Merry Christmas!

Unless things go much longer than expected, we should have our baby home by Christmas next year. We are very much enjoying this one as a family of five! Merry Christmas!

Dossier done!

I mailed off the entire dossier to WACAP today! The ups store guy asked me how much it was worth, how much to insure it for. $200, 4 months of work, a new addition to our family: its priceless. Now begins the real waiting game... up until now, I've had things to do, now there really is nothing left until we get "The Call".

Two more documents

Two more documents are waiting at the NC SOS for me to pick up Monday morning. Then.. the dossier paperwork will be done! By the way, I am determined to get a bit of humanity back from the lady I have visited three times at the Secy of State's office. She ahs barely even looked at me, and only speaks the cursory amount of words to get through our transactions. Despite me being as gracious as possible, while not using up more of her time than is neccesary. I don't think she knows that what she is doing for me a a step in bringing home our son.

I finally got back the medical certificate from my doctors office today, it took them nearly 2 weeks to return. But, I have it now. Tomorrow, I am taking a giant stack of papers to the NC Secretary of State to have all the notary signatures authenticated. I decided to make the drive down there and hand deliver/pick up the paperwork to save some $$. Plus, I don't have to worry it is lost in the mail somewhere.

Quote

“Family need not be defined merely as those with whom they
share blood but for those for whom they would give their blood.”
--from Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens

Sibling Connection?

I was sitting at the table with my three year old while she was eating lunch on Monday. She stopped, looked at me and said "Mama there is a baby crying. I think it's our baby brother. We need to go get him!"

Hmmmm... so I will record this and maybe November 9th is a significant day for our son. Or, maybe our three year old has an active imagination. Either way, this will be fun for both these kids to read some day.

An important paper came today!

We received the form from USCIS today saying that our fingerprints have been approved. This is big big news because as of today, we are officially on the waiting list for a referral!!

Fingerprinted

C and I had a very productive morning! Our first stop took us to the Sheriff's dept to get our criminal record checks. You'll all be surprised to hear that they are all clear :) :) The next stop was to the other side of the Triangle to the USCIS office for fingerprinting. Apparently the security there is tighter than the airport. I had to throw away the snacks I brought to entertain the littlest girl. Plus the guy dug into my purse.. did you know I had four sets of random keys in there? Neither did I! But, after the somewhat embarrassing trip through security, the rest was fine. We waited for a few minutes then had our turn with the fingerprinting computer. Its all electronic, and non-messy. Plus the young woman taking care of us was very sweet and wanted to talk about the kids (present and future) the whole time.

Two more things to mark off the to-do list!

Accepted!

I received an email from WACAP today that we have been accepted into the Ethiopia program!

These words came to me today during some quiet time... "It's my job to hear you when no one else does." At the time, I was thinking about our child who may or not even be conceived yet, much less on this earth. So, Im not sure if it is my message to him, or my message from Him.

Medical Reports cleared!

Our social worker confirmed with us today that the director has approved the medical portion of the homestudy! This is big because now it means all that is left is minor tweaks before we can send it off to our placement agency. Once the draft has been approved by them, it can be finalized and notarized! First hurdle handled!

For the moment the ball is out of our court.

We had what is hopefully our last meeting with our pediatrician today to finalize the medical reports on our (current) kids. The form was handed off to our social worker, and that is the last of the paperwork. If the agency director approves, the Homestudy should be complete by Tuesday or Wednesday of next week!

I say the last of the paperwork... but that is just for the Homestudy. Now I can focus more on the dossier paperwork. Similar stuff, but more complicated as almost every form needs to be notarized. Right now I'm working on the application letter that basically introduces our family to the Ethiopian adoption officials.

Paperwork

No updates for awhile since we are just working on paperwork. We've had a few issues with our medical reports, but we are on our way to a solution for those. Measnwhile, I am working on the parenting resource plan we have to submit before the homestudy can be approved with our placement agency. That has taken more time than I originally thought, but Ive got all but one question answered. I should be ready to send it all off to WACAP by the time the homestudy is completed.

Dear friends...

Now that we are well into this process, we have decided to start sharing the news of our adventure with family and friends. Everyone has been very enthusiastic and supportive. I'm hoping to use this blog as a way to document the adoption process, as well as to let others keep up with whats going on. I also hope this will be something our child will enjoy reading in the future.

We have our third (and final) meeting with our social worker tonight. She has said that in this meeting we will be discussing our parenting philosophy and our reasons for choosing adoption. She gave us an article on discipline to read and we will also be talking through that. Since it echoes how we already parent, it should not be any trouble. Otherwise I'm just waiting on paperwork to be returned to me so I can pass it along for completion of the home study.

On our way

Things are moving right along! This past weekend we had our home visit with our social worker. I cleaned all weekend in preparation for her arrival... the house hasn't been this clean in a long time. Over all it was a very easy meeting. She had a tour of the house, and had us tell her the significant items in each room. So for instance, several of our rooms are adorned with Cale's handiwork. The kids loved having someone to show around the house and to tell about their treasures. She asked what the kids like to do, and what we like to do as a family. It was a very relaxed meeting, and would have been more so if I hadn't been so nervous! One interesting thing we found out during this meeting is that our social workers kids go to the same school as our oldest. Strange that we have never crossed paths, but I'm sure we will now!

Otherwise, we are plugging away at the paperwork and Ive started the online training as well. Not too exciting, but every form filled out is one step closer to our dream!

Sent!

Handed two fat envelopes to the mail lady today! And then, tried not to pass out. :)

Two envelopes

"Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase." ~Martin Luther King Jr.

There are two envelopes waiting to be stamped and mailed. They are the first step towards growing our family by adopting a son from Ethiopia. I am weary from trying to anticipate the entire journey to know if I am strong enough. With this inital paperwork, I take this step in faith and hand it over to God.