Our Dog Maddie

I know this is my adoption blog.. and I don't keep up much on the life of my wonderful kid that came from this adoption but I have to post this somewhere.
Our dog Maddie was put to sleep last night. I knew she was sick and I knew it was time but I don't think I was ready yet.
We got Maddie from the animal shelter many, many moons ago.. we are all debating how long we have had her. But it was for Amanda's birthday, it was her dog. So Amanda, Christopher and I(believe it or not that was all of us back in those days- just the three of us!) trudged down to the animal shelter around Amanda's birthday that year and went up and down the kennels looking at all the dogs. I found one that I thought was perfect but Amanda found Maddie.
Maddie was skin and bones and about knee high from her back to the floor, she was a golden brown medium length haired dog that was missing a patch of fir chain wide around her neck. Her head was huge. But this was the one Amanda wanted and it was her dog for her birthday. So we paid for her.
Well as we know the animal shelter does not let you take that animal home that day, you must pay, fill out papers and then come back in three days after the animal has been made into an it... and so we did. The day we returned to get our new member of the family the shelter decided it was time for us to have "information" on our new pet. It was a write up from the people who had dropped her off a few weeks before. They claimed she was a terrible dog, she ripped up everything in the house, that she tried to dig her way out of the yard and was just un-trainable. All I could think of is what did I get myself into???
Well, that was about 15 years ago and I am not sure who the dog on the paper was talking about but it wasn't the dog we brought home. She was the best animal, the best playmate, a protector to the kids, she was a happy animal and other then the window screens I can't think of one thing she ever destroyed.
She hated to be cooped up. She loved to lay outside, in the front yard and chat with all the neighbors! So if the windows were open and no one was home she would find her way to the front yard. This was okay for the first six years we had her because we lived in the country, on a dirt road and the neighbors loved Maddie.
But after we moved to the home we live in now, we live next door to Satan who hates animals. We finally had to explain to the kids NOT to let Maddie out the front door as this neighbor walked up and down the street kicking any animals he would see and actually took a long bladed knife after Maddie's legs back about eight years ago. Cops couldn't or wouldn't do anything about it... so I am just rude to this neighbor and live in an isolated neighborhood where people don't speak to each other.
But Maddie has been a part of this family through a marriage then a divorce and then another marriage along with the pregnancy and birth of two kids and the adoption of another. She watched Chris and Amanda grow up and move out on their own. She has laid next to the crib of each of the new Born's until she feels that child doesn't need her there and then moves back to her spot in the hallway, out side all the children's doors, where she can protect all of the kids at the same time. She found her way into my room next to the crib we had for Alexis after we brought her home from China. She has been used as a step for the little ones as they learned to get up on the furniture and as the pillow for them while they laid on the floor to watch tv. She has been dressed as a pumpkin for Halloween and had blankets tied around her neck to make her a cape so she could be super dog!
But Maddie started to show signs of age a few years ago, then about 10 months ago I had a feeling she had diabetes... she was drinking a bowl of water then using the bathroom all night long! I took her to the vet who ran test, charged me a whole lot of money and told me it was old age. Then she started not to hear. She didn't bark anymore the last few months and then yesterday morning she was just not breathing right. My year in nursing school told me what I didn't want to face, it was really time.
After Jay got home and we got the kids fed, we found her in the master bathroom on the tile floor. She hadn't moved in hours. Jay tried to get her to drink but she would not move. So at ten last night I called the emergency pet clinic and they told us to bring her in.
Her inner body temp was 107 and they checked it twice. Her lungs were full of fluid and she could barely breath. I couldn't get Amanda on the phone and after hearing the doctor state that Maddie had cancer and it was in her lungs- which is not a place dogs get cancer so it was in other parts of her body also- I had to make the decision I knew was coming but I was dreading to have her put to sleep.
They asked us how we wanted to handle the body? I knew I was not going to bring Maddie home for the kids to see her and I just couldn't imagine putting a bowl of ashes on my fireplace so that we could be sad every time we looked up there so I first just wanted them to have her cremated and then her ashes put out with the other animals on a farm somewhere north of here.. but I couldn't get Amanda to answer her phone and I felt that she or Chris needed to decided.
So I called Chris. He told me to please bring Maddie's ashes home so that we could spread her over our front yard and then she could be where she loved to be best. And I thought this was the right choice.
So that is the story of the greatest dog ever. A family pet, a family member who will be dearly missed in this home forever.

