Our Little Spring Roll

2008-04-28T22:10:00.001-04:00

Since the US Embassy, Vietnam released the statements on Friday, we have been processing the weight of the information. While nothing was new news, absorbing it in its entirety was heavy. We were fortunate to have my parents in town the last several days to talk through it all. I have also appreciated reading the responses of many other PAPs and APs. There isn't much that I can say that hasn't been shared by others.

Throughout the past year, I have become less and less comfortable posting about this journey. Regardless of the fact that I have two blogs...I am not a super open person and having an open blog devoted to something as close to us as the adoption of our child doesn't help. So, we have decided to relocate to wordpress so that we have the option to password protect posts. As we get closer to the possibility of referral, it will be nice to know who we are sharing with, and hopefully we'll do a better job keeping friends and family up to date.

littlespringroll.wordpress.com

4 months, 5 years

2008-04-14T14:48:00.002-04:00

Saturday was a fairly significant day. For anyone keeping track (which I am pretty sure doesn't include anyone other than me), Saturday marked 4 months in our wait for a referral. Referrals have continued to come, and so we hope that our wait won't be too much longer. But, we don't know. Ah, the world of international adoption....so many hopes, so many unknowns.

In addition to marking four months of waiting, Saturday (April 12) was also our five year anniversary. To celebrate, we went to Charleston, SC for the weekend and had a fabulous, stress-free weekend.

Here is a picture from the Magnolia Gardens near Charleston.

April 4th

2008-04-04T08:00:00.001-04:00

One year ago today, Nick and I put our initial application in the mail to our agency. We didn't tell most people for many months to come, but it was a pretty significant day in this journey...it was the first.

Last year at this time we thought that there was a good chance we'd be traveling right about now. But, life happens; both to us and to the world of Vietnam adoptions. And so instead we are still waiting for our referral.

The whole Vietnam-adoption world has changed quite a bit from one year ago. Our agency was already not allowing families to choose gender and within a few months they stopped accepting new applications for their Vietnam program altogether. Since then, there have been several significant policy changes and the MOU expiration creeps closer and closer making tensions high.

This is a roller coaster ride that is hard to understand if you're not on it yourself. And I hardly write about it here, so if this is how you've kept up with our experience, I apologize for the lack of full information. I feel like we've done a pretty good job with the waiting. Waiting that has become a lot more than just waiting for a referral. However, this is hard. Some days are harder than others...but we're holding together fairly well. We're learning to be cozy with the unknowns...and if I may add, getting pretty good at it.

Education Log

2008-03-27T18:22:00.002-04:00

Today I sent our education logs to our program coordinator. Our agency requires us to complete thirty hours of adoption education before accepting a referral. We've been working at this for months. This also included taking a CPR/First Aid class. We ended up taking it with the foster/adoption group at our county social services office. It was informative and surprising less complicated than the last time I took the course. Things change I guess. Actually, my first aid certifications are overlapping by one year. Oh well.

Also, several families from my agency have received their I-600 approvals this week. I'm super excited for them and hope that it implies consistent timelines in the weeks and months to come.

As for us...we're still waiting.

Three months

2008-03-14T11:11:00.002-04:00

On Wednesday, our dossier had been in Vietnam for three months. I'm excited that time is progressing. But, there are so many factors in the equation these days. With so many unknowns, its hard to know what to think these days. So we celebrate that every day is one day closer to the day we finally bring a child into our family. And, we continue to wait...for a referral and for some information from the US and Vietnam governments to make announcements regarding in-process adoptions from Sept 1.

For friends and family who do not follow Vietnam adoptions closely...the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) regarding inter-country adoptions between the US and Vietnam expires at the end of August. For inter-country adoptions to continue, a new MOU needs to be negotiated. It is unknown how long this will take. In addition, many families are waiting for approval from the US government to bring their children home. It is uncertain if the US government will continue to process the I600s and grant visas to the children or if the Vietnamese government will allow in-process adoptions to be completed after the MOU expires.

Please visit BringOurChildrenHome.org for more information.

