Ethiopia: Day 2

So today was the BIG day, we got custody of our children. We got ready, packed our backpack (i.e. diaper bag), ate breakfast, and left for the orphanage. We needed to be there by 9am so we could go to meet our lawyer at 10am. When we got to the orphanage they put us in the room that I had seen on youtube.com and other families blogs. Every time I would see a video or picture of this room I would envision our meeting with our children. Let me tell you it was better than any of my daydreams. Knowing that these two precious children were to be handed over to us by their loving nannies was much more than I could have imagined. Before they brought the twins to us the orphanage gave us a bag for each child with a traditional Ethiopian outfit in it. They are so gorgeous, I can't wait til they are able to fit into them. They also gave us back all the care package items we sent to the twins. We kept the photo books and the disposable cameras but gave the toys and clothing back to the orphanage. Then we signed the form that said that we were now soul guardians of our babies!! We changed them into clothes that we brought so that the orphanage could have back the clothes they were wearing. We then found out that our meeting with the lawyer wasn't until the next day at 11am. We all went back to the guest house to get acquainted with our babies and eat lunch. When we got back to our room Matt asked me "Now what?" which I had no answer for. I had done all kinds of research on the How to's on adoption but not the How To's on parenting. We were a bit lost the first couple of days but we soon found a routine and it became a little easier. After lunch we went shopping in the Post Office District of Addis. We only went to one shop though because it starting raining Monsoon style right before we were getting ready to leave this shop. Going to this shop was the most difficult part of our trip so far. We hadn't been face to face with the poverty until this point. There were people everywhere wanting us to buy items from them or just to give them money for food. It was very hard to walk away from them but if we gave them any thing we would have been mobbed by all the street people and with three young babies, we were with another family, in tow that would not have been safe at all. So we had to no to everyone.After that we just went back to the Guest House and hung out there. That night when the children were sleeping Matt and I would jump at any sound they made. It was really funny but a tad bit tiring too. Thankfully we learned not to be so jumpy after that first night, or we would have been the walking dead the rest of our trip.

Ethiopia - Day 1 (better late than never)

We arrived in Ethiopia at 7am and were ready to get to our guest house for a shower and a nap. First we needed to get our luggage and our visas and find our driver. Easy Peasy! While Matt went to change dollars to Birr I stood in line to get our visas. We got our visas found our luggage and found our driver. We were out of the airport at around 8am. Pretty darn good for International traveling. To say walking out of the Bole International Airport and seeing our surroundings was a culture shock is not saying enough. People tell you about the poverty and you see pictures but it is nothing until you have seen it first hand. This was my first time out of the U.S. and I thought I was prepared for what I would be seeing and experiencing but I was not. Our drive to the guest house was only about 5 minutes thankfully because we were so tired and ready to get clean. When we got to our guest house we were greeted by the friendliest people ever. They took us to our room and then were taken to the dining room to eat some breakfast. This is where we met Susan and her mom, Maureen. This is also when we found out that we would be meeting our children later that day. After breakfast I went up to take a shower and to start unpacking. Matt came up shortly afterwards but before he could take a shower we found out we would be changing rooms. This was good because we were originally in a very small room with only one crib, two kiddos and one crib is not a good thing, especially the way our children sleep. So now we were on the fourth floor and had two rooms that were connected. It was great except for the climbing the stairs carrying a child and the fact that the air is much thinner in Addis Ababa than it is in Central Illinois. It was good exercise though. We both finally did get our shower and a small nap. Matt slept fine but I was all worked up. Many feelings going on at once. One: I was ready to go home, the culture shock was too much for me the first couple of days there. Two: OMG we are parents to not one but two infants. What were we thinking. Three: I am about to meet my children for the first time in just a couple of short hours. I can't believe that we are finally here. And many more thoughts were there also but those were the main ones. At 3 o'clock we left to go to the orphanage, we made a quick stop at the Hilton so Susan could get her little girl's lap ticket verification. The Hilton is beautiful BTW and it has some great little shops in it. We finally started for the orphanage, the moment we had been waiting for for so long. I videotaped the journey but unfortunately I deleted it on accident. As soon as we got to the orphanage my camera said that the memory was full so I also didn't get any shots or video of us meeting our babies for the first time. I know, we were so unprepared. We did get shots of us after we sat down and I was able to get a new memory card in our camera. After visiting with the twins we went back to the guest house and unpacked, ate dinner and crashed. We needed to be well rested to pick up our babies the next morning.

**As soon as our computer at home gets fixed I will post pics with each day of the trip.**

Well Fall is in the air which means it is time for the slow cooker to be dusted off and put on the counter to make some great recipes. The recipe below I made last night and is so good I just had to share it with you. Hope you enjoy it as much as we did.



MOM'S TURKEY BREAST DINNER

-4 POTATOES, PEELED AND SLICED
-4 CARROTS, PEELED AND SLICED
-2 TO 3 LBS. TURKEY TENDERLOINS
-10 1/2 OZ. CAN FRENCH ONION SOUP

PLACE VEGETABLES IN SLOW COOKER; ADD TURKEY BREAST. POUR SOUP OVER TOP. COVER AND COOK ON LOW SETTING FOR 6 TO 8 HOURS. SERVES 6.

*SIDENOTE- I DID NOT PEEL THE POTATOES AND THEY TURNED OUT FINE. PLUS I USED BABY CARROTS IN THE BAG WHICH ALSO TURNED OUT FINE.*

evaluation results

An Occupational Therapist and a Physical Therapist came out yesterday for Early Intervention. Both kids did good with the Occupational Therapist's tests, and Isabelle did good with the Physical Therapist's tests but Avery is below 30% with the Physical test. He will be getting physical therapy once a week for as long as needed. I wish we didn't need this due to the fact that we have to pay $70/month for it but if it will help him no price is too much. Avery at the moment can not put himself into a sitting position if he is laying down, pull himself up to things, and he only army crawls. We are hoping that in about six months he will be close to walking. The therapist is positive that he can get to that goal. This means too that Matt and I need to do our part in helping him. The therapist will be coming to our home to work with Avery but mostly it will be to teach me the exercises we need to be working on with Avery. Matt and I want what is best for our son so I know that we will do whatever we need to do to help him gain the strength he needs to get him on track. I am only worried about having two walkers soon. LOL! Right now we only have to worry about Isabelle getting into things since Avery is a much slower mover. Isabelle is now walking with help from us or a toy walker. She is so darn cute when she is with the walker as she knows how excited we are and she gets all smiley and laughs the whole way. Unfortunately walls keep getting in her way. She hasn't quite got the turning thing down yet, but I'm sure she will soon.

Now that we are home with the twins I do not have time to keep up with the blog. Atleast not right now anyways. So I have decided that I will try and post pics when I get a chance but that will be it. Hopefully once life gets a little less hectic and I am used to having two children I can start posting about all the great things they are doing but not now. Thanks for those who have been reading and I will be posting on Facebook, it is a lot easier at the moment. See ya.

Traveling

On Wednesday Matt and I left around 1:00p to go to Indy for our 7:55p flight. Of course when we got to the airport we had plenty of time to kill before we flew out. So we went to the airport bar and had a few drinks to pass the time and to calm our nerves. Our flight to Boston sucked due to the fact that the plane was extremely cramped, which made it very uncomfortable. Luckily it was only a 2 hour flight. When we got to Boston we asked where we were to go to catch our next flight that was in 2 hours. We could not understand the man that gave us directions so we took the long way to get our destination. Matt and I made a pact that we would not snap on each other while traveling so we just laughed about our detour and finally found our destination. Our flight to Paris was nice. The flight was not full so Matt and I got a row of three seats to ourselves, which was nice since it was an overnight flight it made sleeping a lot easier. We had a 10 hour layover in Paris but we were not able to leave the airport. The airport is on the outer edge of Paris and thus not close to any tourist attractions. We wish we would have gotten a hotel room at one the airport hotels so that we could have taken a shower and gotten some sleep but we didn't think about it until it was too late. So we ended up people watching and exploring Charles DeGalle airport instead. Nothing too exciting happened while we were at the airport though. I had wished something funny or exciting would have happened though, atleast I would have had something to blog about. Our flight to Ethiopia was an overnight flight also but not as comfortable as our flight to Paris. We had a man and a young boy sitting behind us and the both of them kept putting their knees into our backs making very difficult to sleep or to be comfortable at all really. But in all our flights went well and were really uneventful. We arrived in Ethiopia at 7am on Friday morning. We were so happy to finally be there.

We are home!

Well we have been home for a little over a week, but this is the first chance for me to be able to post anything. Our trip was wonderful yet terrifying and saddening at the same time. We met some great people, but the best ones of all were the twins. Unfortunately I do not have video of our meeting but another family did get it on her camera so I'm sure when she gets a chance she will send it to me and I will post it. I will try and post pictures soon too. It has been quite hectic around here with two kids and all. Matt and I were sick for the first week back also that did not help matters any. Well I now have two extremely cute kids wanting to play so I will have to post more about our trip later. But just so everyone knows we are doing great and loving being parents.

Okay so I had a three day weekend and our computer at home was not working well at all so that is the reason for the jump from 6 to 2 on my countdown.

I also wanted to add that today the twins turn 13 months old. I am so glad we don't have to miss another birthday. This time next month they will be in our arms and home forever.

The countdown begins!

We are going!!

I just got an email from our agency that we have the August 9th embassy appt. We will really be going this time. Yay!! I am one happy camper. We also found a sitter for Tues. and Thurs. today. It has been a good day all in all. Now if only we could win the lottery so I wouldn't have to work. Of course you have to have the money to play the lottery first. LOL! Oh well for now I will work, but at least is only part time. I'm just glad that in one weeks and 1 day we will be boarding a plane that will take us to our babies. Finally the wait is almost over.

No news is good news?

So so far we have not heard from our agency that we will not be going to Ethiopia for the August 9th embassy date, but it is still early. We should know by this week if we are not going. Fingers and toes are crossed and prayers are being said. I keep saying that I am going no matter what, but realistically that won't be able to happen due to not being able to afford to stay in Ethiopia for that long. If we don't get the August 9th date we have to wait til the August 23rd date. But I am optimistic in getting the August 9th date now that all of the paperwork is in place. I think our agency director is also optimistic in us getting the Aug. 9th date. So that helps in being positive.

Matt's best friend, Adam, has been staying with us while he's been home visiting, he lives in Florida. He leaves on Wednesday so after he leaves we will be getting all the cleaning, packing, making baby food and freezer food and last minute home repairs going since we will only have a week til we leave. Matt's parents will be staying at our house while we are gone. It will be so nice knowing that the dogs will be with someone all day and that the house will be safe while we are gone. It will make for a much smoother and a little less stressful trip knowing all is well at home.

I can't wait to hold my babies! Soon very soon they will be in our arms and all the waiting, stress, and anxiety we felt during our journey to them will just fade away and all that will matter is that they are with us for the rest of our lives and we won't have to miss another minute of their smiles, laughs, cries, not any of it. Soon very soon it will all be over and we will be a family of 4, 6 if we count the dogs.

Our paperwork in at the embassy

I got an email yesterday from the National Visa Center that our paperwork had been transmitted to the U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia and then today I got an email from the U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia that they have all the paperwork needed for us to have our embassy appt. WooHoo! Now we wait to see if we can get a confirmed appt. for Aug 9th. We should know if we have the appt. sometime next week. The embassy won't do anything until two weeks before the requested date. Our agency director is positive that we will get the Aug 9th date since we were originally in the bunch for the July 26th date but couldn't get it due to the missing paperwork, which they now have so I am staying optimistic that we will be in Ethiopia in two weeks so pick up our babies. Oh wow this is really going to happen. After wanting to be a mommy for my entire life it's finally going to happen. In two weeks I will be holding my children in my arms for the first time. Tears and goosebumps is all I can say.

We leave in two weeks...

Well after a very stressful phone conversation with Expedia.com we finally have a new travel itenerary. We leave on Wednesday August 4th out of Indianapolis and get to Addis Ababa at 6:50am on Thursday August 5th. We then leave Addis Ababa on Thursday August 12th and land in Indianapolis on Friday at 4:57pm, with babies in our arms I might add. And I will not be changing these flights so no matter what we will be in Ethiopia in two weeks and two days. Our agency seems pretty positive that we will get the August 9th embassy date as long as all of our paperwork is where it needs to be and it should be by then so it looks like this is for this time around. I am frantically trying to get my job all squared away before we leave. I can't stand having someone else do my job but it is for such a great reason that I am willing to set aside my control issues this one time. I went shopping yesterday for my clothes to take with us. I really needed some new shirts and some jeans so it wasn't just for the trip that I bought this stuff for. Now to do more job organizing so that it will be done correctly.LOL!

Change in plans

So due to the 171h update not getting done soon enough we will not be leaving on the 22nd of July for the July 26th embassy appt. We will now be leaving on Aug. 5th for the August 9th embassy appt. We are extremely disappointed about this but there is nothing we can do about it, so we will just keep going and leave in three weeks instead of one. It is all a part of International Adoption. The good thing is that now we have more time to get stuff done around the house that wouldn't have been done had we left on the 22nd. We now pray that all goes as planned for this date and we get to pick up our children on the 8th of August. We will land in Addis on Friday night and meet the kids the next day but we will not take them with us until Sunday. That way we can do some stuff that we wouldn't want to take the kids to do, like go the museum and going to an Authentic Ethiopian restaurant. That way we can do those things and not have to leave the kids with a nanny they don't know. But on Sunday we will be taking our babies with us and will have them with us for the rest of our trip. Til then we will be getting our house ready for babies. Thank you for all the prayers and positive thoughts thus far.

Do you believe in magic?!

I do! I believe that blogging has magical powers. I've written about this before, about how every time I blog about something I would like to happen it happens. Well it happened again today. I blogged about not having our 171h and we should get our 171H early next week!! YIPPEE!!

