What my methodical brain would love to do is detail out step by step how we got to where we are today, because that in itself is an amazing journey. But the time thing Matt mentioned is a factor, so instead I will use this post to give a very brief timeline of how things have developed from the fall of 2012 when this process officially began.
[Hmm. I just finished writing this, and brief is tough. And leaves lot of gaps. So, now to go back and add two more significant details to make the story make a little more sense.]
4/6/2012 We hear God telling us enough talking - it's time to Go. Start walking toward this adoption thing I've been leading you toward. (More about that in another post!) So we spend the weekend researching a few adoption agencies, and making some preliminary inquiries. Early the next week we get turned down flat - we don't earn enough money according to the United Stated Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to adopt. To make it worse, it's been a much slower income year (we're self-employed) than usual, and at the beginning of April we've only brought in about $3000. Kind of takes the wind out of our sails, asking God why he told us to walk knowing that this big wall was in the way? And his answer came quickly, "So you can see me lift the walls out of your way at the right time."
7/8/2012 Matt's dad loses his life to the cancer that he's been fighting for three years. The last three weeks were very intense, spent caring for him and his mom. His death prompts us to begin thinking about proceeding with house addition plans we've been considering for years, hoping that we would be able to provide a place for his mom when she's ready to move out of her home - she's always said she wanted to spend a year in the house after he died, and is often adamant about not wanting to go into "a home." We've talked with our parents for years about wanting to be able to provide a place for them when they are no longer on their own. We are grateful, too, that we are not in the middle of an adoption at this point.
october 2012: we find out that the huge financial roadblock from April is gone - the USCIS allows adoptive families to apply assets (such as equity in a home) dollar for dollar to their income for meeting the minimum requirements!
We also find out this month that in the settling of Matt's dad's estate that one of the scenarios on the table for tax reasons for Matt's mom is to split one certain asset between Matt and his brother. That's all we know. But it sure does serve as a reminder that God has the ability to do as he pleases with money.
10/17/2012 We email inquiring about an older child with cerebral palsy (CP) whose picture we've seen on someone else's blog. We are told that there is already another family submitting commitment documents for him, but we use this as a jumping off point.
10/20/2012 We fill out our pre-application with our primary adoption agency (the one who will help us with the international side of things.)
10/23/2012 We mail in our application (and first money out! even though it's only $150, that first check makes it seem that much more real) to a local adoption agency who will do our home study.
10/26/2012 We receive our list and begin gathering paperwork for the home study.
10/29/2012 We find out that the ephemeral chunk of money that Matt will inherit from his Dad's estate (since the decision was made that that option WAS the most reasonable option) comes in the form of an IRA. So, from what we know, 1) our assets have just skyrocketed, and 2) it's not money that we can use to actually pay for anything. Ha!! Doesn't it just give you the delightful feeling that God has something big in store - and is a real tangible reminder that He CAN (and does) just provide things out of the blue.
Also on this date I had my first phone contact with our primary agency - a critical part of being approved from their end.
11/7/2012 We take a family field trip to the local Police Department to get fingerprinted for the home study. Fingerprinting is done, for obvious reasons, back by the holding cells. Owen listens intently while the officer describes how even though there are only two small holding cells, they can secure up to four people in the area if need be. Reuben, our echo finder, discovers that holding cells make great echos. The louder the better!
We also find out that inherited IRAs, as opposed to traditional IRAs, MUST be drawn out year by year so they are gone by the time Matt reaches retirement age. There is no penalty (besides the nuisance of having to pay income taxes on it) to drawing more than the minimum amount each year. So that money is more accessible than we thought, but still not entirely "free."
11/8/2012 Phone call with our primary doctor regarding physicals for the family for the home study. He says he's seen most of us frequently enough over the past few months (ha ha!) that he doesn't need us to set up individual appointments to be able to write the necessary letters - he will just write them for five of the six of us. Matt is too healthy to have ever seen him, but our doctor suggests we contact the doctor at the U of M who did a rigorous round of tests on Matt in the spring for something else and see if he will do it. I randomly choose one of the contacts at the U to call, and I end up getting a mom who adopted from Columbia 22 years ago and is very excited to help us get this small piece of the puzzle. God provides through not having to pay for an exam!
mid-November: Matt finally hears back from the contractor we are hoping will help with our building project this spring. His schedule has changed such that he won't be able to start until June.
