Monday, May 21, 2012

The Finding Ad

We received something truly amazing in the mail yesterday. 
Virtually all adoptions in China are abandonments, so “finding ads”, or ads placed in newspapers that identify found children, are required before a child is placed for adoption.  This should give families a chance to find their children if indeed a child was lost or taken.  Of course, as with many aspects of adoption, the horror stories of finding ads being placed far away from a child’s hometown or after a child has been adopted out of the country are forefront in everyone’s minds. 
We hired a researcher to look for Little Guys finding ad, and he found it fairly quickly.  We received it in the mail yesterday, with a translation.  A few things stood out:
*We received the actual newspaper containing his finding ad.  The actual newspaper, not a copy.  And it’s a national paper, from his hometown, and printed about 3 months after he was found.  Holy cow.
*The story in the ad absolutely matches up to what we were told. 
And the big one.  Huge.  Enormous.
It contains a picture of him as an infant.
Be still, my heart. 
We now have an infant picture.   We never thought we would have something this important. 
We are so, so happy and so, so fortunate. 

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

LID

We are officially logged in!  Our LID (Logged In Date) is today! 

Next steps?  In the next 2-4 months we will (hopefully!) get our LOA, or Letter of Approval.  I can't think much beyond that. 

Until then?  We have lots of money to save, lots of things to get ready, and lots of books to read on toddlers, adoption, special needs and all things pertinent to Little Guy.  We will continue to spend inordinate amounts of time talking about him, wondering about him, and planning for him. 

And, of course, hoping for fast and careful bureaucratic processes.