Kai's care package

The day we got our LOA we contacted Lady Bugs and Love and ordered Kai a care package. We weren't allowed to do that until we got our official "yes" from China so you better believe I got on that quickly! Some of our most treasured pictures from when we adopted Rhett was when we got photos of him seeing us in a picture book and eating a cake we ordered for him and his friends. It's like he officially knew we were coming for him. This morning our agency emailed us two pictures they received from his "party". I'm not sure if we'll get anymore but you can believe that I was happy to get these!!

I mean COME ON! Look at his sweet face! And you know we ARE from Texas so I say "go big or go home" about that cake!! Hilarious!! Listen, we don't mess around.

I can't wait to kiss his sweet little cheeks. 

Soon....

What's next?

Before we talk about anything else lets just take another look at our little sweetie.....

*sigh*.........

He's just too precious. And I'm so thrilled that we can actually share his photos and tell you a little about him.

His name right now is An Fu Rui. He lives in Guizhou, China. An Shun City to be exact. We found that An means "peaceful" and Fu means "blessing" and so we chose to keep those two names in his new name. Just like we did with Rhett and Adiah. So Micaiah James AnFu Woods. And I can't wait to get him home and start the journey of us learning about him and him learning about us and all the fun stuff in between.

So now that we've been approved by getting our LOA you'd think we can just hop on a plane like yesterday, right? For those who followed along with our other adoption journeys then you know there are a few more steps to take before we can go. Thus, the estimated mid August to early September travel time frame.

I found this handy dandy graphic floating around the world wide web that *sort of* explains what all happens during a Chinese adoption process.

We are currently on step 9. Yesterday I mailed off our I800 application which is basically our immigration application to bring home this specific child. Once approved steps 10-13 kinda happen with out me knowing much. They kinda happen behind the scenes. Which is weird but hey....can't change it.So I'm thinking late July or early August before we get Travel Approval. That's just a guess.

BUT OH the paperwork that now we get to do in order to prepare for travel. And by that I mean starting this morning after I get done typing this I'll be up to my EAR BALLS (yes, I made that up and in my head it sounds awesome so I'm keeping it right there) in paperwork, paperwork, paperwork. I ate my breakfast, took my greens and vitamins, did my stretches so now I'm ready. I can do it!!!

Kai is so worth it!

Wait....say whaaaa? (aka LOA, baby!!!)

So.....

today around 3pm I had decided that yet again our LOA would not arrive since it was already 4pm where our agency is. I figured that maybe Friday it would come.

At 3:01 pm I was sitting at the computer checking email and facebook when I saw at notification that I had just gotten another email. I clicked over and this is what it said...

"LOA Arrived & Next steps!"

Come again....??

I stared at the screen and then literally SCREAMED my head off. A couple of times.
And then I hugged my daughter and called my husband, and told the rest of the kids! (I did eventually get a call from our family coordinator. I guess she sent the email first.)


China says YES!

Introducing you to our son, Micaiah James AnFu Woods! Aka:Kai Aka:little man Aka:our boy

We are over the moon excited and can't wait to go get him! We have a few more steps to go through in order to get travel approval. Estimating a mid August-early September travel time frame. We shall see. But first...We CELEBRATE!!!

Well here we are....Dragon Boat Festival

Dragon Boat Festival in China

"The Dragon Boat Festival (Duanwu Festival, Duānwǔ Jié, Double Fifth, Tuen Ng Jit) is a
traditional holiday that commemorates the life and death of the famous Chinese scholar
Qu Yuan (Chu Yuan). The festival occurs on the fifth day of the fifth month on the 
Chinese lunar calendar.

What Do People Do?

The Dragon Boat Festival is a celebration where many eat rice dumplings (zongzi), drink realgar wine
(xionghuangjiu), and race dragon boats. Other activities include hanging icons of Zhong Kui (a mythic
guardian figure), hanging mugwort and calamus, taking long walks, writing spells and wearing perfumed 
medicine bags.

All of these activities and games such as making an egg stand at noon were regarded by the ancients as
an effective way of preventing disease, evil, while promoting good health and well-being. People
sometimes wear talismans to fend off evil spirits or they may hang the picture of Zhong Kui, a guardian 
against evil spirits, on the door of their homes.

