Road Block

I'm back from Haiti and Amos and our USCIS approval notice were waiting here for me when I landed! However, yesterday Ethiopia sent word out from their high courts that starting immediately, there will be 2 trips to Ethiopia required and that both parents have to travel at least once...This is devastating to us because Amos cannot travel for any reason. We are holding our breath and hoping to hear more details that might give us a loop hole or something. I could manage 2 trips if I had to but Amos cannot go even once which is the main reason we chose to adopt from Ethiopia. Maybe a Dr.'s note?...Please keep this situation in your prayers for us. We are very nervous.

Fingerprints Done!

We got our fingerprints taken this last Tuesday! Yippee! Hopefully there will be an approval notice in the mailbox when I get back from Haiti!

Good news (finally)

Hello! My blog update is an upper today:) I'm sure that is a nice change for you readers!

We received our fingerprint appointment in the mail yesterday! We will go to the immigration office on Feb 23rd! I am so happy that our appointment is not months away and that it is NOT while I am in Haiti!

Also, Amos and I took a drive today up to Diablo. A family at my school gave us a kid holder back pack for hiking this week. While we were up in the mountains and tromping the trails I kept thinking..."soon we will be a family of three doing this!". We had tons of fun today but we are both looking forward to adding to our family.

Lastly, we got our Tshirt sale site up and going! You can purchase a shirt from our online store and help us bring our baby home! This next step is very expensive ($6,400!) and every little bit helps! Visit www.adoptionbug.com/babykallen to browse our designs:)

We're waiting...

Let's hear it! Hip, hip hooray! We mailed off our home study and I-600A application about two weeks ago. We are hoping to hear from US immigration soon. They will send us an appointment time to get our fingerprints done and then we wait again for the approval of the I-600A.
I am so excited to have it in someone else's corner now. We just have to wait...which isn't easy either but at least our paperwork is somewhere working it's way through the system.
Pray for a speedy appointment and speedy approval!

Backing up to move forward!

Okay...so after wrestling with immigration for a couple of weeks, we are just moving ahead by filing a new I-600A instead of a form to change our existing approved I-800A. We have to pay ANOTHER $670 to file this form and totally loose our $670 for the I-800A but I feel good about it because we will be moving and I know this form will work.
So here I sit with the form all filled out except for a few questions I'm not sure about. I will call the agency tomorrow and they should be able to give me the answers. Then I send it in with our NEW REVISED home study that I picked up last week! I think we have to get fingerprinted again but Amos is betting we don't. I think I will win this one.
This backing up to move forward to Ethiopia still feels REALLY good. I think it will feel even better when our stuff is off to Ethiopia. Then we will officially be further along than we were with Burundi. From what I hear Burundi is still not moving. That is just one more confirmation that we made the right choice to leave the program.
Thanks for continuing to read and care. I know we haven't had much exciting news to report.

Moving Slowly

Hello Readers!
Our home study is in its final stages before getting notarized. Our agency reviewed it and gave it an "excellent" so that's good! I think I have one more final check to make on it and then it will be mailed to us. The next hurdle we have to jump is figuring out how to fill out the I824 as "a petition to change an approved action". Has anyone out there done this? Our agency is thankfully checking on that and hopefully will get back to us shortly after our home study is done so we can ask the good ol US of A to bring a child to the US from Ethiopia instead of Burundi. Yeah....I know. Red Tape.
Yesterday we went to the bank and got a stack of papers notarized for the dossier. After we get our USCIS approval we will be all set to send off our entire dossier to Ethiopia!
In the mean time we are reading Parenting with Love and Logic. I'll keep you posted!

Light at the End of the Paperwork Tunnel

James 1:27 "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress..."

Hello Readers! I am a bit more upbeat today because we are getting so very close to having all of our dossier paperwork gathered! Amos got his passport photos today and I uploaded our family photos for the dossier to Costco! They are mailing them to me! We are just waiting on a couple things to come in the mail and for our social worker to finish revising our home study! I don't think this should take too long because the bulk of it is done. Let me make this as clear as my guesses can be:

1) Gather and notarize remaining paperwork (a week or so)

2)Get home study (2-3weeks)

3)Apply (again) to CIS (2-4weeks)

4)Get dossier approved and authenticated by Hilary Clinton(2-3weeks)

5)Ship it to Ethiopia! (January?)

6)Hear back about a specific child (2-6 months)

Those are my best guesses based on the agencies paperwork but STUFF always happens.