Archives for January 2012

In my last post, I mentioned that we were about finished with our homestudy – – then on to I800a approval and finishing the dossier. I was pretty excited and hoped to have I800a approval sometime in April, and then maybe travel not long after that. But, little did I know what problems my daughter’s birthday would bring. 

One of my girls turns eighteen in February. I knew she would have to be fingerprinted for the I800a, and that was no problem. What I failed to realize is that she had to complete background checks for our homestudy – – CPS, Criminal / Sex Offender, and our state also requires her to be fingerprinted which takes about six to eight weeks to get back. 

So, another slowdown we thought. Oh well, not that big of a deal. Then our social worker mentioned that our daughter can NOT be fingerprinted for the homestudy until she has her eighteenth birthday and since it is taking six to eight weeks to get them back, that would put us into March. Then OUR background checks for the homestudy would expire and we would have to re-do them – – taking another six to eight weeks or so. Another slow down! 

We have talked back and forth trying to figure out the best way to do this without slowing us down by eight or nine weeks. I think what we are going to do is this: have our homestudy finished before Katie’s eighteenth birthday, but mention in the homestudy that she will be eighteen in February and that her background checks will be done then. We will then have an addendum added to the homestudy when her checks are back. That way we will finish our homestudy before our background clearances expire. This will still slow us down for the I800a, but it seems to be the best solution at this time. 

I suppose I shouldn’t stress this so much. I know it will eventually all work out. It’s just that I am so anxious for our first visit. I can hardly wait to meet our girls and the sooner we make that first trip, the sooner we will be able to bring them home. 

Our homestudy is almost done! Our worker told us this week it will be finished by the end of January. Of course, we still have lots of paperwork to do for our dossier. When I think of our two little girls, so far away, it makes me want to do everything we can to bring them home quickly.

Another exciting thing happened this week — we received our first donations! I was in our family room earlier this week talking to some of our girls, and my husband came in and said that someone had given a donation. It was such a thrill! Then on Wednesday I looked, and we had received another. It is so encouraging, and we are so thankful for the two people that showed such generosity in support of our efforts. Thank you.