An Ode to Faith

2008-03-09T13:12:00.000-04:00

An Ode to Faith
-Patrick Overter

When you have come to the edge
Of all the light you know,
Into the darkness of the unknown,
Faith is knowing that
one of two things will happen,
There will be something solid to stand on,
or you will be taught how to fly

Blessingway

2008-03-09T00:15:00.002-05:00

Last Sunday, I attending a Blessingway for my friend Corrie. I don't know how widely known Blessingways are, but I have been to several in the last few years. A Blessingway is a celebration of a woman late in pregnancy, and the journey she is about to begin as a mother. In addition to gift giving, we also each brought a bead and blessing for Corrie. The beads will be strung together for her to wear during early labor...a way to feel the support of her women friends. We also each tied a piece of string around our wrists. We'll wear them until the baby is born as a reminder to remember her in these weeks as she anticipates labor and prepares for the baby. This is always a wonderful time of sharing, celebrating and anticipating of the transition into motherhood.

Here are several pictures from the event...and while the pictures indicate that there were only a few friends present, there were about 15 of us there.

Corrie

Corrie is using cloth diapers and received the diapers she needed at the shower. She was thrilled.

We have several friends in this group who are pregnant. Corrie is due at the end of April and Abby is due at the beginning of June with her second daughter. Our baby will have many new friends waiting for his/her arrival!

These are the gifts that I made for Corrie--in addition to contributing to the diapers. I had a lot of fun making the bibs and "taggy"...I'll definitely be making more in the future.

So far, all of the Blessingways I have attended have been for women who are pregnant. I wonder if anyone has been to a Blessingway for an adoptive mother and what that looked like. I also feel like my women community is so spread out these days. Being new to area, my circle here is still small and my circles in other areas are still strong. I was glad to be a part of this Blessingway, but it also made me miss many of the women I would want to be at my own.

If anyone has been to a Blessingway for an adoptive mother, please tell me about it.

This Little Guy Loves His Thumb

2008-03-06T17:42:00.001-05:00

Renee & Jeremy

2008-02-25T20:35:00.004-05:00

Yesterday morning, as we prepared breakfast, Nick and I listened to this entire CD online.
I came across it on a craft blog and fell in love with the likability of this children's album. Aren't these such sweet lyrics?

Night Mantra
by: Renee & Jeremy

I will be your home
I will be your guide
I will be your friend
always on your side

sleep now in your room
quiet of the night
surrounded by the moon
till you see the light

The music you hear as you view this page is them as well.

2008-02-19T20:29:00.000-05:00

One faces the future with one's past.

-Pearl S. Buck

2 months

2008-02-12T16:13:00.000-05:00

These little milestones are comforting in this crazy process. Today marks two months since our dossier went to Vietnam.

Merry Christmas Subscription!

2008-02-03T16:02:00.001-05:00

One of my Christmas presents this year was a subscription to Adoptive Families magazine. My cousin, who adopted a child from China a few years ago, told me about this magazine a few months ago. My Mom then ordered it for us as a Christmas gift this year. Our first issue arrived this past week. I'm excited to be getting it and often stop by the website to read past articles, as well.

Elizabeth Jane

2008-01-30T10:36:00.001-05:00

Before we left Pittsburgh last year, our neighbors--Jess and Chris--shared that they had begun a domestic adoption process. At the time they were told that it could take years. So, imagine my surprise when I met their daughter this week! I was completely shocked because no one had told me before I met her in person. It was such a wonderful surprise. And she is such a beautiful baby.

I just couldn't soak it in fast enough. My eyes continued to well up with happiness as I listened to their story. I still am so shocked and wish we still lived up the street and I could be there to celebrate with them more often.

Congratulations Jessika and Chris! I am so so happy for all three of you!

Elizabeth

Elizabeth with her super cool parents, Jess & Chris.

Elizabeth with Brinnly. Since we last visited, our other neighbors, Jonathan & Kaethe, had their second baby girl. So, I got to meet two new Glenview residents this week! Unfortunately, Amalia had already gone down for a nap before I got my camera out. It is always fun to see her, too. She is such a great big sister and growing so fast!

It was really wonderful to see all of them. And extra special to have such good adoption news!

For the babe

2008-01-26T09:19:00.001-05:00

I haven't bought much for our baby. However, when I found these shoes, I couldn't resist. Somedays I have a hard time grasping that this could happen. Other days, I can catch glimpses. I'm trying to keep a positive perspective. Now, if only I had some little feet to put inside!

Reading Vietnamese

2008-01-16T08:54:00.000-05:00

I ordered a Vietnamese Dictionary & Phrasebook last week. I don't know if it is the best one ever, but I think it is definitely the cutest ever. Anyway, this morning I decided to try using it to help me "read" the Vietnamese board book that Ben got for our baby. I forgot how funny direct language translations can be!

