DTC!

Hooray! This is a HUGE step for us! It took 19 days from 800A approval to be DTC..mostly because my agency and dossier service is in NY and I am on the west Coast....no complaints here! I am still way ahead of where I thought we would be!  The next stop on the crazy train will be LID (Log in Date). This is when all papers have been translated and we begin our official wait in line. Next stop:  LOA (Letter of Acceptance) from China. This important document makes everything "official".  This can take anywhere from 30-90 days with the average I believe being 60 days. But some people have waited over 100 days. Let's just not go there....unless we have to. Hopefully things will move along and we will travel in October...which of course is the most expensive due to the trade fair...however, we have a little boy we are trying to get to...so we will swing it.
Tom and I are headed to California Friday, for our cousin Brady's funeral. So sad...he would have been 37 just a couple of days ago.  I wish he could have met Henry!! Take care all!

Waiting....

I need to get used to waiting. I know this. I do not like it. We should be DTC next week...which is great. We are a couple of months ahead of where I thought we would be. That should put us in China in October...that would be great. We have been busy getting the room ready and taking care of small things around the house. Noah and Leah are excited to send Henry a picture book and letter, but we will wait until we are LID to do that. Most people travel 5 months after LID, so we may even wait a little longer to make contact. It really depends whose desk (in China) your file ends up on that determines how long of a wait you might have. There seems to be a bit of a backlog that is clearning up now. Let's hope so!! When we decided to adopt in 2005 and got our paperwork in the beginning of 2006, our wait went from 6 months to 5 years....so who knows how long this will take. Typically, it takes 60-90 days LID to LOA then another 60-90 to TA (travel approval)...let's hope this can be pushed through somehow...

I800A Approval!

This is incredible, and I meant to post sooner but have been in Texas for the adoption training. I went back in that Monday and was approved  TUESDAY and had the approval at my house on Wednesday! Talk about fast...I don't even know how that happened. I think it was less than 20 days!! I now have sent EVERYTHING back east to make my dossier complete. Just a couple more authentications and that should do it. If all goes well, our dossier should be mailed off to China in a couple of weeks.

The training in Texas was good. It gave us some different parenting ideas not only for our adopted kids, but for the bio one as well. It was tough being away, but we ended up meeting some wonderful people and having dinner with an old friend I went to high school with. We actually met a REAL cowboy and Tom rode a mechanical bull....it was fun.  I celebrated my birthday as well down there. I am really glad our agency requires this type of class; especially for those who are totally new to adopting an older child. Anyway, I am exhausted and am going to go to spend time with Noah and Leah. I am hoping we get an update soon on little Henry!

Me, Wait? No...I don' think so.

I couldn't take the wait, so I showed up bright and early to the local CIS office to be fingerprinted again.  I cannot tell you how THRILLED the guy was to see me again. He even started in on a little lecture....well I just told him to take the prints, and if they fail, I will need to pursue other options. I saw the little "reject' light again...far fewer times though. I raced home, called the USCIS in Missouri and the gal said I had PASSED this time!! I do not have an officer and won't until next week, but that is fine with me. I also had an email from our SW saying that she left out a pretty important part of the home study and would need to get that to USCIS today. My hope is that they will have everything they need to process the application next week. Whew.