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.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Saturday, May 19, 2007
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!
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
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".
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!!!!)
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