Article 5 and visas

Well, we have reached another milestone in this journey - or would marathon be a more appropriate analogy. The international adoption process in general, the China program in particular, is NOT for the faint of heart! After doing a little independent (aka frowned upon, but I'm not known for my patience) research, I learned that the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou had forwarded our Article 5 to the CCAA on July 26. We weren't informed by Holt of our A5 until July 30, but we're holding out hope that we get our Travel Approval (TA) in the next week or two!! We can be ready to go anytime now because we got our visas via FedEx today! After our TA we get our Consulate Appointment (CA), and then we make our travel arrangements. I know. It's a lot of letters and numbers, but suffice it to say, we only have two more hurdles to clear and we should be China-bound. The down-side to all of this is, if we don't get a quick TA and our CA is thereby pushed back, we could be looking at a December "Gotcha Day." :( Holt is sending a group to China mid-September. If we don't get into that group, we may be facing a long wait. In October and November, China has trade fairs, is hosting the Asian Games, and has a government holiday for a week. It could be very difficult, if not impossible, and extremely expensive to get a consulate date or lodging and transportation at that time. We would certainly appreciate any and all prayers and positive thoughts for a fast TA. Thanks! Here's hoping I'll be posting again SOON with good news!