The cover of this book (according to this dictionary) means "Color Book Word Squeeze". I am sure something is lost in translation, however, I am also sure that each page represents a color and it is in fact a book and it does have words. Squeeze....leaves me hanging a bit.

I'm not exactly sure what the next pages say. This is a very basic dictionary and either the board book is too advanced for me or the Vietnamese Dictionary feels it is too advanced for children's books. Either way, the words aren't all in there and the picture of the pink flamingos on a blue water background gets a bit more confusing when you think it reads "Classified/One's Child Young Lady/Aunt"... I may need to wait for better language instruction.

I did download some podcasts on learning Vietnamese and will work with them on a road trip that is coming up in the next week or so. I am curious what tools others have used to learn Vietnamese. Has anyone used Rosetta Stone? Taken classes? Language tapes? What is most helpful? Oh, and if anyone can translate the book title correctly for me, please do!

My Other Blog

2008-01-12T21:31:00.001-05:00

A little over a year and a half ago, I started my other blog. We started this blog--Our Little Spring Roll--as a blog for friends and family to follow our adoption journey. I've also been thrilled to get to know some other Vietnam PAPs and APs through having this blog. The plan has always been to combine the two once we bring our baby home, but that is months and months away.

As we wait for referral, there isn't much that comes up for the adoption blog. I wait. I check all of the other blogs. I process. I pray. I read. I learn. I wait. But, there isn't much to write about here.

In the meantime, I do update my other blog. And as of today, anyone who comments on that blog between now and the end of January will be entered into a drawing (for every comment left) to receive a package of handmade gifts from me. Whether you know me personally or not, please visit and participate. I have found that other PAPs and APs seem to be the most consistent people with leaving comments and I figured that you, too, should be rewarded.

Really, this is just a fun way for me to pass the time. And, if you didn't notice....today marks one month! Yay!

Four Weeks!

2008-01-09T13:01:00.000-05:00

We are four weeks into our wait! Four weeks isn't exactly one month....but it feels pretty close! It is hard to believe that much time has already passed.

Yesterday I made a "Big-To-Do" list; things to do before and after referral. We bought our house last spring and still have several house projects that we'd love to have completed before we bring our child home. That will certainly keep us busy. And of course we have a child to prepare for... there is plenty to do!

Thank you for the books!

2007-12-29T09:36:00.001-05:00

Since we first announced to friends and family that we were adopting, we have received some wonderful books for our baby. I thought I should share some of them here.

I am super excited to use signs with our child. I know that many people do and I've been inspired by the amount children can communicate before they are actually talking. My parents' good friends, Marian and Sam, sent us this book this past summer. It was our baby's first present.

This is actually a book that Nick and I bought for the baby. (At the same time we got our first Vietnamese cookbook!) I hope to collect several Vietnamese Folk Tales. So, if you know of other good ones, please let me know.

My friend, Emily, got this book for us. It was a surprise package and a great book. The best part is that John McCutcheon's lyrics and music are included so we'll be able to sing along as we read.

This is a recent present from Ben, our baby's second cousin. We just finished reading it this morning and I know it will be a helpful book as questions arise and we tell (and retell) the story. It will be interesting to see how similar it will be to our own child's story or our journey to Vietnam. I like that it is factual, but with different possibilities. It will be nice to discuss the general and specific details with our child of how this story and their own intersect. Ben is very excited about meeting our baby because he lives just up the road and they will most likely be very close friends!

Also from Ben, a great board book in Vietnamese! Although there are some strong hints as to what the words might say, we really can't read it yet and even if we think we know what it says, we need to figure out the pronunciations. So....that gives us something to work on in the next few months. I really want to learn some Vietnamese before we meet our baby. If you know of any good books or other tools, please pass them on!

This book was the book of choice in our family this year! I saw it opened three separate times this past week! We received it as a present from my parents. What is most exciting to me is that the woman who wrote and illustrated this book (Ingrid Hess) is illustrating my mom's book which will be coming out sometime this year. It will be the fifth children's book that my mom has published. The first four were in the 1980s and were collaborations with my aunt Marilyn.

In addition to these, we've received some great 2nd-hand Dr. Suess books and a few more signing books. For years my mom would get us a children's book for each of our birthdays. She has stopped doing that in recent years, but we have a great collection of books because she always looked for books related to our personal interests.

Baby's (First) First Cousin

2007-12-27T12:30:00.000-05:00

Happy Holidays!

