Thursday, September 29, 2011
Dossier to Ethiopia
Our case worker emailed us today to let us know that our dossier was sent to Ethiopia today. One step closer..yippee!:)
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
We are celebrating tonight!!
Today is Jeremiah's 30th birthday. Olivia and I are so blessed to live this life with him. He is such an amazing husband and daddy. One thing we love is that he constantly makes us laugh! I look forward to seeing Jeremiah become a daddy to two kids. Our little boy is so lucky to have Jeremiah as his daddy!!
Today also marks another important event. We sent off our dossier this evening!!! Jeremiah, Olivia, and I went to the post office and sent it off together. I'm such a dork (I know!:)) because I made us all go together as a family and even had someone take our picture (I will post it another day). I told Jeremiah that I wanted to capture this special event. It has taken us almost 5 months to prepare our dossier and we are so thankful to be done with this part of the journey. When I was pregnant with Olivia we had multiple sonogram pictures and I took weekly belly pictures. It makes me sad that we don't have these pictures for our little guy. So, I am trying to take pictures of all the exciting steps in our journey. This is the reason I made our entire family go to the post office to take a picture of us sending over our dossier. I want our little boy to see how excited we were to send this over and to feel just as special as Olivia does.
Here is where our dossier will go now:
1. The Assistant Stork in Virginia-they will take our dossier to the Ethiopian Embassy to get it authenticated.
2. The Assistant Stork sends our dossier to CHI (our agency).
3. CHI sends our dossier (along with two other photocopies of our documents) to Ethiopia!
After the dossier is in Ethiopia we will be placed on a waiting to list to be matched with a child. We are celebrating both special events at our house tonight.:)
Today also marks another important event. We sent off our dossier this evening!!! Jeremiah, Olivia, and I went to the post office and sent it off together. I'm such a dork (I know!:)) because I made us all go together as a family and even had someone take our picture (I will post it another day). I told Jeremiah that I wanted to capture this special event. It has taken us almost 5 months to prepare our dossier and we are so thankful to be done with this part of the journey. When I was pregnant with Olivia we had multiple sonogram pictures and I took weekly belly pictures. It makes me sad that we don't have these pictures for our little guy. So, I am trying to take pictures of all the exciting steps in our journey. This is the reason I made our entire family go to the post office to take a picture of us sending over our dossier. I want our little boy to see how excited we were to send this over and to feel just as special as Olivia does.
Here is where our dossier will go now:
1. The Assistant Stork in Virginia-they will take our dossier to the Ethiopian Embassy to get it authenticated.
2. The Assistant Stork sends our dossier to CHI (our agency).
3. CHI sends our dossier (along with two other photocopies of our documents) to Ethiopia!
After the dossier is in Ethiopia we will be placed on a waiting to list to be matched with a child. We are celebrating both special events at our house tonight.:)
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Our last piece of paperwork is here!
I'm holding back tears as I write this post. We got our I-171h in the mail today. It only took one week. We've heard of people waiting for months to receive this document. God is good! It's hard to explain to other people how much time and energy has gone into preparing our dossier and this document is the LAST piece of paperwork for our dossier.
So, what's the next step? We will take this document and two other documents to our local bank to get them notarized. After that we will take two of those documents to Springfield to get them certified. Once we've completed these tasks.....we will send off our dossier to Ethiopia! We are beyond thrilled to be at this step in our adoption journey.
We would love for you to keep praying for our journey. We both know that it will be tough to be patient as we wait for a referral.
In addition to praying for us, I would love for you to pray for my friends Mike and Brandy King. They are adopting a sweet little girl named Abi from Ethiopia. They went to meet her in July and are just waiting for the Embassy in Ethiopia to accept their paperwork. Pray specifically that they can bring Abi home soon and that their paperwork is accepted the FIRST time it is submitted to the court. During the past few months numerous people have had their paperwork rejected the first time (and multiple times in some cases) before it is accepted.
Thank you for your support. We appreciate it!:)
So, what's the next step? We will take this document and two other documents to our local bank to get them notarized. After that we will take two of those documents to Springfield to get them certified. Once we've completed these tasks.....we will send off our dossier to Ethiopia! We are beyond thrilled to be at this step in our adoption journey.
We would love for you to keep praying for our journey. We both know that it will be tough to be patient as we wait for a referral.
In addition to praying for us, I would love for you to pray for my friends Mike and Brandy King. They are adopting a sweet little girl named Abi from Ethiopia. They went to meet her in July and are just waiting for the Embassy in Ethiopia to accept their paperwork. Pray specifically that they can bring Abi home soon and that their paperwork is accepted the FIRST time it is submitted to the court. During the past few months numerous people have had their paperwork rejected the first time (and multiple times in some cases) before it is accepted.
