Dossier and other stuff.........

I am happy to say our dossier is out of our hands! Right now, it should be in DC...I hope we get notification early next week that we are officially waiting! John went to the state office to have all the documents authenticated. It wasn't very much fun to find out that two of the documents were notarized by a Kansas notary. So that means, they cant be authenticated in Missouri. Luckily......John was able to take the afternoon off that day and zip over to Topeka, Kansas and get them taken care of the same day. He was able to get it shipped off to the Children's Hope International office in St. Louis so they can check it and make sure it all looks ok. We did get notified last week that it all looked good and it is going to DC. We cant wait to get the word that we are officially waiting! We are excited to start this next step to wait for a referral, but I know this is going to be hard!

What a process! We officially started right after Christmas. We were able to gather all the documents pretty quickly. I think what took the longest was the 5 weeks and 1 day waiting to hear back from the INS!!!


So now we just need to pass the time....and wait.


We have other great things to keep us busy. Lucas our match from the Big Brother Big sister organization is a lot of fun. Last Saturday he participated in his first judo tournament. We are very proud of him! He placed 2nd in his division. He is very dedicated to going each week to his class and his team and coach were also very proud!

This is Lucas receiving his 2nd place medal

This is us.........

We are doing the happy dance today!!! I went to the mailbox this morning...and we received our I171H from the Department of Homeland Security!!!! This is what we needed to complete ALL our paperwork!! We waited 5 weeks and 1 day for this form. I started calling this INS office two weeks ago.....just to make sure everything was OK! I had to opportunity talk to a few very rude people to find out nothing! Next step.....dossier goes to St. Louis to be checked..they send it off, and we will officially be waiting for a referral. I have never been so excited to wait!

Arghhhhh!

3 weeks and 5 days....waiting for the form we need from the INS so we can complete our dossier and get it to Ethiopia so we can start waiting for a referral! Very frustrating! Luckily... my office is very close to my home, so I can stalk the mail man! The INS told us it could take anywhere from 2 weeks to a couple months! I know other adopting families who have used the same office we went to, and it took 2-3 weeks....so we are anxiously waiting, and hoping it will arrive very soon.

No other new exciting news to post....but I was tagged by an adoption blog buddy Lisa..so now I have to list 75 random things about myself (and John!) Here we go.....

1. We love to travel- planning 3 trips, Chicago in May and Los Angeles in June, Wisconsin in Aug!
2. John and I haven't had meat or dairy in almost nine days, we are on a detox diet and have lived on nothing but fruit and vegetables, brown rice and tofu!
3. I have blonde hair
4. John loves Sumo wrestling
5. I have worked in the dental field for almost 15 years
6. John works for Farmland Foods - PORK!
7. We have his and her Boston terriers who demand to sleep in our bed (Johns started it)
8. John is in Houston on business right now and I know he didn't stay on the detox diet!
9. We are very excited to become parents for the first time
10. I already have everything picked out for the nursery and ready to decorate
11. I am a computer nerd and love programming websites
12. John is very good and trivia and can beat just about anyone
13. I am happy that we moved back to Kansas City from Virginia almost 3 years ago
14. John is obsessed with pinball arcade and video games and our basement shows that!
15. We are taking our "little brother" Lucas to his first Judo tournament in a couple weeks
16. A couple weeks ago I had a little accident and backed into another car with my Lexus Suv and it damaged her car but she didn't care and didn't want to report it- Strange?!
17. Our favorite restaurant in Kansas City is Le Fou Frog
18. I would also like to adopt from China or Mongolia
19. Our plans is to have a biological child after the adoption
20. I have always wanted to adopt since I was a child
21. John lived in Japan for one year
22. John has beer on tap in the bar at our house- his dream come true
23. Our house is quite a bit of home to take care of and I sometimes think we should downsize
24. It will be better once we have children, so its not so empty!
25. I think 75 items to list is way to much and I need to get back to work, so I am going to cheat and say thats all for now!

Thanks a lot Lisa! :)