LOA received

We FINALLY received the coveted and long awaited LOA (Letter of Approval) from China that officially approves of our family to go ahead and adopt Yan! Yahoo!! The letter was dated 8/17/09 and we got it 8/24/09.

With the ball back in our court, so to speak, we needed to get a copy of the LOA off to Immigration ASAP! It was a VERY frustrating week of misprinted documents, missing training certificates because we hadn't finished training, people on vacations, broken computers, internet troubles, seemingly slower snail mail than ever, etc. I didn't even want to post on this blog, I was that frustrated and depressed :-}.

But, that thick packet of information that needed to go next to Immigration was finally sent off, and we are now playing the waiting game for approval (again?) from Immigration.

Under pre-Hague law, this application for US Immigration approval would happen at the same time as our agency's seeking Travel Approval (TA) from China, I believe? No more. :-( Application for TA can't even happen until we get the approval from Immigration (not back yet) AND approval of some kind from the place in China that will finalize Yan's adoption.

The current estimate is for traveling sometime in December. At the start of this adoption journey, I would have never believed it would take over a YEAR to adopt an older, special needs, already identified child from China. Wow. I had been hoping and praying for June travel. Now we just pray it will be in 2009!

We have had no word nor pictures of any kind on Yan since mid-March (swine flu concerns stopped all forgeign visitors to the orphanage). Please continue to keep him and his caregivers in your prayers? And please pray God allows us to travel at the "right time" to go get Yan and bring him home. Thanks!