Dossier status

Now that we have nearly all the documents we need, this is the status of our dossier to date.

I need to get our marriage certificate and my birth certificate packaged and sent to the Maryland Secretary of State for authentication.

I am waiting for the I800a from the USCIS, and then will package all the Utah documents and walk them into the Utah Secretary of State office for authentication.

As soon as Tims birth certificate gets here, I will turn that right back around and send it to the Minnesota Secretary of State office for authentication.

I need to take a bunch of family life photos, make copies of both our passport pages, and we both need to have 3 or 4 passport sized photos taken.

Our financial statement is being notarized probably tonight.

Once all the authentications are done, we package all of it up and send it to AAI for them to get the final authentications from the United States Secretary of State, and, the Chinese consulate in Washington DC, and then it is sent to China.

Truly, the longest part of the process is almost over. Once the I800a gets here, the rest will go pretty fast. Then we just look for our little girl, and wait for PreApproval (PA) from China.

Oh boy, a big step forward.

Today we had our fingerprints done for USCIS (immigration) and both passed with no problems. We were in and out of the office in about 15 minutes. I am so relieved.

Also, our marriage certificate arrived in the mail today. Finally, I can send the Maryland and the Utah documents to be state certified.

All we are waiting on now is Tim birth certificate, and the background checks from Ca, SD, MN, and Id to come back and our I800a should be quickly approved.

and yet another step back

Did we even make any progress, it's hard to see if we did at this point.

The agency that did our homestudy, WIAA, failed to complete the background checks in all states we have lived since we were 18. Tim lived in Mn, SD, ID, CA, and Ut, and I lived in MN, CA, and UT. They only checked Utah, and since we have lived here for 26 years, except for the three months in California back in 1986, it really seems foolish to me that we have to jump through this hoop, but, it's a Hague convention requirement, and most of their requirements are fairly rediculous anyway.

I am not the least bit concerned about the checks, they will be routine, and hopefully quick. It's just that it adds more weeks, probably, to this process. Since we still don't have our marriage cert, and Tim's birth cert has been delayed by weeks, I guess that's not going to be a huge hairy deal, but, still, I just want this part to be over already.

AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

and another step back

USCIS processing office sent me an email today asking for clarification on the other places we have lived since we were 18. I looked in our homestudy, and sure enough, it was not spelled out that those places were checked and cleared.

I mailed Tim's birth cert request again. I emailed a copy of the letter from USCIS to both Beesh at WIAA and to our SW Tom.

Please, don't let this be the other shoe I keep waiting for. I still have not seen our marriage certificate come in the mail, it seems to be taking a very long time. Sigh

Two steps forward one step back

Well, we got our fingerprint appointments scheduled for March 6th, which is this Friday. Then I got the application for Tim's birth certificate returned to me in the mail. I had somehow, adoption brain or something, post dated the check for March. So, they returned the whole thing to me. ARGH!!!

Tomorrow I will mail it out, again, and pray it doesn't take too long.

We're logged in

The paper came in the mail today from USCIS. Our documents were received on Feb 11th. That isn't our official log in date, but, pretty close to it. I have sent an email to USCIS for confirmation of the actual log in date, but, it should be within a few days of the 11th. Our fingerprint appointment should be some time in March, possibly the first week in March. Approvals are taking around 30 days, so, we may know if we have been approved for immigration of a Chinese orphan by, oh, about March 15th or so.

I am packaging the Utah documents, all 7 of them, to be certified by the Utah Secretary of State's office. That will take a few weeks, which is fine, since our I800a approval from USCIS will be about a month away anyway. I am still waiting on Tim birth cert and our marriage cert to get here, so I can get them state certified in their respective states.

Then, our paperchase is done, and everything gets authenticated in Washington DC. We are almost done.

Just waiting

It has been 18 days since we sent our USCIS paperwork in. Several other families that sent theirs on the same day have recieved word that their documents are being reviewed. We have not gotten any news yet, but, I am not going to fret about that til we get closer to the end of next week and have not heard anything by then.

Tim's birth cert and our marriage cert are not back yet either, but, again, not worrying about that yet.

In watching the stats for USCIS approvals, it is getting even shorter, with the average being about 30 days now, so, we may actually, barring any problems, be approved in the next two weeks. That would be incredible, since the approvals were taking until 90 days minimum when we started this process in September.

Final documents

Today the forms to request Tim's birth certificate and our marriage certificate went to Minnesota and Maryland, respectively. Expect to see those come in sometime in March at the latest.

Now all I have to do is complete the financial statement and get it notarized. Then, all of the Utah documents can be sent to the Utah Secretary of State for certification of the notaries. As soon as Tim's birth certificate comes back, I will turn that right around and send it back to Minnesota for certification, and when our marriage certificate comes in, I will package that up with my birth certificate and send them both to the Maryland secretary of state for certifications. Then, when all documents are certified by their respective states, I will package them up, and send them to Ky at AAI for authentication, unless she doesn't do that. The paperwork says she does, but, I have found that the paperwork isn't always accurate or up to date, so, I will cross that bridge when I come to it. Authentications are no big deal, I can handle that myself if need be.

