Monday, April 27, 2009

Sec. of State

I got an email today saying our documents made it to the authentication department at the US Secretary of State. Now they must make it from there to the Chinese Embassy and then back home. And that is only for the documents from Tennessee.

Our Georgia documents were delivered to the Houston Consulate last week but have not started their trek back home yet.

Our Missouri documents will be authenticated by the MO secretary of state soon (maybe this week if we have time) and then shipped off to the Chicago Consulate.

It's a good thing I still have a good grip on US geography from school.

It's here!

We have been patiently waiting for the first copy of our home study since we had our home visit. The agency was quick, in my opinion, getting it to us only two weeks to the day after we were interviewed. Reading your life story in 13 pages is a bit weird but also kind of cool in a way too.

And there it was, page 12:
This agency approves and recommends J and C as prospective adoptive parents...

WOW! Now this is getting exciting!

Of course it came when J is out of town for the week but he should be able to review it for any corrections in the evening and then I'll send it back to the agency who will then send it to FTIA for review and it will then be sent back to us for final approval. We attend our workshop this weekend so it would be wonderful to leave there with several notarized copies in our hands.

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Fundraiser

We are thinking of several different ways to raise funds for our adoption and our first attempt is a Tastefully Simple catalog party through a consultant will donate 50% of her profits towards our adoption. Fill up on some good, EASY food while helping us bring our new girl home! (I can't wait until we get matched and decide on her name so we can stop saying "new girl, new sister or new daughter!") Click on the Tastefully Simple logo to order through our fundraiser.

My favorites are the beer bread mix and the almond pound cake. The beer bread can be made with any carbonated beverage making the possibilities endless! Check out the recipe section for many different uses for both products.

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Whew, glad that is over!

Our social worker was here last night to do our home tour and interviews. The interviews were easy, just questions about ourselves, each other and adoption. I was most apprehensive of how the kids' interview would go.

I think Jacob was secretly drinking kool-aid and eating candy bars downstairs prior to the questioning because he was bouncing off the walls hyper. Emily barely talked; she said because Jacob kept saying what she was thinking and then, Matthew. When asked what the new child might not like about our family he pipes up and says "well, she probably won't like Jacob punching her like he punches me in the face." WHAT?!!! What happened to all those briefings we gave them? Just kidding, we actually didn't brief them on what to say at all. Jacob did say he doesn't like Matthew in his room and that he has broke a trophy before so the social worker asked what if his new sister does that. Jacob's reply? "Well, I understand because she would be curious because she's never seen it before but Matthew has been here long enough that he shouldn't be curious anymore."

Hopefully she understands some normal sibling rivalry! Beyond that we have a few things left to do like outlet plugs and cabinet locks on the cleaner cabinet. We figured we would hold off to see if either of those things created issues after we bring her home. If she is particularly fascinated with outlets we will buying a few packages of outlet plugs.

We all celebrated having this step done by feasting on a piece of cake once the social worker left.
Our next step: We will have to wait a couple of weeks to get a draft of the home study. We will review it and our caseworker at FTIA will review it for an errors or needed additions and then once the review process is done we will be given our final draft. We will then send a copy of our final draft with the I-800A application (petition to adopt an international orphan) and supporting documents to USCIS. We will then wait for their approval which is currently taking around a month.

While that is going on I will be taking all of our documents to the MO secretary of state office to be certified and then shipped off to the Chinese consulate to be authenticated. Once we get our USCIS approval I will send it and our home study off to the secretary of state and consulate. That will complete our dossier and then we can send it to the agency who will translate it and send it to the CCAA.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Rescheduled

After all the cleaning and organizing I have done this week to prepare for our home study visit tonight, it was rescheduled this morning due to our social worker being ill. I do completely understand that getting sick is beyond our control but I am still disappointed. I think the biggest reason I'm disappointed is I was mentally prepared for tonight, as was everyone else in the family.

I now have a clean house that I have to try and keep clean with kids home for a long holiday weekend. I guess things could be much worse though!

Happy Easter!

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

On the calendar

The home visit is written on the calendar...in ink! Next Thursday at 6:30.

Part of me is nervous and part of me is very excited; it's taken awhile to get to this point and we have to get through it to get any further. What a great Easter present to have the visit done and behind us!

Originally we thought we could begin the matching process once we had an approved home study draft, which would be early next month. But, the CCAA has decided that most children with minor special needs can now only be matched with families whose dossiers are already in China (or LID- log-in date). For that reason we will now be waiting until our LID to be matched with a child. This will afford our family the opportunity to be matched with a child with more minor needs, as we have requested.