Introducing...

Here she is!!!

Teagin Fu Min Sitzman

Date of Birth: December 10, 2010

Given Name:  Gan Fu Min

Sex:  Female

Province:  Jiangxi

As of April 3, she was 21.5 inches long and weighed 10.58 pounds.  So she’s tiny. 

We FINALLY got our call today.  I didn’t think it was going to happen.  But at 3:36 pm today, the phone finally rang!!!  She is absolutely perfect!  I cannot wait to see her!!!

Today was such an agonizing day.  Because of the holiday, the deliveries were later than normal.  I can’t even describe what I was feeling when we got the call.  I know that I did start crying and didn’t hear much of what our coordinator said to us.  Today has been one of the worst and BEST days of my life!!!

I'm in Labor!

Isn’t this a beautiful sight? 

I can’t wait for my call.  After 5 long years, the wait is finally over.  The agency should be calling us tomorrow and also should be emailing us a picture.  Of COURSE I’ll post it as soon as possible.  I am going to get it to immediate family before that happens, though.  For those of you wondering what we are naming Little Dumpling, well, you’ll find out tomorrow too! 

Now, all I can do is wonder and dream.  What will she look like?  Will she like music as much as her new mommy and daddy?  Will she like to read?  Will she be interested in her daddy’s coin collecting hobby?  Will she be a tom boy or will she be a girly girl?  

You know what?

I DON’T CARE! 

She is going to be absolutely perfect in her own way.  I’ll love her no matter what.  Even if she becomes a Viking’s fan…even if she is an Iowa Hawkeye fan, I’ll still love her.  Football games could become dicey, but hey, that makes it fun!

I HATE WALLPAPER

We started working on Little Dumpling’s room.  The people who lived there before us wallpapered the room in ABC wall paper.  Not bad for a kid’s room, I suppose.  It’s just not my taste. 

Add to that, they did a very poor job of putting the stuff up on the wall.

We’ve decided on a Classic Pooh theme, with pink walls and green accents.  Yes, kind of girly.  My mom is helping by making a comforter and crib accessories.  So the ABC theme in primary colors just didn’t make the cut. 

Here’s a fun fact:  It was the Chinese who invented the wall paper. 

So, with the difficulty one has in removing the stuff, I wanted to curse the descendents of the one who first did it.   But I can’t.  I could potentially be cursing Little Dumpling and my future grandchildren, etc. 

If anyone has ever removed wallpaper, you know the torture we’ve endured.

Priming is next.   Then paint.    I didn’t want to paint because, my luck, we’d paint the room pink and then be referred a boy.  This way, we aren’t wasting our time!

So, this is what the room looks like now in its evolution.

Am I Finally in Labor???

So today, the rumor of a cutoff of June 30, 2006 was validated as fairly true.  This is shocking because of the size, BUT…..

OMG!!!  I’ll get to see Little Dumpling’s face soon!!!!!  I can’t wait!!!  I can’t concentrate!!!!!  My emotions are a mess!  I can go from crying to giggling like a small child at Christmas in less than 60 seconds! 

My biggest emotion though?  Overwhelming and utter and sheer relief.  Relief that this long wait has come to an end.  Relief that we don’t have very many more hoops to jump through for the government.  Relief that, after five long years, I’ll get to see my baby’s face….and the relief from the knowledge that I’ll be holding Little Dumpling in my arms within the next couple of months!

So now, the pins and needles wait has started.  When will we get the call?  Will it be today?  Tuesday?  Wednesday?  I sure hope it’s before Thursday.  My birthday is on June 1 so I REALLY want to see her before then. 

BEST

BIRTHDAY

PRESENT

EVER!!!

Stay tuned….more to come!!!!

The Waiting Roller Coaster

We’re currently on some peculiar loop de loop of the Waiting Roller Coaster. 

Jason, my loving husband, was awoken in the middle of the night by a thunderstorm that was rolling through.  Because we have DirectTv, when it rains hard, the signal is lost, so he couldn’t pull up the Weather Channel to see the satellite.  So, he got out his laptop and pulled their site up.  That led to a surfing session which landed him on the Rumor Queen site (where all China Adopters go for rumors).

Rumor Queen posted last night that she had seen a rumor floating around for a cutoff date of June 30, 2006. 

The poor guy got so excited.  He got up, paced around the house for a bit, debating if he should wake me up to share the news or not.  So, the one night that I’m actually sleeping well this week, he starts shaking me…”Honey, honey, wake up!”

Well, that did the trick.  I’ve been up since 3 a.m.  I’m shaking like a leaf….not sure if it’s because I’m tired or excited….

I want to jump up and down!

I want to crawl under my blankets and hide until I’m certain…..

See, if this rumor turns out to be false, and the cutoff date is earlier than June 27, 2006, I’m going to be devastated.  Heartbroken. 

I’ll also know that I’m next, but I’m afraid I’ve gotten my hopes up so high now that this week will be IT that I’m going to be severely disappointed.  I’ve watched friends see their kiddos graduate…kids I used to baby sit are parents now and I’m still waiting……

So, my friends and family, stay tuned!  This ride is getting WILD!!!