AT around 3 o'clock this afternoon I got a call from an employee at the NBC/USCIS office stating that they could not find our paperwork and asked if I could fax over the paperwork so they could have it to process. Matt brought all our paperwork to my office and I got it all together and he took it to FedEx and he faxed it to them at around 4pm and at around 630pm we had this emai:

"Good Afternoon.
We received your faxed documents. I have rewritten your I-171H and sent the documents to the NVC. I have also placed a copy of the new I-171H in the mail for you.
Congratulations and Best Wishes.

Warm regards,"

I'm not going to post her name for her privacy, but she is now my BFF. She has bent over backwards for us and we will never be able to thank her enough. We are thinking about sending her Boss a nice letter. I am definately going to send her a Thank you card and probably slip a picture of us and the twins together so she can see who she helped and how much her work means to the people she is helping. We still need to make sure that NVC does there part quickly, so we are not totally letting out our breaths but we are definately breathing a little better. Thank you for all the prayers. Our God does great and powerful things and knowing that is what is getting me through all of this.

Still waiting...

So we are still waiting on our new 171H and we leave in 1 week and 6 days!! Our S.W. keeps telling me not to stress but seriously how can I not?! I am trying however not to dwell on the shoulda, coulda, woulda's of our journey to this point. Nothing can change the past so I need to just focus on what is ahead of us and what needs to be done now. It is hard but I am trying. I'm just so scared that 1. We will be stuck in Ethiopia with no certainty of when we would be able to go home or 2. Our embassy date will have to be moved to a later date. Neither of these options sits well with Matt and I. All I want is to bring our babies home. I did get an email from a woman from the NBC/USCIS office today saying that she would be putting my email regarding our case in the expedite file, whatever that means. But atleast one more person knows the urgency of our case. The more the better I say. Our S.W. says that he knows of two people on our case, so that is 3 people working on this. So hopefully it will get done soon. Many more prayers needed. Thank you.

Attachment Do's and Dont's

Do
1. Offer household help (running errands, preparing meals that can go right from the freezer to the oven, etc.) so the mother and father can spend more time holding the children.
2. Trust the mother’s instincts. Even a first time parent may notice subtle symptoms that well-meaning family and friends attribute to "normal" behavior.
3. Accept that attachment issues are difficult for anyone outside of the parents to see and understand.
4. Be supportive even if you think everything looks fine to you.
5. Allow the parents to be the center of the baby’s world. One grandfather, when greeting his grandson, immediately turns him back to his parents and says positive statements about his good mommy and daddy.
6. Tell the baby every time you see her what a good/loving/safe mommy and daddy she has.
7. When the parents need someone to care for the baby for a night out, offer to babysit in the child's home. (After the child has been home for a substantial period of time.)
8. As hard as it may be for you, abide by the requests of the parents. Even if the baby looks like she really wants to be with Grandma, for example, she needs to have a strong attachment to her parents first. Something as simple as passing the baby from one person to another or allowing others, even grandparents, to hold a baby who is not "attached" can make the attachement process that much longer and harder. Some parents have had to refrain from seeing certain family members or friends because they did not respect the parents' requests.
9. Accept that parenting children who are at-risk for or who suffer from attachment issues goes against traditional parenting methods and beliefs. Parenting methods that work for many children can be detrimental to a child with attachment issues.
10. Remember that there is often a honeymoon period after the child arrives. Many babies do not show signs of grief, distress, or anxiety until months after they come home. If the parents are taking precautions, they are smart and should be commended and supported!

Don’t
1. Assume an infant is too young to suffer from emotional issues related to attachment. Babies are not immune.
2. Underestimate a new parent’s instincts that something isn’t right.
3. Judge the parents’s parenting abilities. What looks like spoiling or coddling may be exactly what the child needs to overcome a serious attachment disorder. Parenting methods that work for many children can be detrimental to a child with attachment issues.
4. Make excuses for the child’s behaviors or try to make the mother feel better by calling certain behaviors "normal". For example, many children who suffer from attachment issues may be labeled strong-willed by well-meaning family members. While being strong-willed can be seen as a positive personality trait, this type of behavior in an attachment-impaired child may signify problems.
5. Accuse the mother/father of being overly sensitive or neurotic. They are in a position to see subtle symptoms as no else can.
6. Take it personally if asked to step back so the parents can help their child heal and form a healthy and secure attachment. You may be asked not to hold the baby for more than a minute. This is not meant to hurt you. It is meant to help prove to the baby who his mommy and daddy are. Up until now the children's experience has been that mommies and daddies are replaceable. Allowing people to hold the babies before they have accepted their forever mommy and daddy are can be detrimental to the attachment process.
7. Put your own time frames on how long attachment should take. One mother was hurt when she was chastised by a relative who couldn't understand…after all, the baby had been home six months. It could take weeks, months, even years. Every child is different.
8. Offer traditional parenting advice. Some well-meaning family members will tell a new mother not to pick the baby up every time they cry because it will spoil them. Children who is at-risk or who suffers from attachment issues must be picked up every single time they cry. They need consistent reinforcement that their mommy/daddy will always take care of them and always keep them safe.
9. Fall into the appearance trap. Some babies/toddlers with attachment issues can put on a great show to those outside of the mother/father. What you see is not always a true picture of the child. Even babies as young as 6-months-old are capable of "putting on a good face" in public.
10. Lose hope. With the right kind of parenting and therapy, a child with attachment issues can learn to trust and have healthy relationships. But it does take a lot of work and a good understanding of what these children need.

Needing some major prayers....- Updated

Okay so yesterday we finally rec'd our approval letter from DCFS and our updated home study. So Matt drove to Chicago and dropped it all off at the USCIS building. A wonderful woman there looked it all over and proceeded to let Matt know that there were a couple of things wrong. 1.) Our fingerprints with the FBI and State Police were expired 2.) Some wording in the report about our living environment were missing. So I contacted our Social Worker and explained to him what needed to be done. He sent me the forms to get the FBI and State Police fingerprint reports updated and he changed the wording in the home study regarding the living arrangements. But as of today, July 1, all this info needs to go to Missouri instead of Chicago. And the fingerprint updates take 48 - 72 hours to receive and with the holiday weekend it could be even longer. Our Social Worker is going to see if he can just email them the corrected pages of the home study and if they will expidite our paperwork due to our situations. Because, we leave in exactly 3 weeks for Ethiopia and if we don't have all of this taken care of we won't be leaving Ethiopia until it is resolved. So I'm asking for major prayers, pleading really, for all of this to be resolved before we go over there. Or to have been resolved before our Embassy appt. on Monday the 26th. Thanks to all of you.

**UPDATE: I just got off the phone with our Social Worker and he informed me that our clearances came back yesterday. So he is going to get in contact with a woman at the USCIS in Missouri and see if he can email her the two pages that needed corrected so we can get the ball rolling to get our amended 171H. Please pray that this woman tells him that he can email them and that our S.W. is able to stress to her how much we need this paperwork done as soon as possible. Thanks for the prayers you have given so far.

