More Documents In!

We got our letters of good conduct from the police station today!! WOOHOO! Those took just over 3 weeks and the notary date is good (more than 12 months before it expires) which is what I was worried about.

The only things we need to do now are to wait for the child abuse clearances to come thru so that the homestudy can be finalized and reviewed by our agency, and then when I have that I can put it with all the other dossier docs and then get the final document, affidavit of dossier, notarized, and then get that and the power of attorney letters county and state certified and then make copies of everything and off to the agency they go!!! WOW! I can't even believe that we've gotten most of it done in one month!! The hardest thing was probably making sure the notary's commissions didn't expire within 12 months.. and also having to get a traveling notary for hubby's employment letter and our medical letters. Required a little coordination but worked out fine. Let's just hope that once the agency reviews everything that nothing needs to be redone. I already know that several documents are good as I already scanned them and sent them to our agency for review, so I think we'll be fine there.

So now we just wait for the homestudy.

Homestudy Visit #2

We had our second homestudy visit today at a Starbucks. It was pretty quick as the social worker has most of what she needs to write the report (since it's basically an update). We'll have our last visit next Thursday and then pretty much just have to wait for our child abuse clearances to come back in 4 weeks or so.

We also picked up our medical letters for the dossier today, so that's done. Woohoo!

I STARTED THE NURSERY!

After more than 3 years waiting to do this, I FINALLY decided to start working on the nursery!! I've been wanting to do this sooooo bad!!! But with the state of our China wait, I didn't want to have to see an empty baby room for years. And now that we've started our Ethiopia adoption, I've been so excited at even the thought of being able to do this now, so I'm just going for it! I had been trying to decide on a paint color for a few weeks and I narrowed it down to a nice, bright, happy yellow a couple days ago so I just decided to go get the paint yesterday and I started painting today! I still have to do a second coat and then paint the trim but I am loving it so far! I've also started looking at cribs, again, and I think I am going to go for a dark chocolate finish or a dark walnut finish.

Before

After (1 Coat)

On another note, we have our second homestudy visit Wednesday and we're going to pick up our medical letters Wednesday too. We are sooo close to being done with all the dossier paperwork at this point. I can't wait to get on the wait list!!!!

34 Months

I actually had to think about how many months it's been since we were logged in for China. I think it's a side effect of being knee deep in Ethiopia dossier prep... lol

We had our first homestudy visit Monday and Friday is doctor's appts and NYS fingerprinting and getting a BUNCH of documents notarized. I think the thing that is going to hold us up the longest is the child abuse clearances.. which is supposed to take 4-6 weeks. Let's hope closer to 4, than 6. lol

Chinese New Year/Spring Festival 2010

Blog Makeover!

It was time for a change. I made a new header and changed the background and updated some things on the sidebar to make all pretty pretty. I used papers and elements from the digital scrapbooking kit I made. I also wanted to add to the blog that we are now officially pursuing TWO adoptions and wanted to add some Ethiopia things to the blog. I'm VERY excited about this new turn of events and I wanted the blog to reflect that excitement a bit!

Still gathering paperwork over here. Got a couple of reference letters done today, have some things that SHOULD be in the mail, I hope. I can't wait to take a big batch of papers to the bank to get notarized (FOR FREE!). Our first homestudy visit is Monday so I've been cleaning like a maniac! There are soooo many things going on in my head right now.. lol

I've been thinking of names for our second daughter who will come to us first.. lol Raven is reserved for our China daughter, can't believe it's been so long since hubby picked that name. Actually a bit of a funny story, which might only be funny to me.. lol but when I was thinking of names for our Ethiopian daughter (whether we keep her first name of use it as a middle name), I was listening to music on TV, the channels that play the songs and tell you a little about the artist, classic hip-hop, and an old Monie Love song came on.. ANYWAY.. it said her real name is Simone.. and I was like ... Ohhh I like the name Simone.. and I think Monie is a cute nickname (I'm really into nicknames) so it went on my list. Then a few days past I don't think much of it.. but then watching the same channel again (which I don't really watch as so much listen) and same some .. same line came up that her name is Simone.. Oh yea, I remembered I like that name. Then I start thinking how the names of our daughters would go together.. We'd have a Raven and a Simone.. as in Raven Symone.. The actress.. "That's so Raven".. the little girl from "The Cosby Show".. LOL I was like.. ummmm no. We cannot name her Simone..people will think we did it on purpose (if they even know who Raven Symone is.. ) LOL but I still like the name. But then it gets better. Hubby was speaking to insurance company about a letter for our dossier that we need. The first person he talked to wasn't helpful at all and basically told him they can't send us the letter. I made him call back and speak to someone else (sorry babe!) and the second lady told him sure no problem, she'd start the process to get the letter out to us. So he's finishing up with her and he asks her name and he writes it down while I'm watching.. and her name is Moni.. Short for Monica, not Simone.. but still, it was weird.. and those things I always think are signs.. like I MUST name her Simone or something lol So I can't get the name out of my head now!!.. ANYWAY.. so to make a LOOOONG story short.. I've been trying to think of other names INSTEAD of Simone.. lol Got a few in mind, still have to work on it!

Peace

Busy Week

It's been a busy busy week! I've managed to compile 13 out of the 29 items for the dossier, some just need notarizing and we're waiting on 9 more to either be mailed to us or picked up. The Ethiopia dossier will be MUCH MUCH easier than the China dossier, mostly because we only will have to get 2 documents county and state certified, and the agency takes care of the authentications. The hardest part is that everything except the birth and marriage certificates need to be notarized as originals, meaning doctor's signature needs to be notarized, employment letters signed by an HR person need to be notarized, etc. It's moving along nicely though. Our first homestudy visit is the 15th, and we'll need 3. I want so badly to get on the waiting list asap!! lol I have such a fear of getting on the waiting list only to find out it's more than doubled from when we first started. LOL Gee, I wonder why that could be?? LOL

We went into the city today to order Freddy's BC. Only waited on line in the cold for what seemed like 30 minutes.. but was probably 15. Then waiting on another line for about an hour and a half. 3 minutes at the window when we finally got there, and we were done. If it wasn't so cold out we would have gone to a museum or something, maybe do a little shopping.. maybe next time. We were both done after standing in that line for so long.


Good night.

Referrals - April 4 & 5, 2006