My Little Fred Astaire

Here is Connor dancing with his friend last night at the Kindergarten dance. He loves to dance, just like his momma! Maybe we should get these two on "So You Think You Can Dance."

Thankful

As far as we know, Claire's first court date went okay. We haven't heard anything back, and we've been holding our breath praying they don't request any additional paperwork. It's still looking like February or March until we travel. I have to admit that the past five months have been about a million times harder than the past two years. Over the course of the process, I have always justified the delay in completing our family by saying God was just waiting for the perfect little girl to come along. Well, now we have been matched, we know who she is, and I just don't understand why it's taking so long to get her home. It's so beyond my control, but I'm not taking it well at all. It's been really hard on me for the past few months managing a stressful job, a son in school, keeping up with my house, going back for my Ed.S, and going through the emotions of trying to complete Claire's adoption. I cry all the time when I'm alone because I miss her so much even though I've never met her. I feel so incomplete.

Despite all of the hardships lately, I am so completely thankful for my sweet and beautiful son who brings a smile to my face every day! Yesterday we were on the way back home back from the grocery store and we were talking about syllables in words. We were naming Thanksgiving words, and he would clap out the syllables. We were having a fun little drive (yes, this is fun to us...yes, I am in education...can you tell?) and I said the word "thankful." After telling me there were two syllables, he named everything he was thankful for.

Here is Connor's list almost word for word as best as I can remember it. I wrote it down as soon as I got home:

I'm Thankful For....

1. Mommy and Daddy. They love me.
2. My family. I love them so much.
3. Toys! They're fun!
4. My friends who play with me.
5. Food. I'm never hungry....well sometimes I get hungry, but I just get food.
6. The nice people I meet. I like when people smile at me.
7. I'm glad we can be free. People in other countries can't be their own boss.
8. The beautiful world where I can run and play, be a super hero, climb in my tree and sit there, and just look around.

He's five and he blows me away! I have no idea what if anything we've done to raise a son with such an incredible heart, but he definitely has one sweet little soul! I love him so much and I am so thankful for my sweet, sweet boy!

First Court Date Scheduled

We received word today that our first court date is scheduled for October 26th. This was bittersweet news as we were told we would not know where we were in the court process, and by our timeline we assumed we had already had at least our first hearing. We were crushed because it has been our prayer to have her home before the end of the year, and now that will not happen. We most likely will wait another 3 months to travel, possibly more. However, we felt blessed to finally receive some news! Please, please pray for us on October 26th. Pray that the courts do not request any additional paperwork, which would delay us even more!

The past four months have been grueling. I look at my daughter's face every day, many times a day. I know who she is. I know where she is. They won't let me get to her. It's completely out of my hands. I cannot even begin to describe to you how hard this process has been. This has been the longest and most challenging journey of our lives. I know it will all be worth it, and some day we'll finally gain hindsight, but today in the midst of it all, we are feeling sad and helpless. Please say a prayer for us and most of all Claire. Pray for a miracle!!!

Adoption Shirts!

Our best friends the Watsons are in the middle of their third adoption. They have two domestically adopted children, and are now in the process of adopting an infant boy from Ethiopia. They are selling adoption t-shirts to help them raise money to bring Silas home! Please check out their adoption blog AND the link to the site for their t-shirts. They are only $10 and super cute!


The Watson's Adoption Blog
Adoption Shirts

Another wonderful opportunity to support adoption!

Awesome Fundraiser!!!!

We had the conclusion of our biggest adoption fundraiser, "Bears for Claire" last night. It was completely overwhelming how many generous people were willing to help! I truly thought we would struggle to reach $1,000 in donations, but once again God was so good to us and we ended up raising a little over $3,000!!!! AMAZING!!! Thank you to everyone who donated your services or prizes and asked for nothing in return! Thank you so much!! If you know me well, you know guilt could be my middle name, and I was so sad last night that I couldn't give every single person that donated a prize of some kind. I wanted everyone to win! I kept telling Greg how nervous I was every time I drew a number for a prize. I truly am so thankful for everyone who helped us, and I pray that someday I have the opportunity to help you!!! Because so many gave so freely to us, we wanted to take part of our donations and give them to help another family adopting a little girl from Taiwan as well (They are naming her Claire too!! Good name!) So, please know, if you participated in any way in "Bears for Claire", you helped two families bring their Claire home! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!

Our First Update!

