The Winds

Well, over the past few days we've been having a wild ride with the weather. We've thankfully missed all of the tornadoes that have blown around, but we haven't missed any of the winds. Thankfully, we're not in the worst area - I think it's a lot worse north of here. We've "only" had around 50 mph wind gusts. It certainly sounds like it's spooky Halloween outside!

And with the wind, other changes are afoot... I can't write about it yet, but will when I am able to (unfortunately, it's NOT about a referral - although that will be here before we know it. I hope!)

Well, it should be a fun Halloween weekend ahead. One of Robert's best lifelong friends is coming to town with his wife and 2 kids and we have our annual Halloween Bash with our neighbors. Yeah!

I-600A Renewals out the door!

Well, today I mailed in my request to have our I-600A/I-171H form extended and to be re-fingerprinted for our 4th time. Oh, the joys! On the happy side, we're hopeful that this will be the last time that we're going to have to jump through these hoops. (please keep your fingers crossed on this point!) This process has been so stressful and anyone who's been waiting along with us can corroborate. With each update, they seemed to have changed the process so it was like starting from scratch each time we had to do it. But now it's done and we can sigh a huge relief.

Let's bring on those referrals!

Next up, update Robert's passport... gotta be ready!

September Referrals are Official!

Well, it took them almost two months to report it (partly due to the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival Holiday) but referrals are being made as we speak and families are getting to see their child's face for the very first time. It's an exciting time. I just wish it was our turn already!

This is a 3-day referral month and hopefully one of the last of the small referral batches – after this, we're hoping that attrition starts happening and the number of days being referred starts to increase. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers. This has been over 4 years already and by the time we're done, it will be 5 years - which is far too long for anyone to wait for a child!

Only 57 more log-in dates to go until we're referred our daughter!

Here's the official notice:

9/29/2010
CCAA

The CCAA has finished the placement of children for the families whose adoption application documents were registered with our office before May 18, 2006.

President Barack Obama in Madison today

Amazing experience today, I got to see President Barack Obama when he was in Madison speaking in the Library Mall near campus. My friend Judith got us VIP tickets and we were less than 50 feet away from the President and the other speakers. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for me. I was in heaven. We had such an amazing time. I'm still wide awake from all of the excitement!

Mounted police - security was VERY TIGHT!

... going through the metal detectors...

Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin

the mass of humanity (over 15,000 people) watching the speeches

Ben Harper played - amazing!!

Senator Russ Feingold

Milwaukee Mayor Barrett, running for Governor of Wisconsin

President Barack Obama takes the stage!

Don't forget to go vote in November!!

It's in the mail!

Referrals are in the mail! Yeah! Early rumors have the CCAA getting through May 18, 2006. We shall see in the next day or two if this is true or not. If it is, we're ahead of where we thought we'd be at this point.

Happy Sukkot and Mid-Autumn Moon Festival

Today marks the beginning of two holidays - Sukkot and the Mid-Autumn Moon Festival. Both are harvest festivals - one Jewish and the other Chinese.

Today we celebrated Sukkot at a friends house and had dinner in their Sukkah. It was a beautiful night and the rain held off. On Sunday, we have another party and will say the prayer over a lulav and etrog.


The Mid-Autumn Moon festival is a Chinese holiday celebrating the end of the summer harvest. Families traditionally eat moon cakes, light lanterns, and watch fire dragon dances.

Pattern picked out!

Well, I finally did it - I figured out the pattern I'm going to use for our daughter's 100 Good Wishes Quilt. With the help of some of the ladies at my local quilting store, we found a pattern that looks difficult, but is really simple (see brick-looking one on left of cover). It will end up using 108 squares, so it's going to be a bit more than the 100 needed, but I liked the pattern so much, that a few more good wishes wasn't going to hurt! Just means a little bit more sewing for my mom and I. Today I modified the pattern to fit a Twin sized bed. I can't wait to start on it. Probably won't have any time until the last week of September/beginning of October. It's going to take a while to make. I'll try to post progress photos as we get going on the quilt.

Wish us luck!

Happy 95th Birthday Grandpa!

Today we celebrated my grandpa's 95th birthday. I always say that he'll outlive us all! He's still sharp as a tack, drives and travels the globe. He's the world's greatest grandpa (I think I'm only slightly biased here) and I love him so much. We had about 40 of his closest friends and family celebrating with him. It was a lot of fun to see everyone celebrate for a wonderful occasion.

Happy Birthday Grandpa!!

My mom, sister and I - we even color coordinated... (and no, we didn't call each other!)

my family surrounding the birthday boy! (grandpa is in bright blue in the front row)

Happy 95th Birthday Grandpa!

Cary's visit to Madison

I've become very close with an amazing group of women who are all adopting through our adoption agency (CCAI) and are all logged-in during the month of July 2006. Well, this past weekend my friend Cary (from that group) came to Madison for a visit. We packed a LOT in over a short 3-day weekend. Cary and her husband Dave are also logged-in the same day we are - July 14, 2006. So we will for sure be traveling with them. It was so nice for Robert to finally meet one of the ladies I talk so much about. Here's a few photos from the weekend.

Cary in front of our state capital modeling with our "Forward" statue

Cary and I eating lunch at Graze - a new restaurant on the capital square

Cary on Bascom Hill

Hanging out at Memorial Union

sitting on the famous big chair

In Chicago checking out the "Bean"

Millennium Park

In front of the Art Institute lions

Buckingham fountain

going flying for breakfast

beautiful view of Madison on our way to breakfast

Our breakfast

Hanging at the Memorial Union again

On State Street in Madison with capital behind us on our way to Taste of Madison

It's that time again

Well, it's now September 1st and that means I need to start getting all of our paperwork and updates again to hopefully get our very last I-171H (our current one expires in October). Since we are a grandfathered case (before the Hague Convention took over), we can't let our I-171H expire by even a day or we would have to suffer more paperwork and a delayed travel after our referral. After over 4 years of waiting, I'm really sick of doing these updates and getting re-fingerprinted - not the way I enjoy spending my day(s). I am optimistic that this will be our last time. We are hopeful for a Spring referral and Summer travel. So better cross those fingers and toes for us! With every day I feel closer and closer to our daughter. I am looking forward to the day that we finally get to see her beautiful face for the very first time. Happiness!