As of May 30, 2014, we had confirmed FedEx tracking that our I800A, home study, fee, and supporting documents were received at USCIS in Texas. We can start the clock on waiting for our approval. Our social worker said her most recent application was approved in 60 days and she has another family nearing the 60 day mark right now and they have yet to hear anything....so, we'll stick with the 50-90 day range for processing and approval to occur. Please continue to pray as we gather our dossier documents.
On Wednesday of this week I will have a scheduled phone call with our social worker to piece by piece review each document we will need to complete our dossier. Many of the items we already have, but we will need to be sure every i is dotted and every t is crossed prior to sending for authentication and then off to China. Thirteen documents and each one very, very important. Pray we do not misplace documents and that we are able to obtain those we lack with relative ease.
We thank you for the continued prayers. I cannot begin to tell you what a joy it is to tell someone when they ask where we are in the adoption process, "We are waiting on US Immigration approval to adopt!" It feels so much better than, "Well, we're STILL in the home study process."
God is good and He is showing us His might each step of the way! Thank you for praying us through.
Monday, June 2, 2014
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Finalized!
Chris and I had the chance to read through our home study last night and we had no suggested edits for our social worker. We sent confirmation of our approval last night and then signed some forms this afternoon verifying that we were satisfied with the content. Just now I got this in my e-mail from our social worker:
There *may* have been a few cartwheels, clapping, whoops of joy, sighs of relief, and a few other embarrassing gestures of elation. Just maybe.
Please join us in praying for an approval that occurs in the 50 day time frame they have seen recently, rather than the 90 days? Pray for a favorable review and approval.
"Your Home Study, I800A, and supporting documents are in a FedEx drop box and will arrive in TX tomorrow! HOORAY!!"
There *may* have been a few cartwheels, clapping, whoops of joy, sighs of relief, and a few other embarrassing gestures of elation. Just maybe.
Please join us in praying for an approval that occurs in the 50 day time frame they have seen recently, rather than the 90 days? Pray for a favorable review and approval.
USCIS, here we come!!!
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
What's In My Inbox?
What is in my e-mail inbox today? Oh, nothing too special or important....certainly not a completed home study for Chris and I to review with our final edits! Oh yes, yes it is! There is a home study sitting in my inbox, calling for me to read it, review it, and send it back! But alas, it came while I'm in the thick of my data entry for Benchmark this month and it shall have to wait until at least this evening for my eyes to thoroughly feast upon it. Once Chris and I review it, we'll get that magic word I mentioned a few posts ago: finalized. Finalized is a BIG word...it means it is ready to head to USCIS for immigration review and approval. Perhaps (maybe, just perhaps) we can get that sent off prior to our 11 month mile marker of this process? I won't get my hopes up, because in the past that just leaves me disappointed, but it gives me something to shoot for.
It is just a regular Wednesday. The Wednesday my inbox chimed and I saw a completed home study. Some day down the road it will be a regular Friday (or whatever) and my inbox will chime and I'll see my daughter for the first time. What day that will be! Something so basic, like getting an e-mail, can take a regular 'ole day and make it into something worth remembering.
Happy Wednesday! I have fun e-mail in my inbox!
It is just a regular Wednesday. The Wednesday my inbox chimed and I saw a completed home study. Some day down the road it will be a regular Friday (or whatever) and my inbox will chime and I'll see my daughter for the first time. What day that will be! Something so basic, like getting an e-mail, can take a regular 'ole day and make it into something worth remembering.
Happy Wednesday! I have fun e-mail in my inbox!
Tuesday, May 6, 2014
Sometimes...
Sometimes I find myself looking at photos like this one:
or this one:
and I try to imagine our daughter to be in it. I try to picture her dark eyes and straight jet black hair and my mind tries to put her in them. Will she be sandwiched in the middle of a silly giggle squeeze? Or will she be dramatically trying to steal the show with a cartwheel or twirl in front of everyone? Will she be the only one who actually looks AND smiles or will she be the one looking for food in her bucket or better yet, wearing the bucket on her head? I try to imagine what her silly antics might be and how they will be captured in our log of memories. I can't wait to know her. And not just meet her, but know her. Years of intentional love, part of the family, know her.
