August 12th. I can't believe it. A little over seven months has passed since my last post. I knew this blog thing would be feast or famine. It's been a little more famine than feast, that's for sure! So much has happened over the last seven months. It was quite a bit of "hurry up and wait". Hurry and get things in to our agency, then wait. Hurry and get things to China, and then wait. Now we are in the "hurry up and get everything ready asap" mode because we travel exactly 5 weeks from today. No more waiting....we have lots to do! (We always have lots to do, but we now have a travel date and plane tickets have been purchased.) The deadline is on the horizon and there is a bright light at the end of this long tunnel. I work best under pressure, so I like deadlines. September 16th. That's the day we go to China. And we will meet our new son a few days later. We are so excited!
Here is a "not so short" updated timeline of how things have gone with all of our adoption paperwork: (With lots of photos in between of what has been going on with the family...because, let's face it, even when you're working on big and important stuff...more big and important stuff is happening every day.) It's called life!
December 2014
December 1st, 2014: Homestudy
Our social worker came and spent seven, yes seven, hours with our family. She came in the afternoon when the kids were at school and interviewed me, and toured the house until the kids started arriving home from school. She observed and interviewed them one by one. Luckily I had scheduled it on a day with minimal after school activities and Miss M was super helpful in getting her sister's hair in a bun and off to dance class, since I was still with our social worker. And Middle Z had basketball practice and had a ride to that. So we continued on with all of the questions and things she needed to cover from the fifteen page biographical sketches we had to provide. When Dr. G got home from work, she was able to interview him and then us together. And then we were done....seven hours later. All in all, it was truly not as scary as I expected and our social worker was outstanding. She really was a great listener and was very detailed oriented and prepared. I felt like she truly had our new son's best interests at heart and wanted to make sure we were a good fit for him. When she left, I felt like I had a new best friend. Or at the very least, someone who now knew us very well and had the tools and expertise to support and help us as we embark on this journey and after we bring our boy home.
December 3rd, 2015: Miss M's last high school soccer banquet after four years of HS soccer. It was a happy and sad day all at once. I will miss watching her play and the awesome girls on her team.
December 6th, 2015: Little Bro's 6th birthday! He got a "Dr. Drill and Fill" playdoh dentist toy and he loved it! The next day was our church Christmas party, complete with a visit from Santa. I'm glad I still have a child who likes to visit with Santa.
December 12th -15th, 2015: Six shows of The Nutcracker and "production week" rehearsals everyday before that. December at our house is not for the faint of heart. Middle E did great as a Palace Fairy! I love to watch her dance!
Little Sis at Opening Night!
Middle Sis after her performance...and I have no idea why the next photo is so far down, but it won't move up no matter what I do. I'm still an amateur blogger, for sure.
December 16th, 2015: Twenty Years with this guy!
We aren't perfect, but I can definitely say life is never boring....We are looking forward to the next twenty years of adventures together!
Dr. G always comes through with flowers.....he knows I love roses!
December 25th, 2015: And then it was Christmas...
Christmas Eve, our new pajamas for everyone tradition and Family Nativity play. Some years even though they try to be serious, it can be a bit comical...Big B always likes to be the "star", literally.
December 26th, 2015: Went to visit Grandma and Grandpa G and aunts, uncles and cousins! They had enough snow for some backyard fun!
January 2015
January 3rd, 2015: Happy New Year! Back at home, we took all of the kiddos snow skiing for the first time as a family, together with a few other families. A few of the kids had been before but we had never gone all together. What a super fun day!
Middle E and her friend M and Little Sis...
Little Bro was a pro after about an hour of practice! He even rode up the big lift twice! And actually made it down the mountain!
Middle Z and his snowboard...too cool for skis. ;)
January 8th, 2015: Homestudy Approved
Our Homestudy (after our social worker completed it) was submitted to our agency and approved. It normally doesn't take a whole month for that to happen from the time that you have the Homestudy, but since it was over the Christmas holiday, it took a little longer.
January 8th, 2015: I-800A sent to USCIS (Immigrations)
As soon as our Homestudy was approved, we officially moved into the China Program and received a specific China case worker at our agency. Ours is Carol. She happens to be Chinese and she has been amazing. The I-800A is the "Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country." Basically it means that we are applying to US Immigrations to see if we are suitable to bring our new son into the US as a citizen.
