Adoption process continued...

So, here I go...I will continue to tell you about our adoption journey. Beware, parts will be extremely boring...

During March 2007, I filled out what seemed like an endless amount of paperwork for our home study. They want to know everything about you and then some. Ryan and I each had to answer questions that ended up being 10 pages each of answers! Our home study agency is a small local agency and they have been great. Cathy, who we work with, has always done everything as quickly as possible. We also met with an adoption attorney to look over AAC's service agreement and just make sure we weren't making any big mistakes. All looked good, so we signed the service agreement and sent in our first big chunk of money to our agency! At the end of the month, we also sent in our I-600A, our petition to adopt an orphan. It had been rumored that the fees were going to raise on April 1st, but I don't think they actually raised until July. But, it got us to get it done and we sent a chunk of money to our government.

During April 2007, we received our invitation to be fingerprinted for our I-600A application and a week later we took a day trip to Naperville to get that done. Ryan and I each had our individual meetings with Cathy for our home study, plus we had our in home visit. Now, she just has to write it all up! We also each had our physicals, plus our TB test. I also got a writeup from Kiara's doctor. I had the hardest time getting our state background checks. It is ridiculous, but we had to be fingerprinted 3 times at the same place before they got it right. I spent countless hours on hold with the state police to make sure everything was right. If it wasn't for Yahoo adoption groups, it probably would have taken me another month to get done. But, I put a post out to my state's group and got the name and phone number of the lady that notarizes the police clearances and that helped tremendously!

During May 2007, I spent time compiling our dossier. Everything from pictures of our home and family to employment letters. Our home study was completed and approved by AAC and on May 23rd I sent it off to immigration for our I-600A application. It should now be 4-6 weeks until we get our approval, which is called an I-171H. I had hoped to send it at the beginning of the month, but there were delays that I could not control, so what are you to do? My goal was to have everything waiting and ready to be state certified by the time I got my I-171H approval.

Well, I will leave you with that for this time. The months of June and July were probably the busiest months in our adoption journey so far, so I will leave them for the next post.