We've had some books from the library recently about Chinese adoption. They have been great children's stories and some share the perspective of the siblings waiting at home and others tell it from the adopted child's perspective. Reading these books has been a great thing for us and has generated a lot of good conversation with the kids, Grace especially. She keeps saying she wants to hold her baby sister, but of course, she will likely be too big for Grace to hold. So we've told her how sweet that is and how wonderful it will be to cuddle, but perhaps she may not be able to hold her like she would a baby. One morning at breakfast, Grace sweetly declared, "I can't hold her, but maybe I can hold her hand?" Yes! Yes! You can hold her hand through many parts of her life! Please, hold her hand!
For now we are just left with lots of wondering. Will she be subdued? Will she be introverted or extroverted? Will she be wild and dramatic or quiet and reserved? Where will she be in the photos? Who will she want to be closest to? For now, we just look at our photos and wonder. Sometimes I dream of who she will be.
We've had some books from the library recently about Chinese adoption. They have been great children's stories and some share the perspective of the siblings waiting at home and others tell it from the adopted child's perspective. Reading these books has been a great thing for us and has generated a lot of good conversation with the kids, Grace especially. She keeps saying she wants to hold her baby sister, but of course, she will likely be too big for Grace to hold. So we've told her how sweet that is and how wonderful it will be to cuddle, but perhaps she may not be able to hold her like she would a baby. One morning at breakfast, Grace sweetly declared, "I can't hold her, but maybe I can hold her hand?" Yes! Yes! You can hold her hand through many parts of her life! Please, hold her hand!
For now we are just left with lots of wondering. Will she be subdued? Will she be introverted or extroverted? Will she be wild and dramatic or quiet and reserved? Where will she be in the photos? Who will she want to be closest to? For now, we just look at our photos and wonder. Sometimes I dream of who she will be.
Ten Months-Oh Happy Day!
The last couple of weeks have been adoption roller coaster weeks. The, "I'm so filled with excitement I could burst" down to the lows of "This is so hard, why are we even trying?" I've been filled with so many emotions I experienced when we were trying to get pregnant each time. I've been quite surprised by that. I never really expected to feel those sorts of things, but I have.
For the last few weeks we lacked one item in order to complete our home study. Chris' physical. Well, much to our surprise, God moved mountains in a big way (well, actually, should we have been surprised?!) and Chris got in for his adoption physical at a much, MUCH earlier date than we anticipated. Within just a few days, we had all the documents back from the doctor, lab tests back, etc. I was soooooooo excited. Then NOT excited as I thumbed through the documents to realize that we didn't have one thing from the doctor. A letter. And that letter proved to be the thorn in our sides for about two full weeks time. For some reason the doctor just didn't understand what we needed. Chris called daily. Showed up in their office. Visited the doctor on site at his workplace. Basically....we stalked her (in a friendly way!). Finally, with great anticipation, on Thursday last week, Chris had been promised by the doctor that he would have in his hands just what we needed. He showed her an example and explained precisely what we needed. He would get it. We were going to have Chinese food for dinner to celebrate and all the kids kept asking if we had "the paper" we needed yet so they could eat "Chinese chicken nuggets." Thursday came and Chris went to the doctor's office and picked up what was supposed to be a letter. What it ended up being was a six page dictation note from his physical exam. All rather useful information, but not quite what we need for something that needs to be translated into Chinese. It wasn't even signed. I was heart broken and thought we'd never get what we needed. I sent the six pages to the social worker just in case she might approve it, but was not at all shocked when she wrote back and said no. Back to the drawing board. Again.... I'm not going to lie. This was probably the most deflated I'd felt in a long time in this process. The kids were watching a video and and was hanging up laundry and sort of hid in Grace's closet for a bit and had a huge sob. I just couldn't believe it. I felt so....stuck. And I felt like our daughter was stuck too.
Then, Friday came. With renewed spirit, Chris wrote the letter for the doctor just as we needed it, printed it, and took it to the office. He asked the receptionist to simply place a piece of letterhead in the copier and copy the letter onto their letterhead. Then the doctor signed it and like that....we had it. WE HAD IT! Oh happy day! We got the letter we needed!
