Cross your fingers!

The hope is that I might get to meet our little Becky in January! That would be the first trip to Uzbekistan where I get to meet the MOE and GTO officials. But, more importantly, I get to meet Becky herself! The trip should be about a week long, but there's nothing definite yet. It's a good thing I've got two major holidays between now-and-then to keep me distracted. It will be a great way to fill those post-Christmas ho-hum months!

We have a MATCH!!!!

Hooray!

We have our official referral and she's a "keeper". Given the nature of Uzbek adoptions, I can not share too many details about her yet. Once she's officially, permanently ours, then I'll be posting pictures and all of the details.

I can say that she's 100% adorable and actually looks amazingly like our sons at the same age. She's a little older than our originally requested age, but that is not deterring us in the slightest. February or March is probably the targeted time frame to bring her home. However, timing is always subject to extreme changes.

When Sean and Matthew first saw her picture, they had only one comment - "that looks like a boy, Mommy." Our little Becky definitely has the orphanage/Marine buzz cut, but with some imagination I can picture pigtails.

Jonathan has been traveling everywhere with his little photo album of Becky pictures. His speech therapist, the "cheese lady" at Walmart and our regular Walmart cashier have all been shown each and every picture by Jonathan.

We are getting more confident that Becky will be our daughter one day, but I still keep throwing some "if's" and "probably's" in there for the boys. I don't want the disappointment to be too great if things fall apart at the last minute.

"Becky" - explained

A very careful reader has noted that I used the name "Becky" for our daughter in a previous poast. Each of our children has had a "working name" prior to their birth. "George", "Charlie", "Dewey" (<- for 'do we' want a thir) and finally "Becky". Becky's name comes from her birth home of UzBEKIstan. Ooze and Stan just weren't flattering girls names. Becky's given name and potential adoptive names do not even resemble "Becky" or "Ooze" or "Stan" for that matter.

On a completely different note, I happened to check in to see who has been reading my blog today. Turns out someone from the AquaDots distribution company actually found my blog through a google search. Hmmmmm....

Aqua Dots

I'm not sure when my son first laid eyes on it, but it must have been over a year ago. It was the AquaDots infomercial/commercial that came on at nearly every commercial break. In his own little preschool way, he tried to explain this toy that only required water? Finally he dragged me into the living room one day just to catch the end of the commercial with the infamous "and for just $19.95 ***insert hushed voice**** plus $6.95 shipping and handling" we too could have our own personal AquaDots.

First, let me explain that I NEVER purchase (ok, wait...other than those shake-up flashlights)/ ALMOST never purchase anything from a TV ad. Well, Matthew begged and begged and begged. He bargained, he whined, he tried every 4-year-old...then 5-year-old trick in the book. About two weeks ago, I finally relented. His kindergarten teacher said he needed to work on fine motor skills and I needed incentive for the kids to help me clean the house. I purchased AquaDots at the local Walmart (woohoo... no shipping or handling!).

Poor Matthew assembled his creation, but mean-mommy wouldn't let him spray his artwork. Seems he missed the point that the dots have to be "touching" for adhesion to occur. We were going to fix this and modify his masterpiece as soon as we found a couple of quiet moments without a two-year-old sibling helping.

I even remember thinking... now this is a cool toy. I don't have to worry about my 2-year-old choking on them. They're so small, they'd just pass right through. Not so fast! Never considered they'd hide a date rape drug in a kids toy!?! Ugh.

How do I explain to a 5-year-old who waited over a year for his flipping dots that they could kill him??? Let me just quote from the box, "Conforms to product safety standards.." uh..yeah... I'm sure rat poison has to pass some sort of safety standard too?

Maybe coal would be the safest gift for my kids this Christmas. As long as they don't burn it and inhale the fumes?

Glass is Half Full Today

Since Jonathan was in Mothers-Day-Out on Tuesday, I decided to do a little shopping on my way home from the dentist. I stopped at Tuesday Morning and purchased several gift items for the folks that we will meet along the way in Uzbekistan. More importantly, I started to plan ahead for the trip. I got a great deal on a raincoat/windbreaker with hood that will be perfect for snowy/rainy weather. Still need to do some more research on what weather to expect, but since I didn't know when I'll be traveling....

My favorite purchase was this little guy! He is just the softest little animal you've ever felt. I'm hoping to leave him with "Becky" between our first and final trip, but I'm not sure what the orphanage policies will be. He's filled with little plastic pellets, so he has a real squishy, cuddly feel to him. I also have it on fairly good authority from a dear friend's 1 year old daughter, that little girls really like ducks!

The best news... we were able to send a hug via another About a Child mom to our potential little referral. We know her name, but can't share it yet. She also has light brown hair and light colored eyes, possibly blue. The wait for a picture of her chubby little cheeks is almost too much!

Houston... we have a problem

Thankfully it's with our internet connection, not the adoption! With my "personal network manager/computer system architect" on the other side of the planet, I was bound to encounter troubles of a technical nature. My interpretation of our home network and DSL service is that it resembles a delicate house of cards. Saturday, I innocently unplugged and reconnected a power strip. Not a good idea. Long story short as possible... my DSL modem does not want to reconnect to the internet and can't get an IP address. <- Wow, that actually sounded like I knew what I was talking about, HA! I've temporarily got everything working, but I'm about to start disconnecting and troubleshooting again.

