Adoption Blog

Yay!!! Such good news!

That is great! And so exciting! We are not far behind you. We live in Charlotte. Just wondering, did you choose to stay 16 days or is that how long you have to stay? We were hoping on around 10 days because of my husband's job.

AH

Thanks Michele!

Hi Angie, we did not have a choice. Our adoption agency, CCAI, set the entire trip up for us. It's going to be difficult on my job as well. But fortunately I've been able to work it out.

We are not happy about the length of the trip. We would prefer to just go, sign the paper work, and bring her home. It's not that we do not want to visit and see China. It's just that this is going to be a stressful trip. We would prefer to make this trip very fast, and then go back and visit in a more relaxed environment.

We were a little concerned about leaving our house empty for 16 days. Especially since we have had snow, ice storms, & power outages the past few winters. But it worked out well for us. My brother wanted to get out of town for a while and he asked if we wouldn't mind if he stayed at our house while we are away. :-) Perfect!

Hope things work out for your husbands job. Are you using CCAI?

Congratulations! We are just beginning the process in Charlotte. We've gotten a lot of helpful info from your blog. Have you been 100% happy with CCAI? We're looking at using A Helping Hand. Do you know anything about them? Also, we are going to likely use Nathanson for our home study because of your recommendations! We wish you the best on your trip. God Bless you.
Wendy

Hi, we've been watching your blog since we signed up with CCAI in December. Congratulations on your travel dates! I was wondering....you say CCAI set all of the travel plans. Did they get your plane tickets for you? or did you do that on your own?

Thanks,
Stacey

Mark,
No we are not using CCAI. Datz foundation in Virginia has a satellite office in Concord, NC. They did our homestudy and we really felt comfortable with them so we went with them for the adoption also.

Things will be fine with my husband's job. He just gets really behind in paperwork when he is gone. That is why we wish for a shorter timeframe. Anyway, we are so excited for you and hope you have a great trip. Keep us all informed! Take care.

Angie

Hi Wendy, we are definitely 100% satisfied with CCAI. They have been fantastic. I don't know anything about A Helping Hand though. Sorry. And Nathanson was great. If we ever decide to adopt a second child, we will use CCAI and Nathanson again. I wouldn't even consider any other agencies.

Hi Stacey, CCAI did everything for us but they do use www.jc-travel.com to assist with the plane tickets. They gave us a choice. We could sit back and let them handle all of our travel plans. Or we could do our own travel plans. Some people might want to use frequent flyer miles for their flights so they would have to book them on their own. We preferred to just let CCAI handle it. Plus, when you do this, you end up traveling as a group with the other families. There is a total of 11 families with CCAI all going to the same province. I think at least 9 of them let CCAI handle the travel plans so we will all meet here in the US at the airport and we will travel together. I find that to be less stressful because if we run into any travel problems, the entire group will be together.

Hope that helps!

How exciting! Congratulations!

Mark,
We are likely going to use CCAI after much consideration and prayer. We feel that going with an established larger agency with lots of reps in China will be the best for us. We have a friend in Tenn. that is also using CCAI and is very pleased. Keep us posted when you return and take pictures!! Best wishes,
Wendy

You will all be in our thoughts and prayers...F&R