less than 4 days to go!

And I finally figured out how to post a photo...all I needed to do was concentrate for a few moments and note the "add a picture" icon...sigh..for such a smart lady, sometimes I amaze myself. (I am shaking my head now,,Ben ben ben ( french for well, well well )) So we are almost packed...gulp there is so much to do, but it will have to remain for the last minute. There is no use for me to pack all the clothes and have the kids play in their luggage. I want to make sure Sébastein and Mia have everything they need when they stay over at Denise's. It is a big relief to know how well they will be there, My mom and my MIL have already stated that they will get the kids and spend time with them. that is really nice. I know Sébastien will be fine, he is such a trooper and he understands. Mia on the other hand, has no concept of what 2 weeks is and I worry that she will be lonesome. She is such a little sweetheart. Denise doen't know what a great little shadow she is about to have. Then again with her own 3 kids at home, she knows all about shadows. OK enough rambling, time to get something done.
Next week at this time I will have Kaï, I hope he will confortable enough with me to let me cuddle him by now.

And here is Kai ( Oct 2006)

Happy Mother's day!

I woke up to the wonderful sounds of the kids in my room and breakfast in bed. what a great way to start the day!
I have been packing a few things. Mostly trying to get organised. I start off with the best of intentions then it kinda goes south and I stuff everything in the bags. I am trying to do better. so up to now I have written everything that is in 1 suitcase so that I know where evereything is. I have calculated that by having 2 suitcases each of a max of 50lbs...hey that is 300 lbs of stuff I can bring! then reality is that it is 300 lbs we have to lug around the airport...and by "we" I do mean Daniel. well that is my vision of things to be. I am so excited, there is only 1 weekend left until we leave! My birthday is in 4 days, and I have to remind myself it is coming, usually I am looking forward to it, but this year it pales in comparison to getting Kaï.
We have not had any more info on him. nothing since last october, it is hard not to imagine all sorts of stuff about him. even thought he had a ball in his hands doesn't mean he is athletic.., ya know that kind of stuff. I look forward to learning who he is. Mia has picked up a lot of sign language words, it is cute to see. She is not too sure that she will like this new addition to the family. mostly it is that she will not be the baby anymore, I think that is the big issue, so I keep repeating to her that she is ot A baby, she is MY baby always and forever, and even when she will have a baby of her own, she will still be my baby, she finds that idea kinda funny.
Sébastien was at the playgound today and he was taking care of this little 3 yr old boy, he turns to me and said: Je me pratique pour être le grand-frère à Kaï. ( translation: I am practicing to be Kaï's big brother ) how cute is that!!

Last piece of the puzzle

We received a call from the province that our "Notice of Coming to CHina AKA Travel approval, aka TA" has arrived! youpee. that means that we could leave tomorrow if we wanted to. But we have to wait until the 26th as our tickets are bought, the hotel is booked and Daniel is all organized at work to leave in 4 weeks. I kinda wished I had gambled with the travel dates, we had the choice of the 5th of may or the 26th. I erred on the side of caution, sigh, there is a reason for everything, but I want my baby now. the days are flying by. I must say we are keeping busy with 3 kids at home. I am packing a few things. I will be a walking pharmacy by the time we get there. I am so afraid one of us will be sick and I won't have the right medication to help. So I would rather have more than enough instead of being up at 3 am with a sick child hoping I had a certain med.

Sebastien is so excited about gbetting a brother, he said today that he will teach Kai to jump really high on the beds...and as soon as he learns it, he will have to learn that you don't jump on the furniture ;-)
Genevieve wants to buy a fan in China with a dragon on it, she wants to give it to Simon, an 7 yr old boy in her class who is her " amoureux" boyfriend. oh my.
Mia is excited but she is not sure she likes the whole concept of not being the baby anymore.

We have LOA !!!