If someone needs to get in touch, please call me!!! It could be another day or two until I get this problem completely fixed. Ugh. I want to go back to tin cans with a string between them. I'm just going to need to find some REALLY long string.

Oh... the waiting.

Have I ever mentioned that I'm not good at waiting? Back when I lived in Las Vegas, I was notorious for exiting the freeway at the slightest sign of a backup. An hour later after exploring back roads I never knew existed, I'd either find myself at my final destination or Arizona. I always need to feel like there is some forward momentum in my life, even if not necessarily in the right direction.

I've temporarily turned my adoption energy towards organizing the house. I'm attacking it with the mindset that "everything is trash until proven indispensable". With any luck my filing from ten years ago, should be caught up in a matter of days.

Uzbekistan - The Process

Looking back I realized that I never fully revisited the new adoption laws of Uzbekistan. I'm not a lawyer. I do not speak Uzbek or Russian. I am not an expert on international law of any sort. My interpretation is simply "the word on the street" and could prove to be totally false. With that disclaimer in place... here it goes:

Uzbekistan is now requiring that the prospective adopting parents need to meet their potential child (called a "referral") in person before the Ministry of Education (MOE) will process the adoption petition. I believe the parents also need to meet with several government officials (perhaps at the MOE level?). It seems that only one parent is absolutely required to travel, but they must be in possession of a seriously strong power-of-attorney. Just about the time their internal clock adjusts to the time change it's back on the plane to head home for my favorite part again.... WAITING.

While you wait impatiently at home (now you've met your future child, so the wait becomes THAT much harder), the MOE processes and approves your petition to adopt the child. My understanding is that this takes approximately a month. I just hope they don't call extended family and friends for personal references, because my mom can't understand people who speak "Texan" - much less "Uzbek"!

After this is where my understanding of the process gets even foggier. After receiving approval from the MOE, your paperwork proceeds to the regional guardianship office and mayor. Somewhere around this time, an invitation to travel is extended to you and the scramble to repack begins. The parent(s) [again, it seems that only one parent is absolutely required to travel] meet the mayor and possibly other Uzbek officials prior to the finalization of the adoption. Then there's the issuance of a new birth certificate, passport, visa, etc. Once the Uzbek paperwork is in order, then it's off to the U.S. Embassy to complete the process required to bring an adopted orphan into the United States. You can check out the USCIS website for all of those details.

My understanding is that the first trip will be approximately one week and the second will be approximately two weeks. Keep in mind that the process can change at any moment. There have been two major overhauls to the Uzbekistan adoption process in just the past four months. Be flexible, be patient and be prepared to wait. Ugh! I hate that part!!!!!

Keep your fingers crossed...

There has been news of a potential referral. Don't get excited yet, it will be weeks before we know any of the details or if the child is actually eligible for international adoption. I'm just happy that after months of waiting, I feel like the next step in the adoption process could happen in the foreseeable future.

While I continue my quest for more and more information on the adoption process in general, I stumbled across a link to an article about birthparents. The article is written by a mother who adopted from Guatemala, but the emotions and situations could happen anywhere. It is a very thought provoking article and worth reading.

http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/11/did-i-steal-my-daughter.html

Turn your virus protection on!

There hasn't been any new adoption news to report. The first several families are making their trips to Uzbekistan in the coming weeks. That's great news for them and hopefully the future of international adoption in Uzbekistan. On a selfish note, that also probably means no referrals for the foreseeable future. Our Uzbek coordinator is likely to be swamped with work considering all of the families, government officials and children she's going to be "coordinating". At this point, I don't see any way that we'll be bringing a child home this year.

As for the family update... if there's a virus or bacteria to be caught in Texas, our family has had it during the past month. I *thought* we were all almost healthy when Jonathan developed a bizarre rash. Since I hadn't seen that one before, I took him to urgent care. Turns out he had strep throat. After casually mentioning to the doc that we ALL were sick, we ALL got to come back and get tested for strep. I'm happy to report that all of us almost recovered folks were strep-free. HOWEVER, the rapid test that's given for strep is only 70% accurate. Given the fact that Mike is overseas and we were all sick anyway, the entire family was put on antibiotics. At that point the doc decided to check us all out just to be on the safe side. All of us "healthy" people ended up on an additional six prescriptions. There was one ear infection, one concerning cough and one of my lungs sounded like it might be headed towards bronchitis or pneumonia. I'm glad we didn't go to the doctor while we were actually "sick"... we might have all ended up in the hospital or something.

So, just about the time we all recover from round one, Sean gets the 18-24 hour bug that involves fatigue, high fever and vomiting. Matthew took his turn next and Jonathan & I are still drawing straws to see who goes next.

Whoops! Two weeks already?

My apologies... I seem to have gotten rather addicted to reading blogs rather than posting to them. But, I'm back with a really LONG post! So how are we all adjusting to a single parent family? With the exceptions of fever (Jonathan), coughing fits (Sean & I), really nasty abrasions (let's just say I'm too clumsy to be allowed to mow a lawn) and just general lack of enthusiasm - no so bad! We really miss Mike horribly, but we're going to survive. (Shhhhhh! Don't tell him.)