***UPDATE #2: Everything is now at the USCIS office in Missouri. A woman there told our Social Worker that it should be done by the end of this week and that they would expidite our paperwork so that our travel date would not be delayed. We still have a ways to go before we can breathe easy but we are getting closer to having this resolved. So we now pray for the person who will be taking care of our paperwork to be able to get it done in time. We need to have the hard copy of this form before we leave on the 22nd and the U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia needs the update to be in there computer system by the 26th for our appt. Lots of prayers still needed that this all can be done.

We got our travel date!

I received an email from our agency today that stated that we need to be in Ethiopia on July 24th by 8am!!! Oh my goodness, in one month I will be holding my babies! Matt and I will be searching for flights tonight and getting our guest house reservations made. I can't believe this is actually happening. The bad part, not really bad but anyways, is that my friend Debbie and I had a shopping date for the
23rd to buy all the necesseties we will need to take with us and to buy Avery more clothes. I guess that will need to be rescheduled or I will just have to brave it on my own.LOL. I tell you what this blogging stuff is like magic. I blogged saying it was 2 months of waiting for a referral and we get our referral, I blogged about wanting to get our court date and we got our court date, I blog about the twins 1st birthday and we get our travel date. So now off to find cheap flights. Cross your fingers for us.

Today our Ethiopian prince and princess turn 1 year old! Oh how I wish we could all be together for this momentous occassion. In Ethiopia they do not celebrate birthdays, in fact many do not even know when they were born. They do not have birth certificates as many are not even born in a hospital. We are lucky to know the date of our children's birth. Once they are home we will be having a birthday party for them (read: Matt and I), excluding gifts. I just want to be able to have pics of them with their first birthday cake. You know the ones; icing in the hair, face covered in cake and icing. Ah the joys of being a child!

Happy Birthday sweet ones, Mommy and Daddy will be there soon.

Awesome weekend

So our weekend started off great with new pictures of the twins on Friday afternoon. Friday night I took my mom to Tuscola to see her boyfriend's granddaughter in her first play. But before we went to the play we went to the outlet mall and went to Osh B'Gosh and Carter's and bought some clothes for the babies. Not that they really need anymore but oh well they got some anyways. Then we went and watched the play, which was really cute. It was "Alice in Wonderland" and Mary Rose played the Cheshire Cat, she did a really good job. After the play mom and I went to Villa Grove and met up with our cousin Carol and her husband Paul at the VFW and had a couple of drinks. Every once in awhile it is nice to hang out in my hometown and hear all of the gossip, but only every once in awhile. After we left the VFW we drove around and went by our old house. I do miss the big V.G. sometimes but mainly I miss all of my friends from my childhood and just my childhood in general really. It was a pretty good town to grow up in. Saturday was our 4-year wedding anniversary, we went low key this year. With all of the travel expenses coming up we are trying to save as much money as possible. So we have taken a vow not to eat out or buy anything unless we absolutely need it. ie: food and gas. So we just cleaned out the car we will be using as the "Family Car", then we went to the pool (we allowed ourselves a pool pass for the summer), we took the dogs for a walk, cooked out and after all that we just chilled and watched a movie. It was a Fantastic day! Sunday we went to church, then to Matt's parents house for a Father's Day cookout, after we left the in law's house went to Jupiter's II to meet up with two families that we have become good friends with through our adoption. One of the greatest things that has happened in this process, besides the twins of course, are all the great people we have met. Adoption doesn't just connect you to your children it also connects you to some great people who we are lucky enough to call our friends. We ended our weekend by just relaxing and watching some TV. It was such a great weekend! The weather was awesome and I got to spend time with loved ones. What more could a girl ask for? Well I'm sure I could think of something but I'm not going to push my luck. Next Father's Day will be extra special due to the fact that Matt won't just be legally a father he will have his children home with him. I can't wait to watch our children learn, laugh, cry and just be plain silly with their Daddy. I know he is going to be a great father and I am so happy that I get to share in the joys of parenthood with him. Hope all of you had a great Father's Day weekend.

An Update with pictures!

We got an update today!! The twins are still tiny but we plan on fixing that when they get home. Avery is only 14.7 lbs and Isabelle is 15.2 lbs. I guess this is to be expected when they are only able to feed them 3 bottles a day in the orphanage. It just breaks my heart to know that all these babies are not able to get the nourishment that they need and deserve. Atleast I know that these two babes will soon have everything they need and more. I'm so ready! Especially after seeing these new pictures. Every picture we get they just get more and more real to me and I get more and more anxious to go get them. Yesterday I sent a care package for each of them to a family that will be traveling on Tues. to pick up their twins. In the package I sent them a photo book with pics of Me, Matt and the dogs, plus blankets that Matt and I slept with for a couple of weeks. Hopefully this will help them recognize us when we go and pick them up. Needing lots of hopes and prayers that we get the Aug. 9th embassy date. We will even take the July 26th embassy date if need be. Even though the July date would mean spending about $1000.00 more on airfare we will do it for OUR two precious babies. Mommy and Daddy love you and can't wait to finally hold you in our arms.

So Angry!

In January my friend Debbie made me aware of the fact that our 171H (permission to bring an orphan into the U.S.A.) was wrong. The reason being is that on our home study it said that we were wanting to adopt children 0-6 months at referral, well then DCFS approved us for 0-6 months at referral, which in turn made USCIS approve us on our 171H to be able to bring children 0-6 months in to the U.S. Which means that our children could not be older than 6 months when we brought them home. Well anyone who has adopted, our social worker has, knows that in International Adoption most children come home older than 6 months. When this came to our attention our dossier was already in Ethiopia so I called our placement agency director and he told me to get it fixed ASAP but that it would not affect our paperwork in country, we just needed to have it fixed before we had our embassy appt. Easy peasy since our dossier had only been in country for a couple of weeks and we were expecting to wait 4-6 months just for our referral. So I called our social worker and asked him if he could get our home study changed to say we were approved for children up to 14 months old and he said he would do that no problem. Well a month goes by and I haven't heard anything from our S.W. and when I called to see how things were going with the change he had no idea what I was even talking about. Oh great! So I explained it again and he said he would take care of it. A month later we get our referral and I call him to let him know. I then find out that he still had not changed anything in our h.s. He said that it was no big deal and that with us now having a referral it would be a lot easier to get done. See in Illinois DCFS has to approve not only your h.s. but also your referral. So he was going to send our updated h.s. along with our referral to DCFS and we should be good to go. Matt called our S.W. in April asking if everything had been sent off to DCFS and he acted like he wasn't sure what he was talking about but he would look into it. When he got back to Matt he told him that DCFS had not seen our paperwork yet and that they were really backed up, but don't get worried we still had plenty of time to get it fixed. Then about a month ago our S.W. called saying that DCFS had lost our paperwork and that he, our S.W., could no longer bring up our referral information that I had sent him. SERIOUSLY!! Then on Tuesday I get an email from him that I wasn't sure about so I called him only to find out that DCFS needed an update of our CANTS report, basically saying we are not child abusers, and that they couldn't do anything until they got that. So that was two weeks right there that we thought DCFS was processing our paperwork and come to find out they weren't, but he never even told us. Did I mention that we HAVE to have this paperwork fixed before we go and pick our children up hopefully the second week of August. I know that every thing will work out it is just very frustrating to think that we paid good money to have this stuff done correctly and it wasn't. I guess if we decide to this again we will know better.

