Two big letters.........TA!

Can you believe it?  God has done it again!  

Our agency said to expect TA in 2-3 weeks.  That was almost 2 weeks ago.  Yep.  He's in the details.

Well, I was sitting in the kitchen munching on an apple and texting my sister and hubby when I noticed I had some new emails.  I could see that one of them was from our China coordinator, and when I saw the words "Congratulations.  BAAS received your TA this afternoon," I almost choked on said apple.  For real!

So now the planning is kicking into high gear and the packing must commence.  Unfortunately the new camera/laptop backpack I purchased last week was waaaay too big on my petite frame.  So I need to ship it back and try again.  Ugh.  I really want to wear a backpack to tote around all my gear so that I can wear Havi in the carrier without having to keep a bag from falling off my shoulder.  So I really need to pick something quick.  We are hoping to leave mid June after Madeline's dance recital.

Anyway, enough rambling.  Now for some photos.  Shame on me; I didn't get either hubby to snap a photo of me with my sister the weekend of our birthday/Mother's Day.  Pathetic, I know.  I did, however, follow all the littles around as they walked over to the playground and played wildly one night after dinner.

I love watching Caleb take Josh by the hand.  It's a foreshadowing of the weeks to come.

These last two photos crack me up.  I wanted a shot of all the kids together. So Caleb corralled Josh.  Madeline and Leah jumped into the shot.  But I couldn't convince Madeline to put her knees down so she didn't flash the world.

She couldn't take it and up and left.  And the other three came crashing down.  Not quite the end result I had in mind! lol

Anyway, I'll be sure to keep you all posted on our travel plans when we nail them down.  I plan on blogging when we travel. So be sure to check in on us and leave some comment love.  It'll mean a lot to us while we're half way around the globe.

Some Easter fun and a paperchase update

It's hard to believe that I haven't updated the blog in a few weeks, but I guess we've just been that busy.  That, and I didn't want to sound like a broken record with the "still no progress on the adoption front" kind of news.  That gets old real fast. (Just ask me what I was doing three years ago.  It gets old! lol)

It's also been a while since I picked up my big girl camera.  That, and I can't get my act together to do an iPhone photo dump. So since I finally managed to snap a few photos this weekend, (and I have news) I figured I better share the photos and the update before too much time slips away.

On Saturday, the dumplings dyed eggs.

On Sunday we went to church.  Then before heading over to our friends' house for the afternoon, I snapped a few photos of the kids out back.  This was our first "photo shoot" in our new backyard. It's not as big as our old one, but it will do.

Did you see that bird feeder and bath in the background?  The kids had a field day "playing "with them when I was snapping individual shots of them.  Here's proof.

So I had to be a little creative with my angles and placement.

The kids had a quick bite to eat.  And then as we were trying to rush out the door, I stopped them for a few quick snaps inside.

Madeline wanted to twirl for me.

Then, apparently, sometimes their mama can crack a joke or two.  I should've "upped" my ISO and shutter speed, but we were in a rush.  Still love 'em.

We truly had a lovely and relaxing Easter weekend.  Well, maybe I did.  Patrick had to work a little, poor fella.

So, I know some of you are curious about the latest happenings with Havi's  adoption. After a grueling five week wait since we received our LOA, our home study agency finally completed our necessary update for our Supplement 3 (because we moved.) So on Friday, we finally mailed off our I-800 and Supplement 3 applications. Hopefully our Supp 3 is approved without any RFE's (Request For Evidence). If all goes well, both will get approved in 2-3 weeks. Then we wait for our I-800 approval to be cabled to Guangzhou. After that our Article 5 can be dropped off. Two weeks later, it will be picked up, and we will begin our wait for TA (Travel Approval), which can take 2-3 weeks.   If all goes well, we should be able to travel this June.

Although I'm trying to trust it's all going to work out, I'm now beginning to worry, mostly about our Supplement 3, whether not not our approval will be issued without delay or not. Immigration officers can be picky. I called our officer just one time, to let her know we moved. Other than that, I have had no communication with her. She did approve our I-800A application with no problem.  But seriously, I can't even remember her name! How pathetic is that?! Doesn't every prospective adoptive parent (PAP) know their officer's name? Yes, but not me! Oh how I pray it all goes well.

On top of that, we have a major problem with Madeline's Chinese passport. We applied and received her new U.S. passport.  However, the passport center failed to return her Chinese passport when they returned all the other supporting documents!  The Chinese Embassy requires all Chinese passports for U.S. citizens who were formerly Chinese nationals to also be sent when requesting their first tourist/travel Visa... which would be Madeline.  We NEED to get this item back and STAT so we can apply for our Visas.  The call center won't request original documents to be returned until it's been two weeks since the U.S. passport has been received.  Well, I wasn't waiting two weeks for them to request the item be returned.  So I wrote a letter and overnighted it.  It's been almost one week since I mailed the letter, and NO ONE has called me about the matter.  Needless to say, I'm not happy.  AND I'm stressed out about it.  Please pray that someone will call me or they will just locate it and return it to us soon.  We certainly don't need this extra hassle.