We received our first update on Claire today from Taiwan. We only received this one little tiny picture but it's so great to see something current. We wish we could know what she's thinking... our first thought was that she looks a little bit sad but maybe that's just how seeing pictures of her growing up makes us feel. Regardless, she's still a cutie and we still can't wait to bring our little girl home! It looks like any hopes we had of her coming home with long hair are out the window as it looks like they're keeping it cut really short. Taiwan in the summertime is very hot from what we hear so that makes sense.

Here are a few highlights from her update:

• She's working on potty training at home.   That's a good thing!
  
• She's still taking 4 bottles a day.   I think this is cultural... children there tend to stay on bottles and formula longer than children here. 
• Her favorite solid foods are watermelon and papaya.   Do they have papaya at Kroger? 
• It says she is "outgoing and adorable" and she "makes funny face to make people laugh".   Sounds like her brother! 
• It sounds like her language development is coming along well.   There is no mention of whether or not she is learning any English but we are not expecting her to have ever heard any English at all when we pick her up. 
• Other than that, it sounds like she's a typical two year old for the most part... some minor behavior issues that sound just like things Connor did when he was 2.   Nothing to worry too much about.  

And that's about it.   Everyone keeps asking if there's any news so this was exciting to get in the mail today.   We're still waiting to find out how our court process is going so we can travel but we're just 2 months past referral.   Typical time from referral to travel is 5-8 months.   At the absolute earliest we would travel late October / early November but it is MUCH more likely that we would travel in late December or January and quite possibly as late as February / March.   That seems like an eternity right now.... these past two months have just crept by. 

We're supposed to get an update about every month so hopefully sometime around late September we'll get another update.  

Bears for Claire

Jessica and I are going to be having two adoption fund-raisers this fall to help us cover the costs of our travel to Taiwan to bring Claire home.   Airfare could be as high as $10,000 due to the fact that we'll only have 7-14 days notice before we have to travel.  We've been able to cover our expenses up until now but that daunting total has left us needing to get creative and so, we are excited to present... Bears for Claire

Here's how it works:  Make a donation to our adoption fund and you will receive a "Bear for Claire".  For $5.00 you get one bear, for $10.00 you get three bears, and for $25.00 you get eight bears!   Each bear enters you to win one of over 20 prizes.   We have had some AWESOME prizes donated including: 

* A BRAND NEW NINTENDO WII! 

* Free Chick Fil-A for a Year!

* Tennessee Football Tickets (box seats) 

* A prize package from the Food Network and HGTV

* A prize package from Love 89.1 Radio

* Regal Cinemas Movie Tickets

* Many more!  Over 20 prizes!

The drawing will be held on Sunday, August 30th at 7:00 PM.  We'll actually be webcasting the drawing so people can watch live.  

For all the information you need to participate in our fundraiser, and to purchase you chances to win the Wii and other prizes, please visit: 

www.bearsforclaire.blogspot.com

July 18th, 2009.

(From Greg)

As I write this here in East Tennessee at 11:00 in the morning, on the other side of the world the clock has rolled over and a new day has begun in Taiwan. It is July the 18th and at some point today my daughter Claire will turn two years old.

I was born on October 30th, 1974 a little after 7:00 in the morning. I know this because for years my mom would call me early in the morning on my birthday every year and give me the old "do you know what I was doing at this time 27 years ago???" line. I never knew what to say... "Um... I give up. Were you screaming and cussing out dad?"

Smart alec answers aside, I always appreciated my mom's early morning calls on my birthday... it told me how much she loved me and that not only was the day of my birth worth celebrating but even the moment of my birth was worth remembering. Sure, it's a small thing but a large collection of small things is how a person comes to know that they are loved.

I will probably never know the exact moment of Claire's birth. I'll never know if it was morning, afternoon, or evening... if the sky was sunny or clouded... who witnessed her emergence into this world... what her first moments with her birth mother were like... these things will remain a mystery to me. Adoption is a wonderful thing with a lot to celebrate but there is plenty to mourn as well. When our daughter comes home it will be easy to focus on all that we have gained... but let us not forget all we have lost.