2007-12-21T11:09:00.000-05:00

We've been officially waiting one week and two days and I can honestly say I have no clue where the time went. It seems that once we make it through the holidays, we'll be nearly a month into our wait. That makes it seem like this time may move fairly quickly. (Of course, once we have waited the minimum time our agency foresees us waiting, I have a feeling that everything will start moving VERY SLOWLY.)

I hope that everyone has a wonderful Christmas and New Years. Safe travels to all who are traveling.

DTV!

2007-12-12T12:39:00.000-05:00

Our dossier arrived at our agency this morning. It has been reviewed and will be sent to Vietnam today! Yay! I could not be more excited.

This means that we are officially waiting for the referral of our child. In the meantime, we'll also be working on some adoption education and at some point next month we will need to update our work/income status. Other than that, we wait!

Dossier is Gone!

2007-12-11T14:02:00.001-05:00

So, this morning I mailed our dossier to the agency. It feels great to have it done. My head has been swimming in the details for weeks and I am happy to be finished with it. (I hope). I did remember one minor thing that I forgot to include, but I'm choosing not to stress about it. I have a question in on the best way to solve it and hopefully it too will be off my plate by dinner!

So, tomorrow, once my FedEx tracking number tells me that the dossier has been delivered to the agency, I will be changing my ticker. It is absolutely depressing to open up the blog and see that it has been more than eight months already! There were a million things that got in the way at the beginning, but many of them we couldn't have known. I'm just ready to let go of all of that and have a new scale of time in front of us!

Express Mail...

2007-12-09T12:31:00.000-05:00

...runs on Sundays!

I looked out my studio window in time to see the local mail car turn around and pull out of our driveway, just as Nick came running down the stairs with a special package. I had to stop and think about what day it is. Sunday. Apparently Express Mail runs every day of the year.

So, it's here! We have our documents back and tomorrow we'll get a few notarizations (on non-authenticated documents), write a large check and officially hand the documents over!

I am so excited to be done with this part and actually be waiting. Recently I realize that adoption has me quite nervous. I think that as we become more and more aware of all of the risks involved, I get more and more worried about more loss. Not that we weren't aware, but the last month or so has made all of it much more real.

We have a lot of education that we need to do yet, so we'll still be adoption-busy, but it will just be wonderful to know that we're officially waiting and not just working to wait.

Family Life

2007-12-08T09:22:00.002-05:00

I haven't written in a while, because there hasn't been too much to update. Our authenticated documents are now on their way to us. I expect them today or Monday. So, we've been working on some on non-authenticated dossier docs which are now ready to go as well. Monday we'll get them notarized and hopefully to the agency by mid-week.

As many of you know, part of the dossier includes photographs of family life. I thought I'd share a few since I haven't posted many pics to this blog yet.

We wanted to include an extended family picture and since we don't have even individual family pictures to-date, this seemed like the simplest option. This was taken on our wedding day in April 2003 (4 1/2 years ago) and includes both of our families--since then Nick's sister got married and my brother and his wife had a baby.

This is where we live.

We spend the majority of our time in our living room. It is also the center of all of our holiday decorations.

And this is our kitchen. Todd, Jess & Ben (their new baby) joined us for dinner last Tuesday night. We do meals together quite often. When we first moved here, we had planned on one of us cooking Mondays and the other cooking Thursdays. But then we unexpectedly moved into their house for three months and so we ate every meal together instead. Since we bought our house we haven't found a scheduled routine but somehow end up eating together at some point most weeks.

I hope to have a dossier-on-its-way! update soon. If not, there will surely be a blog-worthy hiccup to write about!

To the Embassy

2007-11-26T18:30:00.000-05:00

Well, 20 days after I originally tried to do it, our documents are on their way to the Embassy for the final authentications. This time was incredibly free of drama. I went to the new mail center again and their calm, confident and clearly capable demeanor helped a lot! In fact, they sealed it and handed it to the Fed Ex guy in front of me. Yay! So, I guess that means that we have about 10 days/two weeks to finish up the other details before handing it to the agency.

We spent a lot of time talking this weekend and have decided to stay put. Our eyes are open, we've talked with many people and feel like we're aware of the issues, but we're also aware that there are no assurances in this process. So, we'll see. At this point we are cautiously moving forward and trusting that we are making the right decision for us at this time. If and when we bring a child home, we can talk fully about our experience.

Happy Thanksgiving!

2007-11-22T21:05:00.000-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving! I've been pretty quiet lately. We've been processing a lot and trying to sort through some new information and figure out what we want our next steps to be. With so many questions that we've felt a need to take some time to think before we act.

I am incredibly thankful to the adoption world of bloggers that continually makes us think. I'm also thankful to those who remind me that it is okay to take the information, step back and trust ourselves in making decisions.

I hope that you have had a wonderful Thanksgiving and find yourself surrounded by family and friends. And for everyone in the adoption world who is waiting (in one way or another), I hope that today you feel the peace of patience and thankfulness for each day that moves us closer to bringing our children home.

Reauthentication of the State Doc

2007-11-16T07:25:00.000-05:00

So, last week I wrote about the craziness of learning that our PA state document was authenticated with the wrong seal. I figured I'd tell you the rest of the story.

Last Thursday, I called the PA state office and talked with an incredibly helpful woman who immediately recognized that they had made a mistake. She said that I did not need to submit a second authentication fee, or a stamped envelope, but just to send it directly to her and she'd put it back in the mail on the SAME DAY. Wow! Of course this is how you would hope glitches like this could be resolved--but I'm not one to assume that they will. However, I jumped in the car, took our marriage certificate and went to the local mailing center. The other local mailing center. I sent it overnight by FedEx.

I thought there was a chance that I would see it Saturday. If not Saturday, then definitely Monday or Tuesday. And every day I came home, I checked the doors. Doors, you ask? Yes, doors. You see, we have five exterior doors--any which one UPS/FedEx can (and has) used. But, I checked the obvious ones. And every day I thought, have patience, many little things could happen, and besides....you have other significant decisions to make that do not hang on this document! So, I kept being patient (seriously).

But, this morning I woke up thinking about it. "Okay, it should have been here. Something is wrong. I should have included a stamped envelope that could be tracked so that I would know what is going on. I'm going to need to call this woman. What if I can't reach her. Can you call UPS and check what has been sent to your address? What is going on?" And then I couldn't go back to sleep. My husband, seemingly always calm, reminded me that this is small and not in need of my worry.

And then, suddenly I had a new idea. Check the screened in porch!

Only once has someone put a package inside our screened in porch--but the weather has been unpredictable and someone may have thought it was the weather-safe option (of someone too lazy to walk to the back door that is fully protected by a porch and put it inside the screen door).

So, I came downstairs and went out on the porch and there, blown against the far wall, and damp from a week of general wetness, was the overnight UPS package. Which means....it arrived last Saturday or Monday, as I had thought it would! From now on, EVERY door will be in my door check.

Luckily, the document is fine, it was in a solid envelope and is possibly less wrinkled than when it returned the first time. And, it has the correct seal.

For Our Baby

2007-11-11T16:52:00.000-05:00

This is a quilt that I began working on last year.
It is for our baby-whenever he or she joins our home.

Panic

2007-11-07T14:42:00.001-05:00

I need to get this out of my system....so here you go!

I just took what I thought was our completed State authentications to the local mail center to be sent to the Embassy of Vietnam in DC. The entire drive back I felt sick to my stomach. I didn't quite trust the college student behind the counter who was "helping" me. I don't have a problem with college students or their ability to effectively do their job. This one though made me nervous with comments like, "I can't figure out how this call waiting works." "I've never done this before." "Oh yea, I guess you're right." etc. I said, "These are VERY IMPORTANT documents and I need to know that they will ABSOLUTELY get there and ABSOLUTELY get back to me." He said, "Yes they absolutely will." And to prove it he added that his boss told him not to close the package before he could make sure it was done correctly. So, like I said, I felt sick my entire drive back to work. Panicked actually.

When I got back to the office, I checked my email. While I was running this so-important errand, I got an email from our program coordinator telling me that one of the authetnications wasn't the correct seal. Now, this is a frustration point all of its own because I specifically called that state office and verifired that if I wrote "adoptoing from Vietnam" in my letter that absolutely the correct seal would be placed on the document. But it wasn't. And now, our whole package is at some mail center with someone I don't quite trust waiting to be sent. So, I quickly called the mail center and said, "DO NOT SEND MY PACKAGE, I'm coming to pick it up this afternoon." He said, "Oh, wow. Okay."

So, I tried to get back to work and felt myself hitting a breaking point, so I decided to jump back in the car and go get it. Amazingly, I felt a bit better on this drive back from the mail center than the last. Obviously this revelation isn't ideal, but we caught it in time, and if it is what I think it is, it is the cheapest "mistake" we could have made in this part of the process. You have to find the silver lining somewhere.

So I guess now we'll just figured out what we need to do to fix this. At most, we'll likely add another week to our timeline before we send the Dossier to Vietnam.

Update

2007-11-05T18:45:00.000-05:00

Nick brought the package home from work today. All of our NC documents are authenticated! The PA document did not arrive today, as I had expected, but will likely be here tomorrow (I think).

Mystery Solved

2007-11-04T21:00:00.000-05:00

After several calls to our local mailing center, UPS and anyone we work with who may have been there, we figured out that a woman received, but did not sign for the package. A bit disconcerting, and very little help, but we hoped to learn something Monday morning.

However, we (thankfully) didn't have to wait until Monday. This afternoon we received a call from our boss, who had just returned home after being out of town for the weekend. Something arrived at their house for us on Friday! Go figure. Apparently when the UPS guy stops by the office after hours and no one is there, he just head to our boss' house since he knows where they live. Crazy.

So, we know where it is and who has it. I will feel MUCH better when we have it and we know what it says...but at least we know that can happen tomorrow. And according to UPS tracking, the other should be delivered tomorrow as well. We had decided to have it sent to work since someone is always there during the day and it was cheaper to have it delivered to a business. Next time, we'll have it returned to the house!

Where is it???

2007-11-02T21:20:00.000-04:00

It is Friday. This evening we have my parents and my aunt and uncle visiting. After dinner, dessert and wine I decided to check my email (I'm not really sure why). There was an email from UPS regarding the tracking of our authentications. Apparently it was delivered to work tonight at 7:16pm.

So, Mom and I jumped in the car and drove into town to pick the documents. I was thrilled at how fast they were returned...and just a little nervous that they were "returned" so quickly because something couldn't be authenticated.

We pulled up and it wasn't there. It wasn't at the front door, side door or back door. It wasn't inside on the front desk or any of the other office desks, tables, or floors.

I am trying not to worry. If we had to, with some inconvenience, we could put this all back together by the end of next week. But, I'm trying to tell myself that we probably won't have to do this and I am worrying for no reason. There is a chance that it was delivered to another business on the other end of the road (ours is SOUTH--the only distinguishing difference). Or maybe it's at a UPS site. Or maybe someone picked it up and have no clue how important it is.... Hopefully we learn something soon.

State Authentications

2007-10-30T21:12:00.000-04:00

Everything is in the mail. Yesterday I sent our Marriage Certificate to PA to be authenticated and today everything else was sent to the NC State Department for authentication. Both are scheduled to be delivered tomorrow.

I have to admit, I panicked just a bit walking away from the mail center this evening. All of a sudden I was worried that maybe I hadn't included everything, or it wasn't all finished, or something else was wrong. I looked over it several times before taking it, but wish I could look just one more time. Oh well. What happens now is just what it is...hopefully all is good. Our program coordinator looked over it all as well, so it probably is fine.

When we receive them back, we'll send them on to be authenticated at the Vietnam Embassy in Washington D.C.. After that, they head to our agency to be translated and then Vietnam. Wahoo! It's all coming together!

It came!

2007-10-26T20:05:00.000-04:00

I didn't expect to get our I-171H until the end of November. I'm not sure if I was preparing myself or being realistic. But...IT CAME TODAY! I am so exciting. I have had a pretty good day and just didn't expect it. I hadn't even gotten to the part where I eagerly check the mailbox everyday!

So, this weekend I need to pull the remaining details of the dossier together and get this thing moving.

As anyone involved in or following the Vietnam Adoption scene knows....there is a lot going on. I have been a bit overwhelmed trying to take in everything. I'm not sure what to even say about it. Although, maybe centralizing things can help with some of the unethical activity. I hope so. At this point I am still soaking it all up, trying to make sense of it all and formulate my own words. I have had a lot of reactions to the recent events. Sadness, fear, hope, disappointment for the families caught in the transition.

So, for the majority of you who have no idea what I am talking about, click below for a few good posts. Here and here.

Dossier Update

2007-10-17T20:06:00.000-04:00

Yesterday we picked up our notarized letters from our physician. And this morning at work I got my employment letters and an email from our coordinator informing us that our criminal reports are good to go! I'll put the letter to Register of Wills for a certified copy of our Marriage Certificate in the mail tomorrow. On my way to work this morning, I broke the dossier down into junks. Everything seemed much more manageable.