Home study complete....yet to be finalized (but that should be soon!). I-800-A off to the agency! And what else? What is sitting open on my desktop? Oh....just a dossier manual! Already I had some major heart attack inducing panic moments when reading the dossier manual, but a couple of quick e-mails with our social worker cleared all of that up and I'm not really sweating collecting those documents. Our agency does all the authenticating for us, so we don't even have to get a single item notarized! Just all originals. I've already requested our birth certificates and we already had our marriage license from when I renewed my passport. Just need to track down some original documents and get them off to our social worker. So here is how it works and what we're doing now:
Ten months. This is NOT where I expected us to be at ten months in. Never did I imagine I'd still be waiting for a finalized home study at this point in time. Never did I imagine we'd be nearly half through 2014 before we even began our dossier. I guess that isn't really what matters, though, is it? It isn't about what I imagined and despite the tears and anxiety over all this, I wouldn't have it the way I imagined it. It is all about Him and His ultimate plan. When the road gets rocky there is so much peace and rest in that. He knows! He knows how long this will take and He is timing it just so....just so....just so....because one day, at the end of the rocky road, is a little girl and all has to be "just so" for her to be ours. And we wouldn't have it any other way.
Ten months. Home study complete and almost finalized. Oh happy day!
For the last few weeks we lacked one item in order to complete our home study. Chris' physical. Well, much to our surprise, God moved mountains in a big way (well, actually, should we have been surprised?!) and Chris got in for his adoption physical at a much, MUCH earlier date than we anticipated. Within just a few days, we had all the documents back from the doctor, lab tests back, etc. I was soooooooo excited. Then NOT excited as I thumbed through the documents to realize that we didn't have one thing from the doctor. A letter. And that letter proved to be the thorn in our sides for about two full weeks time. For some reason the doctor just didn't understand what we needed. Chris called daily. Showed up in their office. Visited the doctor on site at his workplace. Basically....we stalked her (in a friendly way!). Finally, with great anticipation, on Thursday last week, Chris had been promised by the doctor that he would have in his hands just what we needed. He showed her an example and explained precisely what we needed. He would get it. We were going to have Chinese food for dinner to celebrate and all the kids kept asking if we had "the paper" we needed yet so they could eat "Chinese chicken nuggets." Thursday came and Chris went to the doctor's office and picked up what was supposed to be a letter. What it ended up being was a six page dictation note from his physical exam. All rather useful information, but not quite what we need for something that needs to be translated into Chinese. It wasn't even signed. I was heart broken and thought we'd never get what we needed. I sent the six pages to the social worker just in case she might approve it, but was not at all shocked when she wrote back and said no. Back to the drawing board. Again.... I'm not going to lie. This was probably the most deflated I'd felt in a long time in this process. The kids were watching a video and and was hanging up laundry and sort of hid in Grace's closet for a bit and had a huge sob. I just couldn't believe it. I felt so....stuck. And I felt like our daughter was stuck too.
Then, Friday came. With renewed spirit, Chris wrote the letter for the doctor just as we needed it, printed it, and took it to the office. He asked the receptionist to simply place a piece of letterhead in the copier and copy the letter onto their letterhead. Then the doctor signed it and like that....we had it. WE HAD IT! Oh happy day! We got the letter we needed!
Home study complete....yet to be finalized (but that should be soon!). I-800-A off to the agency! And what else? What is sitting open on my desktop? Oh....just a dossier manual! Already I had some major heart attack inducing panic moments when reading the dossier manual, but a couple of quick e-mails with our social worker cleared all of that up and I'm not really sweating collecting those documents. Our agency does all the authenticating for us, so we don't even have to get a single item notarized! Just all originals. I've already requested our birth certificates and we already had our marriage license from when I renewed my passport. Just need to track down some original documents and get them off to our social worker. So here is how it works and what we're doing now:
- Social worker and supervisor finish home study and make edits
- We review home study and make edits
- Home study finalized
- Finalized home study sent overnight to USCIS, along with our I800A application and hangs out there for a bit (the wait time is typically 90 days, but we've been told turn around right now is actually 50 days, so we hope we catch that wave of quicker processing with no hiccups!)
