MEASUREMENTS FINALLY!

Mei called this morning with the measurments! She still has to translate the rest of the report. We do know she doesn't have any teeth and likes to play with a dog (real or stuffed we don't know)! Her measurements and the doctor's comments are below. She is very small. Her head size is still a concern but we have a complete peace about her being part of our family. I did a little research and she's probably in a size 9 months clothes right now. I'll post more ASAP. Thanks for your prayers.


Height 66cm (26 in.)
Weight 7.5kg (16.5 pounds)
Head 42cm
Chest 43cm
Foot 11cm


Mrs. Wilkerson:

Assuming these are current measurements done at 11 mo's of age:

Lillie's growth shows a typical amount of slight lag in weight and height (wt is 3rd% now, and ht is just a hair below 3rd%). This is typical of living in an orphanage and is of no concern. Her head circumference is a little better but still below the 3rd% (but it is closer to the 3rd % than before). I don't see anything new in the photos to comment on other than that her face is filling out nicely!

Please keep me posted on your progress! I look forward to meeting you all at some point if that will be possible.

God Bless,
David Douglass, M.D. For the Children International Adoption Medical Services

Update

It's been a while since I've updated everyone on what's going on with the adoption. We are still waiting on new measurements. However, you can see from Lillie Mei's most recent picture she looks like she is quite healthy! Our case manager was out of town last week and thought they would come while she was gone. She is checking on this but still hasn't heard anything.

We have completed all of our paperwork (our dossier). I spent Monday in Raleigh with mom so we could get everything authenticated at the Secretary of State's office. The plan was to pick them up at 2:30, overnight them to Washington and then they would be in the Charleston office by May 29th. When I went to pick them up, 3 of them were notarized incorrectly so they had to be sent back on Tuesday. With Memorial Day on Monday it now looks like we should everything to Charleston office by June 1st.

As far as a timeline goes this is my best guess at this point. It is very similar to what I had predicted before.

Dossier to China (DTC) - June 6th
Log in Date (LID)- June 30th
Travel Approval (TA)- October 26th
Travel to China- November 30th
Home- December 14th

Time from DTC to LID could be as little as 1 week to 1 month. Current average for LID to TA is 116 days. Most people travel about 4-5 weeks after TA.

Pictures Finally!

I know you couldn't tell it from our posts but we did get pictures this past week! The problem was we were in California and I was checking e-mail on my TV. Anyway here is Lillie Mei's most recent picture--probably taken May 7th or 8th. She has grown so much! I can't believe how much she has changed. It made me very sad when I realized how much of her life we have already missed. Kirk reminded me that she is not technically ours yet, but she is mine in my heart, so I thought of her often on Mother's Day.

I just received an e-mail from our agency and it looks like it might be next week before we get the measurements. I may not know more until our case manager returns from vacation on May 21st. I'll post ASAP!

A Little Progress

We still have no news regarding Lillie Mei's medical. However, we do have some progress. Our home study has been written and sent into the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) and our letter of intent (LOI) is being sent to CCAA (China Center for Adoption Affairs-I think) tomorrow. What does all of this mean? We should receive our pre-approval from the U.S. next week and prior approval from China in about 4-6 weeks. Everything is pretty much on schedule to travel by December (possibly as early as October).

We won't be able to post for a couple of days but will find a way to let everyone know if we get any news. Our case manager is out of the office the 10th-18th so I don't expect any news soon.

Harrison and Zeke at Easter.

What handsome big brothers Lillie Mei does have!

My Patience is Tested Once Again!

Well, we got not-so-great news today, but we know God is in control. Our case manager heard from her boss in China today. It seems the orphanage director did not get what we requested (don't ask me why we heard otherwise). Because of a holiday in China, all offices are closed this week so we cannot expect it anytime soon. Her e-mail even said, "if we can get it by the 10th then she could bring it when she comes to the U.S." which makes us think it could be more than another week.

At this point, Kirk and I are ready to follow our hearts and proceed with all paperwork. God has re-affirmed that this little girl is part of our family in so many ways. If we did get really, really bad news for some reason we could always stop the process, but I don't see that happening. She is already a part of us.

Please keep praying. I know God's timing is perfect, I just wish He would consult with me first! :) Thank you for all of your kind words and prayers for our little girl.

Still Waiting.....

This is the e-mail we received this morning at 9:30.

Good Morning Kirk and Cindy.
We are still waiting for the updated info of Yi Mei Fei. I just sent Jane another email to ask her info be faxed and photos be scanned and emailed to me ASAP. Jane may be on her way to Beijing; so I am anxiously waiting to hear from her. I will give you a ring as soon as I hear anything from her.

Mei


Yongmei (Mei) Bellack
China Case Manager

We'll post here as soon as we hear!

Waiting for new pictures and measurements

We talked to our case manager today. She said we could expect the new information by the end of the week. I think we will get it on Thursday. I check my e-mail about 100 times a day. I really want to see the new pictures and see where she is falling on the growth chart.

The boys and I talked Kirk into letting us go to Babies 'R' Us this weekend. They wanted to buy everything! We came out with a plastic baby photo album so Lillie Mei can learn everyone's name (Zeke's pick) and a pair of pajamas (Harrison's pick). I think I did quite well since they wanted to buy a stroller! I am sure there will be many more shopping trips. After all, we'll have to make up for all the time we didn't have her! I'll post here as soon as we get more information.

Thank you to everyone who is praying and asking others to pray!

When can we expect to get Lillie Mei home?

• We still have a lot of time left on our adoption journey. If everything goes as scheduled (doubtful) this is what our timeline could look like.
  