Yahoo, we received a message on the 4th of april fom Geneivève Forest-Allard ( adoption social worker) that our LOA had arrived, I was at wrok and we received the message after closing hours...and then we had to wait 4 whole days before we could get it signed!! It was the Easter Holidays..so on Tuesday April 10th our LOA was signed and returned to her so she could forward it to Bill Innes and then to CHINA!! Zippideedoodha ! Daniel signed his part in a church that was hosting a music festival...Geneviève was scheduled to play the piano in a competiton ( she received 3rd and 2nd place in her categorie..way to go!) I signed my part in the car on the way to the competition.. I was so excited to see this little piece of paper.
I had to go to work for 11am and at 11pm when I was done, Daniel had left me a message to call Yulin. So we set our travel dates already! We will be leaving may 26th, only 6 weeks away!!!! there is so much to do before we go...what do I pack?? I am so thrilled in about 43 days I will have my baby in my arms...Hold on Kaï, your maman is coming!

BONNE FETE KAI!

Ben oui, mon chum a 3 ans aujourd'hui... Que je suis heureuse qu'il granst bien, mais je suis tres triste de manquer cette occasion avec lui, j'étai sûre que nous allions être en Chine pas asteur, au moins avoir notre date de voyage...mais non, rien du tout, je trouve ceci très frustrant. Je sais que Kaï est bien a l'orphélinat ( OK je ne sais pas si il est bien ou non, mais faute de preuve du contraire je choisi de faire confience qu'il est bien et heureux) je me demande s'il regarde les photo que je lui avait envoyé a Noël, si il joue avec le touttou...sigh je m'ennuis de lui. On va faire une petite fête pour Kaï aujourd'hui, je vais prendre plein de photos avec ma nouvelle camera ( yeah airmiles) de cette façon, quand Kaï sera plus grand il verra que même si il n'est pas encore avec nous, il est quand même une grande partie de nos vies.
Je t'aime mon garçon.

A little update on Kai

This is what we received from Yulin today:
Height: 86 cm, Weight; 12.3 kg, Head Measurement: 47.5 cm, Chest Measurement: 51.5 cm, Tooth: 20, foot long: 13.5.
No pictures, When I saw this, I got teary eyed, someone somewhere touched my baby and measured him...does he know it was because his mother needed some idea on how well he is doing? Oh man, do I ever want him in my arms....I am happy he is growing so well, actually he is almost as tall as Mia, she is 87 cm and weights 11.9 kg.
so maybe the clothes I bought him will fit him well.
I am lonely for him tonight ;-(

On the right track

Well at 8:45 this am, Yulin called to let me know that our file had indeed been misplace, it was witht the NSN files, and that as of yesterday we were in the review room, she called it dept 1, then in about a month we should be in dept 2, where the SC ( seeking confirmation ) letter will be issued, we are to sign it and return it to China, then the TA will be sent. so Yeahhh, we are on the right track, I was hoping that she would call to say that we were getting TA, but hey a girl has got to dream at times, I am glad that things are moving ahead, lately I have been feeling a bit of the stress of the unknown, when are we travelling, are we moving to Ottawa? is my mom going to be OK, she is getting operated for intestinal cancer tomorrow. I am finding myslef a bit stressed. I have to go see my doctor today, that really bothers me, I don't like her, I really don't feel the connection with her I should be have with my family MD. anyways I am going to ask for a referral for Kaï to the ORL, so we can get him on their waiting list.
Mia is outside my door playing iwth her dolls, she is such a sweetheart, I can't wait for Kaï to be able to play with his brother and sisters. Sébastien told me last night that he wants someone to sleep in his room. His way of saying he wants his little brother ? It is such an abstact thing for them to understand and it is taking soooooo long to happen. OK, if all goes well, we will be travelling in April, it will be a nice time to be in Beijing, the flowers will be out. I will have time to finish my mandarin classes. the exam is the 2nd of april...It looks like Kaï will be celebrating another birthday without his family, sniff sniff, but I swear we will never miss another one again!!!

