We are now REALLY home study approved! Yahoo! We received our addendum on Friday afternoon and had it at the post office before closing!
Of course, that was a Friday so, while it had reached the USCIS office Saturday, it could not be delivered until yesterday. We must have checked the USPS confirmation site 20 times yesterday...not an easy feat since we are having internet issues and only get connected about 1 out of 5 tries. By 3:00, they STILL had not updated their website and I was getting edgy!
Chris finally called and got confirmation that it had, indeed, been delivered! Now, we just wait some more. We have heard rumors that the process is going MUCH faster these days and we will probably have approval within a month. I refuse to get my hopes up too high, though, because our luck has not been great in this area so far.
As soon as we get immigration clearance, we can begin assembling our dossier and get our paperwork in country, hopefully in time to be considered when they do their next referrals in June.
Please continue to pray for the process, the fundraising, and for the orphans and people of Uganda.
Showing posts with label home study. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home study. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Home study in Hand...Almost
We have reached another milestone! Sort of! Last week, we got an email telling us that we should be receiving our approved Home study at any time. We excitedly (perhaps obsessively) began checking our mail...back door...front door...garage door, etc. for the "golden" package. Finally, on Friday afternoon, it arrived. We began to make plans to get it in the mail along with our I600A form to send to USCIS. Friday evening, Chris finally got a chance to begin reading through it (It may or may not have been during the Science Fair awards ceremony). Unfortunately, he found a mistake. Five little words that were left out. Evidently, five very important words. Words assuring that he had been cleared in a background check.
Worried that that could cause a problem down the road, we sent an email to our agency. Of course, it was the weekend, so nothing could be done until Monday morning. We naively thought that they could just amend the words and email us a new copy that could be switched with the other. We were wrong. Because that would be simple. And if we have learned one thing in this adoption process, it is that NOTHING is simple! We were told that we would need to get an addendum to be added to the original document.
SO, we are now waiting on our addendum. We have again been told it should be here any day and Chris got a very sweet call from our social worker apologizing for the mistake. Our I600A is all filled out and is just waiting on a completed home study so it can be mailed off. We can ALMOST taste the victory!
As excited as we were to send off our paperwork to immigration, we were also excited to be able to begin applying for grants. Unfortunately, we have learned that, because we are doing an independent adoption, we will not be eligible for most grants. On the upside...we will also have a cheaper adoption than if we were going through an agency. All in all, what that means is another almost. We are ALMOST there financially...but not quite. It would be nice to have about $5000 more to make sure we had all expenses covered. We do have a couple of other fundraisers planned, but we will probably not be quite there, even then. We are looking at a couple of possibilities and hoping that, perhaps there is SOMEONE out there who will help support an independent adoption. I guess that is where prayer comes in. God has been completely faithful up until now and I know that He will provide in His way in His time.
Hopefully, next time we are on here, it will be to say that we have a mistake free home study in hand and that we are moving on to the next phase. Thanks for all the support and prayers!
Worried that that could cause a problem down the road, we sent an email to our agency. Of course, it was the weekend, so nothing could be done until Monday morning. We naively thought that they could just amend the words and email us a new copy that could be switched with the other. We were wrong. Because that would be simple. And if we have learned one thing in this adoption process, it is that NOTHING is simple! We were told that we would need to get an addendum to be added to the original document.
SO, we are now waiting on our addendum. We have again been told it should be here any day and Chris got a very sweet call from our social worker apologizing for the mistake. Our I600A is all filled out and is just waiting on a completed home study so it can be mailed off. We can ALMOST taste the victory!
As excited as we were to send off our paperwork to immigration, we were also excited to be able to begin applying for grants. Unfortunately, we have learned that, because we are doing an independent adoption, we will not be eligible for most grants. On the upside...we will also have a cheaper adoption than if we were going through an agency. All in all, what that means is another almost. We are ALMOST there financially...but not quite. It would be nice to have about $5000 more to make sure we had all expenses covered. We do have a couple of other fundraisers planned, but we will probably not be quite there, even then. We are looking at a couple of possibilities and hoping that, perhaps there is SOMEONE out there who will help support an independent adoption. I guess that is where prayer comes in. God has been completely faithful up until now and I know that He will provide in His way in His time.
Hopefully, next time we are on here, it will be to say that we have a mistake free home study in hand and that we are moving on to the next phase. Thanks for all the support and prayers!
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Home Visit Complete
Yay, our next milestone is complete! Tuesday night we welcomed our social worker into our home for the home visit. We had asked a lot of friends that have been through this what to expect and all said the same thing...Don't go on a cleaning spree. They aren't going to do the "white glove" test.
