Journey to Chongqing Day 1

First Post: Hello Friends and Family,
After much trial and error we are hoping that this post is posting!
We are in the city of Chongqing which is a 90 minute flight from Guangzhou. The city is huge! It is built on many hills much like San Francisco. The river is dry due to a drought and the weather is very warm and a bit humid. Of course we packed all clothing for a cooler climate!!!
The people are friendly and we are enjoying our visit. Today is also "gotcha day" and we will meet our little Emma around 3:00PM. wuk

There are about 15 families that are receiving their babies. We will travel by our faithful bus to the Civil Affairs Office to complete some papers and get our little ones and have a family photo taken. :)

When we arrived we were taken to the floor where the babies waited. The building is very new and modern. What a site we saw! The babies were grouped by orphanage and each group wore there own little outfits! There were babies in walkers and some walking wearing orange, pink, red, yellow and one little light blue outfit which was our little Emma. She traveled alone from her orphanage with her nanny. All of the babies looked wonderful! It is obvious that they have been well taken care of and loved. :)

One by one we were to receive our babies and that allowed us all the time to congratulate and take photos for each other. We were the second family to receive our baby. It went like this;
Her nanny placed her on the floor since she is walking and called our name. We walked towards her and she totally freaked!! That was very encouraging to us.....so we are told. I, mom, picked her up and just rocked her as she cried her little heart out. I sure felt like a mean person to be upsetting her little life. I will tell you that I was scared and as soon as I saw her I was in love! She is lovely and tiny. I am going to love on her until she is ready to love on us. :)

This is the most amazing thing I have ever done in my life. We felt that way when we brought our Nadya home from Russia, but this is different. We knew Nadya and she was old enough to communicate with us. Little Emma is a baby and is so dependent on us. Those of you waiting to travel for your child, prepare for the most amazing time in your lives.

China here we come! :)

Well, the day has finally come and we are leaving in one hour for the airport. We fly to L.A. and stay the night to visit and then we are off to China at 11:50PM Friday. Yeah!!!

Aimee, Bekki and Nadya, We love you, take care while we are gone.

Sam & Hallie (the dogs) Don't miss us too much! LOL

Family and Friends, stay in touch through e-mail. We love you all.

Katie and Nate, we will see you very soon!

Nicole, Melissa, Brian and Nate, We can't wait for you to meet the newest family member!

Feb. 12, 2007

Shopping and Packing for travel! We celebrated my daughter, Bekki's, 16th birthday today! I can hardley believe she is so grown up. She is such a blessing to our family.

I spent several hours browsing the aisles of Target and Old Navy today picking up some items I need for Emma. There is so much out there! :) I will start packing tomorrow. I can't wait to leave in 10 days! We will get Emma in 13 days! How do you like this sweet photo of her from last June 2006? Isn't she a cutie?!

Saturday night my husband's assistant threw a wonderful baby shower for us! So many people came to wish us well and we feel so blessed to be here in Ohio. Thank you all! I will post photos later.

We are expecting a winter storm tonight, and I thought we had moved to a warmer climate! LOL

Emma, we are coming for you soon. We love you!

Travel dates all set!! Another step closer!

What a busy couple of days it has been. First keeping up with my ladybug believers posts that I love to read. Thank you ladies! So, we will fly to LA on the 22nd and stay the night. We hope to visit with my neice and her husband and their little girl, Ellie, who is 2-1/2. I have never seen her! :) (except photos!) We will meet with our group at LAX on the 23rd and fly out that night direct to Guanzhou, a 15 hours flight! Yikes!! That will be hard enough on me never mind the return with a two year old!! Better make sure the Benedryl will help her relax! When we land at 6:20AM in China we will be wisked off to the China Hotel to drop our bags and then off to a welcome breakfast of dim-sum. They call that breakfast? After that we will take a little tour or the area and then back to the hotel to rest and get to know each other. We leave the following day for Chongqing and will spend five days there at the Mariott Hotel, not too shabby!! I looked at it on line and it apprears to be quite nice. :) We will also receive our little girl the same day, it is called "gotcha day". That is all I know at this point. We are trying to make the travel plans and getting ready to pack. I think we will purchase 2 large rolling LLBean adventure bags which are reccommended. I will keep you all posted.

WE'RE GOING TO CHINA...TA ARRIVED TODAY!

