Message from Brennan

"I want to wear a dress. Come get me faster. I miss you."

The Year of the Mickey Mouse

In a few weeks it will be the year of the rat but cute, plush rat toys are rare, so we went with Mickey Mouse. Brennan is sitting next to her Ayi. Linda Huang took this picture for us yesterday. She is a coordinator and also has business called China In Country Assistance Services. Her website is http://www.china-ias.com/. She provides many services to adopting families.

Linda said that Brennan is VERY excited about coming home. She requested "apples, oranges and skirts." She's a west coast girl already! We will leave on Feb 15th and will meet Brennan on Feb 18th.

We have approval to travel!!

We are waiting for confirmation of our consulate appointment, but it looks like we will leave for China on February 15th! So just like Sabra, I'll be getting another daughter for my birthday! No new pictures or updates. We will be the next to travel and bring updates to other families who are waiting. I guess this is really going to happen!

LOA LOA LOA

It's here!! We're over another hurdle! Next we get TA (Travel Approval) and then we're off and away. I could have a birthday in China!

Study: Adoption and Self Esteem

For those of you following along, below is an interesting NPR spot on a Dutch study of adopted children. They looked at inter-racial and international adoption and found no difference in the self esteem of adopted children and biological children. It is a frequent assuption in the adoption community that adopted children will tend to have self esteem problems, so this study was encouraging.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=16572430

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thank you Mannos family for our latest pictures of Brennan! It looks like it's getting pretty cold there. Hopefully our LOA will come soon.

Latest Picture of Brennan

Many thanks to our cyberfriends Lisa and Deirdre for taking this picture of Brennan during their trip to Nanjing for their daughters!