Red Thread I

Two years in the making, our adoption journey is nearing it's close. Our little girl, currently named Huai Qing Liang, is living in an orphanage in Huainan which is in the province of Anhui. She is 17 months old (born June 14th, 2005) which puts her a month behind Evelyn and four months older than Nora, Karen's family. To the best of our knowledge based on the scanty medical information we were provided, she is healthy. We've got some work to do on the happy part though judging from her facial expression in the attached photos. At 14 months she was 29" long, weighed 18 lb. and had 6 teeth!

She will be 19 months old when we travel to China in January to bring her home. Right now we are estimating traveling around the 15th. There are 8 families in our group and the plan is to fly into Beijing for a few days of getting acclimated, shopping and sightseeing, then we split up and fly to the various provinces where our respective babies will be brought to us. They rarely allow the families to visit the orphanages but we are going to try. After a few days of getting used to being a family together we fly to Guangzhou where we go through the reams of paperwork required by both countries to allow us to leave the country and to get her US passport. From Guangzhou we travel back to the US, a 19 hour flight with a toddler, wish us luck! All in all about two weeks so we will be home by the end of January. Ira's sister Susan and cousin Marilyn Harper will be traveling with us. Susan has been learning Chinese which will be a HUGE help.

Her new name will be AiLi Piper Montague. Ai (pronounced eye) and Li (pronounced lee) are Chinese words which loosely translated mean loving and beautiful. Piper was Ira's mothers maiden name. The connection was important to us as she worked for over thirty years as a social worker counseling unwed mothers and assisting with adoptions.

We are so blessed to be given this opportunity to be parents to a child so in need of love and blessed to have the circle of family and friends that we have. Thank you for your love and support.

Ira & Karen


"An invisible red thread connects those who are destined to meet, regardless of time, place, or circumstance. The thread may stretch or tangle, but never break." Ancient Chinese Belief