Wei Again

What makes life so easy for one person and so hard for another? Why can some do wrong and come out smelling like a rose and others like a skunk?
I heard from Wei's second family in Texas. It is very sad but they have decided not to adopt her. So once again this little girl is without a family. They had their reasons and I do understand very much why... but I don't understand WHY when Jay and I would have taken her, no matter what her problems were that China turned us down.
Then I think, maybe it was a higher hand stopping us from taking on more then we could handle but even so when giving birth you don't get to pick and choose your childs good and bad- yet in adoption you get to view the child like a puppy in the pet store and decided you don't like the patch of brown fur or the way the tail wags and you get to turn the child away.
Wei is a beautiful little girl who is now four. She was born with a medical problem that has been corrected. I haven't seen any of her updates since her surgery in 2007 but I am sure there is a family out there that could open their hearts to this child and give her a family. I want her to have a good life and be loved.
We would have had her home two years ago.. TWO YEARS AGO!.. but she has now had to suffer in an institution for all this extra time.
I am so very heartbroken.

Wei

I thought I would update those of you that have followed along in our story. The little girl that we tried so hard to adopt that was from Northern China, Zhang Wei, has been promised to another family that lives in Texas.
It tore my heart out all the time, especially on her birthday, thinking of her still in that orphanage because of stupid rules put into place by ignorant people! But finally she gets to be a part of a family.
I have been able to email with the new mom and she is very excited about getting Wei home. So that puts my heart to ease!

New blog page

Please email me at ginnie003@yahoo.com for new blog page and update!

Christmas 2008

Make a Smilebox photobook

GREAT NEWS!

Okay, first, Trenton is not sick. They are just giving him a yearly physical. Nothing out of the ordinary. Because of his mother's sickness he has to be monitored at different stages in his life up until he is 18 months old. But it is nothing to worry about.

SECOND and MOST IMPORTANT!!!!!!! His mom has contacted our attorneys and wants them to come to the jail and talk to her about us!!!!!!!!!!! This is such GREAT news! It doesn't really mean anything as far as a decision but at least she is being fair to allow them in there to explain who we are and what we want for her son!

I am going to write another letter to send to the attorney for translation over to the jail for his mom. The first two letters as so generic like what is written for your Letter of Intent for adoption in China. This one is going to really tell her who we are, what our goals are in life and what we want for our child. I guess I could include what we have already achieved for our children as we have two that are adults... and there are days that I think they are still my little kids but the two of them turned out to be pretty good adults!!

Grapevine Update

I heard tonight that the birth mom has gotten our letters and we are just waiting on our invite to the jail.
Also there is some concern as to Trenton's health.. wonder if this is just another one of those ploys by Mercy to try to stop me from adopting him.

I AM NOT GIVING UP! I hope they understand this! I see his face and my heart pounds. I can not wait to hug and hold him. What I find to be so sad is the fact that they would rather play with this child's life and hold him in a situation that is not healthy for a child then to let us adopt him because of a divorce.

I wish I had more to tell you but that is all at this time.


We continue to clean the house, paint and get ready for our "daughter for a year!"
She said, "love you mom" on the chat this morning and my heart melted!! We are so looking forward to her arrival! I hope the airport doesn't call security on our noisy family!! LOL

We also found out that her good friend was picked by a family in Northern Florida so she is very happy about that!! And we have another family in our town that is getting a student from Taiwan! If I don't learn some Chinese this year.. I will never learn Chinese!!

