Homestudy

We just had our in-person meeting for our homestudy...YAY!!!

It wasn't so bad really:-)  Lots of questions about our marriage, parenting style, family backgrounds, etc. Pretty much all the questions we already answered on the different forms for our agency.

She said it will take her 1-2 weeks to write it and it may take up to a month to have the finished notarized copy b/c our homestudy agency closes for the holidays...so, here's hoping that our PA clearance comes through fast and that we get our notarized homestudy before our agency closes for Christmas.  If not, we're looking at mid-January before we'll be on the waitlist.

Either way, at least it is forward progress!

Grrr....

This is me right now!

We were so happy to be just about done with our homestudy and dossier and then I find this out today...
1. The PA child abuse clearance (the one I specifically asked my agency how I should fill out) was completed wrong and will need to be re-done and re-submitted (this will take at least 2-4 weeks)
2. My MA clearance has not yet arrived

Here's the thing....I specifically asked my agency how to complete the PA form and they gave me the wrong information.  I called again today to clarify and they gave me different wrong information.  I finally just said, hmmm, I wonder if I can get someone in the PA office to explain this to me.  They did....my agency is wrong wrong wrong.

As for MA all clearances through yesterday afternoon have been processed and sent out.  Since our forms were sent in in late October it should have been done long, long, long ago.

This mama is not happy.

More updates tomorrow (I just got back from a work event and am beat) but I am definitely not happy.

On the bright side, our escrow check finally arrived today (3 weeks later than they said it would!)...

It's really happening!

Today we got confirmation from our agency that they received all our documents and are processing them. Also, the homestudy agency is starting our child abuse and criminal clearances (these typically take the longest of all the components of the homestudy so it's important to start them first) so...we're on track to meet our goal of getting all our paperwork done, approved, and sent to Ethiopia before Christmas (but we're only one step into this journey, so a lot can change!)

Hopefully, we'll get the dossier preparation guide by the end of the week and we can start to tackle that giant heap of paperwork.  In the meantime, we're hoping the co-op will approve the release of our escrow tomorrow so that we can pay the next round of checks:-)

We're off and running!

Today I made a big trip to the post office:-) Yep, I mailed the two items someone recently purchased from me on ebay...

Just kidding (well, I did that too) but the really exciting news is...

We mailed our long application, autobiographies, and policy forms with the non-refundable "big check" as well as our homestudy agreement with the child abuse and criminal checks. I think it was about 80 pages of documents in total.  You can't quite tell from the photo, but the express mail envelope could barely close and the right-hand corner kept popping up:-)

Yep, I was the loon taking pictures of her envelopes at the post office in mid-town Manhattan:-)  (excuse the extra priority labels, a girl has to keep somethings--like her address-- a mystery right?)

The paper pile gets bigger:-)

We've now doubled the size of signed papers on our dining room table:-)  We chose a homestudy agency, so we completed all of that initial paperwork tonight and I now have a GIANT stack of papers to take to the post office tomorrow!

• 1 stack for our placement agency-with a check for $2150 for the first half of our agency fee
• 1 stack for our home study agency-I think we send this $1850 check later, but I'll call in the morning to confirm
• 1 stack for our co-op board-with a $50 check for the mandatory credit check (I'm actually going to need to have this delivered tomorrow-depending on how my work day unfolds I'll either hand deliver it myself or pay for a messenger service)

We had a clothing swap at our church today and I may or may not have brought home 2 shopping bags of adorable clothes-mostly gender neutral-for ages 12-36 months....they were cute, pretty much new (some still had the original tags on), and free.  I figure it doesn't get better than that:-)

Thanks so much to everyone who wished us Happy Anniversary. We can't believe it's been a year!!! We missed our tour of Kykuit due to INSANE traffic (it took almost 3 hours to get there, including a cab hitting a pedestrian which blocked traffic for quite a while) but we had a wonderful time exploring Sleepy Hollow and Tarrytown by car and on foot.  Then we had dinner at Castle on the Hudson. The cheese course was delish!

We accidentally wandered into the Westchester Art Festival and we bought our first piece of art!  Ababa and I both loved this artist's work so we thought it was a great way to commemorate our first anniversary and purchased a piece.  We're going to hang it in the front hall for now, but in the future we'd love to have a tryptic to hang over our living room sofa.

Here's the link to the artist--the birch series is AMAZING:
Steve Ward

Our painting is from this series (but the colors in ours are darker, it's smaller and square, and has more aggressive movement:-).  It is framed in a simple birch floating frame and really looks fantastic!

Homestudy Agency and Current Wait Times

Today I think we narrowed our choice of home study agencies down to 2!!!  We are checking references and then should be able to make an informed decision. I actually really like the two "finalists".  They seem to have great feedback on-line and with the BBB, plus they are prompt and personable! Also, they are each about $1000 less than our third choice agency!  That is a major blessing.  So, we'll finish checking their references, but then we should be good to go!

Also, I just have to say how much we love our placement agency.  As we started our paperwork we had some more questions (such a surprise, I know:-).  We asked for full audited financials, a board list, 501(C)3 letter, updated statistics, and a host of other questions.  Our placement worker emailed us back immediately each time with awesome and transparent answers. This is very different than many other agencies and we really, really appreciate their transparency and efficiency.

The answer from above that is probably most interesting to you is the response to, "When do we come home with our child/children?":-)

Below are the current list of wait times. You are allowed to go on multiple lists and pretty much every family is on the infant girl list.  Our agency is working with about 60 families right now.  We will likely go on all lists, but specify a single toddler under 2 1/2 or a sibling group with all children under 4 (maybe 5...)

It will take about 3 months to get our paperwork done and then we'll be on the waiting list (remember to add another 3-4 months at the end of the process for court/embassy dates).

Based on these wait times (which have remained pretty constant over the summer) we will probably receive a referral for a toddler boy (2-2 1/2 years old) or a sibling group (sibling wait times are highly variable because families request so many different specifics, e.g. only twins, no twins, only girls, only boys, must have one infant, must have no infants, must have one girl, no child over 3 years old, only 2 children, only school aged children...you get the picture:-) Our only specifications for a sibling group are that it is not more than 3 children and that all children are under 4 (or 5...we're a little flexible on that one:-)

So far this year, through our agency, about 60 children have come home from Ethiopia with their forever families.  As of this morning at our agency there are: 

·     36 families waiting for INFANT BOYS

·     9 families waiting for TODDLER BOYS

·     25 families waiting for SIBLINGS

·     59 families waiting for INFANT GIRLS

·     22 families waiting for TODDLER GIRLS

·     There is no waiting list for children 4 years and older, placement is usually immediate

Current estimated wait times for a referral, once a family is on the wait list: 

·     up to 18 months for INFANT BOYS

·     up to 8 months for TODDLER BOYS

·     unknown for SIBLINGS

·     up to 18 months for INFANT GIRLS

·     up to 12 months for TODDLER GIRLS

Of course these are all estimates.  There are so many variables in international adoption!  We're hoping to be done and back home with our child/children by Christmas of 2011. We'll see if that happens:-)