Claire has now lived two years of her life being bounced around between orphanages and a foster home. As far as she can tell, she has no mother and no father... just caregivers who randomly seem to come and go. Hopefully they are kind to her. I wonder if she loves them... I wonder if they love her. I wonder when she spoke her first word and what it was. Did anyone even hear? Did anyone care? When she took her first steps, did anyone even notice?
I'm thinking of all of the treasured moments of Connor's first two years of life... first words, first laughs, learning to crawl and then walk, his first time going down a slide, and his first time dipping his toes in the ocean. I cherish every one of those memories. I know that a lifetime of memories with Claire are ahead of us as well and I know that there is so much joy to come but that future joy for now is tinged with the sadness of all that we have lost.
Even as I sit here now and think about these things, I have to remember that for as much as I have lost, Claire will have lost even more. As our plane lifts off from Taiwan to journey over the ocean and back home to Tennessee, our little girl will be saying goodbye to every single thing she has ever known. Her friends... her caregivers... her bed... her favorite foods... her language... her homeland... gone.

I don't know what our first days with our new daughter will be like but I do know that she is going to be grieving all that she has lost. I don't know how she is going to do this... some adopted children rage and lash out while others simply withdraw and go quiet. Who could blame them? I am praying even now that we will be equipped to comfort her... to help her through the transition into her new life. How will we do this.... the words of comfort she would understand can only be spoken in a language we do not know. God grant us patience, peace, and wisdom.

So, today my daughter turns two. I have no idea what this day will hold for her... I like to imagine that her foster family in Taiwan will have a celebration. Maybe some of her friends from pre-school will come over and there will be cake and ice cream... perhaps they will sing a song to her and she will end up with icing all over her face. Maybe she will celebrate... or maybe it will be just another day. Like so many other things, I will probably never know.

Here in Tennessee, we celebrated Claire's birthday by having a garage sale. We've spent the last week emptying closets and drawers... shelves and storage tubs. I've never seen so much stuff in our garage and hopefully all of it will be sold. All of the money we make today is going towards buying Claire's bedroom furniture. Connor is sitting at a table selling brownies and drinks with a sign that says "Snacks for my Sissy". Claire is heavy on all of our minds today but we're keeping busy... moving forward... wading our way through this wait the only way we know how. We're a little sad but also incredibly hopeful and excited. We know that next year we will celebrate this day very differently. It's going to be an incredible party... we'll have a lot of lost time to make up for. I can't wait.

Adoption Fundraiser - Family Songs Sampler

Greg writing here...

What you see above is an album of original songs I have put together called "Family Songs Sampler". It's a collection of songs from 3 of my albums, plus a couple of early home demos. All of the songs in this collection are about family... there are love songs, songs about being a parent, even a song I recorded about adoption (the great Julie Miller song "By Way of Sorrow"). As I've played shows all over the place these past few years, without exception these songs have been the most popular.


Just click on the widget above and you will be given the opportunity to download this entire collection of songs. Noisetrade (the company I'm using to create the widget) gives you the option to either email 5 friends about the music or to make a paypal donation. Any amount is fine... from $1 to $25 and all points in between. We receive 90% of that and we'll be putting every penny of it towards our adoption.

To be clear, you can either make a donation or email 5 friends to let them know about the music so if you want the music for free, you can do that.

Anyway, I'm not super comfortable with the whole fundraising idea... I'd rather have a garage sale. But if you're so inclined, please download the music and either make a small donation or help us to spread the word. Thanks.

Adoption Frequently Asked Questions - Post Referral Edition

So now that we have received our referral and we know that Claire will be coming home soon, I figured I would take this opportunity to answer a few more of our most frequently asked questions. You can read the original post here.

When will you bring Claire home? There's really no way to know an exact answer to that question. Best case scenario would be October and the worst case scenario would be more like February or March.

Why does it take so long? After receiving our referral on June 18th, we had to sign and date about 7 pages worth of adoption contracts. Those had to be sent to Kansas (where our agency is) and then to Taiwan. Taiwan then sent us a bunch of documents that we had to sign and have notarized and then state certified (which required a trip to Nashville) and those documents are currently at the TECO office in Atlanta which is basically the Taiwanese embassy. Once those documents make their way back to Taiwan we will go into the court system. We'll have an initial hearing where the judge will be presented all of our documents and a social worker acting on our behalf in Taiwan will request permission for us to adopt. From there it's a 10 day waiting period for birth parents to sign off on everything. Then, whenever the judge gets around to it you'll either get a ruling or he'll request more information. I don't know exactly how the system works but it seems like it can either go really quick or really slow... luck of the draw I guess. Once the judge grants a ruling, they'll make an appointment for us to take Claire to get a Visa and that will be our travel date... it's usually about 3-4 weeks after the final ruling.