  
• Home Study written by 5-4
  
• Pre-Approval from US Citizenship and Immigration Services by 5-11
  
• Dossier Complete by 5-14
  
• Authentication process complete by 5-31 (this involves authentication in Raleigh and Washington DC). I may be off on this one -not sure. We will use a courier to speed it up.
  
• Dossier to China (DTC) by 6-10
  
• Log-in Date (LID) by 7-10
  
• Travel Approval by 11-10
  
• Travel to China by 11-30
  
• Home by 12-14
  
  My original hope was to have her home by Thanksgiving but I'm trying to be realistic. There were a lot of changes in Chinese adoption that took effect 5-1 so it may cause some delays even with special needs children. We have no way of knowing at this point. Thanks for your prayers!

Lillie Mei is in a foster home in Jiangzi Province. It is near the east coast in

the southern part of China.

Good News! Now we Wait!

We just got an e-mail from Mei (from our agency). The orphanage director did what we asked (took new measurements) and is taking some pictures. They will then be mailed to Bejing and then to Mei in Charleston, SC. I don't know when we will get the information but we do know it's coming! Please keep praying!

The Past Week!

Okay, now to the past week. Last Wednesday (the 18th), I received an e-mail that the Special Needs list was available by e-mail (it is usually posted on the webpage). Because I recieved the e-mail at night, I knew other families would probably have already viewed the list before us and we might not be the 1st to request any child's information. In addition, there were no pictures which makes it hard to feel an emotional connection to a particular child.

We were sent the list Thursday morning. I forwarded it to Kirk and we went through it over the phone. You only receive a short paragraph about each child which includes their special need, the DOB, where they were found and a brief summary of their current situation. Kirk and I had narrowed the list down to about 5 little girls. I felt called to a little girl named Yi (last name) Mei Fei because we knew our daughter's middle name was going to be Mae and she was already Mei. We prayed about it and decided to request her medical info. We knew she had a facial deformity but had no idea what she would look like. Amazingly, we were the 1st family to request her info. so we received her picture (below). Well, I immediatley began falling in love with her sweet little face. We knew she would have some issues but felt like she belonged in our family.

On Friday we received a 2-page medical report that included her ht, wt, vision, etc. It looked like everything was normal so we planned to go ahead with her adoption (and I began shopping)!

On Tuesday, we had a friend who is a pediatrician review her chart (a requirement of our agency). He caught something we did not, her head size is very small. She is below the 3rd percentile for her age and this is a cause for great concern. My world crumbled. We began researching her condition and realized several things-

• It was possible that there was a mistake b/c so many children are measured and the workers are sometimes poorly trained.
• If there was a mistake, it only had to be off by 2cm to make her fall in the normal category.
• If this was accurate, we could be facing serious mental and behavioral issues.
• If this was accurate, she could still be fine.

We then were put in contact with a doctor that specializes in International Adoption. He was a God send! He has 2 special needs children from China himself and has consulted with many families. We asked lots of questions and he gave us honest answers about what we could face. Towards the end of the conversation, Kirk asked him if he would go ahead with the adoption. Without hesitation he said, "ABSOLUTELY!" He said he knew God would prepare him for what he was going to face. We didn't realize he was a Christian until this point. He then asked if he could pray with us. Of course, we did and God put the peace back in my heart that we were doing the right thing. Kirk had never waivered.

As of right now, we are waiting to see if we can get more information. We are hoping for a current measurement as well as a previous measurement to see how she has developed to better determine what her needs will be. Please keep praying for her and our family!

If all goes well, we hope to have her home before Thanksgivng!

Please keep praying for her and our family!

Our Journey over the Past 4 Months

When I first set up the blog it was mostly just to see if I could do it. Now that I have a little bit of time I want to explain to everyone how our journey has evolved over the past 4 months and then the past week. It has been a roller coaster!

Kirk and I had discussed for quite a while the possibility of having another child. With my history of miscarriage, we knew we could have to face that again and Kirk just really didn't want to go down that road. I never had a real peace about it so I didn't try to convince him. He had said from the beginning of these discussions that he would be willing to adopt. I wasn't. So we decided to be happy with our two wonderful boys.

For a while now I have listened to a radio program, "Family Life Today" almost every day. Last December they ran a series on adoption and how Christians have not stepped up to the plate to do what God has called us to do--care for orphans. He began working on my heart (I realized later he had been doing this prior--I just wasn't listening). Kirk was out of town during part of this time. Late one night I talked to my friend, Donna about the programs we had both heard. We both struggled with God would have us to do. After a very long conversation with her I realized God was calling me to be open to adoption. That weekend Kirk and I talked about it and the journey began. I immediately had an overwhelming peace that this was what we were supposed to do. I no longer struggled with the decision to have another child because I knew I wasn't supposed to give birth--we were suppose to adopt--and we both knew it was from China.

Since December we have been "paperchasing." The amount of paperwork is unbelievable. During this time China changed their adoption policies and the wait time for a child stretched to a possible 3 years! We were open from the beginning to adopting a special needs child if we found one that we felt was ours. Our agency gets approximately 20 special needs children every 3 months. We knew we would look over the list and pray about it, and if we felt like our child was there we would try to adopt her. The next list was due out May 1st.
We were anxiously waiting for that day but knew it would be a long shot since so many families want these children and you have to be the first one to request their medical information or you are put on a waiting list.

That takes us up to last week when things really changed for us!

Harrison and Zeke have a little sister!

We have just begun the process of adopting Yi Mei Fei from China! She is 10 months old. Her birthday is June 21, 2006! Please pray for all of us!