This is where I want to be...NOW!!!

Here it is, the end of the month and we are still waiting for Travel Approval (TA). I am desperately hoping to hear something this week, in order to still travel in September. If not, we won't be able to travel until the end of October. Because we have to be in China this time a minimum of three weeks, the timing has to be just right for the Guangzhou part of the trip. There is a National Holiday in which everything pretty much closes up (including the consulate) the first week of October. After that, there is a huge trade fair and hotel and airfare are extremely expensive and difficult to get during this time. So, here we are. Once again, just waiting. It's so frustrating!!!

Catching Up

Gavin's Room
I painted and "scrapbooked" the letters myself...
The "before" shot
Landree loves her new train table!
It was like Christmas morning!
Landree's favorite pasttime while visiting my parents-watching "Happy Feet" on my laptop!
Reading with Grammie
Celebrating Gavin's birthday
The "FedEx" guy delivering our Letter of Acceptance from the China Center of Adoption Affairs. It was the same guy who delivered Landree's referral!

So, to catch up a bit, unfortunately, it looks like we won't be receiving any pictures of Gavin with his birthday cake. Apparently, they took pictures, but won't give them to the lady who sent the cake because she is not with our agency. Whatever. His orphanage is so conservative! Boo! Anyway, we hope to get the pictures of him when we go to China. I'm just happy he got to celebrate his birthday.

The good news is, we are just awaiting our Travel Approval. All of our paperwork to go has been completed, so once again, we are just waiting to hear something. We are hoping to get our TA by the end of this month for a mid-September travel. It's the exact same time of year that we traveled two years ago to get Landree! Just FYI, it's blazing hot in China at this time of year. But, that just means lighter packing!

I start back to work next week already. I've been working like crazy getting my room ready. Still lots to do! Landree loves coming to my classroom with me and playing with all of my stuff. (I swear sometimes I leave with a bigger mess than I started with). I've also been very busy trying to get Gavin's room ready. I painted and decorated the letters of his name. I have so much fun doing this! I think it turned out pretty good. His room is a transportation theme, with the main colors being red, white and blue. I didn't set out for it to be that way, but that's just kind of the way it turned out. He has the dresser and nightstand from my childhood. The white bookshelf we have had forever from my Uncle Mike and on the opposite wall is Dan's old college table, which happens to be blue and white (and also used to be his old bunkbeds from his childhood as well-his Dad turned them into a table). I'm very happy with how it turned out and I love going in there! Now we just need to get him home!