February 2015
February 4th, 2015: Fingerprint Appointment at USCIS
Part of the I-800A approval process is to have your fingerprints taken. Because Miss M was now 18 years old, she had to do the same. So we three went to our 8am appointment at the nearest immigrations office which happens to be an hour from our house. Early day. There was no line and after having to go through what was like airport security (i.e. remove shoes and anything from pockets, belts, jewelry etc. and walk through a metal detector to get into the building), our fingerprints were digitally taken and sent to the FBI. It all took about half hour from start to finish and we were on our way home. Big B didn't mind missing the first few hours of class in order to get the littles on the school bus and he and Miss M went back to school as soon as we got home.
February 12th, 2015: Celebrating Big B's 16th birthday at Texas Roadhouse. They bring out a saddle and have the birthday person "ride" on it while they sing "Happy Birthday". Big B was a good sport. I think the little kids enjoyed watching it more!
February 14th, 2015: Happy Valentine's Day! My good friend RR and I decided to surprise our hubbies with a candle light dinner at her house while all the kids stayed at our house. So we enjoyed a quiet evening while our 11 kids had fun down the street at our place.
February 19th, 2015: Happy Chinese New Year! And a happy one it was.....We received some photos of our new son looking at photos of us for the very first time. There is a lady whom I have mentioned before (TW), who volunteers at his orphanage. I had emailed her some photos of our family and she printed them and took them with her to the orphanage on Chinese New Year. Sometimes it is hard for her to catch him there, because he lives with a foster family and goes to school outside of the orphanage. But this was a holiday, so she ran into him and his foster mom. We knew that he knew about us already, but this was the first time he saw pictures of us. Seeing these photos made everything a lot more real for us....that's for sure. What an amazing moment!
Here he is looking at the photos we sent....
This one's my favorite!
This is TW, the lady that volunteers at his orphanage and advocates for many of the children there, helping them to find families. She is an angel for these kids!
This is our son's foster mom. She is amazing and he has been well taken care of and loved by her since he began living with their family at age 2 1/2. I will have to write a post another time on how foster parenting works over there. It's not like here, where most foster parents can foster with the goal of adopting their child sometimes. It is much different in China and that is something that rarely can happen there. Nevertheless, this woman has been a wonderful mother to him and we owe her a great deal of gratitude for giving him the best childhood possible under the circumstances.
February 21st, 2015: I received notice in the mail that I needed to go have my fingerprints taken again (not Dr. G or Miss M, just me) because they were not legible to the system for some reason. Setback!
Later that day I left to spend a "Girl's Weekend" with Grandma G (my mom) and Auntie J (my sis) celebrating my mom's 70th birthday! Dinner in a high rise overlooking downtown and we stayed at a fancy hotel my sister booked and watched Downton Abbey Season 5 episodes! We sure know how to have fun! ;)
I brought Grandma G back home with me so she could stay with the kiddos while we took Middle Z to Disneyland.
Conveniently, because Grandma was in town and able get Little Bro off the Kindergarten bus mid-day, the day before I left for Disneyland, I was also able to run up to our USCIS location on a "walk-in" basis even though my new fingerprinting appointment wasn't until March 4th. Instead of waiting until then, I was able to go asap. I explained what happened and gave them my paper requesting new prints be taken. I assumed it was the machine. The supervisor said I most likely had "bad prints". Like it was my fault. She said it happens a lot especially with women's hands who are either dry or have shallow grooves in their fingerprints. So we did them again and I left hoping it would work this time.
And the next day we took Middle Z to Disneyland for the traditional 8th grade "Mom/Son, bring a friend" Disneyland Trip that we have done with all of our kids up to this point. Except this time we let Dad come and we brought Little Bro, who had only been as a baby. He basically felt like an "only child" for three days while Middle Z and his friend E had a great time on their own!
Never too old for the EARS!
This, right here, was the highlight of their trip. I'm positive!
