Her Finding Ad

About 1 to 2 million baby girls are abandoned in China each year. Most Americans probably believe baby girls are abandoned because Chinese families want a boy to carry on the family name. While that may be true in many cases, there are more complex issues that lead families to abandon their daughters (and sons, too). See my post Found for more insight.

It is actually against the law there for parents to give their children up for adoption. This means they can't simply bring their child to an orphanage if they can't or don't want to keep them. Instead, many birth parents leave their babies in a well-traveled area where he or she is sure to be safely found. When a baby is found, it is protocol for the police to attempt to find the birth parents and, beginning 10 years ago, it became law that the orphanage place an ad in the local newspaper, with the hopes that birth parents would claim their children. This is called a finding ad. There is a company here in the States that can locate a child's finding ad, and after a couple months of searching, they found Virginia Grace's ad for us! Here is our little girl in, probably, the earliest picture of her that we'll ever see ...Translation:

Name: (cannot disclose her Chinese name on here until after we're home)

Gender: Female

Age: one month (our report said she was 20 days; parents often end up with several birth dates projected)

Finding Place: The construction/work site near the gate of subdivision No. 2 of Dong Jun Wan residential area, which is a jurisdictional area of Shu Guang Local Police Station

Finding time: 12-15-2008

Birthmark and personal items: None (We were really hoping she'd been left with a letter from her birth parents, but this is more rare than common.)

We are anxious to get the hard copy of the paper in our hands (on it's way) because you can tell in this image that the folding of the paper left a line and a mark over her mouth. I also want to see the picture closer up, as I can somewhat detect the tumor on her tongue. It looks so swollen. Poor baby. But what a beautiful baby!