Arrived in Beijing

Good News!

We have arrived in Beijing and will be heading to the orphanage tomorrow at 6:30AM.

We can not post to this site while in China so we will be posting to http://oursonluke.shutterfly.com/.

- Lisa (via text message to Eric)

More Birthday Photos!

Looks like he has a sweet tooth! He will fit in fine here!

Happy 3rd Birthday Luke!

Here are some great shots of Luke enjoying the cake we sent for his birthday with his friends at the orphanage! It makes my heart sing!

Please keep praying we can bring him home soon!

More about Luke!

Today I also got the email back from the orphanage answering most of the questions I sent!

Here are the thing we have learned:

He now weighs 10.5 kg (23lbs), is 79cm(31 inches) tall.
The only "size" they could translate for clothes or shoes was a "foot length" of 12.5cm(5 inches)
He is generally outgoing except around strangers.
He gets along with all other kids.
He sleeps well in a small bed by himself.
His favorite toys are balls ( Of George was very excited about this!)
He can say baba (daddy), mama(mama), and short sentences
He walks well but cannot navigate stairs well because they always use the elevator in the orphanage
He still drinks from a bottle.
He is not potty trained.

We are thrilled to have this additional information to help us plan for the trip. And I am thinking the 2T clothes I was planning to take will work well. But I better take the underwear out of the suitcase and add some bottles!
Thanks for your prayers!

Arictle 5 !!!!!!!!!

Yeah! Today our Article 5 arrived in China. That means I was able to send for our visas today! It also means we may be only 2 weeks away from our Travel Approval, and when we have that we can make our travel plans. Please pray we can go get Luke in November!

Thank You Ann at Red Thread China!

We are so grateful to Ann for her service to adoptive families through Red Thread China. She puts together care packages with any combo you want of items from her store or items you send from home. This may not seem like a big deal, but it is pretty difficult to send care packages directly to the orphanage and ensure that the orphanage will accept it and that the child will receive it. Ann works with orphanages all over China, so she can be sure to get  your package to your child, and has really made the process simple.
We have sent to Luke ( oh,yeah BTW his new name will be Luke Shuangkui Abate) a photo album of the family, a pillow with a photo of his Forever Family on it,  a photo cube that jingles, a letter from us translated into Chinese, a camera for the nannies to take photos of Luke and of themselves for his memory book, a bear the girls have been sleeping with (to get smells of the house and the girls on it!), a Purdue "tag" blanket and a special box from the girls that they painted, decorated and filled with a book and 2 toy cars (thanks Megan for all the help with that box!). He will receive it this week!

Fang, Shuangkui

These are the first glimpses we got of our boy when he came in a referral bunch called "The Beijing Camp". We instantly fell in love with this face. We first discovered him in February 2010 and we officially matched with him March 8, 2010. We had only started the adoption process June of 2009, our home study was approved December 28, 2009.  Our LID was June 3, 2010. We received our LOA July 21, 2010. Our I-800 was approved Sept 3, 2010, and our NVC letter was issued September 17, 2010. Now we anxiously await Article 5 (hopefully any day now!) and then Travel Approval. We are praying we can travel in November!