Our referral story

CONGRATULATIONS IT’S TWINS!!

March 23, 2010

At 2:37p yesterday I saw that I had missed a call from our agency and the message just said to call back. So I called expecting to learn that we needed some paperwork changed or something. Here is how that conversation went:

Me: (as the phone is ringing I’m checking my email. You know just in case. Nothing is there from AA.) Hi this is Jennifer Barbee and I had a message to call.
Radu: How are you today?
Me: Good. How are you?
Radu: Fine thank you. Can I ask you a question?
Me: Yes.
Radu: Can you keep a secret?
Me: Yes.
Radu: Seriously, do you promise you can keep a secret?
Me: Yes.
Radu: Okay then look at your email.
Me: I don’t see anything. What email address did you send it to?
Some searching on his part and me closing my email and then seeing I had one new message.
Me: Oh I see it. Oh my gosh your kidding right? (the reason for this reaction is because I was looking at an email with the subject line: referral. This is where the sobbing began.)
Radu: this is a special case in which there were twins a boy and a girl available and you and your husband were the only ones who requested this. This doesn’t usually happen so fast and there are other families who have and are waiting longer so you need to make sure not to announce this on the Internet as to not upset anyone.
Me: (a very shaky )Okay thank you.
Radu: You are welcome.

And then the phone conversation was over.

I was able to call Matt and tell him he needed to come to the office. At first he thought something was wrong with my boss because he could tell that I was upset but then I told him we got our referral and he understood my shaky voice. After hanging up with Matt I shakily called my mom to let her know that she was a grandma, unofficially of course. Then I called our home study agency to let our social worker know. Then Matt finally showed up and we sat down to see our baby’s faces for the first time together. Let me just tell you they are the most precious faces I have ever seen. I’m sure it has nothing to do with me being a bit biased or anything either. You’ll understand once I am able to post their pics. Last night was a whirlwind of tears, phone calls, oohs and aahs.

All I can say at this moment it that they are 8 months old and perfect.

Next we wait for our court date. We will not be allowed to travel in May or June due to the elections so we will hopefully travel some time after July but before December. If all goes well that is. As for Matt and I we are going to be kicking it up a notch and getting those honey-do-projects going.

Thank you to all of you that prayed for us. Now I am asking that you please pray for our babies and their family who I am sure misses them. It is really a double edged sword when you receive your referral because you are excited for the chance to be parents to these perfect little beings but at the same time you know that someone out there is missing there babes. Hopefully they will find peace in knowing that their babies are being taken care of and are loved.

Going to go back to Private

Okay so when we received our referral I put the blog on private so I could talk about it. Once we passed court I decided to go back to being public, but after much consideration I feel that the best thing for our family is to go back to private. I'm pretty sure that this blog is not that popular with people that I don't know so I don't think I am going to be cutting anyone out of reading it. I only started this blog to record the journey to our children and to let family and friends know what was going on in our adoption without having to call each and every one of them every time something substational happened. So starting Monday I am going to go back to being a private blog. If you would like an invite you can either leave a comment or if we are facebook friends leave me a message there. If you were on the private list before do not worry you will be on there again. Thanks for the understanding.

Just some words (long)

Eight years after endometriosis caused me to have to have a hysterectomy I have become a mother. I only mention the hysterectomy due to the fact that some women out there may be feeling that the only way to become a mother is to give birth to a child. Well I am here to say that that just isn't true. Just look at the pictures of these precious children, MY precious children. God has blessed us twice and I do believe that they are why I cannot conceive a child. Now I am not going to say that I didn’t have my doubts because believe me I had many, many doubts that I would ever become a mother, but I never gave up hope that someday I would be a mom.
When I first heard that I would have to have a hysterectomy I tried to stay positive, I mean what could I do? I was in so much pain that all I cared about was that after the surgery that pain would be gone. I was single and wasn’t even thinking about motherhood or what this surgery meant for my future. I had always wanted to adopt; the thought of pushing a watermelon through a hole the size of a pea did not appeal to me at all! LOL! So when the surgery was over and I found out that they were able to save my ovaries I only thought about the fact that I wouldn’t be going through early menopause. Later I thought about being able to use a surrogate. In fact when Matt and I discussed starting a family this is what he would think of while my thoughts turned to adoption. Matt and I started seriously talking about starting our family in April of 2008, just a few short months after buying our home. I started researching adoption and surrogacy. I only did the surrogate research to appease Matt, I knew with utmost certainty that I wanted to adopt, but since we both had a hand in the decision I looked at all of our options. After researching we realized that surrogacy is very expensive and you are not at all guaranteed to have a child at the end of the journey, whereas adoption there is a guarantee. So then my research turned to what type of adoption would best fit us; International or Domestic. I did a lot of research on all the countries we could adopt from and I also got a lot of information regarding domestic adoption. Then on November 16, 2008, on our way to a domestic adoption seminar in Glen Ellyn, IL Matt announced to me that he was ready to start the adoption process and he wanted to adopt from Ethiopia!! YAY! See after many months of researching domestic and international adoption I had my heart set on adopting from Ethiopia. I’ll admit it was the last country I had researched due to the fact that the children would be black and Matt and I are both blond with fair skin. I wondered; How would our family react? or How would the public react? Soon I realized that I didn’t care, this was where are children were, I could feel it my bones, but most importantly I felt it in my heart. I knew God had placed this feeling in me and soon he placed it in Matt’s heart too. So since we no longer needed to go to a domestic adoption seminar, we turned around and headed home to tell our parents and Matt’s sister that we were going to be parents to a child from Ethiopia!! (Not until we started the adoption process did we decide to adopt two at once.) By the way are families were and still are thrilled for us. They could really care less about the race of our children; their only concern is our happiness.
We officially started the process in March of 2009 and now 1 year, 2 months, 3 weeks and 6 days later we are officially parents to 11 month old twins.
So you see just because you can’t give birth to children doesn’t mean you can’t be a parent. Parenting is so much more than giving birth. No it’s not the “normal” way to have children but what is “normal” anyways. These babies are my babies whether I gave birth to them or not they are my children in every other way possible!!! Forever! I hope that this gives other women and men hope and understanding that their children are out there somewhere. Sometimes you just have to look a little harder.
We would like to thank all of you that have supported us thus far on our journey to our children. We know we couldn’t have done any of this without the support of our family and friends. We are forever grateful for each and every one of you. The best is still yet to come. We hope to be bringing our children home in August.
Love,
Matt, Jennifer, Avery and Isabelle Barbee

Introducing....

Avery David Hayder and Isabelle Jane Heyriya Barbee

While we were sleeping last night the courts in Ethiopia granted us the privelage to be the parents to these two precious souls. They were born on June 29, 2009 in Shewarobit. We have been doubly blessed and couldn't be any happier. We hope to be traveling to pick them up to bring them home forever in August. For now we wait, yet again. But soon so soon we will have them in our arms and all this waiting will be behind us and we can begin our life as a family of four (six if you count Capone and Rocco).

