A Special Thank You

Although we had decided to adopt from Ethiopia a few weeks ago we were not officially in the program until our agency received our updated home study. Therefore we did not have the information we needed to begin working on our home study. Also we thought we had to wait to change our i-171h which we have now found out we may be able to wait until we actually receive a referral from Ethiopia. What this mean is that we are now in a mad dash to get our dossier done ASAP and with Christmas just a couple of days away we don't want that to delay anything.

So today Mike and I began contacting people for paperwork we needed. To our amazement all 3 of our references and both our employers completed the letters we need for our dossier in just one day.

I would like to say a very public THANK YOU to these people. We are lucky to have such special friends and family.

Christmas Swap

Yes I know it has been a long time since I posted. First off we did make a decision, we are going to do a dualing adoption with Vietnam and Ethiopia. We have been working on getting our home study updated and paperwork for our dossier. In fact today we just had our home study officially approved and we are now part of both programs. Our next step is to submit our paperwork to UCIS so we can get a i-171h for Ethiopia.

The most exciting reason for posting today however came in the mail today. As part of one of the Vietnam Yahoo group I belong to Mike and I participated in a Christmas swap. I would like to say a huge THANK YOU to Shawn and Carolyn who are currently living in China. The gifts they sent were incredibly special. First they sent a silk baby blanket. It is so soft and beautiful. The symbols on the blanket mean good fortune. Second they recently took a trip to Ho Chi Minh City. While there they went to a quilt shop managed by the French NGO providing jobs for woman. The website is www.vietnam-quilts.org. they are a great cause and worth supporting. From there they bought us a handmade ornament and a 2008 calendar. I am such a sentimental person, that these were just the perfect gifts. We will cherish them always.

Here are the pictures:

Options

We still haven't made a decision but I have decided to post what options our agency has given us. I emailed our agency to find out about starting a concurrent adoption. Though not impossible she said it is a lot harder.

Instead she suggested that we do a dualing adoption. This is where you submit a dossier for a different country then which ever country has a referral first you take that one and your other dossier is withdrawn. The only extra fees are what it takes to prepare the dossier.

The other countries our agency works with that we qualify for are Russia, Kazakhstan, Ethiopia, and an African American Domestic Adoption. We have already eliminated Ethiopia because it is a pioneer program for our agency just like their Vietnam program, and we are just not ready for another pioneer program. I don't think we will do Russia because the program is just starting back up and the children are older than we were hoping for.

The good news is Kazakhstan also allows for adoptions of unrelated children so we would still have a chance of bringing home two children. The difficult part is it requires 6-7 weeks in country or 2 trips and I am nervous about a "blind referral." I also still haven't figured out what the average age at referral is for our agency.

We are also seriously considering an African American Domestic adoption. This was actually our first choice when we started this adoption journey but I felt more comfortable being in a line than waiting to be chosen. I love the fact that we could bring our child home from the hospital, that he/she would be ours from almost the beginning of his/her life. I still don't know if I am strong enough to deal with the possibility that the birth mother could change her mind.

So there you have it. As you can imagine I am a basket case trying to decide what is best for us and our future children.

Scrap booking party

I went to my first scrap booking party Friday night. It was a lot of fun. Everyone shares supplies and ideas. The best part was every time you finish a page you get a small prize provided by the hostess. I did two pages so I got this great eye cream (awesome since I'm not getting any younger) and some adhesives to put pictures in my scrapbooks.

The bad part was I was unable to take my scrap booking stuff. I had planned on coming home after work before going but I didn't make it. So the two pages I did were my friends. It ended up being her youngest daughter's baptism. Her daughter is a student in my classroom and being the youngest her scrapbook has the least amount in it, so that made it ok that I didn't have my own pages to do.

Isn't she precious:

Vaccinations Part 1

Despite all the recent discussion about vaccinations on the yahoo groups and blogs I am actually talking about mine and not our future children. I went in and got my first Hepatitis A shot. Luckily because of my job I had the Hepatitis B series years ago. Mike will be starting his series of Hepatitis shots next week. He unfortunately has to endure both A and B.

In adoption news the wait only seems to be getting longer. Our agency is now thinking it might be April of next year before they get their first referrals and we are not #1 on the list.

The good news is our agency is giving us some options that we are considering. I don't want to say anything more until we make a decision, but I will keep you posted.

We Need Children

Mike and I went to Fairmont Hot Springs in Montana this weekend to celebrate our anniversary. Now while most couples our age were relaxing in the hot pool we were in the swimming pool racing each other to the bottom of the of the deep end. It really turned into more of a Mike pushing me down to the bottom because, to steal a term from Lawmommy, I am freakishly buoyant and no matter how hard I try I can't get to the bottom on my own.

