Noelle Dreams & Beyond

For children here and children-to-be and doggies and home and laughter and tears and sunshine and moonlight and rivers and streams and mountains and snowfall and parents and grandparents and vacation and weddings and sisters and brothers and rain and fertile soil and nieces and nephews and meadows and wildlife and trees and flowers and old friends and new friends and birthdays and holidays and long walks and talks and health and yoga and work and play and community and unity and spring blooms and autumn leaves and oceans and lakes and summertime and boat rides and dancing and dinners and peaceful moments and CHRIS and so much that I receive every day - for all of this and more I am thankful .

This essay was posted by the NY Times this month in a series of international adoption stories. A father shares his experience of finding and connecting with the Chinese gentleman who discovered his daughter the day she was abandoned and took her to safety. This story in particular deeply touched me, especially when the father, who doesn't speak Chinese, describes how he longed to express his gratitude to this man, who doesn't speak English, during their first phone call -- he was overcome with emotion and didn't have the words. His friend who translated for him during the call whispers simply, "Xie xie" - thank you. Happy Thanksgiving to all!

2nd Update: They're coming HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1st Update: NO MORE CALLS ARE NEEDED. Apparently the elected officials' offices were swamped with phone calls today. They are working on helping this mother bring her daughter home. ----------------------- I just found out today on chinaadopttalk.com that there's a woman in China whose husband has died unexpectedly, and the U.S. Consulate in China is not allowing her to bring her daughter home, even though the adoption has been finalized in China. Friends of this woman are asking people to call her U.S. senator and representative for help. If you feel called to do so, you can find the information here at the Wusterbarth Family blog.

We had our follow-up appointment yesterday with the reproductive endocrinologist to discuss the test results from last month, and we got really good news overall. One of my hormone levels is a little high, but all the other tests came back normal. We are really lucky. Both my dear doctor friend Meghan and my doctor are optimistic about our chances of conceiving again. We are of course quite relieved to hear this, especially in light of our growing timeline for Noelle (it's looking like fall of 2009 at this point) and the seemingly impossible task of obtaining our fostering license. The latest news in foster land is that I got an email from our licensing worker last week, one week after she said I'd have the license (glad I didn't hold my breath!), and she had figured out that our paperwork was now being held up because the old background check form was used instead of the new one. "Excuse me?" I wanted to say - "You're preventing a child from having ...