Centorian Club

well on Sunday we officially had a TA wait of 100 days. drat. and we received a call at about 10 am from Yulin ( who is in China) that our file had been misplaced. NOT what I tought she was calling about, sigh, we were apparently in the NSN pile or something, Daniel spoke with Yulin, so I got the translation of the phone conversation. Now that we are back in the right pile, dos that mean we go to the bottom of that pile or does the 100 days we have been waiting count for something??? Yulin will call us sometimes this week with more information, and also I had requested an update on Kaï. I want to see my baby ;-( we are missing so much of him growing up, a little update would mean the world to me.
I have been buying clothes for my little guy. I don't know what size he wears, I just feel I need to do something that makes me feel closer to him. We had a visite from the Itinerant Teacher for the HOH children for NB. Her name is Jasmine, she was awesome, explained what the benefits of the audio/visual program and that Ottawa has the same philosophy with regards to the Hearing impaired children, which is to get them to talk and they are going to follow Kaï until he graduates from high school . I spoke to her about our fear that he will not hear us when we will be in China, so she gave me the name of the audiologist at the George Dumont Hospital that will be helping us with his case and maybe she will have a suggestion. I will be calling her today -it is to early for now. We speak of Kaï everyday, the kids are getting ready mentally to have their younger brother. They know that for a while Kaï will have special priviledges -like sitting on my lap when I am eating-a big no-no for them!
I read other people's blogs are they are really funny and witty...I don't feel very witty today. A part of me is in China and I really don't know when I will be whole again. I want my family united. OK end of pity-party!
I am happy-I am healthy-and gosh darn it ! people like me! ( from the " Fire me up" book from Katie MacAllister, what a funny book)

Still trying to figure this blog thing out

It is now a few days later, and I have almost given up..for today at least, to try and post a picture of Kaï, the darn thing doesn't transfer, anyways that will be sor some other time, I guess. Someone asked me, when they found out I was blogging, that it meant I had a computer to update the blog while in China...huhhh no. Hopefully I have access to someone elses. I did want to save up for one..but for anyone that knows me, well you won't be sruprised to find out I didn't quite save up enough, oh well, nive try. I did save up enough to possibly buy a Nintendo DS, now that would be fun, and it could keep Geneviève occupied on the trip. She is a wonderful traveler, not like her mom, I turn green and feel sick with every air turbulance..the things we do for our kids, as there is no way I am not going to china, jet lag, nausea and all! I am still waiting for FOI to send us an update on Kaï and to information on our file, we are over 80 days ;-(

Premier message/first message

Bonjour tous le monde. Bienvenue a mon blog, une place pour laisser mes pensées sur l'adoption prochaine de Kaï et de ma p'tite famille. Puisque la majorité du monde qui va lire ce blog seront anglophone, je vais continuer en Anglais..je suis sur que Daniel aurait quelque chose a dire cotre ça, mais heck, c'est mon Blog..je t'm Daniel ;-)
To translate I welcome you to my blog, a place that I can write my thoughts on the upcoming adoption of our youngest child, Kaï Zhiyan Haché
He is going to be 3 yrs old on march 24, 2007, I hope we can be there before and celebrate it with him.
We received Kaï referral on sept. 22nd '06. and sent our LOI ( letter of intent ) to China nov 12th '06 ... it took a bit of time for us to be able to have all the information re: the health of Kaï. He has bilateral Microtia, meaning his ears are very little and he has no ear canal. so he can hear very little. When we wrote up our homestudy we had written that we would consider a child with heart problems ( ASD/VSD ) cleft lip/cleft palate, Thalassemia B trait, I forget what else, anyways we finished our list with : we would consider a boy child born from jan 2004 and dec 2005 with a mild correctable SN. When FOI called us to say they had a file on a 2 1/2 yr old boy with little ears, we said sure!! BUT...we ( well I) had to read up on hearing loss, I know Kaï will have hearing aids but hearing loss is no little matter, manageable yes, but not a non-issue. Also I needed to know that his heart and his kidneys were OK, and after 6 weeks we finally received the results of tests that were fine...so we said YES! and wrote the LOI, Daniel did it actually and it was a beautifully written letter. brought tears to my eyes. My husband can be wonderful sometimes.
So now we are on day 80 of TA wait, the final OK from China to go get our son. Even thought we have gone throught this process once when we adopted Mia in Jan '04, I feel like this time the wait is even harder, maybe it is because I know how Kaï is, and that he is growing without us.
In October he liked to examine toys before he played with them, he would help the younger children put their shoes on.
sigh... I can't wait to know him more. He is going to be a beautiful addition to our family. I guess I am all typed out for today, bye