We have our LOI

Just heard word that we have our Letter Of Invitation! We also put tickets on hold for the 8th!

Only 9 more days!

FINALLY! We are going to meet our baby!!

We should be leaving on October 8th or 9th!! We have our final approval and our LOI is on its way. The region is open and we should be one of the first families there! There will be many babies available too since no one has been to Karaganda months. This feels so unreal. I have lists and sticky notes everywhere! I am busy packing, organizing, cleaning the house and of course calling everyone in the family! We are so happy and excited! I can hardly sleep and you know I like to sleep! We could have the baby home by the first or second week in December!

About Kazakhstan

Our agency informed us that Karaganda should be opening this week! We are happy but trying not to get our hopes up. We will be much happier when we hear something definite. We also have some paper work to redo but nothing major. Below are a few facts on Kazakhstan and some pictures. It is a very diverse and beautiful country.

Kazakhstan Flag

The population is 15.2 million

The capital city is Astana

The state language is Kazakh

Major religions are Islam and Orthodox

Still waiting

We still have no news...no idea what's going on, etc...

Here's a quote from a family who adopted their daughter from Kaz, I thought it was fitting:

"We have more hurdles, including an intimidating court hearing, but we are already beginning to feel like parents. And that's the thing about adoption. It's just like having a kid the regular way, only not. Unlike biological childbirth, there is no such thing as an accidental adoption. No equivalent of the broken condom or "forgotten" diaphragm. This is a deliberate, always conscious, undertaking. I can't say that makes it better—I wouldn't wish the process on anyone—but it does bring with it a certain sense of clarity. Why exactly do you want a child? What price—in money and sweat and tears—are you willing to pay? My answer, prompted by the two most beautiful eyes I have ever seen, is: as much as it takes."

Their blog address is: http://www.slate.com/id/2132692/entry/2132693 if you want to check it out.

More Craziness

We have just been told the process in the Almaty region has changed. Adoptive families are required to stay 3-7 weeks on their first trip, leave, then wait 4 weeks and return for their child or make THREE trips! Insanity!!
Anyway we are now probably going to wait for the Karaganda region to open up again so we do not have to make three trips to Kazakhstan. They are saying it should be soon. I feel like a liar though, everything I write changes as soon as I post it. Believe me , I wish I was making this stuff up!!Ha ha!
Thanks for the comments! You're all right~ We know we will end up with the baby we are meant to have even if it takes longer than we'd like. We know our baby is somewhere out there waiting, and we love and think about our baby all the time. And of course all of this waiting/frustration will be worth it in the end! Hopefully the end will be soon!

No Answers

We tried again to get some answers from our agency about our situation, but they told us officials in Kaz are on vacation until July 18th and we will not know anything until they return. We have no idea how long we have to wait, where our dossier has to go or what the process is from here. We have had no answers to anything except that we are going to Almaty.

It's frustrating, to say the least, having NO control over your life.

We are learning patience however and that is a good thing. We will resume bugging our agency after the 18th!

The Saga Continues

Well, we are switching regions, from Karaganda to Almaty. We were told we can adopt a baby under a year old from Almaty!!! We do want a young baby so they can get love and care from us as soon as possible and are not stuck in an orphanage longer than necessary!

Anyway, we are still on this roller coaster ride of international adoption! We know it will work out and we pray so much every day! The wait and disappointments can be very hard emotionally some days though. We are trying not to get our hopes up too high, even though we have good news, in case things change.

We hope to know more details soon.

*Check out the update on our baby's room!!*

Sad News

Adoptions are on hold in Karaganda, the region (city) we are suppose to go to. We don't know if it will be a few months or a year before it will open up again. We are considering changing regions, which would mean more paper work and thousands of $$ more. The agency told us they are going to see what they can do for us. The other region they work in doesn't allow adoption of babies under a year old and we wanted a baby as young as possible. Right now we can't do anything but pray and wait. We are very disappointed.

Not quite there yet...

