L-O-Yay!

Yesterday, while checking my email during the day, I noticed there was an email from our agency saying that we received our LOA from China! Wow--that was unexpectedly soon! For those outside the China adoption realm, the LOA is technically called the Letter Seeking Confirmation from Adopter, also called a Letter of Acceptance, shortened to LOA. It's a big step. It doesn't seem like a big step at this moment, because it really just seems to add up to more waiting. But it is our confirmation to China that we are still planning to follow through for Ellie and to tell them to issue our travel approval. Our timeline to travel at this point is in "11 to 15 weeks," which I guess is a quote with the average wait times for other families at this point.

This is a good thing. Through the maze of paperwork and waiting, we hold onto that stuff that we can and celebrate the big steps along the way. I love and appreciate having the confirmation that we are on track.

On another note, I suppose I should start getting my act together because time is running out to prepare to add a 3rd child to our family. We did move her crib into her room, but I haven't bought sheets yet. I'm still waiting to paint her dresser that was a gift from a friend. Meanwhile, her clothes are hanging or piled in various places. Shouldn't I be more prepared? What is the deal? I've always had a hard time with this part... I don't like to set everything up and have it sitting there, waiting to be used, but with no child here yet to use it. I don't like to see the empty room and the empty crib and the clothes hanging sweetly in the closet. Someone asked me recently about how I'm coping with the wait. As I've said here, I think I'm coping fine. I'm actually so busy that I sometimes fail to notice how quickly this wait is passing by because so many hours are taken up by the two children who are already here. Or, maybe I just cope by staying busy so I won't have to think about my girl, waiting over there. Anyway, I then end up putting things off until the last minute, until it is one week until we leave for China and I'm doing last minute shopping and arranging, trying to get everything in order, while simultaneously packing to fly overseas. Do other people do this?