How Do You Pack for a Life Change?

Dave and I have been asking ourselves that, as we surveyed the literal piles of stuff that we had to get into suitcases over the past few days.

The final week of preparation has been intense--more shopping than I ever hope to have to do again, lots of laundry, trying to clean a little, getting the car seat installed (a definite parent moment), picking up cash, getting prescriptions for lots of unpleasant conditions that we hope not to need (we are packing for contingencies, for the possibility of a very sick little girl), etc.

I realized this week that all the effort and worry--do we have everything--is really just displacement for the anxiety of the monumental life change that is nearly upon us.

We've both had mommy and daddy moments over this week of prep. Some highlights:

• The reminder call about Jenny's appointment with the developmental psychologist ("calling to remind you about your daughter's appointment")
• Getting her medications from the pharmacy--all those bottles labeled "Jennie (sic) Westman-Rankin")
• My first ride in the car with a child seat; for Dave, his first installation of same
• Washing Jenny's clothes for the trip--pulling tiny little trousers, onesies, socks, and caps out of the dryer, which I could picture doing over and over and over in the years ahead.
• My first mother's day gift--the most special memory book from my husband, created on our Mac and printed in a book. Best of all, it includes pictures taken by my husband of all the trips, the cultural explorations, meeting our Secret Pals, and of course, pictures from Jenny's referral day.
• Our last official date as a childless couple
• Learning of the earthquake in China, and realizing the possibility that on top of all the change that is soon to overtake our daughter's life, she may have new fears that we will need to help her manage.

We have been so buoyed over these years, months and now last frenetic weeks and days by all of you, our friends, family, and fellow adoptive parents and bloggers. We are grateful for the good wishes, comments, advice, packing tips (what does it mean to "pack light" to a backpacker--taking nothing?), etc.

We expect to blog from China. Dave has put in place more backups for the Blogger site than I can track, so we hope that the technical gods (and Beijing's government) will be with us.

We think the first days may be hard to get online, since there is still so much competition for satellite access because of the quake. But keep visiting, we promise to do our best to share our final days of the very BIG Wait with all of you.

See you all on the other side.

Love, Kristen and Dave