March 2015
While in L.A., we visited the neighborhood where my dad's old house from childhood is, to see if it was still there and drove to the edge of the neighborhood to watch the planes land at LAX, just like he used to do as a little boy. I remember being 6 years old and visiting my grandparents and watching the planes from LAX fly over their house all day long. And then it was time for us to get on one and go home. It was a great trip and we had LOTS of fun. Two years 'til it's Middle E's turn!
Once back at home, I was still dealing with the fingerprinting issues...We were trying to meet a March 18th deadline that the CCCWA (China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption), the governing body in China that handles all adoptions had given us to have all our documents sent to them. This fingerprinting issue was holding that up. The I-800A approval was the LAST thing we needed to get before all our documents could be sent to China. I knew the second fingerprinting would be bad as well, because the machine kept saying "rejected", but the worker just overrode the system and sent them anyway. As we approached the deadline, my "extremely patient" self decided to find a way to contact the FBI on my own since I hadn't received anything in the mail yet. By some miracle, I found the right department online and called them. I explained my dilemma and the looming deadline and a very nice man said he wasn't supposed to tell me by phone because it was really USCIS' (Immigrations) job to notify by mail, but he was able to locate the file by my social security number and let me know that my fingerprints were rejected again. I thanked him for his help and started figuring out who to call next. USCIS is a very broad organization with lots of departments. After a few calls, I was told to contact the National Benefits Center Customer Service in Missouri where they have a special department over all International Adoptions. Who knew!? Thank goodness for the internet. It was too late to call that day so I wrote down the number and planned to call the next day.
March 6th, 2015: So the next day, I took most of the kids out of school (Middle Z was on a band field trip and Big B had to get in his 10 practice minimum for the start of lacrosse season, so he couldn't go. Dr. G was on the field trip with Middle Z). We traveled to the other side of the state to watch our high school basketball team play in the state playoffs. On top of that, after the basketball game we planned to look at a 1994 Toyota 4Runner in that same area, that someone had listed on Craigslist for Big B since he had just turned 16 and I needed another driver. ;) And we were going to spend the day sightseeing and hanging out. So our time was limited. After the game, as I sat in our minivan in the parking lot with a car full of kids, I called the number for the National Benefits Center. When I was finally connected to customer service, I explained to the person my situation and that I needed to know what to do since my fingerprints were not able to be processed by the FBI...twice. She looked up my application number and was surprised to see that SHE was the case worker assigned to my case and was planning on contacting me....soon(ish) by mail to resolve the situation. She could sense the urgency (thank goodness) and determined that all she needed from me was a police clearance from my local city, if I had lived there for five years or more to prove I had no criminal background. I happened to ALREADY have that since it is part of the required documents anyway. I was able to call our case worker, Carol, and she emailed it to her within minutes. The lady at the NBC was able to get approval from her supervisor and was able to send out the I-800A approval by mail that afternoon. Amazing. It was a miracle and it saved us a lot of wasted time waiting for documents to be mailed and received.
We lost our game, but had a great time anyway with everyone else who skipped school to support the team!
We ended up having a really fun day sightseeing and managed to negotiate a great price for Big B's 4Runner and get both cars and kids home by midnight. Whew!
Big B was soooo exited to see his new car. It is a stick shift. I drove it home. Yes, that was scary since I hadn't driven a stick in 20 years. But I only stalled once before we left downtown. Then I was good all the way home. It's like riding a bike...you don't forget! He cleaned it up and washed it the next morning first thing.
March 12, 2015: We received the I-800A Approval in the mail. Yay!!! Because it still had to be verified in our state capital and then sent to the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco to be authenticated, it made our documents arrive in China a little later than the March 18th deadline, but the CCCWA ignored the deadline for us since we were just waiting for that one document to be done.
Whew!
.
For the last several weeks in March, our little dog Jessie got really sick. Actually, she had a very large bladder stone but was misdiagnosed by the vet we had used, and became very ill from the antibiotics they gave her. She was so dehydrated and sick, we thought we would have to put her to sleep. After a few scary days and way too much money at the vet, she started to improve. The short version of the month long ordeal is that we eventually took her to a different vet and she ended up having a surgery in mid-April, to remove the stone (it was the size of an oblong golf ball, if there was such a thing.) The vet took a photo during surgery...I will refrain from posting it here. ;) So our little rescue dog lived and is now completely back to normal. And it was worth every penny!
