Update-o-rama!

There have been so many dang adoption things going on lately that I haven't had time to sit and blog about it all! First of all, there has been scary news coming out of Russia. They are threatening to ban all countries that haven't signed a treaty with them, which would include Canada. Of course this frightens me to no end. Our Canadian family is aware of the threats, but have continued on full steam ahead. I love them. More than I can even say. They love my dear Dasha and won't leave her there, even though there's a risk the same thing that happened to us could happen to them.
Not only is this scary from a personal standpoint, but it's also terrifying because it means more Russian orphans will remain just that: orphans. There are thousands and thousands of children who won't be adopted. Do you remember the picture of "Kyle" I posted in this post? I learned he recently passed away. No child should live their life not knowing how important and special they are. No child should live their life being nobody to anybody. No child should die from neglect. It breaks my heart.
Please continue to pray for Dasha girl, though!! She really needs a family. Her time is running out.

In China news.....we received pre approval for another little guy with Down syndrome just yesterday!! It was quite an adventure trying to obtain his file. Once we had his file, of course it was all in Chinese. What!? It hadn't been translated yet! This almost never happens, so of course it happened to us! We had to find someone to translate it for us so we could at least know his medical needs to include it in our letter of intent to adopt him. It all finally worked out, though, and I am so very excited! Isn't he darling!!

He has been at Little Flower (an amazing American run institution/hospital for Chinese orphans with medical needs) since he was two weeks old. He had heart surgery when he was three months old and has been recovering and receiving lots of love there. His orphanage recently called him back because they get money for having kids there. Little Flower wishes he could have stayed a while longer to get stronger and more stable, but such is the life of an orphan. Of course we are terrified he will pass away before we can get to him. If you have it in you to continue to pray for our family, please pray for our new little guy. Please pray he will be strong and healthy and looked after. We are rushing like CRAZY to get to him!! Oh, and just an FYI (because a lot of people have been asking me this), he turns one in November!
We got our I-797 back last week (approval from the US government to adopt a child from China) and we're super excited! Our dossier had to get stamps from Utah certifying all the notaries on our pages are actually notaries. That step is done, and now our dossier is in Washington D.C. It needs stamps from the State Department, then it will go to the Chinese Consulate in D.C. for their approval. After that, it gets sent to China! All of these steps take a few days, but I'm hopeful it will be ready by the end of next week to send across the ocean! Once it's in China, there are several steps before we can actually go get our boy. Our part of the work will mostly be over, but they process the entire adoption before we get there. It makes it nice in the end, because you go for one trip and take your child home with you. Adoption complete! We are hoping for February travel. I mean, of course I'd LOVE to go sooner, but I think February is the earliest at this point. It feels amazing to have our part of the work over with for now, though!!