days Before Departure!

Since we have been waiting for over 5 1/2 years, it might be hard to believe that we are down to two days before our departure and still have so much to do!!  We leave Sunday morning!  Chuck and I both work today, so that leaves tonight and Saturday.  We have done many of the preparations, but the lists are just long and detailed and we have several of them!  We would be in a real mess if not for Mag and Dave having driven all the way from North Carolina to help us this week - they have been unbelievably helpful!!

AJ's Birthday Party

We couldn't get authorized in time to be there for AJ's 2nd birthday on March 19th, so we sent her a cake, a teddy bear, a blanket and some photos of her new family.  The nannies were nice enough to snap a few photos and e-mail them to us.  Some of the pics are below.

Since we couldn't be together, we had a little party to celebrate AJ at home on the same day

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New Photos!

We were able to get a few updated photos, taken in china on February 10 and emailed to us the same day - we were amazed!  Note the many layers of clothing.  I love the fuzzy jacket.  We received new measurements which confirmed that she is a tiny little peanut for her age - almost two years old.  Based on what we have been told about her personality though, she will make up for her size with her large personality!

Care Package for AJ

Like many adoptive families, we put together a package for AJ after we got her referral.  In the package we put gifts for the nannies and other children at the orphanage.  We also included an album with photos of our family.  We did this for Maddie 7 years ago and got them all back on Gotcha Day, so we hope that happens this time as well.  We even found the same type of red leather photo album.  We also included a disposable camera and hope that they are able to take some photos of her in the orphanage.

Referral Day

We received our referral while on vacation in Bryce National Park.  Here is AJ's big sister, Maddie, after hearing the news.  She got very excited a few minutes later, once it sunk in.  Our referral picture is also below.