So we are ready to entertain our children, and we are even willing to move to the shallow end.

WACAP's 30th Anniversary

This weekend WACAP celebrated their 30th anniversary with an open house on Friday and some special entertainment at their annual kid's day. I am excited that we live close enough that we can participate in some of these special events.

We decided to travel half way on Thursday after Mike got off work. We ended up taking a more scenic route through Leavenworth because Mike wanted to go to lunch at Weinerschnitzel in Everett on Friday. Yes we traveled 100 miles out of the way for a cheap hot dog and chili, but it made my husband happy. He has memories of eating there with his family when he was a child living in California.

To add to our adventure we decided to take our dog. He did very well on the whole trip but he did present a challenge when we got caught in traffic which made us so late that we weren't able to take him to my sister's before going to WACAP's open house. We ended up taking turns going in and taking the tour while the other person stayed in the car with the dog. Seeing the office was fantastic. It was great to put a face to all the people I have been communicating with over the phone and email.

They are very proud of what the do and are eager to share their accomplishments. One of my favorite parts is they have an area where they collect donations and then they have these giant bags that they put the donations in. When one of them travels to a foreign country they take one of these big bags to the orphanages. The person giving us the tour had just returned from Vietnam where she took one of these bags. She said that the most popular item was the underwear. It was something I hadn't really thought of, but I will now.

I also got to sit and talk with our coordinator. She said that the province that they are currently licensed in is very slow to process paperwork. She doesn't really know how long it will take them to get their first referral. I asked if she thought we would have a referral by Christmas and though she said it is possible she didn't think it was very likely. I was a little disappointed to hear this, but when we started this journey we were told it would be a year so I am still ok.

Saturday was their annual kid's day. It was a little different this year because of their anniversary. I have to admit I felt a little out of place because we didn't have any children, but the food was great and they had some wonderful entertainment. Hopefully next year we will attend with children in tow and be able to participate in more of the activities.

I can finally come out of hiding

Mike and I can not wait until we are a family with children, however I would be lying if I didn't acknowledge that there are some freedoms we enjoy that we will be giving up once our children are home. This weekend I exercised the freedom to become completely consumed. I spent all day Sunday reading the new Harry Potter book. I was so concerned that I might find out what happened before I had a chance to finish the book. I didn't read any blogs or turn on the t.v. for fear that I would encounter a spoiler. I am sad that the book is over, that there will be no more Harry Potter books to read but I am glad that I am now out of hiding. I was missing keeping up on the adoption blogs and the funny thing is there were no spoilers, I could have checked them all along.

It is officially safe to eat my cooking

I will be teaching summer school in August, and it is a state law that since our school is over 50% free and reduced lunch we have to provide a snack. That is fine but it meant I had to get my food worker permit. I was lucky enough growing up to find jobs outside the food service industry. (Believe me you would not have wanted to have been served by me, I can guarantee I would have dropped something.) So this was my first time taking the test. I have to tell you though that it wasn't the hardest test I have ever taken. There were about 10 legitimate questions and the rest were "if you can't answer these I don't want you touching my food" questions. So now I have all the skills I need to pass out cheese sticks and crackers.

Vietnamese Restaurant Part 2

We went to the Vietnamese Restaurant last night for the second time. This time I ordered something similar to what I had last time minus the spring roll. It was very tasty. Mike ordered a dish that had chili chicken in it. I was worried it would be spicy but it wasn't, it actually tasted a little like sweet and sour chicken. They served both dishes with a sauce that had shredded carrots in it. I don't know what it is but it was too spicy for me so I left it off.

I have also been practicing using chop sticks. I don't know if forks will be an option when we go to Vietnam so I thought it would be good if I didn't look like a complete idiot. I'm getting pretty good at picking up the big stuff like the pieces of meat. I can do the noodles but my hand starts to cramp and get very tired. I keep saying that this should be my new diet, I would definitely eat less.

Contest

I have been doing a lot of research about babywearing to help with attachment. I will blog more about that later. In the meantime if you would like the opportunity to try and win a moby wrap check out Adventures in babywearing.

Officially Waiting

I emailed our agency this week and I got a response back today. Our Vietnam coordinator said that they have not heard of any problems with our dossier, so it seems that it has gone through with no issue. She said that so far they have been notified within a few days if there were any issues. So it looks like we are officially waiting, time to start putting the nursery together.