Contractions

Yesterday, a rumor was reported that the CCCWA is preparing to match.  With the cutoff date being so close to our LID, my question today is:

Am I in full labor or am I just having Braxton-Hicks contractions?

Here’s my pregnancy analogy:

·         Referral = Full labor

·         Travel Approval = Water broke

·         Travel to China = Beginning to push

·         Little Dumpling in my arms = I just gave birth

Not sure how else to equate it. 

We’ve been waiting 1,762 days at this point.  When we actually travel to China, we’ll have completed our third elephant. 

Stay tuned for further updates!  They’ll be coming soon!

Countdown

Well, the countdown has started for the next batch.  That leaves us right now with two questions:

Will we be in with this month?

Or

Will we be left out of this month and be in next month’s?

Unfortunately, our Log In Date is currently in a cusp position.  If they do a normal size or larger batch, we’re in.  If they do a small batch like last time, we’re not.  OK, so last times was actually miniscule. 

Because we’re in this holding pattern, if you will, we’ve started working on getting everything together for the trip.  I wanted to start now because once we get that referral, we’re going to be running around like chickens with their heads cut off.  It’s going to be exciting AND stressful.

We’ve also started working on Little Dumpling’s room.  We’ve removed all of the wall paper.  We now need to scrub down the walls to get any residual adhesives and paper off.  Once that’s done, we’ll prime.  I think I’m going to leave the painting until after we get the referral.  My biggest fear is that we paint the walls the lovely shade of palest pink and we get a referral for a boy. 

One of my other “stresses” is what if we get a referral for twins?  We only took five years to agree on the girl’s name we picked out (no, you have to wait for the referral announcement to hear what it is).  A boy’s name was relatively easy.  We had immediate agreement on that one.  But a second girl’s name?  That would be a major challenge.  The other stress about twins is that we would have to go out and buy two of EVERYTHING…well, except the stroller….they make those for twins.

Will a boy or twins happen?  Probably not.  But we have to be mentally prepared for it.  All I know is I’m glad that I’m going to be a mommy soon!  (OK, my friend Wendy insists that I already am a mommy…that Little Dumpling is waiting for me)  So I should rephrase that as I’m glad I’m going to be able to hold my baby soon!

..ooOOoo..

I REALLY need to figure out how to insert pictures into this blog.  I need to figure it out before we go to China, since this blog is how we’re going to be sharing our adoption trip.  I’ve signed up for a Flickr account, but Blogger and Flickr don’t seem to “talk” to each other.  So now I have to find a photo sharing site that it likes.  If anyone knows of a site, could you please let me know?

On the Randomness of Referrals (And other mindless drivel)

So the latest batch came out.  The official cut-off date hasn’t been confirmed yet, but it appears that June 20, 2006 was the cut off.  Below is a list of words I am using to describe the size of the batch:

·         Pathetic

·         Wretched

·         Dismal

·         Shameful

·         Depressing

·         Dreary

·         Disheartening

·         Disappointing

·         Discouraging

Get the picture? 

So what does that mean for us?  I’m not really sure.  Usually at this point of the wait, a person can accurately guess when they’ll get their referrals, but here’s the crux of the issue.  There’s a chance we could be next.  So do we assume that?  Get our hopes up?  Use that as the incentive to really start booking on our home projects that absolutely HAVE to get done?  I suppose so.  But there’s another side to doing that.  If we assume we’re next, and we aren’t, it’s going to be heartbreaking.  It WILL mean that we’d be in the next group, but still….

What do we have done?  Not much.  We did purchase a crib, so we’re a bit further along.  We haven’t had a chance to do a whole lot.  April was a weird month for us.  The week of the 4^th through the 8^th, I was making cheesecakes for my dad’s 70^th birthday party.  We’ve been battling illnesses all winter, as well, and April was no exception.  Hopefully, we’re past that and can now focus on what we need to. 

We have 2 projects that we need to get done.  The baby room is the main one.  That’s the one that’s going to be time consuming.  The other is to get the bath tub resurfaced.  It’s an old cast iron tub, original to the house, and the enamel had pretty much worn off when we purchased the house.  We had no way of replacing the tub (it was placed in the bathroom before they built the wall with the door) because no tubs would fit!  So we purchased one of those lovely do-it-yourself re-enameling  kits where you paint the toxic substance on yourself.  Um, that worked well.  Yeah, right.  We found a place that will resurface your tub for you and it’s supposed to last about 20 years.  Ding ding ding.  We’re doing that this time around.  So, yeah, it will cost more, but it should come out a lot better too. 

Jason, in the meantime, has replaced the doors in our house.  We found that NOTHING is plumb in the house.  There are absolutely NO right angles at all.  They don’t even come close! 

Another project that’s being done, most likely tonight, is replacement of the garage door opened.  The motor went out last night.  Fun, fun. 

We also need a new water heater. 

Why does EVERYTHING happen at once???

We still have to work at finalizing a packing list and we have to buy a car seat, stroller, pack-n-play, clothes, toys, diapers, wipes, formula, etc.  So the clothes and diapers and formula will have to wait.  We won’t know what size she is until we get the referral.  Shoot, we won’t even know if she is a SHE until we get the referral.  Boys have been known to pop up every so often.  Hope not.  All of the bedding is girly – pink, green and brown. 

Not much else happening on the home front.