The kids still don't understand the time frame involved, but we will face that as the time comes. The boys have this wonderful plan of throwing a surprise party for Mike upon his return. Nice, kind idea... right? Well, they want us to hide EVERYONE (I think they're going to invite more people to the coming home party than they invited to their birthday bash) and we're supposed to hide behind pieces of furniture at the house. Still a good idea... right? Here's the problem. Mike will be flying home commercially and arriving at our local airport. The surprise factor will be huge when NO ONE is at the airport to pick him up. Seems I can't get the boys to realize this flaw in their planning. Because EVERYONE (again, I stress EVERYONE) must be hiding behind furniture according to my sons. Got a couple of months (7+) to work on that one.

Meanwhile... Back in Uzbekistan

Seems the government in Uzbekistan noticed that there were a lot of families wanting to adopt their children. So, they decided they might need some additional laws to govern the way that's done. Don't get me wrong, I think it's wonderful that a country is taking the utmost concern in the future of their children. However, this is going to be just "darn inconvenient" for us. At the very least, it's going to be adding to my frequent flyer miles, as it seems I will be taking two trips to Central Asia. There are a lot of issues/details that are still being worked out, so I don't have much more I can report at this time.

Let's just say I had quite the distraction going after Mike left. The adoption news hit within 36 hours of Mike leaving and at first it sounded like our dreams of adopting from Uzbekistan were over. So after quite a few days of uncertainty, my glass is getting closer to "half full" and this might actually work after all.

After the stress of all that, little things like trying to run a household of three boys (ages 7 and under) with laryngitis seem insignificant. When you're only squeaking out words at a whisper, you need to choose those words wisely! Parenting silently is actually quite an art form. It was also hilarious to be sitting just three feet from my oldest son while he yelled repeatedly for me. I kept whispering back "what????", but he was too engrossed in the television that he hadn't noticed me. His calls kept getting louder and more perturbed. It wasn't until I was laughing silently yet hysterically that he noticed me. At first he took offense until he realized his error. Then we laughed together.

Two Pictures to Share

On a completely random note... Does anyone know what kind of spider this is? He moved into our front yard a couple of weeks ago and he is just the most amazing looking spider. If I look close enough it even seems as though he has three Halloween skulls on his thorax (is that the correct body part?) for his "costume".

Our activities for this weekend included the local BalloonFest. The kids were skeptical (to say the least!) about any activity that involved leaving the house before dawn. In the end, they agreed it was quite a fun time. Your dose of trivia for the day: The Energizer Hot Hare balloon (the 'bunny balloon' to the boys) is the largest in the world. The boys were staring in awe and in fear... fear that it was about to tip over on them in the wind. I just kept wondering, "is that what hemorrhoids feel like?"

T-Minus 180 + travel days + training days + ? = 227+????? days to go

The boys and I took Mike to the airport this morning. When I say "morning", I mean there were stars and zero-hint of daylight. He is off to his first training stop on the way to Iraq. For two months or more, we've tried to prepare for every possible event that might occur during this coming year. We've filled out pounds of adoption paperwork, just in case we need one particular form. Mike tried to prepare the kids for his departure. He said the one comment that really hurt was when Sean asked last night if he was going to be gone so long that he'd forget about us and what we looked like.

I don't take goodbye's very well. This was one of the worst. I think I'm almost proud of the fact that I think I brought two other people to tears with me. One was a complete stranger in the ladies room. The other, a mere acquaintance. The boys are handling this better than I am. I think mommy's tears instantly turn them into "make mommy happy" mode. It's so sweet to hear the same utterances of "it's okay", "he'll be home soon", "we can send him presents" whispered back to me by a little guy with a brave smile on his face but tears in his eyes.

So, here I sit. We've discussed house issues, tried to clear out paperwork that required Mike's input, washed every piece of uniform with the correct laundry soap, purchased the necessities for packing and the list goes on. Mike frantically tried to finish his masters degree papers before leaving, but he's probably typing right now while flying over Tennessee(?). So after all of the racing around, trying make sure everything that need to be said was, everything that needed a signature was signed and every favorite meal cooked.... now what?

We left the airport, stopped to spend our birthday Walmart gift cards on toys, and picked up donuts. But, now what? Lunches to prepare, poster for school to finish, etc.

T-minus 180 + travel days + training days + ? MINUS ABOUT FIVE MINUTES.

Life goes on...

Two Months Today

Our "road" has a traffic jam right now. There have been no new posts, because there is no new information to report. We are still waiting for a referral. Our dossier arrived in Tashkent exactly two months ago today. In our "spare" time, Mike (and family) have been preparing for his upcoming deployment. On the adoption front, the deployment is creating just a nightmare of paperwork scenarios. Since Mike's final destination is undetermined, his access to the internet/fax/phone/mail service are questionable. We are trying to envision every possible paperwork scenario (or snag!) and have a solution already in place.

