First sister audition!

Hannah and Reagan had their first audition together today for the spring ballet show, Alice in Wonderland!  They had a fun time. Reagan didn't get a part, but still enjoyed it and is looking forward to trying out again for the next show. Hannah got cast as a flower blossom and gets to wear green ballet shoes and a tutu on her head!  Her good friend, Caitlin, got the same part with her which makes it even more fun!  

Meet Eli!

Meet Eli!  We are excited to say that we have officially been matched with our new son, submitted our letter of intent and China has responded back with our pre-approval to continue the adoption process for this little boy! 

This is Eli.  He is 16 months old and will be 2 in September and we hope to have him home close to that time!  He is being cared for in the Zhengzhou City Children's Welfare Institute (ZZ CWI) which is in the Henan province of China.  This woman in the picture with him appears to be his main nanny and is in many of his photos and videos we have of him.  They seem to be quite attached and I am so thankful he has someone there loving on him and taking good care of him.  We are excited to now be able to share his pictures with everyone and would appreciate everyone's prayers as we continue on this journey to bring him home!

                                      Here are some pictures from when he was younger:

                   
Here is a link to our family's adoption fundraising page for anyone who feels led to help us bring the little guy home:  https://www.youcaring.com/sam-and-stephanie-sampson-510948

Adoption Update

We have been continuing to work hard on our adoption process and have been deep into paperwork, doctor appointments and paper chasing.  Our first home study visit is done and went pretty well.  We met with our social worker in our home and she talked with our kids and us and toured our home.  It was actually pretty intimidating at first since she really laid out many not so great adoption outcomes she has seen in the past.  I was getting pretty frustrated during this discussion, since she was making me feel like she was trying to talk us out of it, but I realize she was just giving us a reality check and wanted us to be aware of the possibilities that our little happy family may have some struggles with bringing a new little guy in.  By the end of the visit, things had turned around and she was being more positive and supportive.

Sam and I both have individual interviews left to complete with her, but first we have to get all our paperwork in to her before she will schedule them with us.  So....we have been working really hard to get this all together.  We visited the police station and got our clearance letters, both had physicals and lab work, ordered birth certificates and marriage licenses....the list goes on and on.

In much more exciting news......we got matched with a little boy a couple weeks ago!  After a few days of reviewing his file we decided to say YES!  We submitted our letter of intent to China and are waiting to hear back with pre-approval.  Basically that will be China saying that we are locked in with him and it is okay for us to proceed with the process of adopting him.  So exciting and we are anxiously waiting to hear back!  We can't wait to share more details about the little guy once we get our pre-approval!

 We had another great Christmas and were so happy to have Grandma and Papa up here now to celebrate with us!  The girls both got their gifts they asked Santa for.  Reagan really wanted a violin and Hannah wanted a fashion design set.  Ben got lots of boy stuff, although he only asked Santa for candy.  The kids got up at 6:30, opened their gifts quickly and then the girls played with all their new stuff while and Ben, Sam and I were all took a nap.  Then we enjoyed a great dinner at Grandma and Papa's house.  It was a wonderful day! 

We spend our Christmas Eve day doing this.....SO MUCH RAIN!

So much fun leading up to Christmas!

 Reagan was pretty sure if she fed her cat the "reindeer food" he would be able to fly.

I know why they call it a journey....

I've been spending lots of time reading adoption info and family blogs to read about other families experiences and they always refer to it as their "adoption journey".  I totally get it now.  Sam and I had our orientation meeting at CCAI, our adoption agency, this week. A 2-1/2 hour meeting that was complete information overload. We had a bunch of paperwork to collect before going to this meeting and I thought that was a lot of work but that was hardly nothing compared to what is to come. They reviewed all the paperwork we would have to complete, the home study process, visiting the immigration office, getting our physical exams, and so much more. They also talked to us a lot about our trip to China which was both very exciting and a little bit scary.

Describing it as a journey is the perfect word for what we will be going through.  Not only a physical journey of collecting paperwork, meetings, and training but an emotional journey as well as we struggle with knowing our little guy is out there and we can't bring him home yet. They told us if everything moves along smoothly we would be traveling in about 9 months to get our son.

It's making me a little sad to think there is a boy who will be our son very soon living on the other side of the world and we are having to spend Christmas away from him. I just hope wherever he is they are taking good care of him and he is getting loved on.

For now we are setting up our first meetings with our social worker for our home study and gathering paperwork and waiting for our agency to call us with a match.  Merry Christmas!

Little Lambie

Finally got our pictures back of our sweet little lamb from the Nutcracker

He's so handsome

We were so excited to visit with Melody and Scott last weekend. And we got to

meet the new little guy, Ethan. Our kids just loved playing with the him and he got a ton of attention!  Our time spent together sure looks WAY different than it did 14 years ago in college!