Then, we need to send for Matthew's passport, since he is going to travel with us to pick up his little sister.

I800a today!!!

Well, today we sent the I800a packet to the USCIS (United States Citizenship and Immigration Services) office. From the way the approvals have been going, we expect our next timeline to look something like this.

Date of receipt (the date the USCIS stamps our documents as being officially received in their office for processing. Probably about 1 to 2 weeks from today.

Fingerprint appointment. Probably one month from the Date of receipt. We will then go up to Salt Lake to have our fingerprints taken at their office.

Any requests for further information, clarification, etc, will happen during this month's time.

Approval, which right now is taking anywhere from 48 to 60 days from date of receipt to approval.

HOMESTUDY APPROVED!!!!!!

I have it in my hand, the first draft of our approved homestudy. We can now, finally, say that we are adopting from China again.

Tom emailed me the first draft, asking me to look it over and make any corrections I needed to. Just a few here and there, nothing big, and now we move on to getting the USCIS approval, which is really based on what the homestudy says.

So far, so good.

Almost done with homestudy

So, I sent, via return email, the information he wanted, which was very thorough descriptions of the children living in the home, interests, talents, accomplishments, education, etc, and very basic information on the adult children living outside the home.

He said it was something new, that the Hague treaty made necessary or our homestudy would get bogged down with questions.

I also have sent through email, copies of our scanned police clearances.

So, now we wait.

Finally

The reference letters are all in. The homestudy is being finalized, as so far, no indications of a problem. Tom's email had to be resent to my work email. I had called yesterday to see if he had gotten my email for him to reply to on Sunday, and he said yes and that he had replied immediately to it with the information he needed. I don't know why I never got it, but, I gave him my work email and he resent it with no problem.

He just wanted some basic descriptions of the kids, and I have already sent that to him, as well as, copies of our police clearances, which will be faxed on Thursday. So, that's it. Now, after Thursday, we just wait for him to write it and send up the copies. As long as it all goes well, we can then submit our paperwork to USCIS just as soon as we have that homestudy in hand.

That means we wait again. Once they get our paperwork, they send us a fingerprinting appointment for us to go up to Salt Lake, to the local USCIS fingerprinting office, and have them done there. Then we wait again for the approval from them and we are done. Again, as long as it all goes well, we could be done with all the waiting on paperwork in a few months, tops. Maybe less than two, who knows. The process is speeding up, so, we'll have to wait and see.

Im just relieved he wasn't telling us that we weren't going to be approved. At least not yet.

Ahhhh!!!

OK, I called Tom this morning, and he said he had emailed me some questions he needs to have answered, but, couldn't remember what email address he had sent them to. I never received any emails from him, so, I asked for his email address, and said I would send him a message for him to reply to with the questions. That way, I knew he wouldn't get the wrong email address.

Well, that was at 9am, and it is almost 2pm, still no reply from him.

He hasn't called the house, and I am at work, so, it's difficult to call him, but, I may call again in a bit if I don't see an email soon. I really don't want to bother anyone on Sunday, but, this is so important.

On the edge of my seat

I was getting ready for bed last night, about 10pm, and noticed the light on our bedroom phone flashing that we had a message. No one told me about a message, so, I went downstairs to check. It ended up being a voice message, and when I played it back, it was our social worker Tom, saying he has some questions in writing our study.


Questions!!, that's all he said, Questions!! I don't know what that means. Does he want to just clarify some of the information he is writing, or is there a problem that might deny us? AAHHHH!!!

Since it was so late, I didn't feel good about calling him then, but, brought his number with me this morning and will call him from work later on. Please, Please, don't be anything wrong.

Going into turtle mode, pulling my head and arms inside my shell and hoping nothing bad is going to happen.

and the beat goes on

I feel so somber today. Just trying to patiently wait for that last reference letter to be confirmed in. Heidi said she sent hers in, again, on Wednesday, and we asked two other people if they would send reference letters, Frank Harter and Melanie Meacham. Both said yes, and Franks was mailed Wednesday morning. Not sure the status on Melanie's.

It only takes one, maybe two days at the outside for mail to go from Salem to Ogden, so, Frank's letter could be there today. Beesh at WIAA said she would email me to let me know when any reference letters arrive, so I can relax about it. Once the letter is in, no matter who's it is, Beesh will be forwarding it onto Tom so he can finalize our homestudy report.

I'm really not overly anxious. Just a bit pensive.

USCIS wait times are coming down. We may only have to wait a month or two for approval on that. There is also a rumor that things are going to be speeding up at the CCAA, so, that is good news.

I was afraid of this

Just as I predicted, the one thing that could go wrong is that a reference letter could be delayed. Well, that happened. Heidi says she sent it in twice now, and is going to send it again today.

I don't know what has happened. All the other three, including one from out of state, have come in. So, we have asked two more friends to write and send in letters, and hopefully, one of them will arrive sometime this week or next. This is the only thing holding up our homestudy.

Beesh still won't say, or can't say, if we are all set to be approved. She also has not said that we are not likely to be approved, or what possible difference one reference letter is going to make to that decision. Perhaps she hasn't asked Tom if we are being given a positive homestudy report or not. All I know is this is keeping me guessing, and I never like to guess.