Thank you for your support. We appreciate it!:)
Saturday, August 27, 2011
USCIS appointment
Yesterday, Jeremiah and I went to our scheduled fingerprinting appointment in Indy. We left our house at 5:00a.m. and got to the USCIS office by 8:15a.m. Indy time (7:15a.m our time). We went into the office and checked in at 8:20a.m. and by 8:30a.m. we were in the fingerprinting office. I was a little nervous (me nervous..no way-ha!:)) because the lady in front of us was told, "Your fingerprints aren't showing up. You'll get another letter in a few weeks and you'll have to come back for another appointment." Luckily our fingerprints were fine and we were out by 9:00a.m.
We are so thankful for Jackie and Canaan because they spent the night at our house on Thursday night so they could watch Olivia for us yesterday. Olivia had a blast with them and I think they enjoyed being with her too.:) We are lucky to have so many friends who love our daughter like their own.
Our agency said it will take at least 45 days for the results from the appointment, but other people say it'll take about 2 weeks. We can't wait to get our I-171h in the mail. Once we get this in the mail we can send our dossier to Ethiopia!
On a side note, Olivia is just thrilled about "our baby boy." She talks about him often and says, "I going to hug and kiss our baby boy. I share toys with him." We went with my mom and Kacy to the Peoria Zoo a few weeks ago. While we were there we went to the African exhibit. Kacy said, "Your baby brother is in Africa right now." Olivia responded, "No Kacy, my baby brother is in Ethiopia." We explained that Ethiopia is in Africa. Now Olivia says, "Our baby boy is in Ethiopia, Africa." It's quite precious. When we were driving the other day Olivia said to me, "Mommy and Daddy stay here...no go to Ethiopia." She loves little babies and often asks, "Where my baby brother go?" I hope that this process continues to go quickly so that we have a picture of her baby brother soon.
Please keep praying for us. We really appreciate the encouragement, prayers, and financial support!!
We are so thankful for Jackie and Canaan because they spent the night at our house on Thursday night so they could watch Olivia for us yesterday. Olivia had a blast with them and I think they enjoyed being with her too.:) We are lucky to have so many friends who love our daughter like their own.
Our agency said it will take at least 45 days for the results from the appointment, but other people say it'll take about 2 weeks. We can't wait to get our I-171h in the mail. Once we get this in the mail we can send our dossier to Ethiopia!
On a side note, Olivia is just thrilled about "our baby boy." She talks about him often and says, "I going to hug and kiss our baby boy. I share toys with him." We went with my mom and Kacy to the Peoria Zoo a few weeks ago. While we were there we went to the African exhibit. Kacy said, "Your baby brother is in Africa right now." Olivia responded, "No Kacy, my baby brother is in Ethiopia." We explained that Ethiopia is in Africa. Now Olivia says, "Our baby boy is in Ethiopia, Africa." It's quite precious. When we were driving the other day Olivia said to me, "Mommy and Daddy stay here...no go to Ethiopia." She loves little babies and often asks, "Where my baby brother go?" I hope that this process continues to go quickly so that we have a picture of her baby brother soon.
Please keep praying for us. We really appreciate the encouragement, prayers, and financial support!!
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Paperwork, paperwork, and more paperwork!
This morning Jeremiah and I spent a little over two hours filling out paperwork for our dossier. We were able to complete all of the documents (we had already completed numerous documents before this morning) and then took them to get notarized at the bank. This is a huge weight lifted off of our shoulders. We are going to send all of these documents to our case worker this week. She will review our documents and let us know if we need to make changes. There are 20+ documents that we have filled out for the dossier. Each document has strict guidelines and our dossier will be sent back if we don't follow these rules.
The reason why we were so excited about getting our fingerprinting appointment yesterday was because this appointment is the last big step before we send our dossier to Ethiopia. Once we receive our results, we can finish up our dossier paperwork. One of us will take the final two dossier documents to Springfield to get them notarized. After that, we will send our dossier to Ethiopia.
We want to make sure that everything is done before we get our results back so that we can send our dossier over as soon as possible.
The reason why we were so excited about getting our fingerprinting appointment yesterday was because this appointment is the last big step before we send our dossier to Ethiopia. Once we receive our results, we can finish up our dossier paperwork. One of us will take the final two dossier documents to Springfield to get them notarized. After that, we will send our dossier to Ethiopia.
We want to make sure that everything is done before we get our results back so that we can send our dossier over as soon as possible.