For almost two months now, we've dreaded telling the boys that Daddy was going to be leaving on deployment. Since the countdown was at less than two weeks, we finally had to have the "big talk". We chose a Friday evening during dinner to break the news. The boys listened intently as we explained that Daddy would be going to help the "army guys" in Iraq. He'll be doing a very helpful job and trying to keep other daddies and mommies safe. The trip will be a very long one (he'll miss his birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, etc.), but he will eventually be coming home. With dreaded speech finished, we waited for the reaction. Sean was the first to speak, "Mommy, do you think you can scrape the cheese off of my broccoli? I don't like melted cheese on my food."

So, there you have it.... perhaps melted cheese is the secret weapon we need to use against terrorists...

As the Adoption Turns (or "Doesn't")

Based on the speed at which we got our dossier together, I just assumed the remainder of our adoption would continue at the same breakneck pace. Not so much. After our dossier's one week vacation in Frankfurt, it arrived in Tashkent over a month ago. Since then... nothing. We wait and we wait---as patiently as possible. Has our coordinator been allowed to visit the orphanages? Are there no children paperwork ready? Have all of the orphans in Uzbekistan already been adopted? Has our coordinator gone on a six month sabbatical? We really don't know. Although, I truly doubt the last two ideas have any merit.

On a side note, I've been "tagged" to answer some blogger questions. Rest assured, I will be answering those in my next post or two... and passing the tag along!

No news... not always good news

Sorry I've been away from posting for so long. Let me start with the happier stories and finish the tale of our vacation.

The news of a granddaughter was very popular with Mike's family as well. WE got to break the news there. Evidently after a week in Pennsylvania, the boys forgot that they knew a big secret that Grama and Grandpa didn't. We actually waited at least *gasp* two hours before we told the grandparents. They were excited and wanted to know all of the details. There was also great concern about the fact that this part of the family has no experience with little girls. The whole family tree is just chock full of boys... no girls.

For those of you who read my dad's comments to my last post... there was a picture he wanted to upload. It's my very rough sketch of what their new granddaughter might look like some day. I wanted to make sure we reserved her a space on the grandchild wall of fame.

We spent a happy fun-filled week in Missouri and then headed home. About two days after we got home, our dear furry family member took a turn for the worse. She went from being a perky puppy (despite being 11 years young) into an ailing elderly dog in a matter of days. I gave up my evening blogging to instead resume taking Daisy for evening walks. This was a practice that ended shortly before the birth of our oldest son. Thankfully we got to spend four weeks spoiling Daisy rotten and reminding her that she was truly our first adoptee. We made the difficult decision to put her to sleep on Monday.

For all of the PAP's who have no two-legged children at home yet, just four-legged ones... spend some time spoiling them now. Unfortunately when you bring your two-legged child home, your pets will lose your undivided attention. Daisy gracefully accepted the demotion from firstborn to cherished family pet, but now I regret all of the walks and fun times we missed over the past seven years.

"Out of the office" - On vacation

Hello everyone. Just wanted to check in quickly while we're on vacation. The dossier made it to Uzbekistan! It was delivered on July 7th (3 days late) while we were enroute to the grandparents' house.

The kids are just loving their time being spoiled by the grandparents. The two day drive was a bit excessive, but in the end worth it. Our big secret about a new baby sister was leaked within the first ten minutes of our arrival. I believe the quote from Matthew to Grandmom was, "We have a secret. You can't tell Pop-pop. We are adopting a baby sister from Uzbekistan. When Mommy and Daddy fly on a plane, we'll stay with our friends in Dallas." My mom kept her poker face on and just nodded. While Matthew is known for his tall tales, Mom felt this one had an awful lot of details he couldn't have just made up on his own.

Sean was quick to tell Pop-pop during unloading, "Pop-pop, we're adopting a little sister from Uzbekistan!" Daddy called him away quickly to help with something else and my dad made no acknowledgement that he had even heard the original comment. When questioned about spilling the beans, Sean replied "BUT, Matthew already told Grandmom!" :)

The next morning we officially told them our secret - thinking they were oblivious to our sons' middle of the night ramblings. They did not show the correct level of surprise and admitted they started putting things together the night before. They are very happy for us! My mom said she was always a little sad that I wouldn't have the opportunity to raise a daughter. She couldn't be more thrilled that there will actually be a little girl in the family.

More vacation details to follow when I've got more time... it's almost time to tell the other half of the family. Can't wait to see their reactions! THIS time, we're not going to assume the kids can keep a secret!

Frankfurt, Germany

So, what does Frankfurt, Germany, have to do with anything??? Apparently it's a happening place this time of year or something! Our dossier has been lounging about there since the 29th of June! FedEx has an estimated delivery date of July 4th by 6 pm. Well, that's less than 9 hours to make it 2915 miles "as the crow flies" from Frankfurt to Tashkent. Figuring that's at least 3000+ miles the way the camel walks.... I have no idea what FedEx is thinking!!!

Oh please FedEx... don't you dare lose this package!