Last Day

Today was the last day of school before summer vacation. I have to go back Monday and Tuesday for meetings but the students are done. Since I loop from first to second grade I will have the same group of students next year which is great. They are a wonderful group of kids.

I am looking forward this summer to researching and buying some of the bigger things like the crib. I also want to pick out the fabric and sew the bedding.

I will probably be teaching summer school in August so my vacation will be a little shorter than usual, but the extra money will go straight to our adoption expenses. Hopefully I will be taking my maternity leave next school year so that will make up for the short summer.

Translation Complete

I emailed our agency yesterday about the status of our dossier. I think I have some funny esp with our agency. I always seem to contact them when something progresses. The last time I called to see if our dossier had been mailed to Vietnam, and she had just put it in the mail. The message today was that their facilitator in Vietnam had just this morning contacted her to let her know that the notary office in Vietnam had finished translating our dossier. The facilitator delivered it to the DIA today. It took a little longer for them to translate our dossier than it did the first two they sent.

I had also asked if we would know when our dossier was accepted by the DIA or if they would only notify us if there were problems. She said that with the first couple they were notified of any problems and then were told when they were done reviewing them but no official log in date. I pretty much new there wouldn't be a log in date, but it sounds like we will have some indication of when they are done with our dossier.

So for the next couple of weeks I don't want to hear anything from our agency. No news is good news because if they contact us it will probably be because there is problems with our dossier. Which will mean we have to add or redo something. That means more time and money.

She also said she would notify us of any pertinent dates that would help determine an approximate wait time. I was a little surprised by this but also very excited. Since they haven't done any placements from Vietnam I didn't think they would have any way of calculating anything. But who knows, they may not know anything more until they get their first referral.

Answering Questions

I love getting comments. Hint, hint :) and when I announced our dirty little secret I got a couple of questions in our comments section. I was going to email them privately but I decided that maybe other's were interested also. So in a bold attempt to get more comments I decided to post the answers.

The first question was about our old agency and our new agency. I don't know why I was so cautious about identifying either agency. I have been reading several blogs and many identify the agency so I have decided that it is probably ok. Our first agency was FTIA. Our personal experience with them was first rate. They were the perfect agency to have for the paper chase portion of our adoption. They were excellent with communication and had very detailed packets that helped with filling out the paperwork. Since we were only at the application phase of our adoption we were only out our application fee, which was worth it for the help we received. We were just too far down the list to expect a referral in the years time they originally quoted us. Our new agency is WACAP. They have just been licensed in Vietnam and have what they call a pioneer program. The initial process was not as smooth as I had hoped. It took almost a month and several phone calls on my part to get us accepted into the program. Part of the problem was I completed our dossier just days after I sent in the application so I was ready for it to be sent to Vietnam. They had to review our home study and parenting plan, and other agency requirements. I did live through it and in the long run it won't change our wait time.

The second question was about the age of children we are requesting. From the beginning we hoped to adopt twins. When I first talked to the intake person at FTIA, she said it was harder but possible. She told me that we needed to have our home study and i-600 approved for 2 which we did. I believed if we requested twins, and if we were willing to wait we would eventually get twins. After being in the program for awhile I talked to the Vietnam coordinator at FTIA and found out that it did not work that way. They do not maintain a separate list for twins, if twins are available they go down their list and they are offered to the first family approved for 2. So if we were at the top of the list we couldn't choose to wait until twins were available. I then started to ask about other options. Could we pursue a domestic adoption or an adoption from another country while waiting for our Vietnam referral? NO. Since the wait times for a Vietnam referral were getting so long, could we complete our dossier for a second adoption when we got the referral for the first child? No, we had to wait until we had our 6 month post visit. While I understand their intentions behind these rules it just made things seem hopeless to me. We are approaching 40 and I didn't want to be adopting a second child approaching 45. So when I started researching other agencies these were questions I asked. When I asked WACAP about starting our dossier before we had the referral of our first child, that was when I was told that they allow adoptions of unrelated children. We had to be approved by the director and I had to agree to take at least 6 months maternity leave. It is also not guaranteed. If two children are not available than we accept the referral of the first the second request is terminated. We are not allowed to turn down a referral to wait for 2 children. Our home study is written for 2 children 0-24 months. So the answer is we are trying to adopt twins or 2 unrelated infants.

So there you have it 2 very long answers to 2 very short questions.

DTV!!!! DTV!!!!

I just got off the phone with our agency. I had to call and ask a question about a form I got in the mail today. She then told me she put our dossier in the mail about 5 minutes ago and she was just about to call me. They have sent 2 dossiers already and there hasn't been any major problems. They don't have a log in date but she wasn't sure if Vietnam does log in dates.

