Paper, Paper EVERYWHERE!

So we are nearing the end of the Paper chase or some call it Paper Pregnancy.  Basically how the adoption works is you pick your agency.  For us it was America World Adoption Agency www.awaa.org   We did a ton of research and after hearing the testimonies of personal friends that had adopted through them we felt confident in our decision.  

We then reviewed all the countries that we could adopt from and after much prayer we decided on Ethiopia.   I'll have to share later why we decided on that country.    We received our welcome email and the paper pile started!    All adoptions require paperwork.. international ones from what I gather require a lot more!   From background checks, medical check ups, financial records..(all of which need to be notarized) our government and the government that we are adopting from want to make sure that we will responsible, loving, stable parents.   We have been working pretty steady on this paperwork since February.   What I thought would take 3 months has taken a bit longer...  We're at 6 months currently and we submitted 2 weeks ago the I600A  which is a federal document that is required to pass embassy and legally bring our children back to the US.   We still need to be fingerprinted and are waiting for the governments permission to do so.  So I'm hoping this will be wrapped up in the next month.  

All of this paperwork is referred to as the Dossier.   The  Dossier is submitted to our agency and after an installment payment is made is then shipped off to Ethiopia.   Once in Ethiopia it is reviewed (which can take months and months) and then per our requests children are then matched to us.   This stage is called the Referral.  We receive a file of information on the children and pictures.  We then prayerfully will make the decision to move forward or to wait for a different referral.   Upon acceptance, another payment is made and then we wait for a court date.  Once a court date is set, Josh and I will travel to Ethiopia to meet our children for the 1st time!!  We will be in the country for around a week and upon passing court the children are legally ours.  But then we go back to the U.S. WITHOUT our precious children to wait 6-8 weeks for our embassy date.   We then fly back to Ethiopia to pass embassy and bring them back to the U.S. for good!  There is a process called readoption that takes place once you return to the U.S... but I'll save that for when that happens since I don't know too much about it all yet.   I'm putting together a timeline and will put it on a side post in the future.

'He predestined us to be adopted as His sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance to his pleasure and will."-Ephesians 1:5