Happy Weekend everyone!!

Again a change

Sorry it has been so long since I updated this. I just couldn't. Again.. a change.
It has been a long hard month with me trying again to understand how there are 143 MILLION orphans in the world and here we are one family just wanting to bring home one child.. and people who say they are involved for the "good" of the children are making it hard!

Yep. So the day after I did my last post.. I must have had some sort of sense that something was up. I get an email from Wendy at Mercy, saying that they didn't make a right decision and that they should have given this child's mother more families to choose from. And I also got an email from Ted at Home of God's Love that he felt Mercy had decided not to work with us, "I believe God can and does forgive our past when we bring it before Him in repentance and surrender, but again, I don’t feel I can do this case myself." Why did Ted say this? Because Jay and I had been divorced and Ted does not work with divorced couples. Yet, in my bible God said that it is a SIN not to forgive and if you do not forgive you are sinning against God. But Ted would not do our papers or help us.
Both parties keep pointing fingers at each other, Ted blames Mercy, Mercy blames Ted.
It is a circus.
So I have hired an attorney. They have contacted Trenton's mom and have gone to her with our want to adopt her son. But at the same time Mercy, the Christian organization that is to help woman and children went in at the same time and slammed Jay and I to the birth mom.
So we again wait. The attorney has been a great help. It is so hard to try to take care of things when you are so many miles away and don't speak the language. I had to put my trust in someone. The attorney has followed through with everything and has made more progress in this few weeks than I have made in a year.
So we are just waiting.
I have to tell this part of the story also. I didn't make it up that Mercy and Ted had told me we were getting this child, I have emails to prove it. Ted, himself, sent me an emails stating I needed to pick an American name for him so that they could do the paperwork.
Also Mercy sent me the address to them and to the social worker who was taking Trenton to his birth mom for visits and then back to the foster mom so that I could mail gifts. Jay and I filled two boxes full of gifts so that the foster mom had everything she would need for a few months to care for him. With shipping it was into the hundreds of dollars for these boxes.
Mercy offered to send the box back. Total would have been $80.00 round trip.. for a box of socks, blankets and clothes for the other babies at Mercy. I told them to keep the box.
But what I really got steamed up about is that I was told Ted offered to pay us back for the two boxes that went to the social worker. There was a few hundred dollars worth of clothes and toys for him... where was Ted going to get this money.. from the money that is donated for the kids in his care? Does that clear up their consciences to mail me back the boxes or to pay for them?
And tell me this.. each item in those boxes to Trenton was pick FOR Trenton, our son, from us. We laughed and planned as we picked out each item, we made dreams and plans for the future.. please Ted, how were you going to pay us back for our dreams and plans?
Sorry my post is so nasty. It has taken me an entire month to not be even worse. And yes, I have to ask God every day for forgiveness because I get so upset with these people!
I have also found out that I have been lied to by these people as they keep saying Mercy has custody of Trenton.. but the attorney's found out that the birth mom never signed her rights away. So it is the birth mom that has the rights.
So all I can do now is pray that she reads my letter to her along with the letter the attorney sent her and that she sees that we are a good family that wants to love her son!

DEEP BREATHS! There is some sunshine at the end of this cloud.
I signed us up for an exchange student. Call me a glutton for punishment .. but we qualify for a student, with divorces, short length of marriage, too many children.. and not being "Christian" enough for Home of God's Love.. we do qualify for an exchange student!
She is a beautiful girl that will be in 12th grade and have her birthday two weeks after she gets here. We are planning a BBQ for her! LOL One of the students wrote that they wanted to come to America to see how the neighbors have parties... they had watched American TV! So I figured a BBQ would be the way to go!
We have been chatting with her on the yahoo and she is so excited to come here also!
So even though I don't get to keep her.. she will call me mom and be my child for a year!!
I will post more about her down the road!!!

Please say a prayer that Trenton's mom comes to a decision and please pray that we are that decision!