Some days it hurts to be a parent

Today we got the sad news that we had been dreading. Our dear dog of nearly twelve years has inoperable cancer. The vet has no precise guess as to how long she'll be with us. Could be a matter of a month or two...could be six months. No idea. Explaining it to our sons and cradling them while we all cried together was as hard as knowing I was going to be losing my best four-footed furry friend. Daisy has always been a fixture in their lives and they keep asking for her to get better. I am not sure if the long slow goodbye is the best, but it will give me the chance to make up for the past several years of giving priority to my two-legged kids over my four-legged one. Daisy and I survived college together, trips to Hoover Dam at midnight, cross-country roadtrips, hurricanes, airplane trips, walks on the beach, Kansas thunderstorms, the adoption of my husband and of three puppies (children) to the pack. She's had an adventurous life and we've matured together. I'm going to miss her.

The other part that's breaking my heart is knowing that we'll soon need to tell the boys about Mike's upcoming deployment. The last time he left the kids were too little to understand the concept of "months". This time they know the "months of the year" song and they know exactly how long it will be. There will be questions of where? Why? Can he come home? Why can't he come home? There will be that first week or so of overwhelming sadness and sudden outbreaks of tears and "I want Daddy!". That will be replaced by an unbelievable clingy-ness, thinking that at any moment Mommy might also leave them. About a month or more into the deployment, we'll settle into a routine. Emotions will even out and the extreme attachment will slowly lessen. By the fourth month, "normal" will mean no-Mike. When he returns, it will actually take a while to readjust to a "normal" that includes him.

I am also sadden by everything Mike will miss during this upcoming year. When he comes home, Sean will most likely be reading and have an even more independently defined personality and interest list. Matthew will have lost that wide-eyed innocence of preschool and playdates. He'll have that hardened seriousness of an elementary school student with the pressures of peers and homework. Jonathan will have learned to talk and become fully a preschool boy... not the babbling toddler. And then there will be our daughter... she will have arrived as a part of our family not even knowing there's a daddy lurking closer to her original home than here. The boys will know her personality, likes and dislikes. We will have established our own little family structure minus Mike.

Parenthood isn't all just cute homemade cards and kissing boo-boo's. Some boo-boo's are deep inside and you just can't fix them. Also, no matter how many foam bumper corners and baby gates you install, there are "hurts" that you will never be able to protect your child from. Those are the ones that hurt YOU the most.

The Big Reveal...

So, I'm getting a little nervous. As an avid watcher of shows like Trading Spaces, While You Were Out, there's always that final buildup where the newest creations are shared with family and friends. Our adoption is facing the "big reveal" in the next couple of weeks.

Some of you may disagree with this, but we've kept our adoption news a secret from our parents. Why? Won't they approve? No, nothing like that. I guess we wanted our surprise to be more about a grandchild than this major paperwork process we had gotten ourselves into. Plus, I'm afraid they would have done too many internet searches and read about disrupted adoptions, fraudulent agencies, travel warnings, etc., etc.

We'll be visiting both sets of parents in the next couple of weeks and sharing the big news. Since our sons have been sharing the news with EVERYONE they talk to, we figure the secret will be out within the first ten minutes of walking through the door!

I'll be sure to share the reactions when I have a spare moment or two. Keep your fingers crossed! My guess.... utter surprise, disbelief, "how are you EVER going to keep up with laundry and dishes?" and finally.... "oh WOW, a granddaughter!"

Recap - the happier stuff

So what's happening with our dossier you ask? Right now it's sitting in a FedEx sort facility in Frankfurt, Germany. It's been there for a couple of days now. The estimated delivery date is July 4th. That has got to be the most frequently checking tracking number ever issued by FedEx. I've almost got it memorized.

Since I last left you.... we took our entire dossier to a notary on a Saturday. We signed our lives away and made copies (of the papers - not our lives). Scanned and e-mailed everything to our agency for a fast review before hitting the road to Austin. There was one speedbump in that we were missing one form from the agency. Got that on Saturday... found a notary open before noon on a Sunday (that's a big deal in this town!). Hit the road Sunday afternoon for the state capitol.

Spent Sunday evening chatting with a yahoo group friend who lived in Uzbekistan for two years. We went through photo album after photo album and sipped tea from an authentic Uzbek tea set. I loved every minute of it. It truly made it seem more like a real place with real people than all of the websites I've been looking at. I can't wait to see it for myself.

Monday morning I headed out to the state's certification/apostille office. Mapquest lead me astray with a wrong way turn onto a one way street. Thankfully the building was on the corner and I just found a parking space and hoofed it the rest of the way. The process took just a few minutes. It was well worth the drive though when the woman "bundled" two documents that weren't supposed to be. I had listed them separately on the office's form and had not stapled them (everything else was stapled into bundles), but she bundled them because they were from the same notary. Not acceptable!!! I had her redo it and then our dossier had grown by about another six pieces of paper.

Tuesday I received the last packet from the adoption agency. Slipped that into the dossier and overnighted it to the courier in Washington D.C. (Caring Hands.... Highly recommend them!!!). By Wednesday our dossier was in our nation's capitol and headed to the Department of State the next morning. Friday afternoon it was back on its way to our house after getting an extra page of "official looking" stuff from the Dept. of State and an unintelligible stamp from the Uzbek embassy.

Monday afternoon it was back with FedEx and headed to our agency. Tuesday afternoon it was again with FedEx and on its way to Uzbekistan. That poor stack of paper must be getting dizzy after being whisked around the country so many times.

