One of Bryn's referral photos and her Chinese name.
A year ago today we saw our daughter's face for the first time. Since we didn't have a blog back then many of you don't know the events of the months leading up to that day. Let me fill you in...
After sitting on the fence and thinking about it for over three years, we finally decided in February of 2005 to adopt a baby from China. That March we chose our adoption agency, Family Outreach International (FOI) and had our first meeting with our provincial social services office. The first week of May we had our first of three home-studies (which, coincidentally, were the only three days since we've lived here that our house was spotless). The paperwork and legwork was endless -- police checks, forms, meetings, interviews, physicals, photos -- on and on it went.
Finally on Sept. 5, 2005 our application for a baby was logged in with the Chinese Centre of Adoption Affairs (CCAA). The official wait had begun. When we had our first home-study we were told the wait from log in (LID) to referral (the day we would receive photos and information about our baby) would be from six to nine months. Yikes! We were shocked. We didn't expect it to happen so fast. Suddenly we had so much to do. The shopping and planning and wondering and worrying and the decorating (and redecorating) of our baby's room began.
Then came the delays. China was deluged with applications from all over the world from people like us who wanted to adopt one of their children. Each delay made us more frustrated, more anxious and, I hate to admit it, really grumpy.
On Nov. 30, 2006 the CCAA posted on its website that babies had been matched to all families with LIDs up to Sept. 8. We finally made it! Since we hadn't had any official word from our agency, we were a bit reluctant (pessimists that we were) to believe we were actually in. The next day, a Friday, we had an email from FOI confirming that we actually had been matched with a baby. It was a looooong, agonizing weekend waiting for word from our provincial office telling us they had our referral. The call came Dec. 4 at 9:30 a.m. Our file was in Regina and likely wouldn't be in Saskatoon until late that afternoon or the next day. They did, however, have a fax of our baby's picture. Did we want to come down and see it or wait until the next day when the color photos and the rest of the information arrived? Haha! What a kidder.
I've never seen Girard move so fast. Twenty minutes later we were looking at our beautiful baby's face for the first time. Yu Cai Xing, which translates to "colorful star", couldn't have been a more perfect match for us. We knew that the second we saw her. The six to nine month wait had turned into 15 long months. Funny, though, at that minute it just didn't matter. And we weren't grumpy anymore. We had, or almost had, our baby and we already loved her to pieces. We'd have to wait another two months until we held her in our arms but she was already forever in our hearts.
Now here we are a year later. A year older. A year wiser. And a year more in love with our colorful star, Bryn.
Happy "One Year Later" to our extended family in our travel group...enjoy reliving the moments. We miss you guys.
