Our dossier packet was mailed Tuesday, so I will be stalking my mailman until it makes its appearance. (Later today? Dare I hope?) Since I have done two Ethiopia dossiers before, I have an idea of how to put much of it together. Earlier this week a chat with a fellow dossier-obsessed mama served to remind me of a thing or two I could do before the dossier even arrived. (Did you know that besides the immgration fingerprint clearnace and the local fingerprint clearance, they now require an actual LETTER from the police?)

This morning I ended up with a dozen or so documents that needed notarizing AND a hubby who unexpectedly had the day off. How perfect is that? Off we went with my... more

This week has been jam-packed. Not only did we get all our homestudy visits done (thanks to our awesome new social worker!), we also got in the ten hours of education now required by many adoption agencies in preparation for being Hague-compliant. I thought the social workers did a great job of introducing the major issues adoptive parents need to understand. The majority of the education presented was not new to us. But thanks to this type of education, adoptive parents are going to be much better prepared for challenges they might face.

I was conflicted, though, about the tendency of... more

All week I've been thinking about our dossier packet. Our agency received our preliminary documents Monday morning, so I figured today (Thursday) would be the very earliest we could possibly expect it. Next week would be much more likely. Still, this morning the minute I got home from taking the kids skating, I beelined it for the mailbox. Glory be-- there was a nice fat envelope from AAI. I shrieked in delight, and ripped it open.

Only to find educational reading material.

Now, I am as much in favor of education as anyone. Truly I am. But I'm craving blanks to fill in. Documents to notarize. Signatures to authenticate. Packets to overnight. Not magazine... more

My baby nephew arrived home on Saturday evening, escorted by his momma (my sister Rachel) and his auntie (my sister Sophie). He is a darling big-eyed six month old sprite-- I doubt if he weighs more than 13 pounds. Watching them walk past those security gates and into the waiting arms of family was awesome. My sister and her husband have three older bio children, and it was very sweet indeed to see everyone greeting the newest family member. It was the culmination of months of paperwork and prayer and waiting and worrying.

Thoughts of that moment of homecoming are part of what keeps us adoptive parents pushing through the ridiculous amount of red tape and shelling out the ridiculous... more

(Notes for the impatient)

A reader saw a comment that I made on another blog, stating that I hoped to have our home study done within a month. She asked (in the post below this one) if a home study can really be done this fast. It may be wishful thinking on my part this time around-- we'll see. But the short answer is yes, it can happen if everything works just right.

A huge amount depends on the home study agency that you choose. Some agencies require every scrap of documentation to be done before the first home study visit, right down to every single reference letter and the results of your local fingerprint clearance, which can take... more

(Homestudy Paperwork: Part One here)

Continuing with the list of documents you will need to gather before the home study can begin:

Application This is usually a one-page form with spaces for general information about your family.

Adoptive Parent's Birth Certificates/ Marriage Licenses/ Divorce Decrees Some agencies require certified copies. Others are OK with regular copies. Check with your agency to see which they prefer.

Copy of Driver's License and Social Security Card This is a new one... more

Things are moving on the adoption front at our house. We did need to hire a new home study agency. Fortunately we located a good one quickly, and had both a social worker assigned and a home study packet mailed the very next day. That bodes well, I think.

Looking at the list, I'm pretty sure we should have everything together by the middle of next week, and so our new social worker went ahead and scheduled the first two of our three homestudy interviews. I thought it might be helpful to new families to share a list of the items required for a home study that we are currently gathering to give you an idea of how to prepare for your homestudy.

References

One... more

Awhile back I shared ten not-so-graceful ways to survive the wait. Though I did not really do all those things-- at least not to the degree that I described-- a fair number were rooted in reality. However, none of those suggestions will really do much to help a person survive the wait. I decided I owed you a post with ideas that really work.

Take A Break

Depending on their personality, different people will find different things to be helpful when the wait gets hard. Some people... more

As we are gearing up for our next adoption, I've made myself a list of the first steps in the process to keep me organized. I thought that those of you who are also at the beginning stages of the process might find it helpful. Keep in mind that different agencies may ask for things to be done in a different order, so read all the directions provided in your application packets.

If you have any paperwork questions, be sure to get them answered before go to the trouble of having a document produced and notarized. You want every detail of your paperwork to be correct so that you don't have... more

A post over on the Transracial blog about the hard parts of adoption got me thinking about the 'hard parts' of adopting from Ethiopia. I wrote awhile back that my husband and I decided to go forward with another adoption sometime later this year. Well, things have changed. We have identified a sibling group in Ethiopia that we are interested in. I’ll share details later after I know for sure that they will be ours. But learning about these children has sent us neck-deep into adoption paperwork again. And today, one short week into the adoption process, I'm already remembering just how hard this... more