June Brings us a Whole 6 More Days of Referrals

Referrals began arriving today from China and so far the latest Log-in-Date (LID) that is being reported as receiving a referral is November 7, 2005.

The last LIDs covered by referrals in May were November 1st. So in a month's time we've managed to proceed forward a whopping 6 days (lots of sarcasm added).

Folks are predicting that it may take 5 more months for all of the waiting parents with a November 2005 LID to receive a referral.

This will push us way back in terms of when we get our referral. At this point, I am tired of guessing as to when we will get our referral. It seems that every time we think we will be getting our referral "in the Summer" it becomes "in the Fall" now it is becoming "maybe by December???"

Words cannot begin to express the frustration-- with so many things. In addition to the frustration of the never ending wait . . .

I'm tired of the same people asking how the adoption is going-- obviously it is going very freaking slow!

I am tired of the same people asking why it is taking so long--- nobody really knows and the possibility of answers doesn't change.

I am REALLY tired of hearing people say, A) "It will all be worth it after you have your baby." and B)"You'll forget all about the pain of the wait after you have your baby."

A) If we didn't think it would be worth the wait we wouldn't still be waiting would we?

B) Really? Are you sure? Even if you are sure do you really think that is the best thing to say to someone who has been waiting nearly 18 months to complete an adoption that was only suppose to take 6 to 8 months?

I've talked to plenty of people who had very difficult pregnancies and labors who decided that experiencing it once was enough-- they didn't forget that pain.

I know even more people who said the pain of raising a teenage really made them re-think the whole parenting thing altogether LOL.

Really, if you want to help a parent who is currently waiting for a referral to adopt from China, give them some chocolate and a glass of red wine.

Yes, sick humor. That truly is all I have these days.

Now that I am done venting---

Regardless of how frustrating this wait has become life goes on . . .

Xavier was busy this past month constructing a fort, you can tell he is really happy about it by his enthusiasm in the picture on the left LOL. The picture on the right barely catches him in covert operations involving secret details only known to him.

Gabrielle has had a few band concerts over the past month the first one was her Spring concert at school. Wim took a very nice picture of her with her saxophone.

Her next performance was at a PawSox ballgame. For those of you who aren't

familiar, this is the Rhode Island Red Sox-- B team or something of that nature.

I believe they are part of the same team(??) or something of that nature as the Boston Red Sox-- just a lower level.

Gabrielle is in the middle of the picture on the right and the next picture is of all the kids on the field. Several schools participated in playing the National Anthem at the game.

It was a school night so we stayed and watched the first 4 innings before heading home. Wim and I enjoyed watching the game, but the kids were bored with it.

That is it for all the interesting happenings this past month. Less interesting happenings include painting the kitchen, getting a new dishwasher, a new grill, and sanding and refinishing the dining-room and den floors.

We are readily looking forward to fun times at the beach during the Summer months.

Stay tuned for next month's post where the rate of referrals may surprise by covering an entire week!!! For those who don't know me well-- this is dripping with sarcasm.

TTFN

May Referrals bring us into November-- Finally!!

Hi Folks,

The referrals that arrived in April were too dismal to really report-- they only covered 2-days, October 25th and 26th. Referrals arrived this past week and finally made it to November 1, 2005.

For those not familiar with how China issues referrals or what, even, a referral is. . .

A referral is when adoptive parents are actually matched with a baby and it contains a picture of the baby and scant information about the baby (birth date, weight, basic medical information etc. from last exam). The agency in China that is responsible for adoptions is the CCAA-- I can't remember what the acronym stands for.

When the CCAA issues referrals, they issue them through a date-- so the next batch of referrals will be for November 2, 2005 through ???

With this last batch of referrals October 27-Nov. 1, all waiting families whose paperwork was registered with China during that time frame in 2005 received a referral-- regardless of the agency they are using or the country they live in-- all waiting families received a referral.

The date that an adoptive family's paperwork (also called a dossier) is registered in China is called a Log-in-Date and is often abbreviated LID. Our LID is December 20, 2005. So we only have 48 more LID ahead of us.

Sound good right? Who the heck knows. Some folks think it might take 4 months for the CCAA to issue referrals for all the November families. At this point we are thinking/hoping that we will get our referral between August and October of this year. But, as we keep learning in this process, that date is always subject to change. It sure would be nice if it changed in a good way and became shorter!

At least the weatherer is getting nicer-- Spring has sprung in Little Rhody. Here are some pictures from a trip to the beach to see some seals. It was a nice walk through the woods down to the water.