Waiting!

I talked to Wendy in Taiwan, or actually I emailed with Wendy in Taiwan, last Wednesday or Thursday... asking what I should be doing next. I feel like I should have a job but she was in contact with the home that is helping us with our paperwork and the man in charge is working on many cases right now, so he said we just had to have patience! LOL YEAH RIGHT!
She said she would try to get hold of him on Monday, which is it now Monday, just past midnight here, so that makes it past noon over there! And I am "patiently" waiting! LOL
I just want the adoption contract in my hand. Then I will know that Bao-Sheng's mom signed it and that it is all really happening. So many heartbreaks in the last year and this would be the finally break if something happened. I am not thinking that way, but I really would like to see the contract in my hand!! or on my computer screen!
I am going to see if my boxes have even made it close to Taiwan. I mailed them last Monday but I didn't put a rush on them as it is so expensive to send and I sent three boxes!!
Angie leaves in a few weeks for her daughter, my girlfriend Cindy leaves for her two boys, Don and Be leave around the same time as Angie for their little girl.. it is so exciting all these new kids in our lives!! Adoption is a wonderful blessing!

Birth Mom

There are so many factors and so many walls to hit in international adoption that your head spins. One thing about China that you don't fear is the birth mother. The children are left, with no contact as it is illegal in China to abandon your baby. But in Taiwan, it is different, there is a birth mom and she in many cases has to do that final letting go.
Trenton's birth mom did her final letting go today. I had wrote a letter last week begging for her to understand that we would be the parents she would want for her son and that we would love him as much as she would and that we would never let him forget her... I had to dig down in my soul to make sure when I said those words I really did mean them because I love my children and I want my children to love only me as their mom... but then I have never had to wear these shoes.
So after sitting her for a few hours and making sure that I was able to put into words on a peice of paper who I was, who we were as a family and how important having Trenton as MY son... I also had to feel for her and know that I would never take him away from her, completely.
So today the social worker took Trenton over to the jail to see him mom and to give her the letter that I wrote (Wendy translated it for me and made sure that the English to Chinese was done completely right)
And the birth mom said she was very happy that I wanted to love her son and that she wanted me to be his mom.
I opened this email first thing this morning and have been flying on cloud nine all day!
She asked the social worker to ask me to send her pictures of him and letters to her about him. And I have fully agreed to this as I want him to know her and I want to know her. I want Trenton to know that he wasn't given up because he wasn't loved but because of situations in his mom life.
I can not wait to get that baby in my arms!

Chase just got home from a two week trip with Grandma yesteday. We haven't told them yet as we wanted to make 100% sure this was happening...
You should see him and Ali together! I know siblings fight but they REALLY missed each other!! Ali will not let Chase (or Chasey as she calls him) out of her sight.
This is what life is all about!

I will make it through this!!

I got an email from our contact in Taiwan who is actually handling the paperwork... he said DO NOT get the translation. Actually what it is is that the judges are very tough on everything being so right.. so what he wants is to have someone that has done this for him many times translate for us. This puts so much relief on me because of my messy translation from earlier!

And all we are waiting on is to get Mercy to send over their translation of his English name.. I guess the characters can be different so they want to make sure they are both doing it exactly the same and then he will send out our Power of Attorney and our adoption contract!

Every day.. I just sit there and think.. I am the luckiest person ever! I am so blessed to have all the kids I do and now I am finally getting to complete this family...

And I promise everyone.. this is the last!

Have a great evening!

Learning the Ropes for Taiwan

I am really having to learn a lot with this adoption. I am glad I have a new friend that has gone threw the Taiwan ropes along with a great support group for Independent Adoptions.
I have to have my eight page home study all translated. Very scary after what I have already been thought with one translation. But I am on my own for this one!
Sarah and Deana with Morning Light have told me to contact a woman that will do it for a fee. When she sent the bill it was $7072.. FOR EIGHT PAGES!?? LOL
But that was NT money.. so it was only around $235.00.. big relief!
I have sent the HS and I am waiting for her to tell me how to pay her. I should have it back by next Friday!

