恭喜发财

Gong xi fa cai . . . A traditional Chinese New Year greeting as we begin the Year of the Rat (literally translated, the greeting is a wish for prosperity, and does not mention the new year. Nonetheless, it is the most common traditional greeting for the season). As things stand now, it is likely to be another two to three years until we travel to China to bring home Phoebe’s sister. A long wait to be sure, but one that would have been truly dispiriting if not for Phoebe.

One advantage of the likely timing is that Phoebe should about five when we travel. She’ll get more out of the experience, and she’ll be much more amenable to reason and behavior barter than she is now. (Another advantage is more time to improve my Mandarin skills).

I won’t be mentioning the process for China much (probably only annually at this season) unless there’s a major change (plus or minus) in the Chinese authorities’ pace. Right now, they have been processing about a week’s worth of applications for each month that goes by in real time. They have finished referring children to families whose applications were on file as of December 27, 2005, exactly 7 months before our application was officially logged in. That means about 30 weeks’ worth of applications until we get our referral, and so about 30 months from now, or August 2010. Families usually travel to China about 2-3 months after receiving a referral, so we’re estimating travel right now will occur in October 2010, just before Phoebe’s fifth birthday.