We went to the Department of Homeland Security 8/31

Well, we are 3 months in, and today we went to get fingerprinted. Our appointment was for 8:45am but we arrived a little early at 8:30 and handed over our paperwork, which included the I-600A which is the Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition, paid our fee, and waited for our numbers to be called. It took a little over an hour. Now we have to wait about 8 weeks for them to do an FBI check on us and then we will get our I171 which is basically the USCIS (United States Citizen and Immigration Services) approval form. It may be a while before I write again, although I will keep updating about the parent education meetings, but in our hurry up and wait life with this adoption we are now in the wait period.

Home Study is done! 8/29

Nikki just called, our home study is done. I just made an appointment with INS for this Thursday. We are moving along!

Only one reference left! 8/28

Well we are almost done with the homestudy. I got my new and improved passport in the mail yesterday with my hyphenated last name from when I got married. Yes I know I've been married over 4 years, but it just never seemed that prudent to get it updated, as I had no problems using it to travel to Mexico or England or France, but it seemed the appropriate time to get it done and I have a brand spanking new one now. We have one outstanding reference letter left and then we can move to the next step, hurray!

Another education meeting 8/14

Last night we went to the monthly CHI Parent Education meeting. We met a couple new Vietnamese adopting families and we brought Shawn with us this time. He had a great time (after the initial crying because he was unfamiliar with the person in charge and the other kids) and the lady said he was wonderful and a great helper and very smart. (Sorry I had to add the compliment, what parent can resist?) The topic of the evening was on Life Books, which is something we were familiar with through the fostering system. They are a good idea and we will probably make one for our little guy after he comes home.
The cool thing was that 2 of the families we met last month had referrals for children. Both their kids were off the waiting list. We will probably look there after we finish the homestudy too to see if we fall in love with any of the children.

Final Homestudy meeting 8/10

We met with Nikki for the final homestudy meeting. She brought us a rough draft of the final homestudy writeup and she got to see our house and meet Shawn in his own setting. And of course she got to meet our cats.

Physicals completed 7/19 and 8/3

Well Dave got his physical done on July 19 and I got mine done on August 3rd. Now we are just waiting for my passport to be renewed and two outstanding reference letters to be turned in and we'll be done with the homestudy. Woohoo.