passports and visa's

That's a lot of passports!!



Yippee!!! Thanks to our great friends, Alexa and Brandon, we now have our passports and visa's all in order! Yeah. We just received them back in the mail today. That is a load off my mind.

WHat does the PA look like?

Ok, I have seen others post a picture of their PA on their blogs. I thought that was a cool idea. So, for Ri's sake, here is a picture of CHina's notification to us that we have been pre-approved. It was 11/28/06 when we found out.

Friends in the orphanage

Ri is the littlest guy to the far left. Here he is with some of his friends.

Paul Liu Ri Chen Miller

We have officially named our son. His new name will be: Paul Liu Ri CHen Miller. We will still call him Ri, which is pronounced "Ree". That isn't the way it has been pronounced in Chinese, but we can't seem to master that sound. We are so use to calling him Ri that we really can't imagine changing it. We were told in the beginning that it was pronounced "Ree", but a very good friend of Mark's shared with us that it is not.

We all want Ri to have an American name. We feel it is important for him. As a family, we have chosen Paul as his first name. It was not chosen the way that Elizabeth was chosen (a family vote). This time, we felt very lead to name him after his Uncle. Uncle Paul is very precious to us. He loves the kids as if they were his own. He is a man who loves the Lord with all of his heart. We wanted to honor Paul by naming our son after him.

The new pictures are a true gift! A family just adopted their daughter from the same orphanage. They were allowed to visit and were shown the toddler room. The nannies were so loving towards all the children and genuinely cared for them. They pointed out Ri and shared with the family that they had hopes that he would be adopted soon. Yeah!!! They took some pictures and sent them to me. I am truly grateful!

Just thinking about our boy.

We just got new pictures of Ri. He looks like he has gotten a little chunkier and a haircut.


I've been thinking so much about our little Ri. I use to be able to confidently say that God had taught me so much through Elizabeth about His timing, not mine. I have easily just rested in His hands as we have waited these 5 months. I use to think it would be so much harder waiting on a "special needs" child because you know who they are for so long. With Elizabeth, we had her picture only 2 months before we held her in our arms. With Ri, we have known that he was to be a part of our family since September, when we first laid eyes on him. But for 5 months, I have not been anxious or "going nuts" about him. I haven't sat on pins and needles waiiting for a phone call to give me any more information. I have been at peacea about it all. It has been a wonderful feeling, yet something that has baffled me. Deep down, I wondered if I wasn't using "the lesson God taught me" as an excuse to cover the fact that, maybe.. just maybe I was not really looking forward to having another child. Part of me was somewhat fearful that I had fooled myself into thinking that I was excited to have Ri.

Well... I am happy... and somewhat sad... to announce that I am getting very anxious to hold my son. I am beginning to ache, to long for him, to think of him constantly. I have begun to imagine what it will be like with him, how it will feel to see him, to touch his face and kiss him all over. I look at his picture and my heart begins to ache. There is a part of me that is relieved to finally feel that ache. Yet, there is a part of me that is realizing that I have begun to take the fears and worries out of God's hands and placing them in mine. I don't want to do that because the peace I have in His hands is so much greater!

When I left it in God's hands and didn't worry about when we would go, the days seemed to have passed very, very quickly. I can't believe that it has been well over a months since we have been logged in. Now that I am getting anxious, I think the days have slowed down somehow.

My agency shares with me that we might be one of the next families to recieve our LOA (letter of acceptance). It is a new stage for waiting children. We now have to send a letter back to China informing them that we have accepted Ri as our referral and intend to adopt him. Once we send that back, it appears that the TA's (travel approval) are being sent about 2 weeks later. It is then that we will find out when we can travel to China to bring our son home. TA's enable us to make CA's (Consulate Appointments, to finalize everything). The CA determines the exact dates of our travel. I am told that we will probably be traveling 1-6 weeks after we recieve the TA's.

With all that said, it could be April when we are able to travel. I'm more confident that we will travel in May. We will see. Anyway I look at it, it is still a long time until we get to hold him.

All I know is that I love this little guy and I can't wait to hold him for the first time. Please pray for his heart to be healthy and strong. Please also pray for him to be able to bond with our family. While you are at it, please pray for Elizabeth...as her world is about to be rocked quite a bit! Pray for her in China. The time change is 13 hours (complete night and day shift). She does not handle her routine being changed very well. I think it is safe to say that her routine will be slightly changed in CHina!!!! We are really praying that she loves Ri and is not jealous of him.