Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Fingerprint Appointment!!

I finally got a letter in the mail yesterday from US immigration with a letter stating they received my information and that our fingerprint appt. is set for the ONLY Saturday we will be out of town! So after I got over my frustration, I emailed them and they told me that we can go on any Wednesday we want....yeah!! Next week we will head over to the local office and get fingerprinted(10 days earlier than our scheduled appt.) and be one step closer.
And, by the way, for those of you who have asked, we did NOT pick one of the names that Camdyn and Charlie suggested, although they were all beautiful. She actually will already have a Vietnamese name which we will most likely keep as a middle name for her. As for her English name, we promise to reveal the name selection as soon as we decide, which at this point may be on the plane ride over.

Friday, September 21, 2007

Questions

I had a chance to use my newly learned 'adoption lingo' yesterday. I was talking to someone when she mentioned that she heard we were adopting and asked if we had children already. I answered yes, we have three. So she said, oh, so you already have children of 'your own'. And I said, well, we already have three biological children. I think some people are really surprised to find that adoption isn't necessarily a 'plan B' (as one agency called it) and that families actually DO adopt even if they aren't infertile. I believe that however a child becomes a part of a family is 'natural' and they are definitely 'your own'. And I also believe with every part of my soul that before this little girl was ever thought of by us, God knew she would need a family and we would need her. We are hoping and praying that wherever she is, we will find each other soon.

Monday, September 17, 2007

Still in paperwork waiting mode

The good news is that our homestudy is complete! The set back is that after waiting for fingerprint appointments from US Immigration, I had my I600A returned on Thursday because I paid with a personal check....arrrrg. So, I re-sent in the application with a money order. I really didn't see anywhere in ALL of the instructions on filling it out that a personal check was an issue. Now we wait again for fingerprint appointments and then for our I171-H which is the final approval we need to send everything to Tallahassee to get state certified and then to the Vietnam Consulate to get authenticated....and then to Vietnam! ....and then, of course, more waiting for a referral.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Adoption Lingo

I just recieved two big notebooks from our agency. One contains all the information needed for more paperwork....what needs to be notarized, certified by the state and then authenticated by the Vietnam consulate in California. The other notebook is full of articles on adoption issues, especially the correct 'language' to use. For example, since we have other children and this newest one will obviously be adopted, they point out that we may get a lot of attention and questions from strangers. So one suggestion is that when someone asks where the new little one is from, we should reply, "She was born in Vietnam, (pointing to our other kids) and her brother and sisters were born in Tampa."(that one cracked me up).
One of my friends has a daughter from Korea and an older son who looks very much like his mom and dad. She says that quite often her daughter gets much more attention and her son often pipes in that he was adopted too. She also said that someone actually once asked her how much her daughter cost. That is just unbelievable to me, but I guess it is better to be prepared for all the questions now.
As for an update, I am waiting for two more reference letters and the homestudy will be complete!