Where is Claire right now? Claire is in a foster home in Taiwan. She was in an orphanage until April but at that point she moved to foster care. We're excited about this as it means she is more than likely receiving more attention and care. She's even attending preschool!

How were you matched with Claire? Was it random? Did you choose her? Claire's birth mother decided to place Claire for international adoption in late April and then in mid May, they presented her with several potential families and the birth mother chose us. She has requested that we send her 20 pictures and a short video every year for 15 years which we think is great. She will send cards every year on Claire's birthday and at Chinese New Year.

Will we be able to communicate with Claire while we wait? Unfortunately, no. Due to cultural and language barriers, waiting families usually don't communicate with foster families which I can understand. The good news is that we will be able to send her care packages if we like... we're working on getting the first one together now and we're hoping to send it out soon so it will get to her around the time of her birthday (she'll be 2 on July 18th).

What is Claire's name right now? Hsiang-Ting Hung but everyone calls her Mei-Mei.

Will she be able to speak English? We don't know for sure but almost certainly the answer will be no. Obviously this will be challenging at first but based on everything we've read, she should be able to pick up English at an astonishing rate due to her age.

Won't she be so excited to come home to her forever family? I'll post more in depth on this topic later but in short, probably not at first. Claire has grown up around Taiwanese people (mostly women)... and now she's going to be put in the hands of 2 strangers who don't speak her language, who smell funny to her, who don't know how to make her favorite foods, and who look unusual. Most likely, she'll spend a few days freaking completely out! Think about what your child would have done if at 2 and a half years old you sent them to live in Taiwan with strangers... it's going to be an adjustment for sure! There are lots of tricky things to think of here... attachment issues and things like that and I'll probably post more about it later. I'm reading some books on it and trying to educate myself and once I feel like I know a little more I'll write a bit about it.

She's so cute! I bet you can't wait to get her home! You're right! She's adorable and no, we cannot wait to bring her home! These next few months will be excruciating... we have a lot to do though... a room to paint and a nursery to put together so hopefully those things will keep us busy as we wait.

My Babies!

New Pictures of Claire at 22 months

We were so fortunate to receive several more recent pictures of our daughter Claire this morning. I believe these pictures were taken around the time she was 22 months old (she's 23 months old right now). We already love her so much... with each new picture we receive our hearts melt just a little bit more. She got her hair cut short, but it's so stinking cute! Check these out!



How on earth are we going to wait 7 or 8 months to bring this little angel home? Seriously folks... the waiting before was hard... this is going to be almost unbearable. Knowing our daughter is growing up without us... there's just no way for that not to be gut wrenching. We're so thankful to have all of these pictures though... many families who adopt internationally only get one or two pictures and we have well over 20 right now, plus some video. Our adoption agency has been absolutely unbelievably awesome.

Introducing Claire Elizabeth Adkins

Here she is world, after 14 months and 1 week of waiting for a referral! We got the call yesterday morning and have been in constant prayer that God would grant us a peace to say "yes" if this was our Claire! We had originally said we would accept 0-12 months only, and Claire will be 2 next month, so this was not what we were expecting at all. After wrapping our heads around the fact that God's plans were not our plans, this evening we knew we were supposed to say yes, and a couple of hours later were able to get several pictures of our new baby girl!

There is a story to tell of how God showed his hand in all of this, but I'm so overwhelmed right now, I can't even begin to put it into words. I do know that now the hard part begins. Knowing who she is, seeing her face, and not being able to be with her! It will be several months before we can bring her home, so please keep us in prayer.

God is good. God is faithful. God keeps his promises.

Seattle/Vancouver Trip

Greg and I were able to get away on our own last week and explore Seattle and Vancouver. We had been to Seattle about six years ago during our 3-week trip out west, and loved it so much we were eager to go back. We wanted to go into Vancouver then, but the rental car company charged double if you left the country, so we decided to stick to the states. We were really excited to finally make it up there this time.

We flew into Seattle early Thursday morning and checked into the hotel. We ate a yummy lunch at Cheesecake Factory, explored Pike Place Market, looked at the beautiful flowers, ate some yummy cherries, and of course I made Greg take me to the original Starbucks. We went back to the hotel to rest, and ended up falling asleep way early (like 6:30 Seattle time, 9:30 our time.) It's those Sheraton beds! They are the best. We were also running on two hours of sleep and had been up since 3:30!

