Alyssa Faith?

I am still not sure I want to name our new daughter Alyssa Faith.  I definitely want to honor Dallas' wishes and have her middle name be Faith but I am not sure about Alyssa yet.  So far it is the only name that all of us like.  Most of us like the name Lily or Lilli, too.  We don't want her name to start with a K,Z,N,J, or G because we already have children that go by names that begin with these letters.  To be honest the rest of the family wants me to stop suggesting names and just go with Alyssa but I can't let it go.  It was the same way with Grace. We didn't officially decide until we were in China and she had been with us a night.  Any suggestions?  What is your favorite girl's name?  Does she look like an Alyssa?

He Gets It

Sometimes this teenager of mine really surprises me.  He isn't one to share his feelings or give you too much information about his day at school.  So I was one proud Mom the other day when he shared this story with us.  One of his teachers was talking about how she has always wanted to adopt a child.  He said the kids in the class didn't understand why she would want to do that.  He said that they think if you adopt a child that the kid just comes to stay with you and aren't really a family member.  He spoke up(surprising in itself) and said it isn't like that at all.  They become a part of the family, you don't think of them as being adopted, they are you siblings.  He, also, said you don't notice that they look different(in the case of Grace being from China).   I don't know that he will ever adopt a child himself(he says he wants a small family) but I am so glad that he gets it. 

New Pictures

We sent Alyssa a birthday cake for her birthday. I am not so sure she likes the cake.  We can't wait to put a smile on that face. Look closely she has a pearl like necklace on.  She is going to love playing dress-up with the girls.

Happy Birthday, Alyssa Faith!

We wish we could be with you today!  You are now two years old.  We hope someone sang Happy Birthday to you and gave you the birthday cake we sent. 

Zachary made you some cupcakes for your birthday. They were delicious.  You also got a couple of presents. We are looking forward to bringing them to China so you can play with them. Nicholas is not in the photo because he was at a football game. He did get to enjoy some cake when he got home.

Happy Birthday, baby girl!  We love you!

Fingerprint Appointment

We recieved our fingerprint appointment today. Great news! It is for October 21 but we are going to try and walk in next week.  Hopefully our USCIS approval will come by the beginning of November.  The other good news is the rest of our dossier is on its way back from Washington D.C. with all of its authenications.  Once we recieve our approval from USCIS we can send that off to D.C. too. We would love to be able to send our dossier to China at the beginning of November.  Confusing I know but every step is one step closer to bringing Alyssa home.

An Earlier Photo of Alyssa

Homestudy Complete and I800A on the way to USCIS

I haven't posted in awhile because I have been a little frustrated with how long the homestudy process was taking.  Thank goodness it is done now.  We had 4 very valuable copies in our hands today.  We are down to two because one went to USCIS(United States Citizenship and Imigration Services) and one is going out tomorrow to our placing agency in California.  One copy needs to be certified and authenicated for our dossier and one is ours to keep.  Our homestudy is about 16 pages long. I never thought Dallas and I were that interesting.

Unfortunately it will most likely be around 60 days before we get approval from USCIS.  Praying for things to speed up but we know it will all happen in God's time.  We should get a notice in a couple of weeks informing of us the date we are to be fingerprinted. This will be our third time being fingerprinted for this adoption.  Kristopher got to join in on the fun this time around because he is over 18.

My best guest for travel is April 2012.  It would be nice to travel during the Spring this time.

Now it is time to get our dossier completed so all we will be waiting on is our USCIS approval. Hoping to be LID by the beginning of December. LID means China has our paperwork and it is all logged in.