Pictures

This is my friend Debbie's little girl Naomi. Isn't she precious! Naomi is 2 weeks older than the twins and came home from Ethiopia a couple of days after we received our referral. I see a great friendship in the near future for the twins and Naomi. Naomi also has a big sister, Liliana, who came home a couple of years ago from Guatamala. Lili was with her Daddy while Naomi and Deb were at the baby shower so unfortunately I did not get a picture taken with her. But believe me she is an absolute doll.

One month from today the twins will turn "1". I so wish we could be with them on that day, but it is good to know that we will never miss another birthday with them. We will definately be doing a no presants birthday party once they get home. I want them to atleast get to dig in to their first birthday cake. I also want pictures of this event.

Have a wonderful Memorial Day Weekend. Thank you to all of those that have fought for our freedom!

COURT DATE!!!!

We got our court date today: June 8th. And what is even better is we don't have to travel for it. Now in some ways I am a bit disappointed to hear this due to the fact that I am ready to meet my babies, but for our pocketbook it is a good thing. I'm just glad to know that we are one more step closer to being "legal" parents to these two precious babes, of course in our hearts we already are their parents, but for the sake of red tape we must do things their (read: government's)way. So hopefully in three and half weeks we will posting photos on the blog and packing to go and pick them up. Please pray that all goes well with the court hearing and also if you could please pray for their tummy mommy, I can't even imagine what she has and is going thru.

Baby Shower

This past Saturday (May 8th) my mom, mother-in-law and sister-in-law threw me a baby shower. We had it at Jupiter's II and it was so very nice. Almost everyone that was invited came so there were around 35 people there. We rec'd a lot of nice baby gear along with money and gift cards that I have already used up buying the things that we need but did not receive. The only things that I haven't gotten yet are more clothes (we need some in larger sizes), diapers (for travel), and formula. So all in all we are ready for our babies. Let me say that again, WE ARE READY FOR OUR BABIES!!!!! I am so sick of waiting for our court date it is not even funny. The way things are looking we might be able to travel in June though, so that would be good. I would rather not wait that long but unfortunately it is not in my control, if it was the twins would already be home. I did not get any pictures of the baby shower, which I might say really ticks me off. I had my camera laid out and in the craziness of setting everything up it got buried and I totally forgot to make sure it was with me. I think some people got some pictures but I'm not sure. I will get pictures of the quilts my grandmother made the babies though. They are so gor.ge.ous. She is so talented! The nursery is coming together quite nicely. There cribs are ready for them. We got their crib skirts yesterday so last night I put on the skirts and their bumpers. Their cribs look so cute, they will look even cuter once Avery and Isabelle are them though.

So obviously we are still waiting on our court date. Noone else has rec'd a court date lately either, so I know it isn't just us. Our agency said that our paperwork is in the courts and we should get our court date before the elections, but we will see. I promise that I will let you all know when we hear anything.

Names

Well Matt and I have finally agreed upon the names for our children. His name will be Avery David Ethiopian nameand her name will be Isabelle Jane Ethiopian name. It has been a long and trying road for us to agree on the names. I'm guessing these two children will be our last simply due to the fact that we would never be able to agree on names for any more.LOL!! Well not much more to post at this point, when we have to tell I will definately post it. Til then.

more nursery pictures

Here are more, the blog is not letting me download more than 5 at a time. Sorry!

nursery pictures

Traveling update (Long)

We received information today from our agency regarding the new rules for traveling. If our court date does not come before the second week of May we will have to travel twice. Matt and I understand that there is nothing we can do about this new rule so we are just going to roll with the punches and do whatever we have to do to bring our little ones home. The money is the only thing that we are worried about and we are only a little worried about that because we know that we can do it. We have faith in each other that we can get through this as painlessly as possible because we are a team and we will do whatever it takes to bring the rest of our team home. On the brighter side we would be able to see our "chipmunk" and "bumble bee" sooner than we were expecting to. Plus we would get to do a lot more touristy things while in country than we would if we only traveled once. The reason being is that our first trip the children will not be legally ours so we will not be able to check them out of the orphanage so we will only visit with them when there schedule allows it. So that means while we are not visiting our children we can shop, go to the museums, etc. The second trip we will get custody of them and that is also a shorter trip from what I have heard. Only one of us has to go on the second trip, and if Matt is on a good job we will probably be looking for someone to go with me to pick up the kiddos so that he can stay here and make that much needed money. So who wants to go to Ethiopia with me to pick up our babies? Just leave a note in the comments and I will be drawing the lucky person's name later. LOL.

We will be taking donations for our garage sale also so if you have anything you would like to donate to us please either call me at 217-714-7932 or email me at jennifer_barbee@yahoo.com and we will come and pick the stuff up.

Thanks for all the prayers they are much appreciated!!


The following is the email from our agency:

Dear Families,

The conference of attorneys ended today and Abebe called Radu to inform him of the decisions and changes to the Ethiopia Program. Here are the findings.

Beginning the second week of May (the exact date is yet to be determined) families WILL BE required to travel to Ethiopia for the court date. The families (both parents, one parent, or an escort) will also have to travel back for the visa appointment. These two dates will be about 7-8 weeks apart.

In an effort to ensure that the court process will only require one appearance, it was decided that if MOWA does not have the required letter (often the reason for court dates to be rescheduled) , the proceedings will still occur, a determination will be made (regardless of the lack of letter), and MOWA will send the letter post-completion to the courts. The justices have said they will NOT be postponing court dates for this at all!

Additionally, it will be possible in some situations (Radu expects to have more details about this situations in the weeks to come.) for only one parent to travel for the court appearance if they have a notarized power-of-attorney from the absent parent. This does NOT affect the possibility of using an escort for the Embassy appointment. (But, at least one parent WILL have to be present for the court date.)

Finally, it was decided that the orphanages will have to obtain and produce a birth certificate for every child prior to the court appearance. In the past, sometimes attorneys had it and sometimes they didn’t (in the case of abandonment, for instance.) This birth certificate will state that this child “exists,” include basic data, and will be accompanied with a picture. (There is no expected additional wait time associated with this change.) Then, upon a successful court date, a second birth certificate will be issued by the Minister of Justice and will have the child’s family name. (The last name of the adoptive parents.)
Currently, there are two types of Visas issued by the US Embassy in Ethiopia for adopted children.
IR-3: Which generally means that the child is adopted abroad.
IR-4: The child is brought back to the US for adoption here.
With an IR-3, the adoption is processed in the country of the orphan. IR-3s Visa recipients are automatically considered citizens as they "immigrate" to the US (meaning when they cross to the US for the first time as part of a new family). This recognition only applies to the US federal government and does not carry over into state recognition (though, many states recognize the adoption based on the Visa type). To qualify for an IR-3 visa, BOTH parents (if married) or sole adopting parent MUST visit the child PRIOR to the Court.

This will mean that you might no longer need to “re-adopt” the child/children in the United States as they will have come home on an IR3 Visa. (However, each state has its own regulations, so check with your state immigration office.)