So now I wait and hope everything goes ok. We chose not to send one of the forms that may be needed. Our old agency didn't require it so we are going to wait and see if it goes through. Hopefully it doesn't cause us too much trouble.

Contract

We received our contract from our new agency yesterday. They have approved us into the Vietnam program and as soon as they receive our payment they will be sending our dossier to Vietnam. We overnighted the money today so they will have it first thing Monday morning. We are so excited to be completing such a major step.

Our new agency has sent in 2 dossiers and it took about a week for them to be translated before being sent to the DIA.

We are getting very close to be officially waiting. I can't wait to start decorating the nursery.

Dirty Little Secret

I haven't posted in awhile because I felt like I was harboring a dirty little secret. For the last 3 weeks we have been researching and then applying to a new agency. This was a decision we did not make easily. We really liked the agency we were with. They were prompt and impeccably organized. I never waited more than a few hours for answers to my emails. The problem is that there has just been a total lack of referrals. We were just too far down the list, and since we hadn't submitted our dossier it was now or never.

For those of you that may be reading my blog that have been posting about the ethics of adoption, we are listening. We didn't choose an agency promising young, quick referrals. In fact our new agency isn't making any promises. The reason we chose them is that they are a very established agency who was just licensed in Vietnam. The line is short but the ride may be very bumpy. I have confidence in them because they have started programs in countries that weren't open to international adoption at the time. They have many years of experience in international adoption just not with Vietnam.

The biggest change for us is that the new agency doesn't allow us to choose gender. This took a little bit of soul searching for me. Mostly I think because for the past 3 months I have planned on adopting a little girl. I have been thinking about little girl clothes and a little girl nursery. I am already starting to look at little boy clothes. The designers are doing a much better job of making cute boy clothes. The harder part is that I really can't buy anything. I figure if I find something dirt cheap I will buy it and then if we end up with the other gender I will donate the item to the orphanage.

The other change with our new agency is they will allow us to adopt 2 at a time. From the beginning we wanted to adopt twins so we had our home study and i-600 done for 2. It is not guaranteed that we will bring 2 children home, but we are excited that there is a possibility.

We hope we made the right decision. It is like standing in one line at the grocery store, the clerk is very well trained but she is having problems with the computer which is slowing up the line. They decide to open another lane but the checker there is unfamiliar with the system. She used to work at another grocery store so she has experience just not here. The line is a lot shorter. If the computer starts working in the first line that line it could go faster but the computer is unpredictable. Which line do you choose?

It's Done!!!!

Just short of the 3 month mark we have finished our dossier. I saw last night that FedEx had picked it up last night and I spent the morning hitting refresh on the FedEx tracking site. Luckily it arrived when my students were at Music so I rushed off to the copy store where it was being delivered.

Everything was authenticated (I was worried they wouldn't authenticate the document that the notary that expires Saturday).

When I first started this adoption journey I laughed when I saw pictures of peoples dossiers in their blog. Now that I have worked so hard to complete it I completely understand. So here it is, a picture of our dossier. :)

Were Getting Closer

I really like living in a small town but some times it really sucks. The Washington Secretary of State was lightning fast. We mailed our i-171h to be certified on Saturday, they received it Monday morning and sent it back out Monday afternoon. Unfortunately it took 2 days to get here even though I paid for overnight. I know, I know I am beginning to sound like a broken record. So of course since I work I wasn't home when they tried to deliver it today, so after work I went to the post office. The person working the route hadn't come in yet so they told me to come back later. I decided to drive toward home and see if I could catch her. I found her but she was done with the route and headed back to the post office so I followed her. There was a long line so by the time I got to the window she had unloaded her truck and I was able to get my document. Next I drove to a copy shop that has a FedEx outlet in it. We don't have an actual FedEx here. More small town woes. FedEx picks up at 3:00 here and it was after 4:00 so it wouldn't go out today. Living in a small town cost us 2 days (1 for the extra day to get the document and 1 because FedEx picks up before I get off work). The gentleman who worked at the copy shop was very helpful. He figured out it would save me money if I sent it to the Consulate via UPS 2nd day and then had it shipped back FedEx. I hope I don't have problems using UPS. I also found out that if you want to put in a prepaid return mailer it has to be sent to the copy shop not my residence. I don't know if that is a small town thing or standard, but of course my cover letter says to mail the documents to me in the prepaid mailer and then I give my address. Now of course it won't match but I can't imagine they will even look at the address.