And now... we wait. I don't know how the referral process works from here exactly. I think it's going to involve some waiting. While I'm waiting... I think I'll check that FedEx tracking number again. It's been at least five minutes now.

Eating Frogs

I read an article in our local newspaper a couple of weeks ago where the author talked about sayings her grandmother used to have. "If you have to eat a frog, don't spend too much time looking at it before you have to put it in your mouth." and "If you have to eat two frogs, eat the largest one first."

Well, I've got a lot of frogs all lined up. We found out a couple of weeks ago that Mike is going to be deploying to one of those rather nasty middle Eastern locales. He'll be gone for almost nine months. (To anyone who might know or speak to our kids... they don't know yet!!!)

Next frog, our dog (who has been a part of my family longer than my husband) has been diagnosed with cancer. She's having surgery this week and we'll know more after that.

It's been a long couple of weeks. Adoption news has been a bright point in our lives, but still everything is overshadowed by the impending absence of my husband. How will this affect the adoption? We're not quite sure yet. Part of the reason we chose Uzbekistan is because we could still adopt if only one of us could travel. This was a worst case scenario we had at least considered. My questions now are how it will affect the paperwork and especially the re-adoption in the U.S.

So, for any military families considering adoption, bookmark this blog! We'll walk you through the process of adoption during deployment... or at least we hope to!

It's HERE!

'nuf said!

Friday - Nothing again...

Just came back from the mailbox. Nothing but a real estate flyer. We usually get a LOT more mail than that. I truly wonder if the postman decided not to "sort" mail today or something. Guess there's always tomorrow. :(

Advice to all prospective parents

I know it's tempting to register for all of those really cute little outfits at your favorite stores. The matching bedding/valences/stuffed animals just look adorable. Skip it all. What you REALLY need is a carpet steam cleaner! It is worth its weight in gold.

How have I spent my morning of waiting for the mail? I spent a large portion of it dealing with the aftermath of a 2 year old trying to feed a plastic giraffe 24 oz. of white grape & peach juice out of a 2 oz. plastic cup. Did he open the refrigerator on his own? Did a big brother leave the door slightly ajar? I may never know. Why in a house filled with tile flooring did he choose to use the bedroom carpet as his "pour location"? Ugh! Sticky! Sticky! Sticky! (On a positive note, at least THIS time he didn't use the water from the toilet!)

Of course, you can't JUST clean that one spot in the carpet. That one spot leads to the high traffic area in the hallway... the spot that was under the couch but isn't anymore because you moved it and finally just most of the living room because you've got hot soapy water left in the machine.

It's soon time to go to the mailbox... wish 75% of the family wasn't still in their pj's. Oops!

Another futile trip to the mailbox

You're probably wondering why I haven't updated recently. There's just not much to report. I'm still running to the mailbox every day with the great anticipation that surely TODAY will be the day that the I-171H will be there! Today I was so confident that I actually left the I-171H notarization cover sheet open in Word so that I could print off that very last page after I had the official information. But, alas, still nothing from the USCIS. The USPS must have the slow pony running the OKC to Dallas line or something.

Otherwise, after two very LATE nights, I have completed all of our photo pages and other dossier forms. Everything except that one form is complete and waiting for notarization, copying and authentication.

I feel like I'm that horse at the starting gate. I've got my riding gear on, at the starting line and just waiting for those doors to swing open. As soon as they do, I'll be running as fast as I can. If that silly form arrives tomorrow or Saturday, I have a carefully thought out (ok, developed this morning after 4 hours of sleep between pouring cereal in bowls and cutting pancakes) plan. It includes a trip to Austin on Sunday afternoon to meet up with a friend I met through a Yahoo! Group. Still haven't met in person, but she actually lived in Uzbekistan for two years. I'll be so excited to hear all of her stories and see any pictures she might have. Then it's off to the Secretary of State's office first thing Monday morning and home again in time for Mike to make it to work.

Did I mention I don't have a good backup plan yet? Maybe during breakfast tomorrow one will come to me! Does anyone else in this country get their mail delivered between 2 and 3 o'clock in the afternoon???? Everywhere else I've ever lived, mail was a morning thing. I don't think I ever cared before now, but I need those extra couple of hours for notarization.

Let me leave you with the new family photo that we just did this past weekend.

Immigration JUST called!!!

I just got a phone call from someone with the USCIS. She said she needed copies of our child abuse clearances faxed to her and then everything would be complete and approved for our I-171H. Wow!!!! I called our wonderfully sweet home study social worker who has probably already faxed them by the time I finish this post.

The person from USCIS went on to say that our I-171H should hit the mail by Monday or Tuesday. So, now I have to get really serious about selecting photo's for our family photo pages and coming up with a plan to get to Austin in about a week. Again, wow!!! I can't believe how well everything is falling into place.

Passports are here!

Our passports finally arrived today. We applied back on April 12th and were told it would take 4 weeks since we expedited them. Six weeks later, we have them! Not exactly timely, but I think it was well worth the extra $$$ to have them here sooner.

Now we have a couple of minor paperwork things we need to finish for our part of the dossier, but our big outstanding item is our I-171H. The Texas international adoption yahoo group that I belong to has several members that have gotten theirs 3-4 weeks after completing their fingerprints. If that holds true for us, then we have 1-2 weeks left to wait.

