Well it's been a few weeks since we posted anything on our blog, but we have been very busy chugging along through the first stage of our process! I am very excited to say that we have almost all our paperwork "ready" (ready is a loose term!). I just sent the last batch of clearances to our social worker that she will need to complete our home study. We have also gathered almost all the paperwork we will need for our Dossier (the Dossier is the final set of paperwork that gets translated and sent to the Chinese government). At this point, we are in a holding pattern of sorts for our Home Study to be complete. We had the first meeting with our social worker back in the middle of June - the meeting went very well and feel so blessed to have been assigned to this individual! Due to her vacation schedule and our vacation schedule, the home study process is taking a little longer than usual, but, we know that this is in God's timing and we really didn't want to rush through the process. We will have our final two sessions in the middle of July.
Once the Home Study Report is finalized, we submit it to the US Immigration Department (USCIS) to receive approval from the US Government to become adoptive parents. Part of this approval process will include Jason & I heading down to Phildelphia to get fingerprinted for the immigration process. The time line for USCIS approval is currently about 6 weeks. Realistically... this puts us at about October 1st to receive final approval. With the final USCIS letter of approval we take all our documents out to Harrisburg to be authenticated and then we put them in the mail to the America World Office in Virginia; all the paperwork will be translated and then sent to China - at this point we are considered DTC (Dossier to China). When the Dossier is received in China we are then LID (Logged in Dossier) - this looks to take 2-3 weeks. Then we wait for our referral... the chance to see the face of our daughter!
Keep praying for our family - the past two months have been busy (so very busy!). We continue to rely on God's grace and wisdom through this process, we trust that He will continue to provide all that we need physically, emotionally, spiritually and financially thorugh this process. Last fall we planned a family vacation to head out to Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks. As we embarked on this journey to adopt Makenna, we began to feel guilty about taking a vacation and spending the money on this trip. We certainly wouldn't have planned this if we knew where we would stand right now. But, God knew where we would be and He knew that this is the exact time that we really need a vacation - time to recharge and spend some extra special time with Megan and Mattthew, too! We still feel guilty at times when we think of Makenna in China waiting, but God had planned this as part of our journey, too. Please pray for safety for us as we travel over the next few weeks!
As I write about the progress we have already made in the past two months, I must admit that I am EXCITED!!! So excited that we are privileged to be on this journey - excited to see Makenna's face in a picture in a few months, and excited to travel to China to meet her and bring her home to her forever family (hopefully next Spring). Every now and then I need to stop and almost pinch myself - we are having another daughter!! Keep praying for all five of us - we certainly have felt the overwhelming flood of support from so many of you - we know we still have a long way to go on this journey, we pray that God will find us worthy of the calling that we have received to journey with Him to our daughter!
Blessings,
Jessica
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment