Wednesday, June 22, 2011

One down... two more to go!

One Authentication down . . . two more to go.  We hope to get both of those done tomorrow!  DC here we come..... 

Monday, June 20, 2011

We are getting closer!

Just returned from a few relaxing days at the beach.  Pictures to follow soon. 

Heading to our State Department and then on to the US Department of State and the Ethiopian Embassy this week for our final Authentications!  Hoping to stop at a little Ethiopian Restaurant to celebrate on the way home. 

Our upcoming week in a few words:  (B.U.S.Y.)

*Visit and dinner with out-of-town friends
*Sports Physicals for both boys
*Visit Extreme Home Makeover Site (Our builder and friend is spearheading the construction of a new EXTREME home for a local family – we received VIP passes etc. to visit the site, so I guess we’ll go see Ty Pennington and the crew one evening this week)!
*Baseball Game (yep, we’re still playing, and made it to playoffs too)
*40th Birthday Party
*Help Friends Move
*Graduation Party   

PLUS all of our notarization and authentication appointments. . . . Hope I’m not forgetting anything!      I’m ready for vacation again!

Only 50 days until our case becomes active again… but who’s counting J 

 Oh, and word came out of Ethiopia that they are lifting the 5 case per day limit on reviewing adoption cases!  Yay!

Friday, June 10, 2011

No Way!

Guess what we got in the mail today??  Yep, our new I-171H - NOTICE OF FAVORABLE DETERMINATION CONCERNING APPLICATION FOR ADVANCE PROCESSING OF ORPHAN PETITION.

I cannot believe this.  We tracked our extension request package, and they received it on June 3rd.  According to the envelope, our new I-171H was mailed out on June 6th.  The whole process took 1 week!  Praise God!  We were fully prepared for it to take 45 days or more!

So now, we can stick this puppy in our Dossier package, get a few more notarizations, and head onto get our authentications. 

Yay!  I'm so excited!

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Dossier Update - Update :)

As mentioned in a previous post, we had to redo our dossier because the documents contained in our original dossier are approaching 2 years old -- they expire in November!  [when we go to court in Ethiopia, documents cannot be more than 2 years old]  Plus, with the addition of Baby Faith, we had to do a Home Study Update, which then becomes part of our dossier update as well. 

We submitted a copy of our updated dossier to our agency for a quick review.  In between the UPS man picking up our package and our agency receiving our package, a new Dossier requirement was established.....(seriously??)

MoWCY is now asking for a notarized copy of  I-171H form to be included into new dossier packages.  That is the form from USCIS approving us for adoption.  Cool!  We have that form... BUT, oh yeah, it expires in August and we have requested an extension. (the I-171H approval notice is only valid for 18 months, so if you do not complete your adoption within 18 months, you have to request an extension).  The extension request and new form could take 30 to 45 days to arrive.  We would have requested it earlier, but you cannot ask for an extension EARLIER than 90 days prior to expiration.  Geshz....

ARE YOU CONFUSED YET?? Yeah, me too. It took me the weekend to wrap my head around what we need to do!

So, long story short (sort of), we have to wait to receive our new I-171H form to put into our dossier package before continuing the process.  The addition of this form into the package changes a few other documents...so we will have to re-do, re-sign and re-notarize about 4 other documents too. [sigh]
Again, I truly believe God is in control of this adoption, and He's probably beginning to see that we are serious about this little girl coming home.  A little bit of paperwork confusion isn't going to deter us!

Praying that our I-171H approval arrives sooner than later!  I want to get this package off of my desk before something happens to it!!!