We received our TA today around 2:00PM. The phone kept beeping in while I was on another phone call and I looked at who was calling. When I saw that it was from Florida I knew something was up. So, we have been approved to travel and we will be leaving Cincinnati on Feb. 23rd!!! We are still waiting on the consulate appointment, but that is in the works. Yeah!!! :) Cloud # 9!!! My DH is smiling from ear to ear! Tomorrow reality sets in and all that needs to take place before we go. I've got 3 weeks to pack. YES!

I will post more photos later.

HAPPY NEW YEAR to all!!! 2007 is here.

Here are a couple of photos
of Emma's room.

Well, a new year has begun and with it our wait to pick up our little daughter in China continues. It has been 119 days since our dossier went to China although we were not to receive a DTC date because she has a special need. We are eager to have her home with her new family and the kids are wondering how much longer it will take. We are so ready to get her!! :) This has been a continueous learning experience for me. I know I say I trust in God's perfect plan, yet my heart yearns to hold my little child so far away. My days are full and yet I think of our little one constantly! It's as if she were away for awhile. I am sure it will be a bitter-sweet meeting we will have with her. Our desire to finally hold her being met and her grieving for the loss of all that she has known in her short life. Please pray with us that God would release her to us soon so we can finally love our little baby girl. We hope to have a new photo up soon that we found in someones photo list. :)

CHRISTMAS 2006

Well Merry Christmas to all our dear friends and family. I can't believe that my favorite day of the year has come and gone. It's a good thing that I take seriously the 12 days of Christmas!

We spent the morning at home enjoyed each other and calling family to wish them a blessed Christmas. The girls enjoyed their traditional egg casserole for breakfast and I am sure our little Emma will get to enjoy it next year. :) The afternoon was spent at my sister's in Kentucky with her family. We had a wonderful dinner and time to visit with each other.

We are still waiting for our travel dates. Just keep praying that it will come soon and that all will come together with few if no glitches. :)

Have a Happy New Year!

Christmas is in the air!

Well, we are well on our way towards celebrating the birth or our Savior, Jesus Christ. As we prepare for this special celebration I have had time to reflect on what it means to "prepare". Just as we clean our homes and decorate them to the hilt with all the wonderful seasonal decor(I am currently deep into this faze) preparing to celebrate Christmas day, I realize that we need to be keeping our "human" temples, our spirit homes, in the same fashion. Clean on both the inside and out, presenting ourselves to our King in the best way that we can! Listening and reading the word of God, praying and just being like Jesus to others. How hard is that? We look forward to spending time with family and friends, exchanging gifts and sharing meals, isn't that what we will do in our eternal home!!God has surely provided us with the best training ground possible! I have also learned that God is always faithful to those who trust and wait upon Him. I don't need to be anxious, I try to remember that, and I know that God's timeing is just perfect! I am at peace waiting to travel to pick up our little Emma-lia from China. She has grown up over the months and is no more a baby, but a little girl! I cannot wait to meet her and to help her become a Bergeron family member. :) God has planned our family, even when we think we have it all set and done. What do I know?! So, we are waiting for a travel date and expect to hear in late Jan. 2007. My timing would be now, but we have to learn to wait on His timing, it is just right.

China Journey

China Journey

Well, Thanksgiving has come and gone. We spent the day cooking and serving turkey dinner to a couple of hundred people from our community and church family. It was a very busy and wonderful day for all! There were many from outside that were blessed by this offering. :) It makes me sit back and think about all that God has blessed me and my family with. We have not heard any news on travel to China. Perhaps we can use this extra time to get some things done in the house.

Our friends have returned from China with their little son, Elijah. They are slowly adjusting to haveing a toddler in the house and he is the cutest little guy! It was wonderful to see them. :) My friend in Kentucky got her travel date and she and her husband will leave on the 6th of Dec. to pick up their little girl. We are excited and hope to follow them while they travel. Thank you Greg and Maren for sharing your trip with me. Keep on praying for our travel. :)

No Travel

Well, Happy Birthday to me and some news that we will not be travelling in Dec. but likely in February 2007! We are greatly disappointed...:( So, we will not be putting much up here for a while. If you would, please pray for our travel and for our little Jingxiang. Thanks friends.

Little Orphan Girl

On the street I saw a small girl cold and shivering in a thin dress, with little hope of a decent meal. I became angry and said to God: "Why did you permit this? Why don't you do something about this? For awhile God said nothing then He replied, "I certainly did do something, I made you."