Timeline so far

I "found" Uzbekistan on approximately March 26th. Between March 27th and 31st, I asked Victoria (of About a Child) nearly a hundred questions! On April 1st (no, I'm not kidding) we signed the application and sent it in.

Tues., Apr. 3rd - Posted to the Texas International Adoption group trying to find an agency that would be willing to travel to our "little town" and complete our homestudy.

Wed., Apr. 4th - Found someone from the Dallas area that was willing to travel... AND was actually going to be in town for Easter. She said she could do the home visit the very next Saturday. WOW! I compared it to not telling our oldest son he was getting shots until we were walking into the clinic. You know it is inevitable and it's best to not have to worry about it for a long time prior. We still cleaned like crazy and tried to find all of the required paperwork.

Fri., Apr. 6th - Signed and mailed the contract to About a Child along with our first check. Now we were financially committed!

Sat., Apr. 7th - Met our social worker and had our home visit. Wrote a second check. It was not as painful or white-glove-test-oriented as I thought. I'm really glad that I didn't have a month to worry about it. We had warned her that we had not discussed the adoption with our sons yet, and asked that she keep her questions general in nature when interviewing them. After the interview was complete, we were once again reminded that our oldest doesn't miss ANYTHING. He told her all about how we were trying to adopt a little baby girl for them! So much for the secret. We sat them all down that evening and discussed it. Matthew didn't seem to be too overly fazed by the idea, he just kept telling us he was hungry and asking about what was going to be for dinner. LOL

Sun., Apr. 8th - Wed., Apr. 11th - Wrote our autobiographies for our home study. Let me just warn you that a home study is a combination of a personality test, mortgage application, geneology assignment and essay test all rolled into one. Be prepared to open your life, home and financial records!


Tues., Apr. 10th - Mailed our I600A application in to USCIS.


Thurs., Apr. 12th - Mike and I applied for new passports. We paid extra for the expedite option as they told us it was taking 10 weeks to receive a passport.


Tues., Apr. 17th - I got my TB test which is required by Uzbekistan.


Wed., Apr. 18th - Mike got his TB skin test and had his physical exam.


Thurs., Apr. 19th - Got my TB test read and also had my physical exam. Was also fingerprinted for my Texas Criminal History Record check.


Fri., Apr. 20th - Mike was fingerprinted for his Texas Criminal History Record check. MIKE'S TB SKIN TEST IS POSITIVE!!!! That was our first major hiccup. My afternoon was a panic of "is Mike okay?", "can we still adopt?", "who's ever heard of a positive TB test????" Mike was given seven days to get the kids in to be tested, but I had them there in less than seven hours. I'm a mom... I needed to know NOW if my kids had been exposed too. Thankfully everyone else's test was negative. Mike is on a nine month course of serious antibiotics as a preventative measure. His chest x-ray was negative and it should not affect the adoption. First crisis.... over! (except for Mike... he can't have alcohol or Tylenol for nine months)

Mon., Apr. 23rd - One year from today our first document will expire. April 23rd is our "Pumpkin Day". Our physical forms were dated Apr. 23rd by the doctor, so the clock is now ticking... twelve months until we have to start redoing documents if the adoption is not complete!

Wed., Apr. 25th - (or possibly the 26th), we received our Criminal History Records from the state of Texas. Ironically they were also dated April 23rd... that just re-emphasizes the importance of that date as our deadline.

Sat., May 5th - Rough draft of our home study!

Sun., May 6th - Home study is approved by About a Child.

Mon., May 7th - Home study is sent overnight mail by our social worker direct to USCIS. We sent her the cover letter and prepaid overnight envelope to make sure the home study went direct to the USCIS as fast as possible.

Wed., May 9th - Received our fingerprint notice via fax. I had e-mailed our USCIS service center and inquired about getting either notice either by fax or overnight mail. We needed to make a trip to Dallas the following weekend anyway and wanted to accomplish the fingerprints on the same trip. Again, I think a higher power was at work here. Everything is just falling into place perfectly and amazingly fast!

Sat., May 12th - Mike and I are both fingerprinted at the Dallas Application Support Center. I'm a little nervous because the tech didn't think the quality of my prints were very good, but I'm a mom who washes her hands about a hundred times per day.... my skin is going to be dry and cracked!

Tues., May 15th - Completed the 10 hours of online adoption education required by About a Child.

And now we wait... on our I171, passports, etc. I have a couple of miscellaneous forms that we need to complete, but should be easy. Once we have our other documents in hand, then it will be off to the notary and Austin for the state certification of our documents. We are also going to be getting a new copy of our home study that is notarized by the same notary that did the other agency forms. Otherwise we have to add another "bundle" to our documents which is going to cost us an additional chunk of $. Won't have that until after our social worker returns from her vacation after Memorial Day. The end of May/beginning of June could be very busy!

Uzburburfenzleschnuckerstan?!?!?

Thank you to my little brother for contributing the title to this edition. Uzbekistan was not an obvious choice to us initially, nor did I even know the country existed until several months ago.

