This Week's Referrals

We received notification this week of the following:

The Ethiopia program is thrilled to announce that we received referrals of 3 children this week. A 4 month old baby girl, and two boys 19 months and 2 years old. Congratulations to all of the families. The families waited 9 months, 7 ½ months and 3 months.

So, unfortunately our group (boys under 12 months) didn't get any referrals which means we haven't moved up on the list, but the good news is that 3 families received referrals and that's always great news.

Referrals seem to ebb and flow . . . for awhile it's been older children and baby girls, and a couple months ago there were 5 baby boys referred in just one week. It's a little nerve-wracking, especially because we're not told exactly where we are on the list. We know that there are 103 families (well, I guess after today's referrals that would be 100 families) waiting . . . but those include ALL families. Some are waiting for older children, sibling groups and some are waiting for girls and boys.

From reading other family blogs, it looks like when you get close to the top of the list, people know if they're first or second on the list, etc. And through these referral notices, you can also keep track of the wait times. As mentioned in my last post, it appears families waiting for babies are waiting just about 9 months.

And to my lovely daughter, Gwen, who complained that my last post wasn't "personal" enough . . . you'll just have to stay tuned for me to have a melt-down and then my post will get personal!! :o)

Until next time . . . have a great weekend all!

The Journey Begins . . .

Welcome to our Blog!

Our Adoption Journey began last year when we made the monumental decision to adopt a baby boy from Ethiopia.

In August, 2008 we signed our Adoption Agreement with Children's Hope International and began the first stage . . . the dossier completion. This required collection of the following documents:

1. Letter of Introduction (to be presented with our dossier to the powers that be in Ethiopia)

2. Photos of us (like the one here) plus photos of our home

3. Employment letters

4. Financial declarations

5. Marriage certificate

6. Medical clearance letters

7. Police clearance letters

8. Reference letters

9. Letter of obligation (again to the country of Ethiopia)

10. Passport photos

11. Power of attorney forms

12. Guardianship designation forms

13. Birth certificates

14. Self-Awareness test completion

15. Attendance verification for a Baby Care for Adoptive Families class

16. Completion of extra hours (I can't remember exactly how many) of additional adoptive and trans-racial parenting training

17. And last, but not least, our detailed Home Study (which had its own set of required documents)

These documents had to be notarized and certified by the Secretary of State, and then forwarded to the Federal Government for final verification.

In addition, we also had to go to the immigration office for pre-approval for return to the country with a child, and we got fingerprinted.

This was all completed in November, 2008 and we officially got on the waiting list for a baby boy on November 24, 2008. And now comes the WAITING. Right now, it's looking like the wait for referral of a baby is running between 9-10 months, and then once we have accepted a referral, we then will need to wait another 3-4 months before we can travel to Ethiopia to pick up our son.

So . . . those good at math will quickly see that we're just past 4 months of waiting (I like to think of it as "in the 5th month!" . . . so we are looking at a bit of a wait. Thankfully, the time is going by quicker than I thought.

That's an update for those who've been asking . . . next posting will likely be when we have new information and/or when I finally start decorating the nursery!

Cheers,

~Kim