But we are getting closer. This is the last step before our dossier is finished.

A Bit of Good News

I called our agency first thing this morning. The good thing about using an agency two time zones away is I can call at 6am. I can only handle so much fretting so it is good to get it over as early as I can. The person I talked to said that they haven't had any problem so far with notaries being expired when they get to IAD. The important thing is they get state certified and authenticated before it expires. She did say of course this could change at any time. I am going to send it through for now and cross my fingers.

Nobody said this would be easy

So I called around this morning trying to find a notary on a Saturday in our small town. I finally found someone at the bank and I was completely thrilled. I was struggling with the paperwork so we weren't able to leave right away, but we got down there just after 11:00. Everything was going smoothly, he checked our licenses, got our account number. We signed the paperwork and then he filled in the notary part. HIS NOTARY EXPIRES 4/22/07. That is like 15 days from now. I have no idea if that will be ok and of course since it is the weekend I can't call our agency to find out. The post office closes at noon so we decided to go ahead and mail it to the secretary of state. We paid for overnight both ways (of course there is no guarantees that it will come back in 1 day, I still have yet to figure out the post office). We have decided that Mike will go in a little late Monday so we can call the agency before he leaves to see if we have to get a new notary. If we have to I may have to call in a few favors at work so that I can leave to get it notarized. The good news is the paper was notarizing that it was a copy so it will be easy to redo. Just more postage and time.

Great News

We got out 171-H today. I have read it over and over making sure everything is perfect. Correct spelling, right address, approved for 2. Yep everything looks great. For those of you in the adoption world it took exactly 3 weeks and 4 days to get.

Now I just have to figure out how to get it notarized in our little town on the weekend.

I'm off to do the Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy Dance.

A Tale of Highs and Lows

I picked up our mail today and imagine my surprise when there was an envelope from Citizenship and Immigration Services. I was so excited I mentally started writing my blog post. How surprised everyone would be that it only took a little over a week. What lucky people we are. As I continued up the driveway I began to think perhaps I shouldn't count my chickens before they're hatched. So I opened it up and I did not find our 171h, instead it was just a form letter telling me they had received our i-600. I know we drove 300 miles and dropped it off personally.

Adoption Update: We are still waiting on our 171h. I thought I would tell you something you already know. That seems to be the theme of the day.

The US Mail System

I think I need a little lesson in how the US mail system works. Mike works in a different state so that meant we had to have a few documents for our dossier prepared and notarized in that state. This means that we have to send these documents to the Secretary of State in Idaho to be certified. I decided to get this done so I didn't have to worry about it. This is where the whole mail system mystifies me. I took the documents to my local post office where I found out I can't have a tracking number unless I send the package priority. I decided that I really wanted to be able to track that the documents had arrived so I handed over $4.55. I tracked the package and it took 3 days to get there. It is only 1 state away. But here is where it gets really bizarre. I hadn't enclosed a priority mailer so the Idaho Secretary of State office mailed our documents back to me through regular mail. It cost 85¢ and I received the documents in 2 days.

A poem

This is a poem that I found on adoption.com and is also a part of my adoption workbook that I am completing for our agency. It really put things into perspective for me. And when I am bummed because our child won't be a tiny infant when she comes home this poem helps me to remember we are not adopting for 0-8 months we are adopting for a lifetime, and that it is better to give up that first year then to never experience a child at all.

You may want to have a tissue handy when you read this.

DIFFERENT TRIPS TO THE SAME PLACE
Author Unknown

Deciding to adopt a baby is like making a journey to New Zealand.

You have heard that it is a wonderful place, you’ve read the guide
books and feel certain you are ready to go. Everyone you know
has traveled there by plane. They say it can be a turbulent flight
with occasional rough landings, but you can look forward to
being pampered on the trip.

So you go to the airport and ask the ticket agent for a ticket to
New Zealand. All around you, excited people are boarding planes
for New Zealand. It seems there is no seat for you! You will have
to wait for the next flight. Impatient, but anticipating a
wonderful trip, you wait, and wait, and wait. . .

Flights to New Zealand continue to come and go. And come and
go. People say silly things like, “Relax! Be patient! You will get
on a flight soon enough.” Otherpeople actually get on the plane,
and then cancel their trip, to which you cry, “That’s not fair!”
After a long time, the ticket agent tells you, “I’m sorry, but we are
not going to be able to get you on a plane to New Zealand.
Perhaps you should think about going by boat.”

“BY BOAT!” you exclaim. “Going by boat will take forever. Not
many people go that way – the journey is very uncertain and
you never know where you will end up. It is also very expensive.
I really had my heart set on going by plane.”