Nursery and Quilt

These posts are a bit sporadic-- but there really isn't a whole let to tell at this point. Just a tremendous amount of waiting. During the wait, a lot of house painting. We probably should have done some before and after photos, but I just am not quite that with it. The part of actually getting to the "after the before" is enough.
:-D

I think I have figured out the camera well enough to finally upload some photos of the nursery and the 100 wish quilt.

This is the tree that took me ~4 1/2 hours -- that is just for the tree. Please don't ask how long it took to do the entire room! We did it over a period of several months.


I also made/am making the cushion in the chair. I still have a few more things to do to it.


How do you like the pelican toy holder? I got that at Ikea. They have the greatest stuff!


Below is a picture of the bunny that Gabrielle painted--next to it is the wishing well she painted. She did both free-handed. Pretty darn good!





















Xavier painted the flowers and dragonflies (using stencils). He used silver and gold colors for his because he wanted them to be valuable.


You may have noticed that the bunny is yawning. That is because the bunny is next to the crib and I painted a night-scape in this corner. I used stencils for the stars.


The 100-wish quilt is draped over the crib-- and you can't really see it very well so there is one more picture of it below.















I am going to try and be better about posting-- I will try to post at least once a month when referrals arrive to let folks know where we are at. Right now, referrals are still arriving for the month of October 2005.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Day 2006 was a wet one! All of us traveled to visit relatives in Portsmouth, RI, enjoy some turkey and all the fixin's.

The day was pretty uneventful but it was nice to be together with family for the Holiday. Gabrielle and Xavier enjoyed playing bumper pool. Although, Xavier was a bit beside himself because Gabrielle kept winning.

We managed to get a couple photos of all grandma's grandkids sitting together at the same time. From left to right there is Nate, Gabrielle, Abbie, Xavier, and Ethan.

We can't wait to add our little Josie to the happy picture. Hopefully-- next Thanksgiving she'll be in there with her sister, brother, and all her cousins.

Starting to Blog

Hi. We are Reena Shaw and Wim Chase. The picture to the right is of us at a wedding for Wim's cousin, Jon. The kind of wierd looking guy behind Wim's head is our brother-in-law Bob. He doesn't ussually look so funny. I think he got a bubble in his eye.

Also in our family are Wim's children from his first marriage, Gabrielle (10) and Xavier (8).



We have one kitty, Anita. She came with Wim and his kids, so I affectionately refer to her as my step-cat, need-a-kitty. Not to be forgotten is Xavier's leopard gecko, Dave.

We began our adoption journey well over a year ago with our homestudy. We managed to navigate through all the paperwork using a homestudy agency, Red Thread Adoption, located here in New England and an adoption agency, Great Wall China Adoption (GWCA), located in Texas.

We completed our paperchase on December 9, 2005 and our dossier was sent to China. Our log-in-date (LID) is December 20, 2005.

It has been very tumultuous waiting this past year. When we began the process the wait time to referral was 6-8 months. When our paperwork was sent to China, our agency told us the wait time had increased to 8 to 10 months.

The referral wait time is currently 14 to 15 months and growing. Right now, Wim and I are hopeful that we will get our referral this summer in June or July, meaning we will have waited 18 months from our LID and nearly 2 years since we began the paperchase . The last batch of referrals arrived from China on November 30th and covered log-in-dates from August 25th through September 8th of 2005. We are slowly getting closer.

Right now we have contact our local Center for Immigration Services because our fingerprints will expire this month and we need to have them re-done. Here is an example of how screwed-up our government is-- how exactly does one's fingerprints expire? The cost of re-doing the fingerprints is $70 each for Wim and I. Why can't they just run our prints through the system to see if we have committed any felonies. It's crazy!

Although, we may as well get use to it. With this wait getting so long, we will have to re-do all of our paperwork for the US government--not China-- USA. Can anybody say cha-ching? For those wondering, the biggest part of the cost of adopting goes to our very own Uncle Sam and we all know what he is doing with it these days.

I am keeping busy decorating the nursery. I am painting stencils of flowers, birds, a tree. Those who know me well are surprised to see how much Michelangelo I have in me, LOL. I also purchased a sewing machine and a friend is going to teach me how to sew so I can make a 100-wish quilt for our little Josie. We already have the 100+ quilt squares, I just need to sew them together. A somewhat daunting task for someone who has never sewed more than buttons on a shirt.

We will try to get some pictures posted soon.