Harper-22 months old today!

Today Harper is 22 months old, born October 2, 2008. I'm praying this will be her last monthly birthday with out us. We are hoping to have her in our arms by Sept 2, definately by her Golden Birthday! She seems to be in deep thought in this picture. This is her foster sister. I feel these photos of her foster mom & foster sister are priceless. We even know their names. How ironic that she only has an older foster sister, just like our family.
Bria will be 13 this month & there's a strong possibility that she will celebrate her 13th bday in China with her new sister!

She seems to be an active child. I'm guessing this is the lobby of her apartment building.

This is the only family she's ever known & we're so lucky to have this picture. They seem to really love & care for her as their own.

I'll post more tomorrow....

Our little country girl...

While gone on vacation last week, we received new updates on Harper. We got 12 new photos, here's one I'm sharing for now. She's still in a foster home with a mom & big sister! We got pictures of them as well & it seems they really love her. The sister looks to be around 15 yrs old or so. I love analyzing (overanalyzing at times) the background of these pictures. She's in a very rural area, appears to be a farming area. I believe those are corn stalks, anyone else have an idea? Well, we are definately not country folks, so she may be a bit overwhelmed with her new environment. We continue to pray that this huge event in her life will be an easy transition for her.
For those of you following the paperwork side of all of this, our Article 5 was picked up on 7/22. We are officially waiting on our TA which we hope to receive the end of this week or early next week.
I'll post more later....lots of pics & measurements to report!

Harper's Quilt

Grandma Roxy is making this quilt for Harper's room. She's made all of her grandchildren a handmade quilt. This is a very special gift that Harper will keep forever.

This is the color scheme I'll be going with in her room. I love this color palette.

Retail Therapy

Before we had a face, Harper's name was Pooh. Grandma Roxy came up with this name & it seemed to fit. She's been in our hearts for over 3 years. Grandma Georgianne got Pooh this blankie for Easter right after we sent our first dossier to China. We never imagined it would take this long to match with our daughter.

I couldn't resist these shoes at The Children's Place.

Retail therapy!!! Harper's closet

This is from Kolton... The day we shared our news with Manda, she brought this over.

I found this on craigslist for $10!!! If Harper's anything like her dad & Bria, she'll love football & this outfit will get a lot of use. It's a little big, but I'm willing to share with Ava & Julian.

Preparing...

We finally got the furniture for Harper's room. My sister let us borrow her baby furniture. Her kids have "graduated" to big kid furniture.
Grandma & Grandpa loaded their mini van & made the trip to Columbia for a special home delivery. As my dad says, he's "One Man in a Van" delivery service!
I'm so glad we can use this & not buy new stuff because we aren't sure how long Harper will be in a crib.

Here's my dad & Neil putting together the crib, it seems it was pretty easy to assemble.

The finished product!

There's also a drawer/changing table. I'm still deciding what to do with the walls. I found some really cool wall decals on etsy.com but I need to decide a color theme.
Over time, Bria will be moving to the basement & Harper will move into Bria's current room which is already painted for a little girl.

I painted stripes on her walls a few years ago & added wall decals. It turned out really cute, but it was extremely difficult to do. I quit about 5 times before finally finishing the project. I probably will NEVER do stripes again. Needless to say, I won't be painting over those strips for a long time!

I also bought a white toddler conversion bed which will look really cute in the stripe room.

Another Step....

On the adoption end of things, we made another step in the process.
Our I800 approval was "cabled" to China on 7/2. We are now officially waiting for the "Article 5" step. This step will take 2 weeks.

After we receive the article 5, we are in the homestretch, waiting for China to invite us to trave(TA).

The average time from article 5 to TA is about 2-4 weeks.

So, we are hoping in 5 weeks, we'll know when we'll be going to China.

After we receive the TA, our agency will make an appointment with the consulate (CA) & get us to China as quickly as possible. It could be 2-4 weeks to travel after TA.


Are you confused yet???


Neil describes it as a huge hill to climb, we've been at the bottom of it for so long, waiting, then climbing it, with all of the paperwork, reaching the top, finally we're on the downward slope of things & can see the bottom. Almost there.....



I took this photo this morning, don't let the white one fool you, he's a ball of energy!

July 4th

We spent the 3-day holiday weekend at my parents lake house with the family. There were about 25 or so of us. Never a dull moment with that many people.

Here's a clip of them playing...These are the "tween" boys & Bria playing on the tube. Cael's in the mix also.

Lily, Krissy, Cael (bottom row) Bria, Jayden & Ian (top row) & Uncle Sam

The kids decorated the golf cart for the festivities, there's Ian & Bria!

Miss JuJu being her photogenic self!

Here are my parents, they make all of this possible! Big shout out to Mom & Dad for being so patient & loving us like crazy! We love you...