I didn't make it to the post office today as I have to repack my packages to Trenton.
I am sending two boxes full of fun stuff to the social worker where he is and then I am going to get another box with stuff for the children at The Garden of Mercy for the children there.

If anyone wants to jump into my challenge over on the right side of my blog PLEASE DO.
Deana with Morning Light is a wonderful woman, about to give birth any day now, that has been helping families find their children. On top of that she has applied to the government to be allowed to be a placing agency with the US. So they are building a children area so they will be able to house some of the orphans instead of moving them out to other facilities!

I know in adoption there is always a cause. And I know that my heart wishes I could win the lottery so I could fix all the causes.. but this is a small one.. they only need $1200 for the AC. And after putting out my ten dollar challenge today we are up to $245!!

And some other good news!! I finally after all these years got to call my mom to say I was accepted into college!! Yep, I got my letter.. I will be starting nursing school in two months!! Life is good!

HERE HE IS!!!

I figured that I have the social worker on my side along with the wonderful young woman that took care of him for about eight months of his life...
and when I asked if I could send a care package they told me YES.
So as of right now, I don't see any turning back!!

Jay and I went to the mall tonight and bought a box full of things for him, bibs, shirts, shorts, socks, shoes, pj's, toys and a stuffed animal! And I squeezed it into two Priority Mail boxes.. so it will only be $80.00 to ship both boxes!!

So now I feel I can post the photos! So here he is
Trenton Bao-Sheng Elliott!
And Jay is so excited that he is getting a boy!!
5 Months Old

7 Months Old

8 Months Old

9 Months Old

10 Months Old

Happy Birthday to Trenton

13 Months Old

More Good News!

Well here is the whole scoop!!
He is ours!! It is four in the morning here and four in the afternoon over in Taiwan. I have been emailing back and forth with the children's home, the social worker for Trenton and the best young woman ever, Wendy!

Wendy was taking care of Trenton when he first was seperated from his birth mom. From August 9, 2007 until March 31, 2008.. this was just after his first birthday.
Then he went to a foster home. Wendy is going to find out if I can have the address to the foster mom so that I can send our first package over.

It is all sinking in slowly. They have asked for our names as we don't have the same last name.. and they want to make sure we are married. They have asked for our Home Study for which our social worker has made all the corrections and will be sending it off to me with in a day or so. They have asked us to send in the required letter for the home that is helping with the paper work on that end.
So not counting the courts, the people we are having contact with is all in favor of our adopting Trenton.

I am not sure how all this works from this point on. I know I was asked for a translated home study... by one party.. but told to send the English home study for translation by the other party!! It is all so confusing!! But exciting and the best news I have had in almost a year!!!

The best part of this story is the fact that we wanted a girl.. and Chase kept saying he wanted a boy. Chase loves the little brothers to Polly one of the babies that came home from China in our travel group that doesn't live far from here.. so he thinks having a little brother like that would be the greatest thing since Sponge Bob! And at first Mallory was upset saying she wanted a girl.. but now!! Everyone is beside themselves with JOY!! And Chase is away on vacation with Grandma.. so it will be a HUGE surprise!!

My heart is pounding

There is a process to go through with Taiwan when you don't do the whole agency thing and you go independent. First you must find a child, the child must be declared an orphan by law, then you must send papers and hope your contact is taking care of things on their end.

Well this little boy that we found is an orphan, by the rules. His birth mother is very sick and she was sentence to jail for a very long time. She finally broke down and decided to allow him to go to a family... if she would not have signed these papers he would have sat in the orphanage for at least 12 years.. maybe longer if her sickness won.

But she made the right decision. And the nice thing about Taiwan is that we can keep the birthmother in his life by sending updated pictures of him each year and letting her know how he is.