At first, we began that deep cleaning anyway...you know, just to be sure. Then we realized, we have four children. If we deep clean Saturday, by Tuesday afternoon it is sure to be worse than when we started. SO, we focused our efforts on making sure that we were "safe". Everyone told us they would check for fire extinguishers, check the smoke detectors, etc. We were a little concerned about what they would say about the pool and wondered if they would fault us for not having a fenced yard.
So, we bought an extra fire extinguisher, tested the smoke detectors...a few times, made sure the pool door was locked, etc. I did have a plan for a quick run through to straighten up. I teach at the tutorial on Tuesdays so I knew no one would be there to mess up too much. Monday was CRAZY and there was no way we could work cleaning into the mix so my plan was to straighten up as much as possible before tutorial on Tuesday morning and then when we got home, have everyone pitch in to vacuum, dust, etc.
She was scheduled to come sometime Tuesday afternoon or evening after a visit with another family in town. I figured we had two or three hours after we got home to get it all arranged. SO, imagine my surprise (and panic) when at 12:30, while I was still at Tutorial, she called and said she was about an hour away and would be at our house at 1:30! I was very calm and level headed...or not! I began running around like a chicken with its head cut off rounding up kids and bags and heading for the door!
My precious MIL had kept Coop that day and had texted saying she had made pizzas for the kids at her house. We flew to Nana's where I made the kids inhale their pizza and even forbade them from eating the required bowl of ice cream (a Nana necessity). We got home and I ordered the kids to straighten their rooms, and we vacuumed the kitchen...that is as good as it got!
Our social worker arrived and completely put us at ease. She really is very sweet. We talked for a long time, she interviewed the kids and then we began our house tour...where she didn't even ask to see our safety stuff...we just volunteered it like a preschooler who is proud of their art picture! "See, see our fire extinguisher!" "Look, our smoke detector works!"
By the time we got upstairs, Coop figured out what was going on. He took over as tour guide from there and proudly showed her his bed, his hippie, Sissie's room, the bathtub, the pot AND the toilet paper...He is nothing if not thorough!
Anyway, I think all went well. We will have our final interview on the 7th and HOPEFULLY we will have passed our water test by then (we are re treating this weekend) and will have our fingerprints. If so, we will just have to wait for the completed write up and final copy of the home study and will be one step closer to our sweet little girl!
At first, we began that deep cleaning anyway...you know, just to be sure. Then we realized, we have four children. If we deep clean Saturday, by Tuesday afternoon it is sure to be worse than when we started. SO, we focused our efforts on making sure that we were "safe". Everyone told us they would check for fire extinguishers, check the smoke detectors, etc. We were a little concerned about what they would say about the pool and wondered if they would fault us for not having a fenced yard.
So, we bought an extra fire extinguisher, tested the smoke detectors...a few times, made sure the pool door was locked, etc. I did have a plan for a quick run through to straighten up. I teach at the tutorial on Tuesdays so I knew no one would be there to mess up too much. Monday was CRAZY and there was no way we could work cleaning into the mix so my plan was to straighten up as much as possible before tutorial on Tuesday morning and then when we got home, have everyone pitch in to vacuum, dust, etc.
She was scheduled to come sometime Tuesday afternoon or evening after a visit with another family in town. I figured we had two or three hours after we got home to get it all arranged. SO, imagine my surprise (and panic) when at 12:30, while I was still at Tutorial, she called and said she was about an hour away and would be at our house at 1:30! I was very calm and level headed...or not! I began running around like a chicken with its head cut off rounding up kids and bags and heading for the door!
My precious MIL had kept Coop that day and had texted saying she had made pizzas for the kids at her house. We flew to Nana's where I made the kids inhale their pizza and even forbade them from eating the required bowl of ice cream (a Nana necessity). We got home and I ordered the kids to straighten their rooms, and we vacuumed the kitchen...that is as good as it got!
Our social worker arrived and completely put us at ease. She really is very sweet. We talked for a long time, she interviewed the kids and then we began our house tour...where she didn't even ask to see our safety stuff...we just volunteered it like a preschooler who is proud of their art picture! "See, see our fire extinguisher!" "Look, our smoke detector works!"
By the time we got upstairs, Coop figured out what was going on. He took over as tour guide from there and proudly showed her his bed, his hippie, Sissie's room, the bathtub, the pot AND the toilet paper...He is nothing if not thorough!
Anyway, I think all went well. We will have our final interview on the 7th and HOPEFULLY we will have passed our water test by then (we are re treating this weekend) and will have our fingerprints. If so, we will just have to wait for the completed write up and final copy of the home study and will be one step closer to our sweet little girl!
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