We received word that a package had left China via DHL and was en route to our agency on Friday, September 22^nd. Needless to say, we checked the website frequently to follow it’s progress. It reached the DHL facility in Dublin (Bay Area) on Saturday, September 23^rd at 9:23 am. Since DHL does not deliver on the weekend, we now had to wait until Monday to see when it would get to our agency. We were told that even if the package was delivered on Monday, that it would have to be processed and overnighted to our agency’s local office. Well after this long a wait we weren’t going to let 82 miles keep us away from our daughter’s picture for one minute longer than necessary.

At 12:13 pm on Monday, September 25^th the package was delivered to our agency’s office in Orinda. We had made arrangements with another couple from our agency that will be receiving their referral to carpool together to get our referrals. I (Valorie) jumped on to lightrail (commuter train) to head home to await “the call.” At 1:05 pm (while still on the train) I received “the call.” Misha, our agency rep told me our daughter’s name, birth date and province where she is located. I was so overwhelmed that I couldn’t figure out how old she is (she’s 7 months, I wrote down 9). I notified her that we would be driving to Orinda office and she gave us a 3:30 appointment. I immediately called Jojo and our immediate family to share our wonderful news and then we were on our way.

We arrived at 3:30 for our appointment with Andrea (rep) and Val (agency owner) -it only took us an hour to get there :0) The moment we saw her face for the first time we couldn’t contain our emotions any longer. She is beautiful and precious and PERFECT!!!

Throughout this entire long process, I cannot tell you how many times people would tell us “You’ll get the right baby when it’s meant to happen,” or “It’ll happen when the time is right.” I often thought that I might scream if I heard that one more time. We were tired of waiting for this baby that we have dreamed of for over a year and we wanted her now. I don’t know how they do it, but the CCAA could not have matched us with a more PERFECT baby. She is everything that we have dreamed and prayed for (healthy, young and chubby- you know we like the chubby babies :0) She looks soooo much like Jojo and is a perfect blend between the baby pictures that we submitted with our dossier. Have I mentioned that she is PERFECT?

We are truly in awe of this wonderful gift that God has blessed us with and entrusted to us. She has already changed our lives immensely. I do believe in HIS power and have felt HIS love. God is good!

The next step in the process is to wait for Travel Approval (this should take 2 to 3 weeks) and then make our consulate appointments with the US Embassy in China (the last appointment in the adoption process in China). We anticipate to be traveling in 4 to 6 weeks (last week of October/beginning November).

Thank you to all of our family and friends for all of your unending support during this process. We hope that you will continue to follow along on our journey to China and back. Our journey is just beginning………