Finally -- A Smiling Minsy!

Minsy in China holding the monkey and the book
we sent to her.  Who is that lovely family on
the back of that book?  Why, it's the Blau Family!

We are still waiting.  Waiting.  Waiting. Waiting.  It has been more than two weeks since our Article 5 was delivered, and usually families receive their travel approval by the end of two weeks.  The only person I have ever seen who had to wait longer had to wait three weeks because things were delayed due to Chinese New Year.  Is Chinese New Year in September?  No!  Nothing is going on -- at least no national holidays or anything like that.  Still, we sit here waiting on this last bureaucratic document so that we can finally head to China and bring Minsy home.  It is sooooo frustrating to just sit and wait.  All day long I clutch my iPhone and rush to check all new emails whenever I hear the telltale beat letting me know that I have a new message.  And each time I look I find that it is not from my agency to let me know that my travel approval is on the way.  I have been very laid back about this entire adoption, feeling like things would happen when they were supposed to, and everything has gone really smoothly for the most part.  But this last piece of the puzzle is about to drive me to distraction.  I just want to be able to finally make some concrete plans. 

I think that our agency and the people in China must have heard my frustrated sighs across the miles because this morning I got a new set of pictures of Minsy.  They are pictures of her with the contents of the care package that we sent to her.  I started an account with heritagemakers.com and created a 5x5 book with pictures of our family and our animals so that she could begin to get to know us.  It turned out super cute, at least considering that it is my first book.  I am done with traditional scrapbooking.  I'm doing this online publishing from now on.  It is so easy and fast.  I loved ordering this little book.  When it arrived in the mail it looked just like something I could have bought from a store.  Super cute!  Then we sent this along with a stuffed monkey to Minsy.  I sprayed the monkey with my perfume and Herman's cologne, and then we slept with it for about a week so that it would smell like some good strong Blau.  Seeing her sweet picture holding the monkey and smiling was such a treat for me.  It connected me to her in a way that nothing else has done.  She was holding items that I had held.  She seemed to love these items that I had loved.  I just couldn't stop smiling. 

So for a couple of hours today I was distracted from my waiting.  I'm still impatient with the whole thing, but I am so glad to have a new look at my baby.  It was nice to see a good picture of her feet.  They do not seem to be turned too severely.  I liked getting the picture of Minsy in the AFOs that will help correct the club feet.  I am used to those because my brother Ryan, who has cerebral palsy, had to wear those a lot when he was younger.  I think this is looking very manageable. 

Now I am going to take a bit of time to throw my voice to the wind and hope that the powers that be will hear my cries and get this travel approval here.  We're ready!

Minsy with the corrective AFOs on her legs

She loves that monkey!