Keeping my fingers crossed.

Waiting, waiting

Have not heard back from Tom since his last visit. According to Beesh at WIAA they have all of our documents except one reference letter. I was concerned that one reference letter could hold us up, and just pray that isn't happening already.

It's New Years day and I know we may not hear anything until Monday, since most offices probably won't open for just one day this week. It would be great if they did, but, I'm trying to keep myself open to the possibility that nothing is going to happen for the rest of the week.

It's agonizing to not know if we have cleared that hurdle yet, or not. If Beesh could just tell me that we are approved, and are just waiting for that last letter to make it final, that would help me wait. I would think that, if there was a problem, we would have been contacted. Still, last time around, this was the point where we found out we were not going to be approved. The not knowing is the hardest part.

After this hurdle, we have to clear the USCIS approval.

Final homestudy visit is done!

Well, Tom came by at 3:30 yesterday, sat and interviewed the kids, and then walked through the house. We went over paperwork, he said he had everything except the certificate of Hague training, which I will have Ky send to him, and that was pretty much it.

Unlike last time, the kids were all together, with me, around the table. No private interrogations. He seemed impressed with them, and all that they are involved in. The kids were relaxed and talkative. I was relieved that they were open and said what they thought. When asked what her favorite thing was about school, Myleigh said recess. When asked what her second favorite thing was, she said outside recess. I had to offer that she loves reading, and she piped up quickly with, Im a good reader, too.

Mindy told him that she has two plans for after high school. One, and she said this sheepishly, is to spend time at Disneyworld, in their college student program, being a Disney character. She thought he would think that was kind of silly, but, he really got it, and said he had heard a lot about that program, and how much charity work they do. Then she said that she wanted to be on the BYU ballroom touring team, and he nodded approval.

Mstthew was quieter, but, had no trouble answering questions about being the one to go to China. He is so excited about that, and it really showed. He was fairly bored until Tom asked, who is going to China this time. He perked right up and beamed about it. Myleigh said she wanted to go, and I had to say again that we haven't decided yet about that.

Then the tour, which went well, the house always shows well. Being decorated for Christmas just made it that much nicer. And then, we were done.

Still, I am not going to get overexcited, not yet anyway. We still have to clear the USCIS. Once we know about that, we can breathe out.

Tuesday is the big walk through

The homestudy agency has all the paperwork. AAI has everything they need, and the dossier is clipping right along. Tuesday we will have Tom over for the interview with the kids and the walk through of the house. I don't think I could clean our house any better, and for a third time no less.

Im still waiting for that other shoe to drop.

Christmas is just 14 days away, and we are basically ready. All but the baking and the stocking stuffers are done. I don't think we will have a party this year. Even though my house is certainly clean enough for one, I just don't have the gumption to pull one together. We usually have friends over on Christmas Eve after the luminaria lighting at the cemetery, but, I haven't even heard if anyone plans to go this year. We will be there, of course.

The neighborhood is opting out of giving gifts this year, and doing some charity work instead, which is great by us, since we really don't know too many people anyway, and haven't spent much time at church, what with working weekends most of the year and all. The kids know more of our neighbors then we do.

We were asked to be on the ward activities commitee this year, and when it came time to organize the Christmas party, I wasn't able to go to the first meeting, so Tim told me the theme was Polar Express and I wrote up an outline of my ideas for the party, thinking they would probably pick one , maybe two of my ideas. No, they took the whole thing. Loved it, in fact. So, then I felt responsible for pulling it all together, and had to quickly delegate everything I could just to keep myself sane. After all, I have an adoption to pull together people. I do not have time to run a party.

So, in the end, I was left responsible for the entertainment, and asked Mindy and David to perform their waltz and quickstep to a medley Mindy recorded from the Polar Express soundtrack. That went pretty well, and everyone was very impressed. I asked the primary to put together the song When Christmas Comes To Town, with two soloists, and having the rest of the kids come in on the third verse and chorus. That went really well, too. The kids sounded great, it was pretty magical.

I had recorded several cd's of old Christmas music, Bing Crosby etc, and played it throughout the night as ambient music. The Polar Express was read aloud, while images from the book were displayed on a large screen. All the kids sat on the floor in the middle of the room. I had set the tables up in a large oval to give David and Mindy room to dance, and the kids just loved having all the room to run around.

It was just a fun night. Now that the party is over, and the shopping is done, I can focus somewhat on the adoption. Still so much to do.

Second visit down and at least one to go

Tom came right on schedule yesterday, and met with Tim and I individually. It seems like that went well. He plans to meet with the kids on the 16th to interview them, and then walk through the house.

I sent the packet of paperwork to WIA yesterday,. they will probably get it today or tomorrow, and then our background checks can begin. I haven't heard yet about any reference letters being received but, I'm not sure WIA will tell me as they arrive, so, maybe when Tom comes back next time he will have that information.

Still waiting for something to go wrong. Praying it doesn't.

Today is devoted to Christmas shopping all day. The malls open in a half hour, so, better get a move on.