Immigration Approval

Woohoo! Our immigration approval form came in the mail today!  (Though the only name you see in the photo below is Mark's, my name is there farther down the paper.)  Thanks to all of you who have prayed with us for this.  We are very thankful to have it and excited to move forward in this process.



The next step is to get our dossier (doss-ee-ay) together and sent to Hungary for approval.  For the last several days, we have been working to get this ready to go.  We have most of what we need and will finish collecting the rest of it as quickly as possible.  We will be also be talking with our worker at Lifeline after Thanksgiving to determine when we will send it overseas.

Learning To Ride

Let me start by saying that we don't have any new news right now about the immigration or grant applications.  I did speak to someone last week from one of the grant/loan agencies to verify some information.  Based on what I was told during that phone call, we should hear something from them in the next week or two. This particular group gives interest free loans that are based on the adoption tax credit: they loan you (interest free) a certain amount of money, and you can pay it back after the adoption when you receive the tax credit.  It would not cover all of the cost but would help tremendously.  Like all the grant/loan companies, they usually have more applicants than money.  Please pray with us about this possibility.

As you may have guessed by the photo, Mark is learning to ride the unicycle.  He has had a desire to learn to ride one for several years, so he decided also use it as a tool to raise money for our adoption expenses.  This fundraiser is not planned until the spring  (late March or early April is the thought right now): his plan is to get sponsors (like a bike or walk-a-thon participant would) and ride the unicycle for a specific number of miles.   There are many details to work out, and we do not have all the plans made as of yet, but we thought you might enjoy an occasional update as he learns to ride and prepares for it.

Mark had never been on a unicycle until he purchased this one.  The above photo was taken a few days after he began learning to ride when he still needed to hang on to stay on.  He has made some great improvements since then and can now ride a good distance.  In this you tube video, he is riding on unpaved ground which is quite a bit more difficult than riding on the road but is good practice for him.  Enjoy!

Forever Families...Making A Difference

November is National Adoption Month.  In the adoption world, it is a time to get the word out about orphans, raising awareness about the need that the fatherless around the globe have for forever families, as well as raising needed funds to make this a reality for these children.

Featured today on the how to be a dad today website is a podcast interview from Craig Stewart whose family has become the "forever family" for two children, one of them with special needs.  It isn't always easy, but there are blessings in this journey too.  Follow the link below to listen as he shares from his heart a glimpse of their "making a difference" story.

http://www.howtobeadadtoday.com/2013/11/04/episode-28-parenting-a-special-needs-child/

I-800A Status Update

Sometimes silence is golden, and sometimes... it's not.  Things have been pretty silent for us in the adoption arena these last few weeks.  The short story is that we are still waiting to hear about our application.  For the slightly longer story, read on.

This past Monday I called and spoke to a lady in the adoption department of US immigration.  Our case has not yet been assigned to an agent, so the paperwork is just there until it is our turn to have our information reviewed. 

On the positive side of things, the woman I talked to did tell me that it is taking about fifty-five days from the date of application to get a decision from them. That time frame for us would be somewhere around November 22nd, though it is not a guaranteed date.  It is encouraging to know that we have a good chance of hearing some news regarding our approval for international adoption before January. (To read more about our USCIS process, see here and here.)  We would love to have our immigration approval to be grateful for during Thanksgiving week!

USCIS Fingerprinting

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free..."  These are the words we saw written in the room where swearing in ceremonies happen in the United States Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) building.

Yesterday began early...4:15 a.m. to be exact.  We had a 9 a.m. appointment at the USCIS office that services our county.  Why are we up so early then?  Because that office happens to be 2-1/2 hours (one way) from our house, and we had rush hour traffic to contend with as well.  Mark and I dropped off our children (The paperwork requested that due to limited seating availability, we not bring anyone with us that did not need to be there for the appointment.) at my sister-in-laws' house and started the drive.  

We arrived 30 minutes early and went through security with our appointment notice and ID, (You are not guaranteed admittance into the building without your appointment notice and an ID.) and were seated in the room where swearing in ceremonies for new US citizens is done.  Our US flag and emblems from each of our armed forces are on display, along with the phrase quoted at the beginning of this article.  Unfortunately, no photos are permitted in the building, so I do not have those to share.  Mark commented that we were seated in a room that is important to a lot of people, and where they have become a US citizen.  Though in some ways the room was nondescript, it reminded me that for some, this room represented a dream come true. What a privilege it is for us to have been born in this great nation!

