The TA (Travel Authorization)

We have finally been authorized to travel by the Chinese government!  So what does that mean?  It is the last step in finalizing our plans to go and get our new daughter! (Well, second to the last step—there always seems to be one more.)  We can now submit dates to the US consulate in Guangzhou for our final court date that will issue our new daughter her passport.  Once we have an approved court date we can set our travel plans. We received our travel visas a couple of weeks ago, and were hoping things would be coming together soon!  Fun fact: while my and the kids visas are good for 10 years, Dave’s is only good for 90 days because he is a pastor. So we were starting to feel a little antsy waiting for our TA.   Right now we are hoping that we will be able to leave the last week of February-beginning of March.  

So, if you haven’t been around Dave or I and our cell phones recently, you have probably not seen a picture of our new daughter, so let me introduce you:

Lulu (her nickname—we have not decided on her official name yet, I have this weird thing of needing to physically meet my children before I can decide on their name—and yes Dave just goes along with this— is 5 years old and is from  Changsha in the Hunan province of China. 

From what we understand she is a fun kiddo with a feisty personality and should fit right in with my quiet, shy, introverted children—sorry for the weak attempt at humor!   We cannot wait to meet her!  And no she does not speak any English, nor do we speak Mandarin,, Xiang, Gan, Hakka or any other form of Chinese.  Thank goodness for translator apps!

So, hopefully everything is going to come together quickly now! Please pray for us, for our travel and our planning, but most of all for our new daughter.  Her world is about to be turned upside down, and we want  as many prayers possible for her (and wisdom for us) as she starts a whole new life. 

I will post again before we leave for China.  Once again thank you all for your support and encouragement,  having friends on the journey makes all the difference!

p.s.  As I am bloggerly challenged, if anyone can tell me how to change the square pic that appears with the blog post on FB, I would be grateful :)