So the next part is to have all your paperwork sent to the courts. But with this little boy we have to make sure that the people in charge of finding him a home will accept us- larger family, married only three years- not that this is not allowed but like everything in life there is a stigma about the "perfect" family.

Our contact person in Taiwan has contacted a wonderful children's home called The Home of God's Love that will help with our paperwork. She has also contacted a social worker in Taiwan that is in charge of the little boy's life and together everything must come together and make it through the courts!

But I was asked tonight for the name I would like to call him.... and that was my sign that God had stepped in. His given name was sent to me and though I can't post it tonight I will say this.. he was given as part of his name WEI.
I am not making this up.. I sat here and cried for a few minutes trying to take it in. It has to be the sign that I am to let go of our girl in China and know that this is why we did not get her.

I also got three new pictures of him tonight. HE IS SO CUTE! He is a tough looking boy with a bit of mischief in his eyes. I can not wait to post for all of you!
Please pray hard for us in the next few weeks that all of this falls into place and that we finally get to finish Our Adoption Story!

Some Exciting News

It is not written in stone as of yet.. we have to get through the whole homestudy thing.. and I need to speak to my social worker about redoign a few things in the homestudy to make it right.. but we might have found a child!!

I don't know if I have had so much disappointment in the last year that I can't and won't get my hopes up.. but today I got word that a young girl that was a disrupted adoption here in the US was going to another family- we had asked for her, even though she was older. I didn't feel upset today.. just another one that was not meant for us.. but then I get a message from an orphanage in Taiwan that they have a little boy whose mom just signed off on him about two weeks ago.. he is SOOO healthy and soooo cute and they are asking us for our home study to see if we can adopt him...

I know, I know.. it is a BOY... not what we started out wanting.. but maybe that is why it has taken us so long.. we were waiting on him....

PLEASE PRAY FOR US THAT THIS ALL WORKS OUT because it just seems so right!!

Even Mallory was saying.. NO BOYS.. and after taking a peek at his picture she was saying.. I hope we get him mom!!

Summer Begins

The kids have five fun filled days left of school and then we have them home for the summer. I am glad. I would rather the kids never go to school but then when they do stay home it is one fight after another and I am glad they have to go to school!
Chase will be running off with Grandma to tour the southeast US. They have a two week fun filled trip planned with theme parks, water parks, camping, jem stone searching... on and on. The girls and I will just be home here keeping up the house and swimming.

Also, my Alexis is potty training herself! She is such a smart cookie. We put her potty chair in the master bath and she has been taking her diapers off for about two weeks now.. well the other day she just went in and used her pot. She came out to tell grandma "Ali a good girl" as she was patting herself.. so grandma went to investigate and sure enough.. she had used the potty chair! We have now put her in big girl pants for which she things is great... and hopefully she will be fully trained within the next few weeks!!

I went this week and tested for enterance to the nursing school just down the road. Amanda will go there on Monday to take the first test. I am hoping the government will be so kind as to give us a student loan to help out but either way we will be going. I wasn't exactly excited about blood and the rest but I look at it this way.. if it gets my daughter into a job that will take her into old age so she doesn't follow my foot steps.. then all of it will be worth it!

Now down to the nitty gritty.. Adoption. We are still in limbo. I did talk to our attorney this week in Taiwan. He had gotten a few leads on birth moms that might be looking for an American family... this is like finding a needle in a haystack... but at least he is trying.
I have sent many letters out to doctors and clinics in Taiwan about two weeks ago but I haven't gotten anything back yet on these. So we will just keep waiting!

I get so jealous when I see all these families getting their referrals or the travel but I know our day will come!

Well I am off to have a six year old birthday party today!!
Happy Summer to all!!!!!

Happy Mother's Day! 2008

Happy Mom's Day to all the mom's with kids, the mom's expecting a kid and the best, the adopted moms of the world!!!

