i-797c Notice of Action

We received the i-797c Notice of Action. Its not a rally big deal but every step and every piece of paper we receive is very exciting to us! Eeeeek!!!    The i-797c is simply a notification that payment has been taken, which indicates our i-800 application was successfully submitted. Next we will receive notice that our biometrics appointment has been scheduled at a local USCIS support center. Not sure exactly what the timeline is on that but I am thinking another 60-70 days.
Mean while we are getting our Hague training underway!

Hague Training

Thanks to Eva's Bags we are just about at our fundraising goal for the on-line Hauge training. We waited for this training because we wanted to take the training through Great Wall vs. another provider and the program through Great Wall was just recently launched. David and I are required to take at least 10 hours of  "parental training" which is  geared toward educating us on: becoming a mutlicultural family, healthy attachments,  life inside the orphanage, health and development of orphaned children, travel to China, etc. We are looking forward to the training while we await the response to our i-800 application. If you are interested in learining more about the courses, click this link....http://www.adoptionmomentsonline.org/main.php

Vital document authentications are back but not for long!

Our marriage license and my birth certificates arrived back from the California Secretarty of State on Friday and David's birth certificate came back from Minnesota Secretary of State today so they are officially authenticated by thier respective heads of State. The same documents are now being prepared for yet another journey...to the Chinese Consulates for authentication.

The two California documents go to the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco and the Minnesota one goes to the Chinese Consulate in Chicago.  Bye bye...see you in a few weeks!

I-800 Application in Process

We are submitting the I-800 aka Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country. Here is a link or more information. http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.5af9bb95919f35e66f614176543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=af78b3dfc7c58110VgnVCM1000004718190aRCRD&vgnextchannel=847d18a1f8b73210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD

The process timeframe is 60-90 days. Once we are granted approval we will receive an I-797 - Notice of Approved Action or Notice of Favorable  Determination. Then David adn I will receive instructions to go to a special location for more fingerprints. The I-797 notification of the approval will be forwarded to the National Visa Center (NVC) to be kept on file along with our fingerprints for visa processing later. Here is a link for more information:
http://www.uscis.gov/portal/site/uscis/menuitem.eb1d4c2a3e5b9ac89243c6a7543f6d1a/?vgnextoid=9fcd18a1f8b73210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD&vgnextchannel=9fcd18a1f8b73210VgnVCM100000082ca60aRCRD

We now need to start saving for the the second agency fee of $2,500 so that when we get the I-797 we can send all our paperwork (Dossier) to China and get our log in date!

Consulate Certification

This is Chinese Consulate "seal of approval" and its what we need on every single one of our notarized documents. Very pretty and expensive since there are over a dozen notarized documents in our Dossier @ $20 a pop and we just got our first batch back on Friday so most all of our precious paperwork is safely locked up at home! We still need this seal on three other documents and we are waiting on that now. Please continue to pray that we can gather the funds needed to file the I-800. Thank the Lord for Eva's Bags...bags have been selling at just thr right time but the I-8oo is a sizeable chunk but we really need to get that milestone out of the way so we can get our Dossier logged in to China and get on the official "waiting list".

Vital Document Authentication

Okay, now that the birth certificates and marriage certificate are mailed off for authentication - we are totally document-less ( is that a word?) and all of our life story is floating around out there. Anyway...kinda weird. We are hoping to file our 1-800 this next week, and praying the necessary funds are available. That's another BIG step....and we certainly need to have it behind us before the Holiday's.

November is just about here and HelpUsAdopt.org will be announcing the grant award sometime in December.

Thanks for your continued prayers.

Autumn Day

Well, our marriage certificate finally arrived Saturday and now with the birth certificates, it will be sent off to their respective secretary of state offices to be authenticated before going to the Chinese Consulate. Meanwhile all our Washington documents ( home study, physicals, background checks, etc.) are due back from the Chinese Consulate in about a weeks time. We will definitely feel more comfortable when all our documents are back in our hands.

Eva's Bags are doing very well too and we hope it continues! Although things have moved much slower that we had expected since this all started in February, its been a great year and the Lord has been so faithful! We are excited about His plans and we know His timing is perfect.

Consulate Update

We got a call from Yang at the Chinese consulate on Monday. Apparently the photo copies of our passports were not legible so we had to scramble with making multiple copies in different exposures and faxing them over hoping they would be able to read one of them. Anyway, a couple of faxes and a few phone calls later they finally got a clear copy they could use and all is well. Their authentication process is underway and we should be getting our precious paperwork back soon.
We got an extra copy of our home study ( replacing the one that Simon ruined) on Monday so that is taken care of. We are still waiting for our marriage certificate...C'mon San Diego!

Our documents arrived at the Chinese Consulates office!!!
" item was delivered at 11:20 AM on October 16, 2009 in SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94115." Yay!
both of our birth certificates came ! Just need marriage certificate.
A satisfying end to a busy week.

To the Chinese Consulate

We mailed off our authenticated paper work tothe Chinese Consulate in San Francisco today and should be arriving there Friday around noon. Our birth certificates and marriage license have not arrived yet...any day now!

