Friends: meeting some new ones and catching up with the old

This weekend was a busy one because we celebrated CNY with some brand new friends on Sat. night, and some old friends from Grace's travel group Sunday evening. We live in a small town (population ~10,000) just north of Madison, WI. I happened to meet a fellow adoptive mom 2 months ago at a meeting, (we sat across the table from each other) started talking and came to find out we both have daughters from China, and they are 4 months apart in age. We live 2 blocks from this family. We've attempted to get Grace and Kaili together a few times, but with the Christmas holidays and kids being sick, our girls hadn't met in person. Sat. we met Kaili, her 3 brothers and 5 other families with children from China that live in our little town. We met at a local Chinese restaurant and the girls hit it off from the start! So did the parents. We met some wonderful people, and even found out that one family used the same agency that we did for Grace. They traveled 5 months before we did in 2003. We'll be getting the girls together to play from now on!
Sunday we drove down to the Chicago area and went to a CNY party that my dear friend Michelle and her husband Mark hosted. Grace is one of 11 children in her travel group(9 girls and 2 boys!) These families have become part of our family now. It's so great to catch up with everyone. When we adopted Grace 4.5 yrs. ago I first thought that adoption was about bringing a child into our hearts and home. Adoption is so much more than that, because when you adopt you become part of the most amazing, large, giving and caring "family." It doesn't matter if you meet in a travel group, through a friend, on a yahoo group, waiting parent group, or as fellow bloggers, we all share something in common as far as adoption...maybe we are waiting parents, or perhaps we are home now with our child or children. We not only share this common experience, this extended family supports each other in every possible way on the roller coaster of waiting for a child, offers help and advice after we are together as families, and gives back to the children not yet adopted too. I'm so proud to be part of this community, it's one like I've never remotely experienced before! :)

Happy Friday and a favorite pic

Happy Friday everyone! I'm so glad the weekend is almost upon us. We had a terrible snow storm here on Wed. with over 15 inches of snow in one 24 hr. period. School was cancelled and we have been pretty much staying indoors a lot this week. We are looking forward to the weekend with several CNY celebrations. The favorite pic for Friday is the above one of Grace that was taken exactly 1 year ago right around CNY. I always wanted to have Grace's photo taken in one of her traditional Chinese dresses, so we did and she brought along one of her favorite panda bears so we included him too. When you travel to China I highly recommend buying different sizes of Chinese dresses or clothing for your kids....for them to wear as they grow. They are pretty inexpensive too which is great. Again Happy Friday to all! :)

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Chinese New Year~2006, Grace was not too sure about the lion dance mask she was checking out!

Chinese New Year (sometimes called the Spring Festival) is the most important of the Chinese holidays. It's a time of feasting with the family, celebration, fireworks and gift giving. It's a 15 day holiday beginning on the first day of the new moon and ending with the full moon on the day of the Lantern festival. This year we will be spending part of Chinese New Year in Chicago at a large CNY celebration put on by Grace's agency. After that we will go to a party with her travel group of families and their children. Happy New Year in the year of the rat! :)

Starfish supply raiser~

Kimberley over at the Seventh Diamond is doing a supply raiser for the Starfish Foster Home in China. All supplies will be sent to Amanda, who is a woman in China who started her own foster home to help China's most fragile special needs babies who may not survive in a traditional orphanage. Her orphanage is what we would consider a mid-sized apartment and she has up to 15 children living there at a time.She raises money on her own through LWB to pay for their lifesaving surgeries and goes with them to provide the love and support that they need to survive the procedures. She loves and cares for them as she prepares them to be available for adoption.If you join in, please put the Starfish graphic onto your blog sidebar to show your support. Also, please feel free to do a post to help the cause.

Here are some of the items they need:

Long sleeved onesies or body suits from 0-3to 2T.

Winter sleepers, the ones with covered feet from about 6-9 months to 3T.

Any summer clothes, Preemie to 2T.

Summer shoes from 0 to 6 children's.

Vick's Baby rub.

Infant Motrin and Tylenol

Gripe Water from Amazon.com

Pelican plastic bibs

Baby sunscreen

Plastic backed changing table covers

Plastic backed bibs

Playtex Bottles (the ones with the bags in them)

Playtex nipples (the have four different kinds some of each will do)

Shoes and sandals from 0 to 6 (This can be summer or winter)

Craisans

Instant Oatmeal
Sleepers (Girls and boys all sizes up to 3 T) the kind with the footies and the zippers

Boys winter clothes (9 months)

18M boys and girls winter clothing for the day and night.

2T Boys and Girls winter for day and night.
If you would like to help the Starfish Foster Home by supplying any of these items or any other items for small children, please e-mail Kimberley at timnkim@gmail.com She will be collecting the items throughout the month of February and then mailing them to Starfish at the end of the month.If you are not familiar with Amanda or the Starfish Foster Home in China, please visit their blog at 'Chinese Starfish'.

New look again

I've got a new look today. I get bored easily and do like change so was in the mood for a blog re-do, or maybe you could call it a "blog lift." Becky did this for me and I couldn't be more pleased. She is starting this little blog design venture to raise funds for her adoption. I will say she is very easy to work with, I emailed her the pics I wanted to use in the new header and suggested some colors I'd like to use for the blog and she (we) came up with this. Pink is Grace's favorite color and green is one of mine, as are polka dots of any kind. I think it's Spring-y looking and we all need a bit of Spring right now in early Feb. Thank you so much Becky...I love it! Please check out her blog ~ ladyinwaitingblogdesign.blogspot.com. You can email her if you're interested. :)

Thank you Secret Pal!

Dear Secret Pal,
Thank you for your festive and very fun gifts, we are enjoying them all. We received 2 books about Chinese New Year (we don't have either BTW), I'm hoping Grace will be able to read the Lanterns and Firecrackers story independently next year . Also 2 darling little Chinese rubber ducks, a panda notepad and panda sticker set for Grace (which are quite the hit with her), a stuffed rat (he/she doesn't photograph very well, as he's much cuter in person and he's made of super soft fabric), I think Grace will be adopting him for a while, and finally more fortune cookies than I can count! We love everything and we plan on having a great Chinese New Year celebrating with friends from Grace's travel group. We wish you Gung Hay Fat Choy in this year of the rat. Again, many thanks!
Gail, Dan and Grace

Referrals!

Referrals are arriving for this month. I'm delighted to say that CCAA has referred 8 days worth of dossiers that were logged in, up to Dec. 27th 2005. That's a great way to begin the week. I won't speculate on the future and what it may hold, cause no one can predict what CCAA will do next month with referrals. I will say Congrats to all the families who will see their beautiful children's faces for the first time! :)

It's Friday!

I've been saving this pic of Snoopy doing the happy dance for a while, and I thought why not use him today. It's been a long week and it's Friday! Whoo Hoo! Besides celebrating the fact that it's Friday, there is some good news in the air to celebrate coming soon with referrals from China. And that's always a good thing. :)