Our first searches for countries and agencies was through the information that our friends (Tom and Tanya) provided us. We zero'd in on Ukraine. They are one of the only countries that you travel "blind" to (without a referral for a particular child) and then are presented childrens' files to choose from once you are there. You can actually meet the child and then decide if they are a good fit for your family. The country of Ukraine has been through a lot of turmoil and change in their international adoption program. They had shutdown for several months and had recently reopened. I felt drawn to Ukraine for several reasons. I liked the idea of actually getting to meet the child first (I think I also had some strange fantasy where we'd go to the orphanage and actually fall in love with two little girls and just HAVE to bring them both home.) Ukraine also prefers PAP's (potential adoptive parents) who adopt independently without the use of an agency. That appealed to the "do it mine ownself" (quote from a toddler Lisa many years ago) part of me. Thirdly, most of the children in Ukraine would visually blend with our family in a way that people would not be asking "oh, is she yours?". As I mentioned before, we are a military family. We don't live close to our extended family and a lot of the connection that is built with grandparents, uncles and aunts is through photographs/videos. While I am confident that Mike and I could gladly accept a child of any color into our family (even heliotrope!) and bond 100%, I'm not sure that it would be quite as easy for the extended family. I want to give our future daughter every benefit of family, including that of extended family.

So, I read everything I could find on Ukraine and adoptions from there. I read countless blogs of families preparing paperwork, families returned, etc., etc. But, for as much research as we had done, we just couldn't commit to it. It seemed like a "good idea", but we just could not bring ourselves to take the next step. One evening I stumbled across the About a Child website after their director and facilitator were mentioned on one of the Ukrainian adoption yahoo group posts. They had a little "ad" on the side of the screen mentioning their Hungarian program. That drew me in enough (Mike's roommate in college was Hungarian) to check out their country comparison chart. At the bottom was a country I'd never heard of... Uzbekistan.

Uzbekistan is fairly new to international adoption and can have a lot of uncertainty. On the flip side, it offers us a chance to adopt a little girl as young as four months old. Since we have three sons already to keep us busy, we have the luxury of time and patience. Other families without children might be turned off by the uncertainty of timely referrals and adoption processing. We have three not-so-little distractions to take our minds off of the process occurring on the other side of the world. I could not imagine dealing with such uncertainty if we didn't already have an established family in place. You can read more about the Uzbekistan process at our agency's website at: http://www.aboutachild.org/Uzbekistan.php

The discussion...

During our drive home we discussed the idea of adoption. There are many children who enter this world without the benefit of families to support and nurture them. The reasons children become "orphans" are numerous and the sheer number of children is overwhelming. We both agree that we can't help every child, but we certainly can make a tremendous difference for one. Mike even came up with the starfish story... If you're not familiar with it, it's worth reading. http://www.cedu.niu.edu/~fulmer/starfish.htm

On the more selfish side, it gives us a chance to experience what it is like to raise a daughter. It will give our sons a chance to understand what it is like to have a sister. We have brought three wonderful biological children into this world and in my heart I feel it would be selfish to bring another into the world now that I know there is this alternate way to bring our child into our family.

Our family dynamics have set up a perfect situation for adoption. We have three sons that are very close (despite the normal sibling spats over toys, tv time, which book to read, etc... I could go on and on LOL). They are also very similar in appearance. An adopted son would probably have a difficult time finding his place with his three already close-knit siblings. A little girl will already have the benefit of being naturally different than her brothers. She also will have the benefit of being the only girl on either side of the family. Her older brothers will absolutely adore and protect her.

If our family was made up of both girls and boys already, I think this would have been a more difficult decision for us. But, like I said earlier, God could not have given us a more perfect combination of children to preposition us for a successful adoption. There's nothing our little boys love more than new "babies".

In the beginning...

Every novel, research paper and even blog needs to begin with an introduction. So, here is ours. (Bear with me, I can occasionally be long-winded.)...

Who are we?

Mike and I met back in 1991 while we were both students at the Univ. of Nevada, Las Vegas. We dated for a long time (years...and years...and years...) and got married in December of 1997. During that span of time, we both graduated and Mike joined the military. Getting married meant selling my house and moving to follow Mike on his career. Currently we are living in West Central Texas in a town that we absolutely adore. During the past almost ten years of marriage we've added three wonderful, sweet, adorable sons to our family. Sean was born in 2000, Matthew in 2002 and Jonathan in 2005. (see picture)

Family tree seems to dictate that there are no biological little girls to be had. We agreed that Jonathan was going to be our last pregnancy. Back when we were still dating, I had asked Mike how many children he thought he might want to have. He replied, "zero to four". He said he wanted to be sure he left all options open. I thought our family was complete, but I still yearned for that little girl...

Thanksgiving 2006: We spent the holiday with dear friends of ours (Tom and Tanya). They sprung on us the news that they were talking about adopting a child. To me adoption had always been one of those things you read about, but doesn't ever happen to anyone you actually "know". Tanya showed me all of the documentation they'd received so far and filled me on a lot of the details of the process. Then that Sunday afternoon, we began the four hour drive home to our house. It turned out to be the first trip on "the Road to Uzbekistan". (<- in case you missed it, that's the title of the blog!!!!)

Once upon a time...

This is a test. This is only a test. If this were a real blog, then actual information would have followed. :)

Check back soon for some real news!