Our flights to China are booked

We got the last details needed from our family coordinator today to book our flights. Our travel dates will be 2/21 to 3/6 instead of 3/5. Northwest didn't have a flight that we would be able to make it to on the 5th. So we will stay another night and leave the next morning. We were going to get an extra seat for Sophie. So we would have more room but we decided to save our money instead. Phew! One more thing done. We leave Thursday 2/21 on flight 19 at 1:10 pm and arriving the next day in Beijing at 9:15 pm. We are going through Tokyo to Beijing. Its about 16 1/2 ours of flight time going out (not including layover). We are on flight 12 coming back and our flight time is about 15 hours. Its strange, because of the earth's rotation we leave Beijing on 3/6 at 9:05 am and arrive in Minneapolis on 3/6 at 10:55 am. Its definitely not going to feel like a 2 hour flight. I'm sure our fellow passengers will feel the same way. :)

This is Sophia Allison

I am quite new to blogging. So unfortunately these last 3 posts are in the opposite order that I wanted them. I thought I would introduce Sophie to those who maybe haven't "met" her yet. Its been 3 looooooooong years since we started this process. But she's worth the wait! We received her referral on October 8th, 2007 at 1:48 pm. These are her measurements and pictures at 10 months of age. We won't get any updated pictures or information on her before we go get her. They only give updates if the measurements on file are over 8 months old. But what cute pictures they are! Sophie was born on August 3rd, 2006 in Heilongjiang Province in China. The name her orphanage gave her is Sui Ping (soo ping). At 10 months she was 28" long and weighed approximately 19 pounds. Her special needs are that she does not have a right hand or foot. In her referral it said that she is crawling in bed, she is outgoing, active and cute. She enjoys interacting with people. She likes toys that make sounds. She loves to listen to music.

100 Good Wishes Quilt

Hello Everyone,
We would like to ask you all to participate in a very meaningful project. We have asked my mom (Deb) to make a special quilt; one that everyone can contribute too. There is a tradition in the northern part of China to make a "100 Good Wishes Quilt", to welcome and celebrate a new life. It is a custom to invite friends and family to contribute squares of cloth with a good wish, prayer, scripture, poem, etc. for the baby. The squares are assembled into a quilt for the baby and a small swatch of fabric from each square, with its good wish, is put in a scrapbook. The scrapbook will remind her of the love and good wishes from all the families and friends who contributed a piece of fabric to her quilt and she will know how much she was wanted!
If you would like to participate, please send 2 - 7"x7" squares and 2 small swatches of fabric for the scrapbook. If you prefer you can send your fabric to us and we will wash and cut the squares. ¼ yard of fabric would be enough. You can also ask anyone at a fabric store where their Fat Quarters are. They will know what you are talking about. These are pre-cut pieces of fabric used in quilting. One fat quarter would be enough if you are using one fabric. The material should be cotton fabric, either print or solid… you choose. The theme of the quilt is of course Chinese related fabrics. If you need ideas, fabrics could contain any of these: Asian designs (as long as it doesn’t say “Japan” on it), Lady bugs, any Asian writing or symbols, Chinese food containers, chopsticks, dragons, bamboo, pandas, Chinese paper lanterns, Chinese coins (they have a square hole in the center), Mahjong tiles, chopsticks, paper fans, oriental paper umbrellas, butterflies, dragonflies and if all else fails plain red fabric (or polka dots or stripes). If you need to, good places to buy fabric would be Wal Mart (if their craft section has it), Joanne Fabrics, Mill End Textiles, Crafts direct or any local fabric store. Please send the fabric with a card or a piece of paper with the good wish, prayer, scripture, etc. on it (2 wishes, one per square). Acid- free supplies are the best to use for the wish (if available) so that it will hold up in the scrapbook well. If not that's ok too.
Please send by February 16th to Stacy and Larry or Deb. Email us if you have questions or need our address.
We want to thank everyone in advance who contributes. This quilt will mean a lot to Sophie and us for years to come!

Our travel dates are set!

We have our actual travel dates set! Our agency was able to make consulate appointments for our group. We will be going to China 2/21 - 3/5 with a group of other adoptive families (aka "travel group"). Adoption agencies group as many families together as they can when they travel. This makes the trip more affordable for everyone. We priced out going earlier but with only one other family and it added $3,500 to our cost. As much as we would have liked to have Sophie home a month earlier, we just couldn't justify the extra cost. After our agency sets up our in-country travel plans and books the flights for the other families in our group they will let us know the details. Then we will book our flight to China ourselves. We were blessed incredibly by some wonderful friends who gave us their frequent flyer miles. Its such a huge blessing. I don't think we could ever express in words just how greatful we are. We don't know the details yet but we believe we will be spending 5 business days in the province where Sophie's orphanage is. Then we will travel to Guanzhou where all adoptions go through for another 5 business days. During this time we will be site seeing. I believe we will get Sophie relatively soon after we arrive in China. I think its only a couple of days before we go to her province and they bring her to us.
I will let you know if we have any thing new to share. For now we will spend our time getting the little things ready. If you haven't already, please go to the entry titled "100 Good Wishes Quilt". We'd love to have you all participate.

Finally Got The Blog Created

Well, we are currently waiting for news of an appointment with the consulate in China, and I finally got the Blog set up.

Better late than never!

We'll be adding info from the past three years of our journey, add stuff as we get closer to traveling to China, and then, hopefully, we'll be able to post when we are actually in China with new pictures and stories.

More to come soon!