- While USCIS processes our application, we work on gathering the 13 documents (plus some extra items like photos) for our dossier
- The moment we receive our approval from USCIS, we scan to social worker
- Social Worker immediately begins authentication process on all dossier documents (this is a series of checks and balances to assure China all signatures are "real" and from authorized individuals)
- Authentication is finished within 2-4 weeks from time of start
- D-T-C....DOSSIER TO CHINA!!! This is a big step and will likely be celebrated with more Chinese food in our home!
Ten months. This is NOT where I expected us to be at ten months in. Never did I imagine I'd still be waiting for a finalized home study at this point in time. Never did I imagine we'd be nearly half through 2014 before we even began our dossier. I guess that isn't really what matters, though, is it? It isn't about what I imagined and despite the tears and anxiety over all this, I wouldn't have it the way I imagined it. It is all about Him and His ultimate plan. When the road gets rocky there is so much peace and rest in that. He knows! He knows how long this will take and He is timing it just so....just so....just so....because one day, at the end of the rocky road, is a little girl and all has to be "just so" for her to be ours. And we wouldn't have it any other way.
Ten months. Home study complete and almost finalized. Oh happy day!
Tuesday, April 22, 2014
Broken
I spend a good portion of my time praying, day dreaming, thinking, wondering about our daughter-to-be. I've spent a lot of time lately thinking about adoption itself on a much deeper level. That one little word is so complex and full of meaning. On one side it is purely glorious. On another, it is dark and sad, wounded and broken.
We've spent a lot of our adoption process thus far taking a lot of classes, reading books, completing online modules. My thinking regarding adoption was always fairly solid. Our church has an amazing adoption culture and has done a fantastic job educating all of us about the gospel picture it is. I studied social work in college and understand the beautiful family-creating mechanism it can be. Adoption is beautiful and wonderful. It is a gift.
I guess I just always made a choice to see only the nice parts. The "other side" of the mountain parts. I never stopped to see the humble and broken beginnings. Now that I look at it in the context of our daughter, things have changed. It is awkward and complex. People hear we are adopting and they instantly say, "You must be so excited." They are right to say that. I am excited. It would be wrong to say otherwise, but it also pains me to say the word "excitement" when I refer to the eventual adoption of our daughter.
When I think about the process of having our biological children I remember such joy and anticipation of their eventual arrival. Never once did I think about what they would go through to get here (I did, however, think about what I would go through to get them here!). While birth is probably a rather traumatic event, none of us remember it. God designed it that way. When I think about the process of getting our daughter in China here, it is so, so different. Yes, we have to go through an exhausting and challenging battle to get her here, but what she has to endure to get here, well, it brings tears to my eyes. And there is no guarantee she will not remember.
Adoption is a beautiful and wonderful thing, but let us never forget that the genesis of adoption is trauma and brokenness. Somewhere, over an ocean and a couple continents away, a mother will give birth. For reasons we will likely never comprehend, she decides she will be unable to keep and raise her child, so she abandons her (it is not legal to give up your child for adoption in China, so you must simply abandon them). Our daughter, precious and new, helpless and innocent, will be left somewhere...a city gate, an orphanage door, a busy street. Then, her sweet, amazing, life giving mother will turn and walk away. Her agony is our joy because now, she can become ours. I thank her mother for her bravery. In China you are urged to have an abortion if you've had too many children or any defect in the child is detected. Her agonizing, terrible choice to walk away will one day be our overwhelming joy. Yet somehow, as her adoptive mother, I will one day have to walk my daughter through this. Why her mother made this choice, how it happened, why her, how was she so undesirable to one, yet longed for by another. There will be questions I cannot answer.
So yes, I am deeply and eagerly excited for our daughter to arrive--to see her sweet face, smell her skin, and stroke her hair. I am not, however, excited for what she must endure--the brokenness she will carry for a lifetime. I pray God will mend her heart as only He can. Sweet daughter in China, you are already a little warrior and so miraculous. You are simply amazing and I love you to my core even before I know you.
We've spent a lot of our adoption process thus far taking a lot of classes, reading books, completing online modules. My thinking regarding adoption was always fairly solid. Our church has an amazing adoption culture and has done a fantastic job educating all of us about the gospel picture it is. I studied social work in college and understand the beautiful family-creating mechanism it can be. Adoption is beautiful and wonderful. It is a gift.