So you go home and think about not going to New Zealand at all.
You wonder if New Zealand will be as beautiful if you approach
it by sea, rather than by air. But you have long dreamt of this
wonderful place, and so finally you decide to travel by boat.
It is a long and uncomfortable journey of many months and
over many rough seas. Just a few people are on board. You
wonder if you will ever see New Zealand.

Meanwhile, your friends have flown back and forth from
New Zealand two or three more times, marveling about each trip.

One glorious fine day, the boat finally docks in New Zealand. It is
more exquisite than you had ever imagined, and the beauty is
magnified by the months, even years spent on a rough sea.
You have made wonderful and close friends during your long
voyage and you find yourself comparing stories with others who
have also traveled by sea rather than air. People continue to
fly to New Zealand as often as they were, but you are able to
travel only once; perhaps twice. Somesay things like, “Oh, be glad
you didn’t fly. My flight was awful, if was really uncomfortable.
Traveling by sea must be so easy!”

You will always wonder what it would have been like to fly to
New Zealand. Still, you know that you have a special
appreciation of New Zealand. You realize that the beauty of
New Zealand is not in the way you got there, but in the place itself.

It Worked :)

We made the all day trek to Yakima to file our i-600a with the USCIS office today. It turned out to be totally worth the trip. We showed up a little early and waited in the car until 15 minutes before our appointment. The friendly security officer greeted us at the door and had us put everything in a tub like they have at the airport. I didn't realize that had you empty your pockets so of course Mike had all his change that he had to dig out. Then when he took out his money clip it has a small knife on it so that had to go the car. It was a little bit of a circus getting through the door but they were friendly and we made it ok. The lady that took our paperwork couldn't have been nicer. She was amused by me because with my anal personality I had filled out the form on orange AND salmon colored paper because I had seen references to both colors and I wanted to be prepared for whichever one they preferred. I also had 3 sets of additional paperwork. One set with statements to the fact that they were copies attached, one set without, and the original documents. Just in case. She took or paperwork and sent us over to get our fingerprints. We ended up waiting about an hour because of other people also waiting which was fine by me. I was just so happy to have it go so smoothly.

Good News, Good News, Good News

Good News #1: Our final home study was in the mail Friday. This means we will be heading to Yakima on Monday to file our i-600. Cross your fingers that they will let us and not make us mail it in and then wait for a fingerprinting appointment.

Good News #2: We got an update from our Vietnam coordinator on Friday. She announced that our agency signed with 2 more provinces in Vietnam. They haven't released the details as to which provinces they are, just that they are in the south. I also don't know exactly when they will start placing children from these new provinces or how many children they have to place. We still have awhile but hopefully this will make our overall wait shorter.

Good News #3: Mike and I went to a Vietnamese restaurant tonight. Now anyone who knows me knows that I am a self proclaimed picky eater. If I were to make a list of foods I like and foods I don't, the don't list would be much longer. Since we announced we were adopting I have been joking that I wonder how many bags of M&M's I can pack because I don't know what I will eat when we travel to Vietnam. However, it has been important to me to really learn about the culture and I decided that I would try new things (This really is a big step for me). I ordered Bun Thit Nuong, luckily it was number 20 on the menu because I wouldn't have had a clue how to pronounce it and I wouldn't have insulted the waiter by even trying. It was Vermicelli with broiled pork and fried egg roll. Now I am not going to lie and say I loved it, but I did like it and I would go back. I actually really liked the noodles and the pork, it was the egg roll part that wasn't my favorite. Mike ordered Bun Thit Ga Va Tom Xo Xau Nuong which was the vermicelli with chicken and shrimp. I tried some of his chicken and it was really good. So I have some ideas for ordering next time. They had some dishes with chili chicken, chili pork or chili beef, but the word chili made me think they were spicy and I don't like spicy foods. Does anyone know if they are spicy or should I try them?

4 Extra Days

As you can probably tell from the title We did not get our home study in the mail today. I still don't understand why it takes the same amount of time to send something across the state as it takes to send something clear across the country. I take some blame here, I should have arranged to have my social worker overnight the document. I know in the scheme of this long wait that 4 days is probably not the end of the world, but have you seen the top of my blog? I'm counting every second.