Well, apparently there was some sort of mix up and we don't have our final approval yet. Our paperwork is still at the MOE. We haven't been rejected or anything, we just don't have our final approval after all. This would normally just mean a longer wait, and though this doesn't thrill us, there are apparently some other things going on in Karaganda going on that could complicate things. From what we hear, a different agency that works there hasn't been completing their post-placement reports. As a result, they are thinking about suspending adoptions there until this agency does what they should be doing. If this happens and we are still in the pipe, this would mean we have a much longer wait ahead of us.
There is still some hope though. Our coordinator is working hard to get us through, so we're still hopeful that we'll be going sooner rather than later. We'll keep you posted when we know more.

Final Approval

We have been waiting so long (it seems) to hear that we have the final approval that I didn't think we would be very excited when we got it. You know how frustrating it is to wait and wait for something and then it comes and you are too depressed from waiting to feel overjoyed.

Well that didn't happen to us! We are overjoyed! The agency has applied for our Letter of Invitation and when they/we receive it they will tell us travel dates! Yippee!

Oh by the way, we miss hearing your comments! I know the blog is a little boring right now, until we get baby pics on it, but we like to know who is watching and waiting with us!

Baby Shower

We were given a baby shower on Sunday. It was so wonderful to see how excited and happy everyone is for us. We were definitely "showered" with gifts! We could not see the floor in the babies room, the crib was full and the tops of all the dressers were covered when we brought the gifts in. In addition we have the bigger items, strollers, jumperoo, highchair, pack-n-play and more in the garage for now. It's hard to believe we are going to be parents in a few weeks! Our agency told us yesterday to start making plans to travel in the first two weeks of June! We are so thrilled and nervous thinking about how quickly June will be here!

News???

Have you heard anything seems to be the words we hear the most these days, so I guess the answer is yes and no. Yes, we have heard things, but nothing super concrete. More like warm butter than concrete. Our agency thinks our paperwork is done, but they aren't 100% sure, so we can't say anything definitive. They have said that as far as they know there aren't any children available in the age range we're looking for right now, but they still think we'll be traveling sometime in June. So even though we have nothing really substantial, it's pretty exciting to think that we could be flying to the other side of the planet next month!

Update

We were told by our agency that they are checking on the children available in the orphanage we are going to. They will let us know as soon as they find out from their coordinator in Kazakhstan. I don't think we'll know many details but it may give us a better idea of when we can travel.
We are getting more excited as we get closer to traveling. I am making lists of things to do and bring. I already have one bag packed. I think we will try to pack all our non-clothing and toiletry items soon. The agency says to pack a full two weeks in advance and then think about what you can remove or what you forgot to add. But we may not have a full two weeks when we are told we can travel, so we are starting early.

Registering

Decisions, decisions... do we want the blue or yellow burp cloths? Bibs with ducks or bears? Black or brown diaper bag? This is going to be one spoiled baby!

We had so much fun registering. We registered at Target and Babies R Us. I can't believe the amount of stuff babies need! But, do we really need a wipe warmer or shopping cart cover?

Of course we do! :)

Getting Closer!!

We have a tentative "due date"!

We just heard that our dossier is out of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is now at the Ministry of Education as of yesterday! It will be there about a month and shortly thereafter we get our Letter of Invitation! Then it will may a couple of weeks to get tickets, visas and prepare to travel.

We could be parents in 6-8 weeks!!

(Jason thinks I use to many exclamation points on the blog, but I think this warrants it!!!!!!)

GREAT NEWS!! :)

We finally have news!! Our dossier , which we thought was still in translation, has been out of translation, gone to the Embassy and is now in Kazakhstan at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs!!! Wow! We are so happy, I cried! After it gets approval it goes to the Ministry of Education and then we get our LOI (letter of invitation). We are not sure how long this will take but I will try to call the agency next week and find out (The guy we are working with is away). I think it will still be 2-3 months though. I will keep posting with updates.
After hearing this news I decided I better start baby-proofing the house! Our living room now looks bare! I didn't realize almost everything I have is glass (picture frames, candle holders, ect)!! Oh well, it will only be about 10 years before I can decorate again :)!