I guess I just always made a choice to see only the nice parts. The "other side" of the mountain parts. I never stopped to see the humble and broken beginnings. Now that I look at it in the context of our daughter, things have changed. It is awkward and complex. People hear we are adopting and they instantly say, "You must be so excited." They are right to say that. I am excited. It would be wrong to say otherwise, but it also pains me to say the word "excitement" when I refer to the eventual adoption of our daughter.
When I think about the process of having our biological children I remember such joy and anticipation of their eventual arrival. Never once did I think about what they would go through to get here (I did, however, think about what I would go through to get them here!). While birth is probably a rather traumatic event, none of us remember it. God designed it that way. When I think about the process of getting our daughter in China here, it is so, so different. Yes, we have to go through an exhausting and challenging battle to get her here, but what she has to endure to get here, well, it brings tears to my eyes. And there is no guarantee she will not remember.
Adoption is a beautiful and wonderful thing, but let us never forget that the genesis of adoption is trauma and brokenness. Somewhere, over an ocean and a couple continents away, a mother will give birth. For reasons we will likely never comprehend, she decides she will be unable to keep and raise her child, so she abandons her (it is not legal to give up your child for adoption in China, so you must simply abandon them). Our daughter, precious and new, helpless and innocent, will be left somewhere...a city gate, an orphanage door, a busy street. Then, her sweet, amazing, life giving mother will turn and walk away. Her agony is our joy because now, she can become ours. I thank her mother for her bravery. In China you are urged to have an abortion if you've had too many children or any defect in the child is detected. Her agonizing, terrible choice to walk away will one day be our overwhelming joy. Yet somehow, as her adoptive mother, I will one day have to walk my daughter through this. Why her mother made this choice, how it happened, why her, how was she so undesirable to one, yet longed for by another. There will be questions I cannot answer.
So yes, I am deeply and eagerly excited for our daughter to arrive--to see her sweet face, smell her skin, and stroke her hair. I am not, however, excited for what she must endure--the brokenness she will carry for a lifetime. I pray God will mend her heart as only He can. Sweet daughter in China, you are already a little warrior and so miraculous. You are simply amazing and I love you to my core even before I know you.
My Heart is Full
It has been way too long since we've had some non-adoption related family updates! Here is a photo over load of some of the fun we've had in the last several months:
These little nuggets turned three. THREE!! I guess I cannot refer to them as "the babies" any longer. Somehow "the pre-schoolers" doesn't have quite the same ring to it. They are the most complicated, sanctifying, fulfilling, overwhelming, joyful, complex, and stretching part of each day for me. There still isn't a day that goes by that I don't say, "God, you sure you wanted me (ME?!) to be the mommy of twins?! I sure do make a mess of almost each day!" Yet He is so faithful to use the challenges of mothering multiples to show me my desperate need for Him. I am so humbled and thankful He did pick me! Mama of twins is such a unique thing. It is hard to put words to it. You twin mamas out there totally get it, I know! I adore them and cherish them. This age, while carrying a special set of challenges, is seriously so much fun for Chris and I! I love little people in my home. I hope to keep it that way for a long time to come. We must have little people! Joshua and Grace abound with joy and I love their special bond.
This boy saw fit to turn six the following month!! SIX! Surely I am not old enough to mother a six year old! Jacob has had an explosive year with his reading. We went from "Hop on Pop" to full throttle with chapter books! We went to the library last night and checked out at least five new books and I have no doubt they will all be done in two weeks or less! This boy loves to read and it makes my heart so happy! Jacob is an amazing big brother. He loves his siblings and they adore him. He is mature and poised and he makes us proud! We have chosen, as a family, to pursue home school next year and participate in a local Classical Conversations community as a part of that. He and I are so excited to embark on this journey together. We can't wait to see what God has in store in the coming school year. He is wrapping up his time at Trinity with gusto and working so hard. He loves to study and learn!
My heart and my arms are full. Sometimes I find myself looking at photos like this and I try to picture our second daughter with us. Yes, my heart and arms are full--yet they long for her to come and ache with the emptiness her absence brings. Until then, I pray for her and rejoice in what I have right now, knowing all of it, all of this, is part of His glorious plan for me. Blessed indeed.
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