I had to cancel my Thursday appointment with the USCIS. They only had two appointments left for Monday, which I know I should be thankful that there were still appointments left but I was a little bummed that the earliest we could get in was 2:00. There is some risk in going in person to the USCIS. Technically in Washington (I don't know if they did this in other states too) they closed to walk ins to file their i-600 back in November. You had to mail in your application and then wait for a fingerprinting appointment. Now my Washington adoption Yahoo group has been posting that as of the end of January they have been unofficially accepting walk-ins or more specifically people who schedule an infopass appointment. They say the best day is Wednesday (I don't know why) but people have posted that they have gone on other days. So far I have not seen a single post of someone not being able to get in. Let's hope we are not the first. I know I am going to fret all day wondering if we will be able to get in, so it would have been nice to get in earlier so I could have had some peace of mind.

Now please mister postman deliver our home study tomorrow so I don't have to fret over that too.

Please Mister Postman

I finally succeeded in getting a hold of our social worker yesterday. We have been waiting for our final draft of our home study. He had a couple of revisions that he needed to run by me so he emailed me a copy and I called him back right away. I'm talking less than five minutes. Yes I am anxious to have this done. He said that he would get it notarized today and mail it to us. So I made an info pass appointment with the USCIS office for Thursday. This office will process our form for adopting an orphan and run our fingerprints.

I now have to cross my fingers that the home study will arrive in the mail tomorrow. When I called my social worker today to confirm that he did mail it. (Helpful adopting hint: Don't assume anything, confirm everything) I found out he sent it out priority but when he asked they told him it would take two to three days to get to me. Now I know we live in the boonies but I am in the same state. I used priority mail to mail my passport all the way to the east coast and that made it there in two days. We are talking a fraction of the distance.

Now everyone repeat after me: Neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow, nor gloom of night...NOR 400 MILES will keep the postman from delivering our final home study.

Hi my name is Shelley and I'm a shopaholic

I love to shop. My whole family can vouch for that. But when Mike and I decided to adopt and I found out how long the wait would be I decided to make a vow that I wouldn't buy anything for the baby until all the paperwork was submitted and we were officially on the waiting list.

So here is what I have bought so far, and no were not on the waiting list. Dang Ebay!!!


They were all so adorable I just couldn't resist. Do they have a 12 step program for this???

The List

Were on the list. No not the waiting list. For that we need to get our finalized home study, get our 171h (which means we can adopt an orphan), and log all our paperwork with the Vietnam government.

No the list I am talking about is Mrs. Broccoli guys blog roll. This is a list of blogs about people who are adopting from Vietnam. Now I don't want to give the impression that she searches the web and came across our wonderful blog and decided to add it to her list. No I found her wonderful blog and asked if she would add our blog to her list. When I checked this morning there is was a little more than halfway down her alphabetical list. I have added a link to her sight so one you can see that I really am on the list, and two if you want a great resource for finding other Vietnam adoption blogs this is a great place to go.

scrapbooking 101

I have finally gotten around to trying my hand at scrapbooking. My plan is to do as many pages as I can and then add the pictures when I get them. That way I have a better chance of actually completing the life book.

I have attached pictures of the 2 pages I have finished. I thought it would be good to see if I can figure out how to post pictures to this blog.


Title Page

Referral Page

Dilemma

I emailed our dossier documents to our agency coordinator today so she could check them over before I send them off to have them state certified. This was her response to me:

These documents are all in really good shape. I found a few minor,
knit-picky kind of issues that I would not actually require you
to correct but you can if you would like to be extra-cautious.

All of the documents are perfect except for both our medical exams. On both forms the doctors middle initial wasn't written and on my form I printed and wrote my name with my middle name but on the notary paragraph only has my first and last name. So here is my dilemma. I have the time to get them redone but as everyone knows anything that involves a doctor is a real pain. I don't even know if I have to make an appointment or if the front desk can just take it back to have the doctor sign. No matter what, my doctor is 2 hours away so it will be at least a half day if not a full day off work. If anyone has an opinion feel free to leave a comment. Since my agency said it was optional maybe I will take a poll.

I forwarded my home study to my coordinator today also. It needs to be approved by the agency then our social worker can finalize it and get it notarized. Then we can file our i-600. Yeah!

Oh Happy Day!

First of all our social worker emailed our home study rough draft this morning. I know it was a little later than he told me but I'm just so happy to get it that I don't care. In the scheme of home studies I think ours is happening at a pretty good pace. Of course not as fast as I want because I want it to be instant.

The other great news is we finished gathering all of our documents for our dossier this week. The next step is to send them to our coordinator at our agency so she can look them over to make sure we did everything right. Then we send them to the state where they were notarized to be state certified. All of Mike's documents go to Idaho because that is where he had them notarized since he works over there. The good news is it is 5 dollars cheaper per document to have them certified in Idaho than in Washington so that will save us a little bit of money.

