It is in the mail...

Well after a few issues yesterday, we finally sent our dossier in the mail yesterday! I drove to Springfield to have it all apostilled. Right before Meg and I got there our agency realized we had never gotten or filled out our Power of Attorney for our facilitator in Ukraine. So we had to deal with getting that form printed, signed, notarized apostiled and shipped off too... all while several hours from home! But thanks to some very kind people, and a husband who got in the car and drove when he heard the stress in my voice, all is okay.

Now we just have to hope and PRAY that the package arrives in Ukraine in time for it to be submitted by the November deadline. We do not want to have to wait until Feb before it is submitted!!! We are hoping to travel by that time.

So that is the update. We are leaving in about 12 hours for an early Thanksgiving with the McSorley family in Ohio. We'll be back on Sunday and Monday we'll know if things are moving ahead in our journey to adopt Alina of if we are in a several month holding pattern.

Keep those prayers coming!
Anne

GREAT NEWS!!!

Thanks to the hard work of our friends at the local congressmans office (as well as our Congressman himself) our I-171H has arrived!! It is nothing short of a miracle!!

So tomorrow I will scan and send all our forms to our agency in CA for one last review, then once I get the okay I will drive everything to Springfield to have it apostilled and then shipped to Ukraine. It looks like we might make the Nov 29th deadline for the year.

There is a chance we could have Alina with us by her birhtday on Valentine's day! How wonderful would that be!

So keep those prayers, love and support coming... they are truly helping to work miracles in our situation!

So where we are today...

Brief review...Todd and I filed our I-600A in late July/early August. At that time we received a letter stating that our home study had not been submitted nor had our DCFS letter of recommendation. We knew that both of these had not been submitted. We were fingerprinted in Naperville on Thursday, August 21st.



On September 25th I received an email from Cathy who is our case worker for our home study. She stated our Home Study had been approved by the state and was being sent to Immigration that day. Both the Home Study and letter for support from DCFS were mailed that day.



Since that date we have been anxiously awaiting the arrival of our 171-H form (the outcome of filing our I-600A) so that we may process our paperwork to adopt. When a month passed and we didn’t hear anything we had our local congressmans office inquire about the status of our paperwork. Late last week I received a fax from Immigration that states they have our I-600A, but have not received the necessary Home Study and DCFS endorsement letter so there is nothing for them to process. They cannot move forward until this necessary paperwork is provided.

So the bottom line is that all the documentation that was mailed on Sept 25 was never recieved. Last Friday we resubmitted the info, our Congressman called Immigration on our behalf and we are waiting to hear our status.

We are really frustrated and upset about all of this... but grateful that our friend in the Congressmans office pushed us to let them check into it for us (thanks Nate!) Who knows how long we would still be waiting...

So if you have any prayers for a speedy turn around, we could certainly use them. We are still hopeful that our dossier will be submitted by 11/29, but each day that passes lessens that hope.

Things on the homefront are fine. Noah had an ear infection last week and Caleb has some sort of coughing cold thing that is keeping him (and most of us) up at night. Hopefully it won't spread to the rest of the family and he'll feel better soon.

Had a quiet weekend at home. I would say we were enjoying football but I can't say that... stupid Iowa! I hate those Hawkeye's!!!!

long time no updates

So every day I run to the mail and every day I am disappointed. Still no form from the state. I was hopeful we would have it submitted to our agency by Nov 1, but that isn't going to happen. I have learned that if we don't submit our dossier by Nov 29th to Ukraine, it will be Feb before they begin to accept them again. Making this process much longer than we wanted.

Otherwise it has been a whirlwind of a month. Lots going on at work and on the homefront.

Todd is busy with football. The Elmwood Trojans have their first playoff game on Saturday. We are hoping for a win to keep the season going.

The kids are excited about Halloween. They are all going as gnomes... their costumes are hysterical!

Work has been hectic, we have had 5 major events in the last month, not including the Extreme Home Makeover of one of our very own Easter Seals families... so much activity! I believe the episode will air Jan 11th... but I will keep you posted. I am enjoying the activity, but am ready for a less hectic schedule! Especially with the holidays around the corner.

If you have any prayers to spare, could you please say a few that this adoption process speeds up for us. I know everything happens in Gods time.... so maybe your prayers should be for patience for us while we wait for that time to arrive.

Here are a few pics... one is of our family at the first Down Syndrome Buddy Walk
in Peoria and the other is of my little gnomes (minus one little gnome who was napping)

One step closer

We heard today that our home study was approved by the state and now has been forwarded to Immigration. Once they process it we will be sent the I-171H form, which is what we need to submit our dossier! How exciting!!!

Home sick with a sore throat and stuffy nose... off to take a nap while the house is quiet.

Enjoying some quiet time...

The house is as quiet as it has ever been. Todd took the kids to a parade and I am enjoying a few minutes of peace! Things are busy on this end... it was Homecoming in Elmwood last night and the football team did well. So they are now 3-1... off to a good start.

The boys are doing well in school. Caleb is adjusting, although he still has a hard time saying goodbye to Todd in the morning when it is time to go to class. Noah is quite the leader in the class. He is busy spending his time thinking about his birthday in Wednesday and he changes the party theme on an hourly basis. Right now it is spooky Halloween birthday!

Meg is keeping us busy. She walks, climbs and dances non-stop. No wonder she is such a peanut she is constantly moving!

This week we recieved our foster parent license from the State. We also heard that the case worker at the state level is currently reviewing our homestudy... so hopefully that is one step closer.

Todd and I are doing well. Busy with work and enjoying the kids as they grow so fast...

I think it is time to put more laundry in... that is how I am spending my peaceful morning as well!!!

Back to school...

Well yesterday was the first day of school for the boys. They were very excited to be heading to preschool, this is Noah's 2nd year in Bright Futures Preschool and Calebs first year. Same class, same teacher... should be interesting. They seemed to have a good first day, talked about playing with blocks, singing songs and most importantly having snacks... which were colored goldfish crackers on the first day!

Todd drops Meg off at Sherry's (who is our sitter, kids "second mom" and answer to our prayers in lot of ways!) and then he and the boys head to school. Since in our small town there is one big school, K-12, and the pre-school is there as well. The boys hang out with Todd in his classroom until almost 8, when he can take them to the grade school gym to wait to go to their class.

Yesterday we were laughing about how next year he will have 4 kids in his classroom in the mornings! It will be like preschool in itself! Noah will be in kindergarden and then Caleb, Ellen and Meg will all be in Bright Futures together! What a hoot that will be.

Big weekend at our house... it is the Fall festival (aka travelling carnival). The boys are excited about the "crazy rides". Last weekend we made the trip to Chicago to see Bob (Anne's Brother) and rode the huge ferris wheel at Navy Pier. The kids also rode the merry go round... and Meg loved that. She waved and blew kisses the whole time... so I am sure she'll be all over the merry go round this weekend as well.

As for our adoption efforts, our home study is at the state, we are waiting for approval from them. I am hoping we have that within 6 weeks... hurry up and wait...
just need to remember it will all happen in God's time...