Sam's First Birthday

Happy First Birthday to our Sweet Sam!! We love you so much already- you are a blessing to so many and you are already such a sweet part of our family! God is so amazing in the way that he has already imprinted you on our hearts! We are sad not to be with you today, but we are thankful that you are loved and cared for and that you are getting to spend your first birthday with those who have loved you and whom you love!! We pray that you somehow know you are special and loved and that God has a plan just for your life! A plan that nobody else could live out. A plan that is just for you! We love you, baby Sam!!

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY!

Blessings-

Meredith

Sam's Orphanage

Wanted to share a few pictures of Sam's orphanage...We did find out that he is on the side that is completely run by the government. That is both good and bad. The good part is that the sickest babies are typically moved over to the ICC (International China Concern) side, so it means he is likely not considered one of the sickest babies, and never has been! The negative is that the government-run side is not funded as well, so he does not have access to many of the things that are available on the ICC side. BUT, we know God has him right where he is supposed to be, and we know he will be taken care of because our God is a mighty one who doesn't make mistakes!!

Sam's orphanage appears to be much smaller than Lily's was. It is definitely not as updated, but the "up" side is that it appears to be clean and safe, and they have bouncy seats and a bathtub!! We love squeaky-clean babies!

Blessings-

Meredith

Finally.....He has a name!!

Introducing.......

SAMUEL TODD TUCHAO CURTIS

We plan to call him Sam. We wanted him to have a Biblical name as well as a family name. Todd is my maiden name, and we also wanted to keep his Chinese given name as we did for Lily.

We recently sent this care package to Sam that we hope will arrive in time for his first birthday on October 17. Riley chose the super-soft blue blanket, and Jackson chose the stuffed monkey to send. We also included a photo album with our pictures, a couple of small toys, some cookies for the kids to share, 2 disposable cameras that we hope they will use, and some candy for the nannies. We included 3 outfits as well- size 9 months, and we are interested to see how big they are on him! We think he is somewhere between 6-9 months in size, but hopefully they will dress him in one and send us a picture so we can know for sure! Can't wait for an update on our sweet Sam!

Blessings-

Meredith

Bryce

My heart is breaking for this precious little boy who still waits for his family to find him.


He is with our agency and is available to a family who is logged in. He is a little over 18 months old, and is listed as having a very minor special need. He is in a wonderful orphanage! If you even think you might be interested in him, or know someone who might be, please message me! I would love to share more information with you- this is a precious little boy, and if we could bring two home, I would grab him up in a minute. He is just waiting for God to show him to his family!

Blessings-

Meredith

UPDATE!

When you have a child who lives halfway around the world, whom you have never met, what you most wish for on a daily basis are pictures- living proof that sweet child is doing well.......and today we received some! Seven to be exact, along with a video that we can't open, and an update! We are so excited to share them with you! We think he is even more beautiful in these pics than before!

Look at that sweet baby checking himself out in the mirror!!

MY FAVORITE ONE!!!

Below is translation of the update:

What is Tu Chao's personality like?
He is quiet.

Is he healthy usually?
He’s low resistance. He is easy to get a cold. But he’s been doing well recently.

Is he crawling or walking, and if so, when did he start?
He can crawl forward a short distance.

What is his favorite thing to do or play with?
Look into the mirror. (Well, of course it is! If I was that precious, that's what I would do too!)

Does he have a cribmate or best friend he plays with?
Yang Fu Lu who is in the same class with him. Also get therapy with him.

Does he have a favorite nanny- and if so what is her name?
His rehabilitation Wang Chun Mei.

How does he like to go to sleep? Do you pat him, lay him down, etc?
He likes to suck his finger before goes to sleep. (Awww...)

His updated measurements:
Height: 67cm; Weight: 7kg; Head: 44cm; Chest: 43cm; Foot: 11cm; Teeth: upper 2, lower 3.


Awww.....Put me on that plane today!

PRE- APPROVAL!

And here he is!!!