Were 2 steps closer, Yeah!!!

Frustrated

I am beginning to get a little frustrated over my home study report. Last Tuesday I called and he told me I was next on the list and that he would call me either Wednesday or Thursday. Those days came and went and I let it slide. The scary thing is I called him yesterday (Tuesday) and he told me he had a stack of home studies he was going to work on that night, I was #1 or #2 on the pile and he would call me Wednesday or Thursday. Am I experiencing Da Ja Vou? Are they remaking the movie Groundhog Day and I am now playing the staring role? That would be a hoot as I'm not much of an actress.

I did feel as if I may have rushed into finding a social worker. So I went back tonight and did some more research. There isn't a lot of information about him on my yahoo groups but everything I did find is very positive. I would think if he wasn't legit there would be a least one negative post. I guess I just need to keep repeating "patience." I'm sure it is a word I will be saying a lot on this journey.

On a more positive note I went to Walmart tonight and bought several more dollars of scrapbooking supplies. I haven't made a single page but boy do I have some cool stuff. LOL

Lifebook

One thing that our agency requires is that we complete a workbook that deals with International Adoption. The chapter that I just completed was making a life book for our child. A life book is similar to a baby book but it includes things that are more specific to an adoption. Pages for journaling how excited we were when we sent our application, humorous stories about our home study, our first referral photos, etc.

I just recently got rid of all my crafting supplies to make room for our new baby. So the idea of being able to start a new hobby is very appealing to me. I have never done scrapbooking before because I didn't feel I took enough photos to warrant it. But now I have this great excuse. A few years ago my sister gave me an art supply storage crate so I have decided that I can't get any more supplies than what will fit in this crate.

SHOPPING TRIP! I went to Michael's today and wandered around their scrapbooking aisles. I was in heaven, they have just about everything you can imagine. An hour and several dollars later I walked out with what I hope will be enough supplies to get me started.

P.S. Still no home study rough draft.

Home Study Rough Draft???

Well I am disappointed to say that we did not get our rough draft for our home study. I must have refreshed my email every 20 minutes today looking for it. I'm still hoping that he will send it this weekend. I know he does a lot of his writing when he gets home. If not I will call on Monday, but it is a holiday so it is hard to say if he will be in the office.

Another problem: when I was checking my husband's medical report I noticed they put his height and weight in inches and pounds instead of meters and kilograms. I had him go back to have it redone and they told him they had no way to convert the figures. Maybe I am wrong but I would think that most doctors would know how to do this. Mine did it in his head when he filled out my report. So I plan to fill that part out myself then he can take it back to the doctor's office for the rest. Luckily we don't need this form for awhile so the delay won't affect anything.

Here's hoping I will have more positive news my next post.

Valentine's Day

Today is Valentine's Day. My wonderful husband sent me surprise flowers today. He bought flowers this weekend so I didn't think I would be getting any today. But surprise a lovely bouquet was delivered to work today. I love my husband.

Adoption news: I called our social worker yesterday to check on our home study. He said he had one to finish writing then ours was next on his list. He said he would probably call today or tomorrow. I of course was hoping today, what a great extra Valentine's present, but alas no. No phone call, no email. Let's all hope for tomorrow.

To blog or not to blog

For those of you who know me your are probably thinking "What is she thinking?" She is going to blog? Well let me tell you the story behind the blog. Mike and I decided we wanted to adopt. Then we decided we wanted to adopt internationally, and finally we decided we wanted to adopt from Vietnam. Then it was time for me to start researching, and you know how I love to research. I found every adoption forum and yahoo group that was on the internet. I read as many old posts as I could trying to decide on an agency. Then it became obvious that I would have to post to some of these groups if I was going to get more answers. This is how I met "T" (I'll call her that until I find out if she wants her real name used) she emailed me asking me to share what I found out about an agency she was also interested in. From there we starting emailing back and forth sharing our experience so far.

Then one day she emailed me and asked are you going to start a blog? I replied that I enjoyed reading as many blogs as I could about Vietnam adoptions but I probably wouldn't write one myself. What would I write about during those endless months of waiting? She emailed me back and suggested that a blog would be a good way to connect with other adoptive parents. A way to get support and find out more information about the process. I decided that she was right. It wasn't fair for me to lurk at all the other blogs out there and not share my experiences as well. So that was how this blog got started.

I will do my best to stick with this, although I still worry about the day when I write "still waiting." And if your out there please comment let me know that I am connecting with other adoptive parents or people just curious about this wonderful, joyful, roller coaster ride called international adoption.