These changes, at the root, are to ensure authenticity of the status of “orphan” for these children. Yes, this may make it more complicated for some. Yes, there are some aspects of this change that may be questionable. But, at the end of the day, this will provide more assurance for the government of Ethiopia, for the citizens of Ethiopia, for adoptive parents, and for the adopted children that the adoption is ethical.

Two months down

Today marks two months on the wait list for our referrals. At the time it seems like it is taking forever for the days to pass, but as I look back I feel like it has gone pretty quickly. I guess that is the way it always is though. I'm hoping that we will not have much more waiting, but I'm also not holding my breath on it.

Matt and I worked on the dresser Saturday but unfortunately it was too cold to do anything with it Sunday. We are stripping the old paint off of it and staining it. So far we have one drawer and the dresser itself left to strip, they are partially stripped which is good. I stained 3 of the drawers Saturday but was only able to get one coat on them so Matt was hoping to get the second coat on them today, but it is not supposed to get too warm today so that might not happen. I wish the weather would cooperate with us so we can get this done and get the dresser out of the garage and be able to put both cars back in the garage. And so I can the dresser organized with our diapers. I bought the curtains for the nursery on Friday and I am hoping that Matt will be able to put up the rod so we can get those up. We bought a roller shade for the window also, but Matt is hoping that he doesn't have to put it up and that the curtains will suffice, but I want the room to be blacked out so we will see who wins this battle. (Me). I really am hoping to have pics up soon. Well that is all for now. Till next time, thank you for all the prayers and well wishes.

One year

One year ago today we had our first home study meeting, which started our journey to International Adoption. At that time I was really hoping we would be a lot closer to our babies than we are, but God had other plans. I trust that He will do what is right for us and our family.

There are rumors going around in the Ethiopian adoption world that we will now have to take two trips to Ethiopia for our adoption instead of the one trip consisting of 7-10 days. Now as of right now our agency is saying that they will not be implementing this to their clients, but if it becomes a law there is nothing they can do, we will have to take two trips. As you might realize this will be more added expense to the already expensive journey of ours. It could possibley run us an extra $5000.00 to $6000.00, but I know that we will be able to do it, God can move mountains and in comparison this is just an ant hill. We would appreciate to be in your prayers in this time of unsurity as to what is in store for us financially. We know that the children God has planned for us are in Ethiopia and we will do whatever it takes to get to them.

Last night my mother-in-law and I went and picked up the dresser we will be using as the changing table. So this weekend Matt and I will be sanding and staining it. We will also be getting the shelves hung and the blinds. I'm still looking for brown curtains that I like. If I can't find any I might look for fabric and see if my grandmother, who happens to be an awesome seamstress along with other things, will make us curtains. After tax season I will be helping my grandma make the baby wipes and washcloths. I would love to learn how to sew, so maybe this will help me get on my way. In high school I took home ec and sewed shorts and a sweatshirt but I have totally forgotten everything I learned. Hopefully after this weekend I will have more pics of the nursery to share.

Some nursery pics

Her bed is on the left, his on the right. Above her crib are pics of a baby zebra and a baby giraffe, above his are pics of two lion cubs and a baby elephant.

A close up of Africa. I was going to put a heart where Ethiopia is but I like it better this way.

So last weekend Matt and I painted the nursery. My friends were giving us one of their cribs so we wanted to get the room painted before they dropped it off. Then this past week I did this I painted Africa on the wall. FYI I had help with a projector my SIL borrowed from the school she teaches at, I am not that talented. It took me most of the week to get it done and I love the final result. I hope the babies love it too. I bought a dresser off of craigs list today to be our changing table but we won't be able to pick it up until Thursday night, it needs some freshening up but it will work great. I had bought a changing table early last year but I decided that a dresser would work out better, this way we can store all our cloth diapers in a more convenient space.

Matt had been in Florida visiting his best friend. We figured it will be his last man trip for a very long time. Once our babes come home he will not be going on a trip without me. LOL! It has been very boring without him here yet very peaceful at the same time. The dogs really miss him, of course I do too but at least I know he is coming home. He will be home Tuesday night late, so I won't probably get to bed til after midnight but it will be worth it to see him.

One Month Down

So as of today we have been officially waiting one month for our referrals. So far so good. As I have said in previous posts, our agency told us that the wait is around 5 months right now. Hopefully the rest of the months go as fast as the first one did. Once the weather gets warmer they will probably fly by, which is fine by me.

Well I got the okay from Matt last night and I bought the rest of our cloth diaper stash, plus the wet bags and diaper pail liners. So unless they come out with some cuter styles we shouldn't need to buy any more diapers, at least I hope not anyways. We now have a total of 56 diapers for two infants, that should be enough I would think. We have 27 bum genius', 8 smart pants, 8 soft bum covers w/20 snap in liners and 4 gro baby covers with w/4 snap in liners. If you are wondering how I came up with 56 diapers is because of the soft bums, each snap in liner is considered one diaper.

Next weekend I'm planning on painting the nursery and we will probably have our second crib by then also. I'm hoping that my SIL will be able to borrow a projector from her school so we can do the pic of Africa we are planning to paint on one of the walls. So hopefully by the first week of March I will have pics to post of the nursery. Until then have a blessed couple of weeks.

Passing the time

So now that we are officially waiting for our referrals I wanted to find things that I could do to pass the time, besides shopping that is. Then I remembered a book that I had read and that I had copied pages from it (I borrowed the book from the library). The book is called The Complete Book of International Adoption by Dawn Davenport, I recommend this book to anyone that is contemplating International Adoption. Here are things that she recommends to do while waiting for your referral.