Documents we need to get:
(1) Marriage Certificate (newly issued)
(2) Criminal Reports (stamped with seal, less than 5 months old)
(3) Medical Letter from Doctor (notarized & on letterhead)
(4) Employment Letters (notarized & on letterhead)

Things we're waiting on:
(1) A copy of our home study
(2) The I-171H (government approval to adopt internationally)

Things I can pull together quickly:
(1) Notarized copy of our passport
(2) Pictures of "Home Life"

Forms to fill out:
(1) Note Concerning Adoption Application
(2) Application for Vietnamese Child Adoption
(3) Commitment on Giving Periodical Information Regarding Development Of Adopted
Child

Items that do not apply to us and therefore we can ignore:
(1) Single Parent Affidavit
(2) Power of Attorney in the case that only one spouse is traveling

Working on the Dossier

2007-10-11T16:35:00.000-04:00

This week has been a bit overwhelming in my adoption world. We received the lengthy instructions regarding our dossier specifics. I went to bed early with a migraine before I was able to see it as a manageable project. Four days later, it feels specific, but doable. I think that I am a bit overwhelmed by "time" in general. Most people have sent off their dossier within 4-6 months. We're at six months now and have probably 2 months yet (mostly due to waiting on CIS). I just have to keep reminding myself that immediately after we starting this process Nick was in a bad car accident and we decided it was time to proceed with a hysterectomy. We didn't purposefully slow things down, but we didn't push them forward either. We needed that time to adjust and process some of the other significant life experiences we were dealt. However, those are behind us. We're both feeling great and recuperated. Life is finding a somewhat normal rhythm, and apparently I have more time to feel anxiety about how long we'll be waiting to bring our baby home. I still seemed to believe that EVERYTHING will be better once the dossier is in Vietnam. I feel like right now we're just waiting to wait. I'd rather just be waiting.

So, now that my poor-us rant is over, I will say that we had the physicals for our dossier this week. Being relatively new to our area, this was our first experience with this particular doctors office and I really like them. I like them for many of the same reasons that I like our bank....they both have the personal feel of a small town. When we lived in Pittsburgh, my doctor definitely knew me and was very responsive and personal, but the other people in her office didn't seem to remember me from one time to the next. And the wait to see her was usually at least three months. Not here. To start with, as new patients I was about to get both of us appointments the following week. And just to prove how wonderfully small town we are, our doctors office does not have a notary, so the notary of our bank agreed to go to our doctors office to notarize the documents for us. I can't imagine the look I would have received had I asked someone at our Pgh bank to do this. Then again, I'm sure my doctor's office had a notary!

So, our homestudy should be sent to CIS at the beginning of next week. After that we likely have a month until we receive the I-171H. That means we have one month to get all of our dossier documents together. I've broken it into weekly tasks and figured out which documents will be notarized when, and when we'll start sending them to the different states who need to participate in our authenticating. It is definitely doable.

Original Returned

2007-10-06T08:17:00.000-04:00

They returned my expired passport!

Fingerprinted We Are!

2007-10-04T16:09:00.000-04:00

On Tuesday night we drove to Charlotte for our Wednesday appointment. We had a great time visiting with Nick's aunt and uncle and appreciated the less harried appointment day.

In the morning, we went to the Discovery Place and saw the Body Worlds exhibition. It was very interesting. Although, the several hundred students who were on a field trip certainly changed the experience a bit. There were many things that stood out to me but I think the most interesting was the wee-bit size of a normal uterus. Mine just wasn't that small. I do have pictures from my hysterectomy of the removed organ (in little pieces). I don't care how tightly you squeezed all of those little pieces together, they'd never be even twice that size.

Anyway, as we neared the end of the exhibit I suddenly remembered that we didn't put any money in the meter at our fabulous parking spot. So our "great spot" ended up costing us $25. Whoops! I have no clue what we were thinking.

For lunch we managed to find a little Vietnamese restaurant near the fingerprinting office. It was some of the best vermicelli that I have eaten. We were also excited to learn that there was an Asian grocery store next door that has both Vietnamese and Indonesian food. I figure that if we ever need a break from mountain living we can head to the lake and hit up the Vietnamese food sources in Charlotte! Do you think its too far to travel two hours for your groceries?

The fingerprinting went very quickly and smoothly. It's all electronic--which I didn't know...but makes complete sense. We were in and out in about 40 minutes and on our way home again.

When we arrived home my new passport was in the mailbox! So, we have them both--although Nick received his old one back and I did not. Which sucks. But what can you do?

I feel like we're doing something adoption related just about every day lately. It is nice to feel like things are moving forward. Next week we have our physicals for the dossier. Hopefully by the end of October we'll have it all completed and will just be waiting on the I-171H.

