Travel Plans

Probably the number one question that any Pre-Adoptive Parent gets asked (after the ever present “Why”, which is a whole different post…) is,

When will you travel?

Finally, we have a better sense of things.

Our facilitator is expecting our TA to arrive before CNY!

We are being allowed to build our own itinerary and travel on our  own (we kind of form our own group with the 9 of us!) in order for us to visit our other kids’ provinces before unofficially meeting Samuel at New Day and then adopting him in Hunan.  We would then return to Beijing for our Canadian adoption process, as our Embassy is there. 

It sounds lilke the next travel group may not be until April and so we are trying our best to gather all our many months of pondering, build a plan and get on a plane the third week in February, with the hope that we can adopt Samuel at the beginning of March. 

At this point my head is swirling (although it may be the remnants of the flu) and we are trying to sort out what will be most important and what will be left for another trip.

We still need to file our requests for orphanage visits and that will help create a framework for our travel dates.  We also know we need to be in Changsha on a Monday for Sam’s adoption. 

My stomach is doing some strange butterfly dance and I am in awe that we are even at this point!

As for who will travel?

Our hope has always been that each of our kids at home could travel with us to meet our new little guy in person.  For months they have played with him over the computer screen, talked about him, made space in their home and their world for the addition of Sam.  And we can’t imagine a better way for Samuel to be welcomed than by the whole overwhelmingly, noisy, crazy bunch.  In order to make that happen on our last two trips, my folks have been able to come “herd the cats” (as Steve calls it).  And so far, that is what we are planning for.

We need to look at the costs and sift through everything first, but at this point we are doing everything possible to make this happen! 

So off I go to make lists, phone airlines, price hotels and trains.  And pray.  We need a whoooole lot of wisdom. 

We thought our 2010 Big Family Vacation was a big undertaking.  Little did we know God had an Ace up his sleeve waiting for us in China.

This trip should trump that one  by far!