A Hallie Update

We have finished our home study update and submitted our immigration paperwork, so for now we are waiting for a fingerprinting appointment with USCIS... because, I guess we didn't get fingerprinted enough with Jordan's adoption.  Luckily, because we are reusing our dossier, these will be the only fingerprints we have to do this time around and we don't have to pay $890 to repeat them.  That's how much we paid for these fingerprints, (yep fingerprints!) a year ago, so even if it's annoying to have to go through the process again, I am grateful we don't have to pay for them again. 

Since being matched to Hallie, I've made friends with a few families who, when there adopting their own children from Hallie's orphanage, have taken pictures of Hallie.  Every picture is a gift.  Jordan came with hundreds of pictures.  With Hallie, we started with only a handful of pictures and have worked our way up to a few handfuls of pictures.   We still haven't seen a smile on her face, but we now have a picture or two with near smiles.  From what those who have met her have said, she is a quiet, very observant girl.  Some say she seems sad, others say not sad, but very shy and gentle.  I really can't wait to meet her for myself!  Waiting is hard.  Hard because I know she needs a Mama and a Baba.  When Jordan came out surgery and went into respiratory distress, machines were beeping and it was a bit chaotic... but when I held him, everything settled down.  I was his Mama, and I was able to comfort to him in a way that the nurses couldn't.  Since then, I keep thinking about the surgeries, and hospitalizations Hallie has had to face alone.  No one was there, just for her, to hold her and comfort her.  It makes me terribly sad when I think about it.  Waiting is also hard because of where Hallie is.  It's no where near as good as the situation Jordan was in.  As I read accounts of the punishments and abuse that children from Hallie's orphanage have reported after being adopted, I sat at my computer and cried.  Generally the children Hallie's age and younger are spared from abuse, but that doesn't comfort me, because whether or not Hallie has been mistreated, the children around her have been.  And there is nothing I can do to undo that and nothing I can do to get Hallie home any sooner.   We just pray like crazy for Hallie as well as for her nannies.