1.) GET IN SHAPE. I joined a gym and am trying to go to classes 6 days a week. Key word is trying.
2.) CHOOSE A PEDIATRICIAN. This we still need to do. Any suggestions, we go to Christie Clinic?
3.) GET THE REQUIRED IMMUNIZATIONS. This one we have started.
4.) PREPARE A WILL OR REVIEW YOUR EXISTING ONE. We have talked about making one but have yet to do.
5.) FIND OUT YOUR EMPLOYER'S POLICY ON ADOPTION LEAVE. Check
6.) GET BOTH PARENTS UP TO SPEED. What she means by this is that usually one person does all the paperwork, research, etc. (i.e. me) and that that person should let the other person know what is going on, which I do, so...Check.
7.) MAKE SURE GRANDPARENTS AND CLOSE FRIENDS UNDERSTAND ATTACHMENT AND BONDING TECHNIQUES. By letting those close to know about this you are less likely to offend them when you don't let them hold your child(ren) for long periods of time when you are working on the bonding/attachment with your child(ren).
8.) READ ADOPTION BOOKS AND ARTICLES. Have read some and still reading as much as I can.
9.) LEARN AS MUCH OF YOUR CHILD'S BIRTH LANGUAGE AS POSSIBLE. This one is a little more difficult because Amharic is not a language that they have a lot of information on, we did buy a translation book and a CD to teach us a little, but only to speak to children not to the adults. Meaning that you say "Hi" to a child differently than you would do an adult. Still more to learn on this.
10.) READ CHILD-DEVELOPMENT AND PARENTING BOOKS. Still need to do.
11.) CHOOSE A NAME. In our case names. We have a girl's name chosen and it will Mya her Ethiopian name Jane, of course Mya could become something if once we see her face and we feel that she is not a Mya, so I guess we will see when the time comes. Coming up with a boy's name has proven very difficult. I like Solomon and Tyson but Matt can't decide for the life of him, we are hoping it will come to us once we see his face. We do know that he will have two middle names and they will be his Ethiopian name and David. So come on referrals so we can finally choose a name.
12.) PAMPER YOURSELF. Do this every chance we get.
13.) START A JOURNAL. Hopefully a blog counts.
14.) WRITE YOUR PARENTS A THANK YOU LETTER. Will need to get on this one.
15.) ORGANIZE YOUR CLOSETS, DRAWERS AND CUPBOARDS. Waiting for the nesting period to kick in on this one.
16.) CHILDPROOF YOUR HOME. Have bought the gates, still need to put up.
17.) TAKE A CHILD CPR COURSE. Really want to do this one and probably will once the class comes up to take.
18.) LEARN TO TAKE DECENT PICTURES, ESPECIALLY OF CHILDREN. Need to buy new camera first.
19.) PREPARE YOUR PETS FOR THE BABY'S ARRIVAL. Starting this one.
20.) TACKLE YOUR "SOMEDAY" LIST.
21.) TAKE CHILD CARE CLASSES AT THE LOCAL HOSPITAL. Looked into this one and our hospitals don't offer any classes like this.
22.) BUY A COOKBOOK FROM YOUR CHILD'S COUNTRY. Probably won't be doing this since Matt and I do not care for Ethiopian cuisine.
23.) LEARN A FEW LULLABIES AND BOUNCY GAMES. Check
24.) SHOP GARAGE SALES FOR BABY ITEMS AND TOYS. Oh I started this a looonnnggg time ago and I am still doing it.
25.) BUY A FEW FAVORITE CHILDREN'S BOOKS. Check
26.) LEARN BABY MASSAGE TECHNIQUES. Still need to do.
27.) SEND A TRANSITION OBJECT OR PHOTO ALBUM TO YOUR CHILD(REN). Will be doing this once we get our referrals.
28.) BEGIN PREPARING A LIFE BOOK FOR YOUR CHILD.
29.) PRINT YOUR POSTS FROM ONLINE FORMS. I do do this and I have a three ring binder to put them all in, in fact I am going out today to buy a bigger binder.
30.) GET A LOCAL OR NATIONAL NEWSPAPER FROM YOUR CHILD'S BIRTH DATE. Again, will have to wait until we get our referrals for this one.
31.) COOK AND FREEZE MEALS FOR THE FIRST WEEKS BACK. Planning on doing this plus the baby's food when we get a lot closer to traveling.
32.) DECORATE THE NURSERY. Have started on this one.
33.) BUY BABY ANNOUNCEMENTS AND ADDRESS THE ENVELOPES. Will do this once we get home with the babes.
34.) BUY GIFTS FOR YOUR CHILD'S CAREGIVERS AND GUEST HOUSE EMPLOYEES. Have started this still need to get a few more things but we have time.
35.) BUY AND READ TRAVEL BOOKS ON YOUR CHILD'S BIRTH COUNTRY. Check
36.) MAKE COLOR COPIES OF YOUR CHILD'S PICTURES. Waiting for them to come to us.
37.) LOOK INTO DAYCARE. Have started this one.

So there they are some things to do while waiting on your referral and while waiting to travel. I'm hoping that that can keep me busy for a month or two and then I'll have to find something else to do after that. At least it will be spring/summer by then and it will be a lot easier to find things to do by then.

Hopefully I have been able to give anyone who is also in the waiting phase some ideas to keep sane until that moment we get to meet our precious child/ren.

Small update

So I just got an email from our agency director and he told me our dossier was registered on January 22nd and that the wait times are around 5 months at this time. So hopefully we will get our referrals around June, of course I wouldn't be opposed to sooner either. Just wanted to let you all know.

Guess our Referral date

So by the suggestion of a friend, I am going to have a little contest for you all. I'm going to have a guess our referral date contest. Let's see who can get the closest without going over. Now we know that our dossier has been registered but we do not know the exact date of said registration so I am still going to count down to referral from the day our dossier was in the hands of A.A.'s Ethiopian office, which was January 4, 2010. Good Luck to you all. Just leave your guesses in the comments. I will put the winner out to the side. (Sorry no actual prizes, just the satisfaction of knowing you were right or atleast the closest.)

"Waiting Family"

So I just got the news from our agency that our dossier has been registered! What does this mean you might ask? It means we are Officially a "Waiting Family". Next step in this wonderful journey: our referral(s). WooHoo!! The parenthesis around the s is because we are waiting for one referral for twins or two referrals to unrelated children. Oh my gosh, we are there. We are a Waiting Family. Wow that sounds great yet terrifying all at the same time.

This weekend we found out there is a change that needs to be made on our 171H. It is a big deal but it is not something that will hinder our progress thus far. The main thing is that it will need to be fixed before we travel and have our embassy date and that will be quite a few months from now, so we are okay. I found out Saturday that there was a problem so needless to say I was a bit frantic not knowing what it all meant to our paperwork already in Ethiopia. But after talking with our agency director and our social worker today I am a lot better.

Matt and I talked about changing our request to only one child and then adopting another in a year or two after. But then after talking about we realized that we asked for two children for a reason and we have known for 10 months that we were going to be adopting two. We have, as a good friend of mine put it, First-Time-Parent-Jitters. It is getting a bit more scary now. We are no longer waiting for important documents, no longer stalking the mailman for that all too important envelope, we are now waiting for the all too important email telling us that our children are waiting for us. Our children, gosh that sounds awesome. I can't wait to hear mama or mommy coming out of our babies mouths. That will be a very special day for sure. But one step at a time, we need our referral(s) first. So the praying for our referral(s) begins. Thanks for all the prayers thus far. We truly appreciate all the prayers and support from all our friends and family.

Our dossier is in Ethiopia

So according to our FedEx Account our dossier has arrived in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia and is being delivered to our agency's lawyer today. So now it needs to be translated and registered, which we were told could take around 3 weeks. Once this is done we are officially a waiting family. I am, however, going to start counting down as of today for our referrals. I don't want to bother our agency to find out when our dossier was registered. Three to four weeks doens't mean that much in the whole scheme of things really. So now we wait, as of right now the wait for a referral is 4-6 months, because we are asking for a boy and a girl infants it might be closer to the six months, but we are prepared for this. We are hoping to be traveling by the end of this year. If it just so happens to happen sooner that would be okay too. I am going to paint the nursery in February. I will post before and after pictures. I bought more diapers and more baby legs, but alas my shopping must stop. We now need to start saving and paying off debt to be able to pay for when we travel. Yes I know it is still a ways away but the travel expense is not cheap, so we are starting now. If I found out when our dossier was registered I will let you all know.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!