Yesterday we received an "On Deck" e-mail from our Agency! After long months of waiting and discouragement at the continued extended wait times, we are finally getting very excited. I doubt out LID will come up in the March referrals, but we're hopeful that April or May will bring our news. The tunnel now has a bright light at the end!

It's just over two years now that our paperwork was logged in at the CCAA (January 13, 2006). As of today the CCAA has referred children through December 19, 2005. Based on the last few months referrals of getting through just 5 or 6 days per month, it may yet be several months before we see our referral. We are so looking forward to it!

In November and December our family had the opportunity to participate in a music missions trip to Bordeaux, France. Below is a picture we took as we travelled to the coast for some sightseeing. It was a terrific experience, and you can read the details on our blog at musicalheirs.blogspot.com.

On Friday, August 3, the CCAA announced it had placed children with families whose documents had been completed before November 21, 2005. Just 7 weeks of documents until ours is completed!

Those 7 weeks may possibly drag into 7 months of time, unless the CCAA is able to speed up the process, which is currently 1 week per month.

Based on that, our family is traveling to Paris and Bordeaux, France, the week of Thanksgiving and following, as part of a missions group to use choral music as a means of reaching French nationals. This will be our first missions trip as an entire family, and we are looking forward to it.

Today the CCAA posted placement of children whose dossiers had been received by November 14. Eight weeks of referrals to go until we know who our girls are! At the current rate of one week of referrals per month, it could possibly be another eight months before our referral. But things could change just as quickly in the opposite direction, and we could see our referral earlier. God has that timing thing all set up...we're just ready to see it!

18 months ago today, our paperwork arrived in China. As of today, referrals have been given out to parents with a LID of November 7. Our LID is January 13. Unfortunately, it looks like our referral is still several months away, perhaps into 2008. Only God knows what the journey He has in store for us looks like, and we are anxiously awaiting the roadmap!

Today is one week short of 13 months since our LID in China. The CCAA has placed children in the hands of those LID is October 24, 2005 or before. When we started this journey, the wait time was 8-10 months. Now it seems to be 16-18 months. The CCAA is placing about 2 weeks of dossiers every month, so it will most likely be late this summer before we receive our referral and get to travel to China. But God is in control of it all, and we will just wait for His timing.

LID!

We received our LogIn Date today -- January 13, 2006. The Chinese Center of Adoption Affairs (CCAA) web site says they have completed reviewing all dossiers submitted through June, 2005, and sent referrals for those through May 13, 2005. So now the long wait begins!