In the Republic of China, the festival was also celebrated as "Poets' Day" in honor of Qu Yuan, who

is known as China's first poet. Chinese citizens traditionally throw bamboo leaves filled with cooked

rice into the water and it is also customary to eat tzungtzu and rice dumplings."

June 9-12...Chinese National Holiday

If you're wondering how I feel about Dragon Boat 
Festival....I'm all for it! Truly. Enjoy! But please....can
you come back from said festival and issue us our LOA? 
Thanks. 

Love, 

The mama who loves a good celebration but desperately 
wants her baby boy home

Missing you

It's Friday night.Emily is out with friends. Natalie is at a choir banquet. Ridge, Adiah, and Rhett are watching spider man with your dad. And I'm sitting here desperately missing you. A boy whom I've never physically met before. Kai...Mommy can't wait to hold you and whisper in your ear how much I love you as I tuck you in at night. It's crazy to miss someone so much that you've never met. But I can't quit dreaming about these hands....

And these feet....

It's only been 10 days since we've been logged in and 18 days since we saw your face. And I can't quit seeing you in my mind. Or when I look at the family table and imagine you around it. Or when I see little kids running around at restaurants. I see you. I think of you. I pray for you. And I can't wait to hug you and kiss you. And for you to know that you have a mommy and a daddy and sisters and brothers who can't wait to do the same. Praying our LOA comes quickly....

LID and LOI

Today we received the news that we are officially logged in and our Letter of Intent was sent as well. Now the 2-3 month count down until we are approved by the Chinese govt (LOA). Easy peasy..... (hah). Lots to do anyway to prepare for our boy so I'll try to use my time wisely! Plus,, with the end of school flurry of events I'm sure the time will pass quickly. Thats what I'm telling myself anyway. Don't burst my bubble!

What's in a name?

Thank you so much for sharing our joy with us! What an amazingly exhausting week we had. And now the amazingly exhausting wait for our acceptance letter (LOA) and TA (travel approval).

Many of you asked me when we can go get him now that we know who he is. Well, I wish I could say that it would be this week but not so much. I would have to say that I think it will be 4-5 months from now before we can go. Maybe longer or maybe sooner. Only God knows. But on average that's what people wait after accepting a referral.

So why the name?

Obviously what you name your child is a huge decision as you definitely want to name them something that means a lot. And something they can grow into. It's as if you are speaking something over there lives. So we spent many months thinking on this.

As we stated before we are going to name him Micaiah James *chinese name* Woods.  With Adiah and Rhett we chose to keep one of their Chinese names as one of their middle names and we will do this with him as well.

Micaiah is a prophet from the bible. You can read about him in 1 Kings 22. I had forgotten about this story but when I was at a women's event at our church our Worship pastor's wife, Aunie, was speaking that night. She had another message prepared but God laid on her heart that day to change her message and speak about something else and use this scripture. In this scripture, Jehosephat and Ahab were wanting to take over some land that didn't belong to them. They wanted to do it but decided to consult with some prophets to see if God would look favorably on them if they did. Would they succeed, basically. So they consulted with 400 prophets and each prophet told them to go for it (my words). Jehosephat didn't really feel satisfied with that and asked if there wasn't any other prophet they could ask. Ahab said "There is still one prophet in whom we can inquire of the Lord, but I hate him because he never prophesies anything good about me, but always bad. He is Micaiah son of Imlah." In other words, he never tells me what I want to hear.  He just says what God tells him.
You can read the rest of the story but I loved the name when I heard it so I came home and studied that scripture some more. I looked up what the name Micaiah means and it means "who is like God". So after talking with Brian we agreed and decided on that. I'm SO glad Aunie changed her message that night! We plan to call him Kai.

James is Brian's dad's name. Brian always said if we ever had another boy he would like to name him after his dad. Brian says that Papa Jim (what the kids call him) didn't have the easiest upbringing as the youngest of 4 boys in a preacher/carpenter's home in West Texas. There was love but over the years Brian has learned there were also a lot of challenges. So Brian has watched as most of his dad's life he fought for things that weren't easy, but always believed he could. I see so much of that in Brian even today - and we both want that trait to be true for our latest son. He may have not had the easiest beginnings in life - but he will be a Woods now! So Micaiah James is the name - and his Chinese name (we'll have to write about that after we are allowed!) and Woods round it out...

May he always say what God tells him, never settle for going with the crowd, and always believe that with God he can achieve anything - even when he knows it won't be easy!