The Way I See It #208

My sister-in-law brought me a paper cup from Starbucks today...I wondered why...but this is the quote that was on it:

"I wish couples who desperately take every means to conceive a child would realize that adoption is a wonderful alternative. A child who becomes your child through adoption completes a family. Just as when you commit to your spouse or partner, there are no biological ties, yet a family is formed. This child enters a family the same way! It is not blood and flesh that form a family, but the heart."...Written by Starbucks customer, Michele Johnson

Agency...

I just found out (now that our dossier is almost finished) that our agency is actually working in partnership with another "sister" agency...Adoptions International Inc. out of Dallas, TX. Adoptions International is the agency actually re-licensed to travel to Vietnam. I was just wondering if anyone else out there has experience working with partnership agencies like this or Adoptions International Inc.. I'm not sure how the "sister-agency" thing works and I'm very curious. My agency hasn't been terribly helpful in explaining this process in plain English. Any suggestions or information????

Thanks!!!

Letter from the doctor...almost in my hands

We dropped off the form letter for our dossier at our doctor's office over a month ago. The letter was already written...he (a.k.a. his office staff) just had to re-type it on letterhead and fill in the blanks with our name, DOB, etc. then sign it and notarize it. The office has a notary, so it wasn't a problem...until...they noticed that per the directions from our agency, the notary couldn't expire within 12 months of the date it's done. The notary at their office was 12 days short of that cut off. Sooooo, they were "working on finding another notary" within their network (a large medical group) in our area. Apparently, most of the people who are notary's got their commission at the same time, therefore, they all expire at the same time. I spoke with the office manager last week, who had clearly forgotten about it, and begged her to just have our doctor take the letter to his bank to have it notarized!!! I said I'd even pay for his expenses...mind you, he is a doctor...I work in a public school :) Anyway, I called to "follow up" today and she said they finally lined someone up to come to their office this Thursday to take care of it...Believe me, I'll be on the heals of that notary to pick up the paperwork! Good news (odd I'm calling this good news) but our I71-H shouldn't be back for a week or two so I really have some time, but I wasn't going to tell the doctor that! AHHH! I'm so ready to be done with this paperwork!

We've been fingerprinted!

We had our fingerprinting appt. today at noon...we were a few minutes early and were back out the door before noon! It took about 10 minutes. I know two people who have recently been fingerprinted (within the last three weeks) at the same immigration office and they both got there I71-H form within 10 days, which is amazing! The I71-H form is the last piece of paper we need for the dossier to be sent to Vietnam. We're hoping for the same speedy return! Wish us luck!

The story of Ella's bedding

I'm excited that we decided to post a picture of her bedding...thanks for the nice comments. There's a little story behind the beautiful work. Ed and I remodeled the nursery a few months ago and we decided we should pick the bedding so we could paint the room once. We went shopping and were less than impressed with the selection at the chain stores...and I wasn't going to pay $800 for a set I "kind of liked" at a boutique. So, we set out on a mission to find brown and pink fabric that was somewhat modern and looked very tailored for my mom to sew into a beautiful crib set. Once we got into shopping and designing, we decided...we may be onto something here. So, my mom and I decided to start our own little home-based company to make custom and one-of-a-kind crib sets. My mom is retired and this is a great project for her and I desperately hope to be able to stay home with Ella and a future sibling, so we are praying that this works out and can be our "new job". We'll see what happens :-)

A sneak peak of Ella's crib bedding...

My very talented mother has just finished sewing this for us. This picture is on the crib at my mom's and we don't think it looks great with the cherry stain. Ella's crib is white, which we think will look much better...but I couldn't resist showing it off.

Some history on us for those of you who are new to our site

Hello,

Well, it's official...I'm totally addicted to everyone else's blog online. It seems that there are several people who have recently gone to Vietnam or are going soon, which means there are great pictures of beautiful babies!

I have just added our blog site address to a large list of Vietnam adoption blogs. Most of the visitors thus far know us, so we haven't had to really introduce ourselves...for those of us who are new to our site...welcome and I hope you have wonderful stories to share!

A little bit about us...Ed and I met on a blind date (set up by a mutual friend) in 1996 when we were in high school. We have been together ever since. We got married in 2002 and in 2005, we decided to start our family. It was much harder than expected and instead of turning to the doctors, our hearts lead us to adoption. We first looked into international adoption, then foster care to adoption programs with the state, and then we came back to international adoption. We are young and the children that were able to be adopted locally, were typically over the age of 5 which wouldn't have been a good fit for us.

We did some searching into different countries and talked to as many people as we could. We quickly set our hearts on Vietnam. There was just something about it that felt right. We picked a very small agency close to our house to work with. They have a really good track record of getting though the red tape quickly. We submitted our formal application to them on October 24th and had our final homestudy appointment on November 29th! We began our dossier on December 12th and we go to get fingerprinted next Friday (1.26.07). I was hoping our appt. would have been earlier but with the holidays, I think things got backed up.

So, we are trying to keep ourselves busy. We've decided that we own way too much "stuff" and have decided to simplify a bit in order to make our house a little better for baby Ella. We are also just embarking on a small remodel. We are tearing down the cracking plaster walls and re-drywalling the hallway and our bedroom... We have been wanting to do it for about 2 years now and with the baby coming sometime in the near future...we want the dust to settle so we can just enjoy her!

Well, that's enough about us :). I continue to hope and pray for those of you going through the same process...I am amazed with the circle of people out there who are acting as such a great support group for eachother.

I'll update again when we get some more news.

-Jenna

Progress...

Good news...we got our fingerprint appointment today!!! We go to get them on Jan. 26th. We're at a stand still until we get them back, but we are just happy we have a date in our minds and can look forward to to the next step...oh, and I can stop running to the mailbox everyday :)

We are also happy because we have met another young couple in the area going to Vietnam through the same agency. We are so close to eachother with our paperwork, that our agency thinks there is a chance we could be traveling together, which would be great. We are happy that Ella will have another friend in the area!

Hope everyone is having a great new year!

Passport #2 is here!

Good news...we got my passport today! We are just waiting for two letters to come back...I was told they would both be done by Friday! Oh, and we're still waiting for our fingerprinting appt. but so far, so good! I think our dossier (minus fingerprinting which is out of our control) will be done this weekend!