Friday we had breakfast by the water, and took a land/water tour of Seattle called, "Ride the Ducks." It was super fun. The tour vehicle turned into a boat and we got to see Seattle from the lake. We saw the house from "Sleepless in Seattle" and I also got to see Seattle Grace Hospital (for all you Grey's Anatomy fans), which is actually Fisher Plaza, not a hospital! After exploring Seattle a little more, we drove to Olympia, Washington for Greg's show, and ended up spending the night in a beautiful mansion on the Puget Sound.

Saturday we were treated to a yummy breakfast, and hung out until early afternoon at the house we stayed in. We then ate Thai food, and walked around Olympia. Greg had another show that night, and we drove back to Seattle pretty late. When we got back to Seattle, the hotel we were staying in was so busy, and we had to wait for our room to be cleaned, even though it was 10:30 at night! Apparently the desk clerk had been getting yelled at all night for them being so busy, but my sweet hubby was so nice about it that they upgraded our room to a beautiful "Executive Corner Suite" and gave us free room service breakfasts every morning we were there. The room was on corner overlooking the city, most of the walls were windows! It was such a great view! See...it's better to be nice than mean!

Sunday, we got up early and ate at Seattle's very own, Top Pot Doughnuts then we attended Mars Hill Church and heard Marc Driscoll teach. It was wonderful! After church we wandered around a market in Fremont and ate at a yummy Greek restaurant. We headed over to Ballard Locks to see the fish ladder and watch salmon swim upstream. It was so weird to watch them swim against the current, and sad! They barely got anywhere in the 30 minutes we watched them. What a sad life, to fight against the current for miles and miles just to get where you're going and die. Sniff...sniff! We explored the Seattle waterfront Sunday evening and went back to take a nap before dinner, and once again ended up falling asleep. We ended up waking up at 10 p.m. and had to order room service. The time adjustment was hard on us!

Monday, we got up early and ordered a yummy room service breakfast and headed into Vancouver up in Canada. We rented bikes and rode around Stanley Park, a huge, beautiful park right on the water. We saw hundreds of starfish all over the shore. It was an amazing sight! After biking, we headed to lunch and then drove around Vancouver. We ended up in a park with one of the most beautiful views of mountains that I've ever seen. It rivaled Glacier National Park, which to me is the most beautiful place I've seen! We then drove up a mountain near where the Winter Olympics will be and looked down on an amazing view of Vancouver. We were exhausted and headed back to Seattle pretty early to get all of our stuff packed up.

We made it home late Tuesday night after a crazy flight from Seattle to Memphis. Apparently there was a tornado over Kansas, which made for a very rough ride home! I'm already terrified of flying, despite of how often I seem to be flying lately, so I pretty much squeezed Greg's hand and prayed until we hit the ground in Memphis. Thankfully Memphis to Knoxville was short and smooth!

We had a great trip, but we missed Connor so much! We kept saying how much he would've loved everything we did, and regretted him not being there with us, although it's always good to get away alone. We are definitely looking forward to our family trip to the beach next weekend!!

We're Still Here!

I guess we kind of fell off the face of the blog world lately. Things here have been so busy, so much going on! The end of the school year is always insane, and I've been a little under the weather too. The good news is, the school year is over and I'm finally feeling better, so maybe life can return to normal. We've been trying to kick off the summer with a little fun. We've done the Dollywood thing, seen "Up" (fabulous!), hung out a lot downtown, gone to the Reading Festival, played a lot outside, and tomorrow we'll head to Nana and Granddaddy's for our first swim of the summer! We also have been in the process of updating a bunch of our adoption paperwork (it's that time!) and had our annual home visit with our social worker on Tuesday. Apparently we still appear to be suitable parents. : )

Greg and I head to Seattle on Thursday morning, catching an early morning flight. We'll spend several days there and will head up to Vancouver for a day as well. It's fun when someone likes your hubby's music so much that they fly him across the country for a couple of shows, and you get to tag along! We plan to visit some of the places we saw last time, actually go up the Space Needle this time, do a little biking and whale watching, and then explore Vancouver for the first time. It will be fun to spend some time away, just the two of us. Then just a few days after our getaway, we'll make our annual trip down to St. Augustine, which is quite honestly my favorite week of the entire year. We have so much fun and do some serious relaxing! I'm curious to see how many sharks we can catch this year, and I think we'll all be sticking a little closer to shore thanks to last year's shark experience!

I'll try to do a better job of keeping up, as I enjoy my paid 10 week vacation. Yes, my job rules!