So that's where things stand on the adoption front.  Oh, we also ordered a cake care package for Havi but have yet to receive any photos.  To say that I'm disappointed is an understatement.  It's been over two weeks since we ordered the package.  When oh when will we receive some updated photos of our little Havi?  I'm just so bummed.

Anyway, I do promise to share some iPhone photos here soon.  And hopefully we have some good news to share too.

2012 Year in review

Happy New Year to you all!

I meant to write this post yesterday, but time got the best of me.  So here is our 2012 year in review... a day late.

There was no way I could narrow down each month to just one photo because we honestly had such a busy year.  Not only that, 2012 found me behind my camera like I've never been before.  I know I sound like a broken record, but the passing of dear sweet Gina has impacted my life tremendously.  Thanks to Gina, this year I found my purpose behind my lens.  So here are the images that tell our family's 2012 story, in chronological order.

January

Madeline started dance :: celebrated Caleb's 7th birthday

February

Disney just because :: baseball season began

March

Madeline turned 4 :: Spring training

April

Met the Crebbin crew :: got serious about photography

Caleb lost his first tooth :: Gina's golf tournament

May

every day moments :: celebrated Mother's Day & my birthday

June

Father's Day :: Madeline's dance recital

paperchasing for Havi :: Gina's funeral

July

Summer days :: Madeline's Family Day celebration

Bammy's visit :: expanded my photography skills

August

More summer fun :: road trip to Miami :: homeschooling

September & October

life :: Disney :: baseball

Go Team Gina :: Halloween

 family visit to Connecticut :: lifeNovember & December

life :: celebrated Caleb's 5 year Family Day

moved :: New York City

Christmas

Well, my hope in 2013 is to do a month-in-review at the end of each month, like my friend Jill, not at the end of the year like today. lol. Anyway, I hope and pray that in 2013, not only we will see our daughter Havi's face, but that we will get to travel to China to bring her home too.  I also plan to do school with Madeline more regularly.  And I hope to continually push myself to grow as a photographer, a wife, a mother, and a child of God.  

Happy New Year to all of you readers!  I hope you'll stick around for another year.

How we spent our Christmas

If you don't want to see a boatload of images, turn back now!

You know I have a hard time narrowing down my images.  So in my attempt to share them all and reduce the overload a bit,I thought I would try to create some storyboards (which is still very new to me and the reason for the delay in sharing them.)

Now on to the day...which started very early.  At 06:00 Baba woke me up so I could get dressed and ready my camera.  At 06:10, the sound of feet could be heard emerging from someone's bedroom.  Enter Madeline, who graciously was willing to watch a show on TV while we waited for her brother to wake up.  At 06:15, we heard a very loud "Merry Christmas!" and in entered said brother.  Oh well.  By 06:17, the process of unwrapping had commenced.

The dumplings had made a few requests: legos, roller skates, clocks for their rooms, a baby doll, and a pedometer (for Caleb.  How cute!)  And just like the night before, Caleb quickly set to work on one of his lego sets.  Madeline got to work too.

Late morning found the arrival of my sister, Andy, their munchkins and Andy's parents, Phil and Marsha.  When Caleb opened his roller skates earlier, he had commented that we forgot his elbow and knee pads.  In actuality, his cousins had him covered.

Leah scored a cute pair of shoes.

My sister got a shirt we picked up while in NYC earlier this month (and a cookbook.)

Then it was off to Disney Vero for a delicious buffet.  The kidlets watched cartoons while we waited to be seated.

Josh got a little bit of love from all his adoring fans.

After a delicious and belt busting meal, the kids let out some steam by running around outside on the resort grounds.

This year they were roaring dinosaurs.

My sister and I had fun capturing each other capturing the kids.

And she (gasp) even managed to capture a shot of the four of us.  Yay!

We walked over to the beach.

And the fresh salt air found Patrick growing some new hair.

The kids managed to snooze on the drive back to the house, which meant they had plenty of more energy to burn off.

After eating some ham and Texas "caviar" (when we weren't even hungry), we sang Happy Birthday to Jesus  because my sister helped me salvage the butter cream frosting for His birthday cake.  Thank you, Deb! lol

I'm so thankful that my sister lives within driving distance so our kidlets can spend the holidays together.  I'm thankful for family and extended family.  And I'm thankful for God's love and grace and the gift of His precious Son!

I hope you all had a wonderful and merry Christmas!