Snowzilla VS. TA

After the huge amounts of snow we got here from 5 big storms in 1 month, a gigantic pile of snow appeared in the parking lot at work from the plows piling it up. I told Jess that it's a race -- will the 8-foot pile of snow melt first, or will we get our TA (travel approval) to get Liya first? Of course, we were hoping the TA would win, and thought that with such a long, cold winter there was no way Snowzilla would win the race.

Well, Snowzilla is about to win. :( Following last week's temps in the 60s and 70s, Snowzilla is only about 1 foot high and 2 feel long right now -- just a tiny shadow of its former self. It's probably only got a few more days of life left.

As for our TA, we found out last week that our file has gotten stuck in China. It's been in the review room for 4 months. It needs to move out of that room and into the matching room -- where our confirmation letter will be generated. A couple of weeks after the confirmation letter is returned to China, the TA will be released. We thought we'd have our TA, or at least our confirmation letter, by now. So it's looking like we have several months at least until our TA shows up, and everyone knows that even a giant Snowzilla can't survive the summer heat.

Speaking of that, how am I going to survive the summer heat -- 90s and 100s + 100% humidity -- in China?

Baby Shower!

A couple of the ladies from my adoption email group threw a baby shower for Liya and me on Saturday. Unfortuantely, the weather wasn't the most cooperative so some people couldn't make it -- including our good freinds from Denver. But the 10 of us who were there had a great time!

The most meaningful part for me was that Kari asked me to share our story of how we came to adoption and how we found Liya. She gave everyone a piece of paper with Liya's picture on it, and asked them to write down things they could pray for as I told the story. Then she asked for specific prayer requests that I'd like everyone to pray for. Then we had a group prayer time for Liya, our adoption, and the family transition when we get home. It was very meaningful to have a group of friends support us in prayer and commit to praying us through the rest of this process.

Then we had a wonderful luncheon and cake to welcome Liya home.

Finally, I opened gifts for Liya that everyone had brought. It was a really nice time of celebrating Liya's imminent arrival!