Batter Up!

...will be making his "home run" sometime in June!

On Monday morning, I got THE call -- the call that told us we had been officially matched with Addison. Those crazy people -- letting us be parents AGAIN.

So what happens now? We wait for Travel Approval, apply for visas, raise some more money, make plans for Kate, panic about everything, etc. So far, all we've been able to do is walk around with silly grins on our faces.

Our adoption agency anticipates us traveling as early as mid-May!

I'm counting the minutes until that sweet boy is in my arms....

Wow. Wow. Wow.

Help Autism Research!

Chevrolet has partnered with an organization called Autism Speaks and hopes to raise a million dollars this month for Autism Awareness Month. You can help by just watching a very short video introduction of the new Chevy Malibu on the Autism Speaks website.

Each time this video is viewed, Chevy will donate to Autism Speaks. Just go to http://www.autismspeaks.org/ and click on the "Chevy for Autism" link.

The video isn't long, and it can really help some very deserving children.*

Thanks to http://www.familyforsophie.blogspot/ for the text of this post. :-)

I'll post more about LOA tomorrow, but needless to say -- we're thrilled, and scared, and excited, and nervous, and worried about money, and feeling all those things that you are supposed to be when you are parents AGAIN.

LOA, baby!

More later....

With grins from The Lucky Ones

Updates

KATE-THE-GREAT

Good news continues in our little corner of the world. The results of Kate's 48-hour EEG indicate that she is seizure-free. When I asked the neurologist about taking her off the seizure med. she is on (Lamictal), she told me that one of the side effects they have been finding for it is that it helps kids "on the spectrum" (aka, autism spectrum) to improve eye-contact and increase verbalization. We have noticed this in Kate, as has the neurologist. Kate is definitely having a language explosion -- albeit a very garbled one. It's okay -- the attempt to communicate is most important.

We've realized that Kate's language issue is a combination of speech apraxia and autism. Very difficult to overcome, but who likes things the easy way...? We are working very hard with sign language and some other tools to help Kate express her feelings -- especially when she is frustrated. More on this later, but we can already see how these tools can change all of our lives. :-)

ANXIOUSLY AWAITING ADDISON

We are still waiting on our "Letter of Seeking Confirmation" from China, what we call LOA -- Letter of Acceptance. That means that China has put the red seal on the match, and then we wait for Travel Approval, and then we go get our son.

Our dossier was logged-in on January 15th. Several people with late January log-in dates just got their LOA's, so we are starting to feel hopeful about next week. Each adoption agency has a different paperwork rep. in China, and we apparently have a slightly "slower" rep. Please say a prayer that our LOA will be here soon.

We want to get our boy home!

~With love from The Lucky Ones