 By Jnn13 (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 

We were called in to a smaller room a few minutes before our 9 o'clock appointment time, given a short form to fill out, and then called to a kiosk where an attendant took our digital fingerprints.  Within twenty minutes, our appointment was completed, and we were on our way home. It was a five hour round trip for digital fingerprints! 

Now, we are again at one of the many waiting stages during the adoption process.  It has been said that adoption is the "paper pregnancy", and that has been very accurate so far.  Fingerprinting was the last of what was needed for the completion of our immigration application: now, we wait for our case to be assigned and approved or denied.  We have recently learned that immigration processes seem to have been very slow lately, taking up to four months for a verdict.  If ours takes that long, it could be January before we know if we have immigration approval or not.  Please pray with us for two things:1) approval from immigration for an international adoption and 2) that our approval will not take such a lengthy time to process.  

We will continue to keep you updated on how things are progressing.

USCIS* Notice

 Triple Falls, DuPont State Forest

Today's update is short with only a little bit to tell you about, but it's part of the process, so...

We took a mini vacation for three days this past week (which is not part of the adoption process :D.  We had a great time, and I will include a few pictures of out trip at the end of the post.  The picture to the left was taken by Mark).  When we came home, there was a mail notice from USCIS* acknowledging receipt of our I-800A (Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country) form.  We were also informed that USCIS* will schedule bio metrics (in plain English, electronic fingerprinting and/or photograph) appointment.  We should receive the notice for the time,date, and place in the mail - hopefully sooner rather than later, but you never know.  This notice is not an approval from immigration for the adoption but we know that they have our application! Please continue to keep our immigration approval in prayer as we wait for a decision to be made (yes or no...of course, we need/want a yes!).

We are also working to get grant applications out.  We have mailed two of them out and have complete a third online.  There are three or four more that we hope to get in the mail in the next week or so.  We will probably not have any information regarding the applications we have sent out for eight weeks or more. Thank you to those who have provided the requested references for us to send in with the grant paperwork. Please pray that we will be able to be approved for one or more grants: this would be a tremendous help for the adoption costs.

Thanks again for joining us!

* United States Citizenship and Immigration Services

 High Point, DuPont State Forest

 Triple Falls
(It rained at the beginning of our hike, so we were a bit damp.)

 At the Apple Orchard

Immigration Paperwork Is In

By Jonathan Joseph Bondhus via Wikimedia Commons

     Since the last time we updated you, we have received the hard copy of our home-study.  Yay!

     Today, we received an email from Lifeline stating that our next batch of paperwork had been received by them and they have submitted it to immigration.  We submitted form I-800 A along with copies of our birth certificates, marriage license, home-study, and the immigration application fee.  Form I-800 A is used for those who are planning to adopt from a Hague Convention country.  As stated on the I-800 A application form, this is basically  "for determination of suitability to adopt a child from a convention country". So, now we are waiting for approval from the US immigration office to be accepted to adopt internationally.  The adoption process is full of paperwork and waiting!!  Please pray with us that we will be approved through US immigration without a problem.


     And...speaking of paperwork, we are now collecting what is needed to complete our dossier (pronounced doss-ee-ay).  The dossier is a collection of information about us that will be sent to Hungary and translated into Hungarian for approval from Hungarian officials for us to adopt from their country.  (Once you are approved by the US for adoption from a particular country, you are likely to be approved by that country for adoption.)  Many of the same pieces of information that we have already collected, we will need to get again.  We will need another medical form from our doctor (this is time sensitive and cannot be done too early or it will "expire"), certified copies of birth certificates and our marriage license, financial  information, immigration approval form (once we get it), photos of ourselves and our home, copies of our passports, our home-study, and the dossier fee (there is a fee for pretty much everything you submit throughout the adoption process) are all included in the dossier.  If you are new to the adoption process, I recommend that you ask your placement agency at the beginning of the process (before you do the home-study) how many certified copies of your marriage license and  birth certificates you will need for the adoption process.  You may be able to avoid having to get this information multiple times and it is likely to be cheaper to get all the copies you need at once.

     We are excited about the progress that has been made in the last month and look forward to moving forward in the months ahead.