I do not know who wrote that, but it sure confirmed our decisions that we are doing the right thing with this adoption. :)

We hear that there are many travel dates coming out this week. We have no expectations, but prayerfully hope we will be one of the families chosen. God knows the right time for us to go. :) Hang in there Trayce, our time is near! :)

Post-Placement Completed for Nadya

Today we had our last meeting for the adoption of Nadya. Yeah!!! We will no longer need to submit a report and photos of our life to the Russian government. However, we will soon begin a new post-placement with China. They only require one year with three meetings, much easier than Russia with their three year requirements. I should feel relieved that we do not have to report to our childrens' government until they are 18 like some of the other countries. :)

The Wait for Travel

Hello to all. Well, we are at the end of October and no news on our travel. We have been told that if we do not travel in early December we will not travel until February. So, we are put off again. Emma will be two years old the 4th of February and we would have loved to have her home before she was two. We are trusting on God's timeing as he is in charge. Just a remimder, Emma was 15 months when we accepted her referral. It has been a long wait considering the fact that she is a special needs child and will need medical attention when she arrives home. So, please pray with us that we will have a travel date before Christmas. Thank you!

photos added

We are trying to add more photos to the site.

 

Wendy

ewbergeron@adelphia.net

513-755-6702

 

One Small Child - Her City of Birth

Chongqing

Here is some interesting information about the "little one" on a journey to a new home in America. This is the only information provided by the Chinese Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA) to us:

Name: Qian, Jingxiang

DOB: Feb 4, 2005

From: Chongqing, QianJiang District SW1

Special Need: heart defect, ASD

City Information:

Chongqing only officially became a "city" in 1927, but its strategic position at the head of the Yangtze Gorges has made it a trading capital for centuries. The "Mountain City" rises high above the Da Jiang (Yangtze River). Chongqing lies at the confluence of the Yangzi and Jialingjiang Rivers, centered on a hilly peninsula encircled by the rivers, in what was formerly the eastern part of Sichuan Province. Also known as the Mountain City, Chongqing is 1,025 km (640 miles) northwest of Hong Kong, and 1,800 km (1,120 miles) southwest of Beijing. It is one of the four “furnace cities” of China, with blazingly hot and humid summers and cold, foggy winters.

Language: Mandarin Currency: Yuan

One Small Child - Her Story

This is the story of our journey to bring our new little daughter home to her forever family.

We began our journey a year ago when we began praying about whether or not we should consider adding to our already large family! Our youngest daughter, Nadya, who we had adopted from Russia almost 3 years ago was the prayer warrior for our newest family member. She began praying in school with her class for a little sister from China. We learned of this through her teacher at a student conference and denied that we were going to adopt again. LIttle did we know that the prayers of a child would be heard by our God.

January 2006 the paperwork began. We had committed to a "Waiting Child". That is a child with special needs.

February 2006 we were fingerprinted. The homestudy is well underway. We had our medicals.

March 2006 our homestudy is complete and we file for the I71 document.

April 2006 we are waiting for approval. I finally arrives the last week of April. Yeah!

May 2006 We have all our documents completed and our dossier is ready to be sent off. But....we hear some news that puts us on hold for a bit. The age of the child we desired may not be possible due to our old ages!!!

June 2006 I begin looking at other agencies both for the age situation, but more importantly, the timeing of our referral. We are told we will not hear anything until at least Dec. 2006 or Jan. 2007. We know that our paper will start to expire if we wait. We begin praying...praying...what should we do?

July 2006 I receive a telephone call from a woman that works for an agency in Fl. She introduces herself and we immediately connect. I hung up feeling greatly encouraged and Larry and I discuss changing to this agency. We decided to enjoy the weekend of July 4th and to make the decision after.

July 9th I received another phone call from this wonderful lady, Martha. She shares that God had laid it on her heart to offer a child to us. This child is promised to another family, but they may decide not to go forward with the adoption. We would have to wait the weekend to hear.

July 13th at 3:10PM I received a phone call from Martha asking if we still were interested in this little girl?! YES!!! We wanted to make Qian, Jingxiang our new daughter. :) I could hardly control my excitement and the call came just when I was visiting our pediatrician for one of the other kids. This gave me the opportunity to talk with her about the medical condition we were taking on. No Problem!!!

July 25th We left for Cape Cod, Ma. for a much needed vacation and family reunion. We enjoyed two weeks with family and felt ready to come home and begin the next step to bring Jingxiang home to Ohio.

August 15th we received our pre-approval from China. Another step closer!

September 2006 Our dossier is in translation for China. We wait.

October 2006 We are still waiting. I am getting anxious to bring her home. We have not settled on a name yet and the kids have put there ideas before us. We will start working on her room next week. I would like to make one of the 100 square prayer quilts that are a China tradition for babies. I don't have a sewing machine so I need to find a volunteer to help me. :)