Anxiously Waiting

There is not much to report right now but our time frame has changed a little. We were told by our agency to expect to travel about May-June. We had been hoping for mid April. That would've been a nice anniversary gift! The wait is very hard -much more so than I expected.
Also, our dossier has been in translation for a couple weeks now (it can take 4-6 weeks). We will be told when it goes to Kaz. and as it gets approved from the various offices.
Now we have more time to get things done around the house, learn Russian, sleep while we still can, ect...
Keep praying for us and our baby!

Our Baby's Room

The room was painted with help from Dad, Dan and Amber. Also, we changed the blinds to cellular/cordless, and my mom and I cleared all the old furniture out and organized the closet. That was a fun week, our house was a disaster! I also painted a little chair and shelf to match the room and bought an area rug. Each week it's looking more like a baby's room.

We need curtains and other baby things, but we still have time. We should be getting a crib this month! The dressers are from my grandmother, they no longer needed them so they gave it to us. We also were given a glider/rocking chair! Everyone has been so generous! We're not sure if we're getting a boy or girl so this color scheme should accommodate both.

Uncle Dan, putting together the crib for us. He wouldn't let me see it until it was done :) but his wife took some pictures for me.

~~~ UPDATE 6/18/07: ~~~

Grandma decided that the baby needed a new crib ~and she bought us one! It is beautiful! It converts to a toddler bed, then full size bed. It is solid, doesn't move at all and is very safe and pretty! Here is a picture of it, with the beautiful quilt made by my best friend and her mom-in-law!

Grandpa and Daddy setting up the crib!

The crib is full of stuffed animals and blankets, we need to make room for the baby soon! We have a breathable bumper on the crib too~can you tell I like green??

A little bit of paperwork

So what's in our dossier? We are sending to the agency the paperwork you see below. In these stacks are 35 original documents signed by both of us or someone else (bank, employer, Realtor), with the signatures notarized. We have another 35 original documents with the same bunch of signatures which have also been "apostilled". This means that each document has a little paper stapled to them from the county of the notary (we ended up going to 3 counties) saying 'yes this person is a notary' with an officials signature; and then another large paper from NY State saying 'yes these people who signed the paper for the county are legitimate' complete with the Secretary of the States signature and seal on it. So far 70 documents.
We also have to send 5 copies of each of these to the agency, which is another 175 documents. Most of these are single pages, but the home study for instance is something like 7 pages long, so that's a lot of paper. The grand total is something like 245 documents, totaling about 375+ individual pieces of paper. On top of all this is about 25 pictures of us, our house, our families and the area. Amber has been running around a lot and putting a ton of work into getting this done. All I can say is I hope that we got everything right!!!!

Books

Here are some books I have read and recommend. If any friends want to borrow these I would be happy to lend them to you.

For Everyone:

The Russian Word for Snow
Janis Newman

This is a true story of a couple who adopted from Russia. You will definitely cry reading this one. It may help some to understand the emotion and drive adoptive parents have to get to their children despite difficulties.

For Couples:

Adopting after Infertility
Patricia Irwin Johnston

Great book to work though emotions and issues facing you as a result of infertility. Also, to help couples with the choice of child-free life or adoption.

International Adoption handbook
Myra Alperson

Great book for those just starting an adoption. It gives detailed information on different types of international adoption.

Dear Bithmother by Kathleen Silber
Phylis Speedlin

Wow, this book is powerful! You will read myths people have about birth-parents and then the truth from birth-parents themselves. It features letters from adoptive parents and birth-parents to each other, and more excellent information.

For Children:

Why Was I Adopted?

This had rave reviews on Amazon.com. This is an adorable book that talks about adoption as something special but that adopted kids are still like every other kid and still need to brush their teeth and go to bed early. Too cute!


Adoption is for Always
Linda Walvoord Girard

Book about a little girl who realizes she is adopted and what it means. The end is sweet as she understands even though she has a birth-mother/father her adoptive mommy is her real mom and daddy, real dad "for always".

The Pretty House That Found Happiness

I love this cute little vintage book! I hope our kids like it as much as I do!