11/14/2012 We have to cancel the home visit for our home study because most of us are vomiting.
11/17/2012 We hear that the family who is committing to the boy we had originally asked about was requested to submit more paperwork, so we're still waiting.
Our worker from our primary agency sends photos and files on 8 children who are waiting to find a family.
11/20/2012 We have our rescheduled home visit for the home study.
late November: our agency sends another group of children.
early December: Matt sees a photo of a little boy who captures his interest on a blog that we frequent written by a mother who's also adopted and is adopting from the same country we're pursuing.
12/9/2012 We request (and receive that same night!) information from agency on a little boy referred to as "Kramer." Matt is gone at his mom's when I receive the email, and it's a tough read. We knew we were looking for a child who was going to need extra love and care, but seeing it in the context of a child that may be *your* child is tough. Matt comes home, and tells me simply, "If he's our guy, then it doesn't really matter, does it?"
12/12/2012 We request the commitment documents for K. Every country has its own different systems, and the way the adoption process works in his country is you have the option to "commit" to a child before you have your dossier completed. (The dossier is the collection of legal and other documents that are required by the country to allow the adoption to take place.) We spend the next few days filling out the application, and scrounging up the other papers we need, and by
12/16/2012 we have them ready to be notarized (someone at church notarizes things for us - very convenient!!) and email the scans to the foreign agency. They will begin translating them, and K is officially on hold for us. We now have six months to submit our completed dossier.
12/20/2012 Our local agency completes our home study.
12/27/2012 Shelley informs us that there is an adoptive family in Georgia travelling to K's country on Jan 4 who can hand deliver the necessary hard copies of our commitment documents saving us 1) the cost of DHL and 2) making sure they are given directly to the right person in a timely fashion.
12/28/2012 Our I-800-A application is submitted. This goes to the Department of Homeland Security, and will give us their preliminary approval to pursue an international adoption. This approved application is a required piece of our dossier. It is one of two pieces that make the dossier take a long time. The I-800-A may take up to 90 days to process. This puts us at Leah's birthday - March 31, 2013. The other piece that takes a while is that we have to be fingerprinted again, have those searched again by the FBI, and the results sent to us in a different format than the ones required for the home study. Once these are returned to us, they have to be sent to the US Secretary of State in Washington, D.C. to be apostilled (approved for international legitimacy). All the other pieces of the dossier are just little bits and pieces for me to gather here - a copy of our marriage certificate, and a copy of our passports. Photos of our family and our house, more medical statements.
1/5/2013 An internet friend travels to Eastern Europe for her first visit to the child her family is adopting. Her child lives in the same orphanage as our little boy, and we are hopeful that she will get to visit with K, and possible even take photos!!! We are anxiously awaiting her return home (knowing that she's awfully busy this week).
Where we go from here:
- once our I-800-A is approved, and our fingerprints returned with their apostilles, then I take all the documents to our regular old MN Secretary of State to be apostilled, and then send it on to K's country!
- once it is translated, they will (or won't) give us their approval to move forward, and we will be invited to travel to spend one week with K. Matt and I are both hoping to go on this trip, but thankfully his country does not require both parents to travel. There are a number of logistics to be worked out to get both of us over there, the biggest being 1) having to buy two plane tickets instead of only one, and 2) finding someone to take care of our four children (one of whom has special needs of his own. What am I talking about? ALL children have their own special needs! But Reuben's are qualified as such by the state, school district, etc. He is extra work. :) ) while we're both gone.
- after our week with K, we need to tell the agency in his country that, yes, we are ready to move ahead with the adoption. And then we have to fly back home without him.
- over the next 4-5 MONTHS the foreign legal process of the adoption will be finalized on our behalf. After that time is over, and the adoption is complete...
- we get to fly back to K's country for a week, and this time, bring him home!
I hope to come back and fill in details through future posts, but at the moment, I hope this is helpful in giving a bit of an idea where we're coming from and where we're going from here. I hope to post more about K and how we were drawn to him in another post soon.
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