Today we got our Preapproval (PA) to adopt our kiddo! Now that we have pre-approval, we can show you his pictures! His name is Tu Chao Yang, and he is living in Hengyang City Social Welfare Institute in Hengyang City, Hunan Province, People's Republic of China. I have no idea when these pictures were taken, or how old he was when they were taken. I do know that he wears a bow and headband well!! Tu Chao will turn 1 on October 17, and we are working on sending a care package over that hopefully he will receive by his first birthday. We are also working on an English name that will be easier to remember than TuChao! It is interesting that TuChao means "He is super, He is Ultraman" in Chinese.....especially funny when you check out the headband picture!

I know that he is very small- as of a month or so ago (10 months old), he weighed only 14 pounds- more like a 6 month old size. My understanding is that he likely has bottles only with little or no cereal added. I have been emailing with a couple of moms who have recently adopted from this same orphanage, and have been able to get a little bit of information with their help. It appears this orphanage is quite a bit smaller than Lily's in Shantou. Also, this orphanage is divided into two parts. One is government run and the other is run by an international group called ICC. I haven't yet been able to decipher which side he is on, or exactly what difference it makes, but it appears that they are different.

The next step in the process is to wait the typical 2-3 months for the official Letter of Acceptance(LOA) from the Chinese government. In the meantime, we will be filling out lots of paperwork so that when we receive LOA we can immediately sign it and overnight it right back to China, and send a copy to the US side with all that paperwork attached.

Please pray with us that Tu Chao will be safe and that God might heal his heart while he waits to come home. We know that he likely has an 8mm Atrial Septal Defect, and that is considered mild to moderate. We know he is a bit delayed, but likely this is typical orphanage delay. I have read that for every 3 months a child spends institutionalized, they will be behind approximately one month....For instance, you would expect "typical orphange delay" for a 12 month old to be that of a 9 month old. So, this is where we expect Tu Chao would be right about now. Hoping for an update and maybe some more pictures in the next several weeks.

Blessings!

Meredith

LOI!

What a crazy emotional week we have had. Since last Monday evening, we have received not one, but 3 referrals to look over. That, in an of itself is a bit unusual. Typically, if you receive a referral, it will be at least another month before you see another child's file. All 3 of the files that we have looked at/ prayed over/ researched/ etc. over the past week are of little boys whose true special need is that they need a family. They need to be loved. They need to belong. They need the hugs of a dad. They need the love of a mom. They need the friendship of brothers and sisters. And most of all, they need a chance to know Jesus. It is so difficult to look through files and try to decipher God's plan in all of this. We know each child so desperately needs to be adopted. We know there are so many more children than there are families, and we know that boys especially have a greater change of not being adopted at all, and growing up in the system. That being said, we know that for each file we turn down, there is a chance that child's file will never be looked at again, a chance they will never be adopted.

So, as we looked over these files- all of perfectly precious, chubby-cheeked boys between the ages of 11 months and 28 months, we prayed. We prayed for clarity, for peace and for John and I to BOTH know our son.

God answers prayer. After turning down 2 referrals, we received another suprise referral when we woke up Labor Day morning. We weren't expecting this referral. In fact, we had asked our social worker to just wait until the next list came out and not to try to match us. But, God had other plans. Lily (Our contact in China who matched us with our Lily, and is her namesake) locked one last file for us. She saw it and thought we might be interested. The file was a bit unclear. The baby was younger than we had expected. But....something told her we might be interested. Our sweet social worker Karla received the file. She almost didn't send it to us. He was young. We had already turned down 2 in less than a week. We had asked her to just wait......but something told her to send it to us....

We opened the referral. This boy was super cute. I mean super cute. Dark eyes, beautiful skin, precious face. BUT.....he was a heart baby. What do we know about hearts? And....he's young....11 months young. But....something told us to look further. So, after spending a day talking to specialists, getting an orphanage update, and praying/ talking/researching.....we are excited to announce that God has led us to send our Letter of Intent (LOI) to adopt this sweet baby.

We are thrilled and we are praying that God will take care of our little guy until we can bring him home. Please pray with us that his heart is healed, that he is safe, loved, fed and cared for until we can get to him. That somehow he knows he is already loved by his forever family.

At this point, we cannot yet post pictures as we are waiting for pre-approval to adopt him. But I can tell you that he is from Hunan Province and that his first birthday will be October 17.

As soon as we receive an update or we can post pictures, I will!

Blessings-

Meredith