Friday, August 12, 2011
A letter from Homeland Security...
Jeremiah, Olivia, and I have been in Washington for the past few days. He has been at a conference and I have enjoyed spending time with my family. Both of my sisters were home and it was nice just hanging out with the my family. We came home tonight to find a letter from Homeland Security. It was our USCIS fingerprinting date!!! I really wanted to go before school started, but it just didn't work out that way. We will be going in about a week to the USCIS in Indy. Again, this is just another step closer to bringing home our little guy. We are thrilled that our date came this soon! Praise God!:)
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Be Still My Soul
Hey everyone,
This is Jeremiah, Kortny's husband. Nice to meet you. This is the first time I've created an entry on this blog. Kortny has done a terrific job of keeping all of you updated on what's been going on with our adoption. I've decided to write my first entry while 30,000 feet in the air on my way to the Echo Conference in Dallas.
I'm pumped about this adoption, and what God has in store for our family. At the same time, I'm a typical guy in that right now when we're in the midst of paper work, financial support raising, act… those are the things I'm mainly focused on. As you can imagine they're not the most fun things to do, but we also knew what we were getting into when we signed up for this.
When we first decided that this is what God called us to do, I wasn't really all that worried about how it would all come together. I felt that if God is calling us to do something, that he'll provided all the emotional, mental, and financial support we'd need. I know that's all true, but in the past few days I've began to doubt some of it. Seeing our savings account dwindle and waiting for this form to get approved and that form to come in the mail, it's created a considerable amount of worry in me. This morning, I woke up at 3:30 to catch an early flight out of O'Hare, and I drank a full cup of coffee. Both of these things can make my stomach a little more sick than normal, but I was also extra worried about adoption "things" more than normal. Before my plane left the ground, I sent a quick text to a friend asking for prayers that God may calm my fears and that I'd again trust Him in this process.
Once we got in the air and the pilot approved usage of electronic devices (I waited to use it because I work for a church and try to be a good person, okay?). So with a sick stomach and more worried than I've been in years, I fired up the laptop to work on my annual staff self-evaluation (I'll post that when I'm done. No I won't.). I then opened up iTunes and picked Page CXVI to listen to. I played the first song that showed up, and here are are the lyrics I heard…
Be still my soul, the Lord is on your side
Bear patiently the Cross of grateful pain
Lean to your God to order and provide
In every change, He will remain
It's pretty amazing when God directly speaks and comforts you while 10,000 ft in the air through a song written 200 years ago
3 minutes later, I had to go through the awkward moment of having grown man tears in my eyes while telling the flight attendant I'll take sprite and pretzels.
This is Jeremiah, Kortny's husband. Nice to meet you. This is the first time I've created an entry on this blog. Kortny has done a terrific job of keeping all of you updated on what's been going on with our adoption. I've decided to write my first entry while 30,000 feet in the air on my way to the Echo Conference in Dallas.
I'm pumped about this adoption, and what God has in store for our family. At the same time, I'm a typical guy in that right now when we're in the midst of paper work, financial support raising, act… those are the things I'm mainly focused on. As you can imagine they're not the most fun things to do, but we also knew what we were getting into when we signed up for this.
When we first decided that this is what God called us to do, I wasn't really all that worried about how it would all come together. I felt that if God is calling us to do something, that he'll provided all the emotional, mental, and financial support we'd need. I know that's all true, but in the past few days I've began to doubt some of it. Seeing our savings account dwindle and waiting for this form to get approved and that form to come in the mail, it's created a considerable amount of worry in me. This morning, I woke up at 3:30 to catch an early flight out of O'Hare, and I drank a full cup of coffee. Both of these things can make my stomach a little more sick than normal, but I was also extra worried about adoption "things" more than normal. Before my plane left the ground, I sent a quick text to a friend asking for prayers that God may calm my fears and that I'd again trust Him in this process.
Once we got in the air and the pilot approved usage of electronic devices (I waited to use it because I work for a church and try to be a good person, okay?). So with a sick stomach and more worried than I've been in years, I fired up the laptop to work on my annual staff self-evaluation (I'll post that when I'm done. No I won't.). I then opened up iTunes and picked Page CXVI to listen to. I played the first song that showed up, and here are are the lyrics I heard…
Be still my soul, the Lord is on your side
Bear patiently the Cross of grateful pain
Lean to your God to order and provide
In every change, He will remain
It's pretty amazing when God directly speaks and comforts you while 10,000 ft in the air through a song written 200 years ago
3 minutes later, I had to go through the awkward moment of having grown man tears in my eyes while telling the flight attendant I'll take sprite and pretzels.
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