March 18th, 2015: Miss M got glasses instead of her contacts and Big B got his braces off.
Spring is here!
Middle Z and Middle E competed on the their school archery team at the State Tournament. It was fun to watch them. Middle E had the highest score of any of the girls at her school in 6th, 7th or 8th grade! Middle Z got the second highest score for the 8th grade boys at his school.
April 2015
April 2nd, 2015: Spring Break Camping...Big B's first time pulling a trailer. (the small one) ;)
We camped in the mountains a few hours from home. It was CHILLY even though it was Spring! We brought a few animals, a few toys to play with and the kitchen sink! (in the horse trailer/camper)
Breakfast in the trailer...
April 8th, 2015: Dossier to China (DTC)
Our dossier was sent to China this day....hallelujah! This was all of the documents we had collected since June 2014 (Birth certificates, marriage certificate, along with our Homestudy and I-800A Approval, all of which had to be verified and authenticated in the state where the document originated from (which was four different states for us) and then authenticated at the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco for some of the docs and the Chinese Consulate in Washington DC for other docs from other states whose jurisdiction is DC. (I know...complicated.) Anyway, that was a big relief....the paper chase was finally over.
Lacrosse season was in full force for Big B and Middle Z and Little Sis and Little Bro were playing on their soccer teams. Miss M had no Spring sport for the first time in 8 years but was doing an after school internship at our local medical center. She loved that! And Middle E has five dance classes per week. So Spring gets pretty busy...I usually just hold my breath and exhale about the end of June!
Here is Ben's Varsity lacrosse team. He is #12.
April 14th, 2015: Scout Court of Honor for the big boys that night. I snapped a photo of Big B because he came straight from lacrosse practice and was still wearing his funny lacrosse shorts!
April 16th, 2015: School district Band Showcase for all the middle school and high school band kids in our district. Middle E plays the flute and the boys play percussion. Big B is in Wind Ensemble at the High School.
April 17th, 2015: Log In Date (LID)
We received an email from our case worker, Carol, that our dossier had been logged into the CCCWA system. Hooray!
April 21st, 2015: Into Translation (IT)
Our Dossier moved "into translation". This is where they translate the Homestudy and everything else into Chinese so they are able to read it and determine if we are officially approved to adopt our son. (Although we had been pre-approved already back in June, 2014 based on preliminary information that we had sent)
April 22nd, 2015: The ongoing sick dog saga finally came to an end when Jessie had her surgery this day. I picked her up from the new vet the next morning and she was like a different dog. So happy and jumping and running around already. On the left is a photo of her at the door where she waits EVERY day for Little Bro to get off the Kindergarten bus at noon. I will miss having him home this coming year since he will be at school all day now. :(
May 2015
May 6th, 2015: We added a new member to the family...A 10 year old quarter horse mare named Lexie. She is great with the kids and the other two horses got used to a new friend pretty quickly. Although Hazel, (not pictured), is still the boss.
May 9th, 2015: Little Sis finished up her first season of competitive soccer after playing rec soccer since Kindergarten. These girls worked so hard and learned a ton. It was fun to watch them improve so much from the beginning to the end of the season.
Also on May 9th was Prom for Miss M and Big B. It was Miss M's last dance which was kind of sad. So many "lasts" during senior year. She went with her good friend J and they had a great time. Big B went to Prom with Maddie's friend B, who was also adopted from China when she was almost 14. She is amazing and has been a huge resource for us on all kinds of adoption questions.
Miss M and her Prom group. These kids are just awesome and I will miss seeing them around all the time as they go off to college and missions.
Big B and his group of equally great kids!
May 10th, 2015: Happy Mother's Day! I have to say, despite the incredibly busy weekend, everyone made this Mother's Day a special one. It was fun and I felt very loved! I have the best job in the world. And I can't wait to add our new son to our family.
My plate at Sunday breakfast....full of lots of cute, homemade gifts and cards! Thanks to Dr. G who cooked up a nice breakfast before church.
