Well, that was unexpected.

So the way this is supposed to work is that when you receive your referral, you send a Letter of Intent to adopt the child, then China is to review your file and send you a Letter of Acceptance. This means that they will allow you to proceed with the adoption. The process usually takes 4-8 weeks for the Letter of Acceptance. Ours, however, came in 10 days. The agency was stunned and said it was totally unexpected. Yeah, for you and us both. So now instead of an April or May trip, we are looking at a February or march trip to China. Now shifting into the next gear.

Hi, I'm Bucky Goldstein

What to do when you have a very Italian last name and a very Chinese daughter? For our bio daughter it was ok to pair an Italian sounding first name with our last name, but we didn't like mixing ethnic names like Irish-Italian, Russian-Italian, Egyptian-Italian, but the Italian-Italian worked. However, a very obvious Chinese girl may baffle some blind dates and future TSA agents when a Chinese girl with a Pittsburgh accent introduces herself as something like Giuseppina Portobello, or Speranza Rigatoni. I think she may get interrogated as a spy. The alternative would be to use an American name. However, we can't find one that we are really all that interested in using. So I think we are now trying to agree on one that is a bit Italian, but not too much, and will also fit her looks. We thought Violet/Violetta, but she is hardly a delicate flower based on the description we were provided of her personality. (Obstinate, full of energy, extroverted) Hmmm, perhaps she can have an ironic name...

Is it really a surprise if you were expecting it for 4 1/2 years?

After 4 and a half years of waiting we finally got the call. It was a call at 11:45 at night but who needs sleep anyway. I was woken out of my sound sleep by DW who just happened to still be up working at that time and answered the phone since she thought someone must be dead or in the hospital. However, it was the exception to the late night phone call where we were told that our agency had a match for us. So I was woken up, without DW actually telling me why I had to get on the phone, and after hearing the conversation I started to realize what we were talking about. However, i did hear something about triplets and am not sure if that was still being asleep or no,t but it woke me up real fast. Not triplets for us, but the agency did have a little girl for us, a 2 1/2 year old (HOLY COW!) She was emailing the medical packet and pictures to us via email right now and they needed a decision by 6pm our time the next day. Only Twelve hours. No pressure there.

....

That was a LONG 10 minutes to wait for that email. While waiting I thought how odd it was to have someone call me at almost midnight, tell me I have a 2 1/2 year old daughter, over 6,000 miles away, and I can't just go get her but have to wait. For probably 6 months. DING! "You have mail!" (actually, I don't have AOL but this would have been the one time that sound wouldn't have been annoying)

Then we saw her for the first time...

I didn't care about her medical records anymore. She was my daughter from that point.

We did, of course, have the medicals reviewed by our doctor and got a second opinion from DW's friend who works at a hospital in another city and both said that everything was good. So we made the phone call to the Agency with at least 30 minutes to spare. Now. We wait. And price some flights.