Washington Authentication Complete

We got our Washington documents back today!
We are now sending these off the the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco to be approved. These will be off by Thursday via overnight express delivery.
Meanwhile we await our birth certificates and marriage licenses and once we get those, they will then to to the Chinese Consulates. Davids Minnesota Birth Certificate to Chicago and my California Birth Certificate and out California Marriage Certificate will go to the Consulate in San Francisco. We are still saving to file the I-800 - goal is to have it filed the first week of November.

Our certified vital documents (Birth Certificates and marriage certificates ) are expected back any day now and the envelopes for the consulates offices are ready to go. We are expecting our packet of Washington state authenticated documents back in a couple of days!!! And....the grant paperwork was successfully re-done while Simon was locked away and is being post marked today! Yay!

Well, not everything goes exactly as planned... We had a little accident, well, Simon had a little accident (our cat that loves to bring me flowers) knocked over a vase of flowers on the dining room table where I had been working on adoption paperwork and well, to keep a long story short, we need to re-do some things so I am taking Wednesday off to get all that back in order and yes...the cat is still alive. Keep us in prayer!

Ducks in a row...

Well, with the help of some friends David and I were able to get our ducks in a row last night.

All our Washington documents will be in Olympia for authentication / certification within the next week.

New requests for birth certificates and marriage certificate are being mailed out tomorrow, then once they come back - Minnesota's Birth Cert needs to go to the Consulate Chicago for authentication and California Birth Certificate and marriage Certificate go to the Consulate in San Francisco for authentication. All our cover letters are ready to go too!

We completed the filling out of the 1-800 and should have that off within a week or so or at least by the 15th. That will take 30 days to process.

Once all out documents are back from authentication and we receive our 1-800 approval...we will have overcome yet another huge hurdle.

God's timing is perfect and His plans for our lives never change. When we get overwhelmed and get off track, He guides us back into the light and He brings the right people along side you to help keep you going.

This was in my devotional today , pretty neat. "Through many channels My help can flow. I am your supply."

Thank you all for your prayers and for your loving support!

Game Plan

David and I went through all the adoption paperwork and formulated a game plan with a time frame for logging into China. We didn't go with the Great Wall's Dossier Service in a effort to save money but at the same time I wish we did. This is all quite overwhelming and its been easy to lose ground and get discouraged.

Because our schedules are so full, compiling our dossier was just one of those things I found that we needed more support with...more than expected and I tried doing it all myself since this kind of thing is usually a strong point for me. NOT! Anyway God is gracious and we will see what we can accomplish Tuesday and keep you all posted.

I was able to find several more possibilities for grants but a few of them require quite a bit of paper work themselves so...keep us in prayer with this too, we want to keep our eye on the ball....

The gift of new life...

Congratulations Tom and LaTisha!

Caleb James Wood

born

Wednesday, September 23, 2009 at 7:01am
9 lbs. 3oz. 20 in.

Happy Birthday Caleb!

Summer is gone!

Wow...been a while since we've even looked at our blogs....The Lord has richly belssed us this summer....My brother visited for a week, Mom visited for 6 weeks, we were able to get away to the Oregon Coast and stay with family, David did Jr. High Summer Camp, filling orders for 22 Eva's Bags, two baby showers and everything else in between!

Now everyone has gone home, the sand is emptied out of our suitcases and all is setting back into some semblance of normal, whatever that is.

Please keep us in prayer for direction with our adoption. We feel we need to make some decisions.... on exactly how we are to move forward with adopting a baby. We are also reviewing grant programs, etc.

Lead us on Sovereign Shepherd, You are God on high and you see all. You know the distance between what can be seen and understood to where the road turns and the remaining journey seems a mystery but that distance is filled with you. You give us the desires that we have in our hearts.... Lord we want your will and you are working in our hearts, I know and in the midst of uncertainty we praise you God for your faithfulness in all things. Amen.

Todays Quote

Nothing particulary spiritual but its is true none the less.

The mind determines what is possible. The heart surpasses it. ~Pilar Coolinta

His Eye Is On The Sparrow...

Seems like these last few weeks have been pretty quiet as far as activity on the adoption front. Our schedules have gotten pretty busy - we are preparing for mom and Chris' visit...they arrive August 5th and then we have our upcoming road trip to the Oregon coast to stay with family for a week at the end of August. So in waiting on the next step, I got that ever encouraging call from Corntey today. She asked how we were doing and if we needed anything. I just told her I had no idea what to do next and the more I looked at the dossier guide to figure it out, the more confused I got so I just felt the right thing to do was to just stop and wait, so we've just been waiting, for her call I guess! Thank you Lord. I got some clarification on the next step(s).
~ We need to file our I-800 as quickly as possible because it takes about a month to get a response. So we are saving and fundraising for this fee...its a big one.
~ In the mean time we need to get our documents authenticated through the appropriate state authorities before the end of September. The authentication is about $20 per page...we have many pages of paperwork so we are saving for this too.

I think it's time to start looking into some programs to see if we can qualify for grants / financial aide for some of these upcoming expenses so we can keep on moving! I know that any quiet time in this process has a purpose and we must trust in God and wait on Him but its hard to wait without getting lost in that, especially since the wait seems so long anyway. It's only been 5 months!!

Please continue to keep us in prayer. The Lord has not failed to provide for us thus far and we are very excited and encouraged by all the support and all the ways He has shown us that we are on the right path and in His will, He is faithful!