May 16th, 2015: The girls and their "Activity Days" church group had a little Mother's Day Tea and we were told to "bring our fanciest selves". And so we did...it was fun to dress up!
May 20th, 2015: Out of Translation (OT)
This was the hurry up...and wait, part. We were in translation for a month. So once we got out, things move pretty quickly from there! :) Our status became "out of translation" on this date.
May 22nd, 2015: Matched!!!
This is the day that we were officially matched with our son and our dossier was approved by the CCCWA!
Also Dr. G's sister and family arrived from out of town and we had a fun-filled weekend of cousins, swimming and bike riding! They even helped us get our backyard ready for Miss M's graduation party the following weekend! Couldn't have done it without you guys! (Well, we could have...it would have just taken a lot longer!) ;)
May 27th, 2015: Letter Seeking Confirmation (LSC) also known as LOA (Letter of Approval)
This is the day that the "soft LSC" was issued meaning it came to our agency via email. The "hard" LSC was received the next day and they sent it to us for signature and return to the agency so they could send it back to China. The Letter Seeking Confirmation is basically just that....the CCCWA is seeking to confirm and have us sign that we are willing to adopt this child. That was an exciting day!
May 29th, 2015: I-800 Application
A copy of the LSC is sent with another application that we had to complete called the I-800 application. Not the I-800A. That was the application to apply for this application. We already had that approved after the whole fingerprinting issue. So once we received the LSC, we sent in the I-800 immediately. This is the "Petition to Classify Convention Adoptee as an Immediate Relative". Basically it's the precursor for being able to apply for an American visa for him to be able to leave China once he has a Chinese passport.
May 30th, 2015: Grad Party! We had a graduation party for Miss M and her two best friends, S and S. Both of their parents helped a ton and it turned out to be a great evening!
A party is not a party without these guys!
The Senior Girls!
I'm gonna miss these kids!
The pasture conveniently doubled as a parking lot.
BFF's
More friends from school and "the hood".
Auntie J and family came three hours just to hang with us for the evening! So glad they could make it! Just missing cousin M!
June 2015
June 5th, 2015: Congratulations Class of 2015! Graduation Day for Miss M...Grandma and Grandpa G came to visit and brought cousin B. Our other Grandma G came, too!
Pre-Graduation dinner at our favorite Chinese food restaurant.
Our little girl is graduating....I can't believe it!
The whole family....and everyone is smiling (yay!) !
Picture with the Grandmas (Three Generations).
With Grandma G (My mom).
With Grandpa and Grandma G (Dr. G's parents).
Proud Mom!
Miss M and her cousin B!
The girls!
The Class of 2015
All Smiles!
There she is!
Receiving her diploma...
The gang after the ceremony...Congratulations Miss M, we are so proud of you!
June 6th, 2015: The day after graduation, we had Middle E's annual dance recital. I helped at the High School's Grad Party and left there at 4:45am. Saw the sun rising on the way home. Slept for a few hours and then delivered Middle E to rehearsal at 10am, I think. The actual performance was later in the afternoon. I'm pretty sure I had a nap, that day.
Middle E and her ballet number. They all did great!
Jazz number...
Tap number...
Afterwards with the grandparents...Nice job Middle E! You danced beautifully!
June 7th, 2015: The next day was Seminary Graduation for Miss M! Four years of Seminary during high school. So proud of her accomplishment.
June 8th, 2015: I-797 Received
This is the document from USCIS that tells you that your I-800 application was received at the lockbox and was forwarded for processing.
June 15th, 2015: I-800 Approval
We received the I-800 Approval in the mail which means we can apply for our son's visa! The approval notification is then sent to the National Visa Center (NVC).
The National Visa Center then sends you via email (if you specially request it, otherwise it's snail mail) the letter giving you some case numbers for you to apply for the visa (Form DS-260).
June 19th, 2015: Packed up and moved Miss M to BYU for the summer term. (Left on July 18th and she moved into the dorms on June 19th.) This is the "before" picture of her dorm room.
First stop, BYU Bookstore...one of my favorite places on the planet!
Much progress was made in 24 hours with a little help from Middle E and I and a trip to IKEA. It was lots of fun!
I don't remember the dorms being this nice when I was in college!