Well I sent our package out yesterday to another agency. Yep, one more try. Call it punishment for such a perfect life- at least I thought is was perfect- just these crazy countries don't find my life to be so perfect!! We found a wonderful agency that is not going to take ANY money from us until they are sure that we can be matched with a child. They have been working with Taiwan for a long time and know who to have do the translations on the home studies, how to ask the social worker to write the home study so that it is correct but not to add useless details that can be badly translated, and other things that just might help.
We are not out anything if it doesn't work.. so that is a great thing.

I also got to talk with a woman that has adopted from Taiwan and now works with Independent adoptions in Taiwan. She gave me some great pointers on a few things to try... so that is also in my plans.

And of course.. I am going to keep praying that China changes the rules and that I can go get Wei. It never hurts to have a plan and a dream in life!

Happy Mom's Day!!

Also if you haven't bought a ticket for the fund raiser.. PLEASE DO!! If you are the winner you can book a cruise, a family vacation, air line tickets.. any thing a travel agent can book and it is a FREE $500!!
The drawing is on the 24th of this month so not much time.. and it can be used anywhere in the world.. you just have to go on line to the agency that is offering the $500 voucher to book. I checked out their prices and they are the same as booking direct!! So it is a good deal!
My sales pitch for the evening.

Happy News for Angie and Mike

A week before Jay and I left last year to go get Ali from China we started to finally buy her some clothes.. we finally knew a size to buy.
Chase was with us in the store and he really wanted to help but he continued to pick out really UGLY clothes and I continued to tell him he was picking the wrong sizes!LOL
Well there were these two ladies in the store also going through the little girl clothes listening and watching this go on with Chase. Finally one of the women asked me what we were buying all the clothes for and I told her we were going to China to get our daughter. She then said her daughter, the other lady shopping was also going to China to get a daughter.
Come to find out Angie only lives about eight minutes from my front door to hers and that we were both using GWCA.. except we logged in Sept 05 and she logged in Oct 06... so you know where this is going.. Angie and her husband Mike were in for the LONG wait for a referral!!
But yesterday, my cool and calm friend came over to the house, unannounced, to tell me she wanted to show me something... I was a bit puzzled because she always calls and I knew she had to work in a short while...
She asked me if she could pull something up on my computer.. and then said she wanted to show me an email.. I was still puzzled....
GWCA had called her yesterday with a REFERRAL on a BEAUTIFUL little girl!!!
Mallory was standing here and we were all three jumping and crying!!!
Angie is over at the doctor's office as I write having the babies chart looked over.. but she is a healthy little girl with a clept lip/palate and she is just beautiful! So I am sure the doctor is going to give an okay on this end!!
And Angie wants Jay and I to go to China with them!! Which really makes me feel loved!!!
Angie's little girl if from the province just north of Ali's province in the center of China.. and the two girls are about 11 months apart... PERFECT PLAYMATES!!!
CONGRATS TO ANGIE AND MIKE!! You are going to be wonderful parents!

Things are starting to look up!!!!

I am sorry to everyone reading my blog that I took a month off. I just didn't have anything nice to say and I didn't want to say anything nasty.. and I was hurt and upset about the way all of this was handled.
I am still in contact with the agency about this whole thing. What a mess.

But on the brighter side!!! There is a brighter side when you have been bumped and bruised and slammed against the wall in International Adoption!

I have decided not to give up. Which those of you who know me, know I will not give up until I feel it was done to the best of every one's ability...
And for this part, the best of MY ability is to try to find our last child myself.

I have a great new friend that has been giving me a lot of information on Taiwan. Because even though our Agency isn't helping us, we do qualify for Taiwan by all LAWS..and we can adopt if we can find a child.

So I have contacted an attorney in Taiwan who will help me once a child is found and my great new friend told me about a private run home that helps the children.

I can't get into details right now.. because I want to make sure this is all going to happen but the woman and her husband that work with these pregnant moms is talking to our attorney about a young girl that will give birth in June.. to a girl!!

That is all I am saying!! I just need all the prayers out there that this is the child we will have!!!