Yesterday we got an exciting little package in the mail! Our adoption agency had a representative go to the Social Welfare Institute (SWI) to visit Little Brother a few weeks ago. While they were there, they made a small video of him and mailed the CD to us. It arrived in the mail yesterday! After a few tries, we were able to play the clip on The Dad's laptop. If I can somehow figure out how to post a portion of the clip, I will do so.
Little Brother was fairly grumpy in the video because they had just woke him up. But he is so very sweet. He seems quite attached to the nanny who was holding him and really did not want much to do with the agency representative. She was able to bribe him with some candy and eventually he let her hold him. He can walk, but seems a bit wobbly and quite small. Big Sister, Big Brother and Biggest Sister all enjoyed seeing him. Big Sister seemed very intrigued! Later, when I was going to the store, she said, "You go get Little Brother?"
Not just yet, for now we still must wait....
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Sunday, July 09, 2006
July 9, 2006
The Dad in the family, whom I will affectionately refer to as "The Dad," gives me a bit of a hard time for my use of the internet. I consider it a tremendous source of information and a major time-saver for a working mom. There is really nothing better than being able to shop in your PJ's at 10pm after the kids go to bed without driving up a single drop of $3/gal fuel. I love it!
Well, in this whole adoption journey - starting with Big Sister (different than the Biggest Sister), I joined some Yahoo! groups. I have met some fantastic people through these groups and gleaned some incredible insight and advice. I saw Big Sister's orphanage before the trauma of seeing it real and in person, I knew what to pack and what to buy in China. The Dad always asks, "How do you know that?" when I have some sort of seemingly impossible piece of knowledge. It's one way for me to stay ahead of him - I will never be able to recite the US Presidents in order...
For Little Brother, I have joined the Chengdu orphanage group, the Waiting Child group and two Microtia/Atresia groups (one specific to adoption). Through these groups and local friends, I have determined what doctors we will likely see when we get home and know much better what to expect when we meet Little Brother.
BUT, best of all, I "met" a wonderful person who resides in Chengdu and visited the orphanage on July 4. She was kind enough to seek out Little Brother and he let her take some pictures of him. I will be forever grateful to her for sending me these precious pictures of Little Brother that drew me to tears...
Too cute, huh? We just can't wait to get him!
More later!
Well, in this whole adoption journey - starting with Big Sister (different than the Biggest Sister), I joined some Yahoo! groups. I have met some fantastic people through these groups and gleaned some incredible insight and advice. I saw Big Sister's orphanage before the trauma of seeing it real and in person, I knew what to pack and what to buy in China. The Dad always asks, "How do you know that?" when I have some sort of seemingly impossible piece of knowledge. It's one way for me to stay ahead of him - I will never be able to recite the US Presidents in order...
For Little Brother, I have joined the Chengdu orphanage group, the Waiting Child group and two Microtia/Atresia groups (one specific to adoption). Through these groups and local friends, I have determined what doctors we will likely see when we get home and know much better what to expect when we meet Little Brother.
BUT, best of all, I "met" a wonderful person who resides in Chengdu and visited the orphanage on July 4. She was kind enough to seek out Little Brother and he let her take some pictures of him. I will be forever grateful to her for sending me these precious pictures of Little Brother that drew me to tears...
Too cute, huh? We just can't wait to get him!
More later!
Thursday, July 06, 2006
July 6, 2006
We are happy to share with everyone the pictures of the newest member of our family!
Little Hou Dong Guo currently resides at the Chengdu Social Welfare Institute in Sechuan, China. His birthday is October 26, 2004 so he is almost two years old!
We have sent off our letter of intent and understand that we will need to wait 2-3 months for our travel notice and then we will travel 2-4 weeks after that. We are thinking that this will put us in China perhaps in October.
Little Brother is part of the waiting child program, meaning that he has a special need. He was born with a condition called bilateral microtia/atresia, which means his ears did not form completely and his ear canals are closed. His nannies at the orphanage report that he can hear. We know that with his condition that he must have some hearing loss and we know that many kids with this condition can have their hearing restored to near normal with a bone conduction or bone anchored hearing aid. I will talk more about this in later posts. I have been fortunate to have some wonderful people who have steered us in the right direction and it turns out we are in close proximity to some excellent doctors who specialize in Little Brother's condition!
I will post more tomorrow - it is getting late!
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
July 5, 2006
I have been wanting to set up a blog and worried about how hard it would be. So far, so good. So, here is my very first post to share our story of our journey to bring home the new little brother for our family. How exciting! I am a blogger!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