A little lunch while shopping at the outlets....oh, and we picked up Big B in SLC after his AFY camp.
Can't miss having ice cream at The Creamery, for sure!
This was not an easy goodbye, but I will see her at the end of summer. Love you Miss M!
June 24th, 2015: Back home and ready for Middle E's first year at Girls Camp!
We survived!
June 28th, 2015: Happy
12th
Birthday, Middle E! She received an amazing homemade cake from her Sunday School teacher, who is so talented at desserts, and pretty much everything else.
June 29th, 2015: NVC Letter/LSC drop off
A courier took
our LSC and a copy of the NVC letter to the American Consulate in
Guangzhou, China and receives a pick up date (July 14th). (Article 5
Pickup)
At that point I had to complete the DS-260
which is an "Immigrant Visa Application" and it's done online. The
American Consulate in Guangzhou receives the DS-260 and basically
processes it and approves it in time for the Article 5 pickup date. On a
side note...the immigrations website where you apply for this had been
having issues for a month or so. It had been hit or miss for a lot of
families when they tried to complete the application and sometimes they
had to start over from scratch or parts of the application weren't
working correctly. I sat down one night at 1am and completed it from
start to finish in about 45 minutes. I told my case worker the next
morning that I had been able to complete it with no problems and she
said we were the first one of her families in a month to complete it
without an issue. Whew!
July 2015
July 2nd, 2015: Just a few pics from our first camping trip of the summer to Montana and our first outing with the new vehicle (A Nissan NVP 3500-middle). The kids have named it "The Swagon Wagon"! I don't know if "swag" can be in the same sentence with a car that has 12 seats....but they seem to think so. Anyhow, we love it, it fits our entire family, including our new addition and it pulls like a boss! I pulled our friends' camper trailer while Dr. G pulled the horse trailer and our friends pulled 14 bikes and miscellaneous ATV's in their trailer. We were quite the entourage on the freeway!
Dr. G parking the "Swagon Wagon" at the camp site. I can pull it. I just don't back it up with trailer attached.
A mountain lake after our 2 mile hike...gorgeous!
Swimming and fishing!
I will have to devote an entire post to our summer camping trips...there are just too many good pictures!
July 13th, 2015: This was one of my top ten best days of all time! The orphanage director had contacted our agency, and then she and I got in contact through WeChat, which is an app that many people in Asia use. You can talk, text and have video chats, like Facetime. Anyway, our boy had been very nervous about being adopted and what his new life would be like. The orphanage director over adoptions suggested that we have a video chat so he could see our family and help him to feel more at ease about the upcoming changes. We invited over our friend S, who adopted two boys from China about two years ago. One of them is from the same orphanage as our son. They were great little translators for us and very helpful! So here are a few photos of the video conference. The director had to change the time at the last minute, so Dr. G wasn't able to be there because it was earlier in the day. But we plan to do another one soon. The kids very much enjoyed talking with him and asking him his favorite foods and favorite color (blue). We walked all around the house and yard to show him everything. He really enjoyed seeing his room. I was able to find out afterwards that he was much less anxious and very happy that we were "good and kind people". So he felt much better about his future and wasn't so worried anymore.
Here he is, and his foster mom, as well. TW was there in the orphanage office, too. It was GREAT to talk to her "face to face"!
This is what it looked like from their end...
July 10th, 2015: Happy 14th Birthday, Middle Z! G and G Graves were visiting again and we all went out to dinner at Fujiyama to celebrate both Middle E and Middle Z's special days, since their birthdays are 12 days apart. The kids love this place and we don't go very often. It's a special treat!
July 14th, 2015: Article 5 Letter Pickup
The courier picked up our Article 5 Letter which lets the CCCWA know that our immigrations file is complete and we will be able to get our son's visa when we travel to China. The letter is mailed to Beijing to the CCCWA and they then issue the long awaited "Travel Approval" which means we can now come to China to pick up our son!
July 17th, 2015: Travel Approval
Only three days later we were issued our Travel Approval. Time to shop for plane tickets!! (I'd only been doing that already for months.) On that same day, our Chinese visas arrived as well! So we were official and could enter China without any limitations.
We had applied for passports during the last several months for the kids and those had all arrived in a timely manner. On July 2nd, I had over-nighted six Chinese visa applications and our passports to the courier for our travel agency who is in San Francisco. She delivered them to the Chinese consulate in SF and our 10 year multiple entry visas were issued without any problems. I'm glad I don't have to do those applications again for a while! China just started issuing 10 year visas recently. Thank you Chinese government! :)
These girls and their matching bikes! I just had to snap a photo in the driveway. They have had a great summer together!
July 18th, 2015: Hauling nine tons of alfalfa hay! It was that time again to stock up on hay for the rest of the year, so we don't have to buy it in the winter. It is always so HOT when they do this, and this year did not disappoint once again. I think it was at least 100 degrees. Dr. G had some help from a friend and a couple of boys as well. So Middle Z and Big B spent the day hauling and stacking. They love it. (NOT.)
July 22nd, 2015: Boating with the family. Quick trip out on the river for the evening...
Little Bro is probably saying, "Hey, don't forget about me back here!"
July 23rd, 2015: American Consulate Appointment Set
After examining at least 5000 different combinations of travel dates (I may be exaggerating a tiny bit), we finally chose our five options for the consulate appointment when we pick up our son's visa in Guangzhou. The consulate allows you to submit five dates and they let you know which one works for them. The tricky part is that we are planning to travel in September and there are multiple Chinese holidays that we we're trying to work around. The consulate is closed for all of these holidays and several days in between which connect one holiday and another. We received our second choice which was October 6th at 8:30am. Our first choice was October 5th, but the consulate is closed that day. Holiday for "Golden Week". So the 6th it is. This is the date that we build the entire trip around. We are allowed to leave the country 48 hours after the appointment, assuming there are no issues with picking up the visa.
July 24th, 2015: Bought us some plane tickets!
Our rep at Shaanxi Sun Travel is amazing. I was able to find a great deal on Expedia.com for our tickets. We fly on Delta and its a non-stop flight both ways into Beijing and out of Hong Kong. I called her and she was able to get the same tickets for $225 less all together. So we ended up with $575 RT tickets for Miss M and I. And Dr. G and the other three kiddos' tickets were $726 RT. (They leave China sooner than Miss M and I. We are staying longer to wait for the visa appointment and then will travel home with our son.) Our son's one way ticket was $433. These are AMAZING prices considering that to fly right now in July, you are looking at a $1600 ticket round trip. I had always been shooting for travel dates in July. It was our least busy month. I didn't schedule any camps for the kids and basically had flexible things going on. The delays that we experienced due to the fingerprinting issues held off our Travel Approval about a month or so. I can say now that I am really glad not to have to pay $1600 per ticket even though it means waiting a little longer to go.
Also Miss M and four of her five roommates drove up for the weekend to go camping with us. They arrived at 2am and got up to visit the temple in our city at 8am. They have visited a different temple every Friday of the summer semester, so they wanted to keep up their streak. Miss M took Middle E with her for the very first time at the temple. They had a great morning and all returned home to sleep until we were ready to leave for camping. She is so lucky to have such great roommates. I don't think she could have asked for a better "first semester at college experience". They are all truly amazing girls. Dr. G got home from work at noon and we headed out for a weekend in the woods!
Here they are at the campground...along with Miss M's friend MW. She is like one of the family.
Playing games with all the kiddos...we went with three other families.
More games...
One of my next posts will have to be about our summer camping trips because we sure had a blast both times and there are way too many pictures of all the fun not to share them. So that wraps up the end of July. We have been enjoying a relatively calm first couple of weeks of August (or I would have never been able to get this post done.) Middle E has a two week Ballet Intensive every day for six hours and the big boys are off at a HUGE scout Encampment for this entire week. (A couple of the scout leaders posted this photo of the group at Encampment on FB. 2000+ boys and leaders.) Great photo! I'm so glad my boys get to be a part of this!
So with only three kids at home, I have been able to get a lot of stuff done with the travel preparations (hotels/trains etc.) for China. That took up three straight days by itself.
This is the end of the summer lull though, because beginning this weekend, it will be non-stop stuff going on for the next five weeks straight...and then we go to China to bring our son home. Just breathe... :)