On a non-paperwork note, I had a dream about receiving a referral the other night. It was my first somewhat normal dream about who this child might be. I can't remember the name anymore, but it was a girl. I couldn't believe it. And we got her at the same time we got the referral. Unfortunately in the dream it wasn't all connecting though and we weren't remembering to take care of her. My family was all here and they were doing everything. And then all of a sudden I realized that this child would never know who we were if we didn't start meeting her needs. And that's when I woke up. She was a cutie though and the majority of the dream was focused on trying to choose between two names....obviously more important than feeding, changing or comforting. As silly as this all is, I imagine that dreams will just become more vivid as we get closer and especially after we receive a referral.

Well, that is where our adoption stands today. I always love hearing from others with more experience then we've had so far. So, for any APs reading this, what kind of dreams did you have about your child before you met him/her? How did they change from before to after referral?

Another Small Step Forward

2007-10-01T16:11:00.000-04:00

Nick's new passport arrived today. I didn't realize that they'd return the old as well, which is great. I am assuming that mine will arrive within a few days since we sent them in together.

It's here!

2007-09-25T18:56:00.000-04:00

We received the fingerprinting appointment letter today! Wahoo! We go next week already. I was glad to learn that it was very early in the month.

We've decided we'll make a trip of it and head to Charlotte Tuesday evening and stay with Nick's aunt and uncle. Wednesday morning we hope to catch the Body Worlds exhibit at the Discovery Place before heading to our appointment.

Promising News

2007-09-24T13:47:00.001-04:00

I emailed with our program coordinator this morning and she urged me to contact CIS about our fingerprinting appointment. I did and they responded immediately! I wasn't expecting that at all. They are mailing out their October appointments today, so hopefully we'll hear something by Wednesday. Wahoo!

Meanwhile, we should probably start looking at the rest of the documents needed for the dossier. We knew we had some time because of waiting on the I-171H and passports, but I think we should at least be aware of what is coming up soon.

Waiting-Part 1 (barely)

2007-09-20T07:51:00.000-04:00

I really hope that today is the day that we receive our invitation to fingerprint. Sounds silly, right? No, actually we need that in order for them to continue/finish processing and return our I-171H. We aren't expected to get that for another month or so, but this fingerprinting thing is a factor. I have found myself checking the mail with anticipation daily this past week. I also know that this isn't the last time during our adoption process that this is going to happen. So, if you've adopted, and you want to share how long it took for you to get fingerprinted after mailing in the I-600A, I'd love to know! Although, I do realize that every state is different and timelines have lengthened...

I think I'll do better with waiting after the dossier is sent. (Can't wait to eat those words!) However, I'm sure that the hardest wait will be waiting to travel!

Final Homestudy

2007-09-09T08:41:00.000-04:00

Thursday evening we met with our social worker for the final time. We had all of the documents we had been working to collect and handed them over to be included in the home study report. It has taken me a few days to get this post up because our conversation is a bit of a blur. I found it to be our most helpful meeting. I think this is because it overlapped with some of the books we've been reading most recently. We discussed having the referral reviewed by a specialist, bonding with our child, bringing our child home, sensory integration dysfunction, what special needs we're willing to consider and many other things.

I want to comment specifically on the checklist that we did regarding the special needs we'd be willing to consider. While I understand the value of an activity that pushes you to think and define what you mean by "healthy", this was an incredibly hard and uncomfortable task. And there has to be a better way than a checklist. I personally would rather have had space to respond in writing to each of the needs. It is such a strange feeling to check yes to this, no to that. Thanks to the blogging world, especially Lauri who has hosted some conversation on special needs, I have become more and more confident and comfortable with our limitations. We were also able to talk openly with our social worker about not only our limitations but also the awkwardness of the activity. She was very supportive and said that most people found it to be very difficult. I felt a need to qualify each of our answers. It is just incredibly hard to draw these lines knowing that ultimately "healthy" isn't what is going to define our love for our child nor his/her need to be loved. But, I do think it is important for us as first time parents, as first time adoptive parents and in order for me to be able to stay home (financially) to be with our child, that we honestly look at our current limitations. We may not always have these same limitations, but ultimately this is where we are today.

Whoops!

2007-08-29T20:32:00.000-04:00

I found this today on another adoption blog. It made me laugh. It is quite funny.....especially for those of us still in the paper-heavy part of this process. But on that same note, we're hoping to finish up our home study next week. I will be happy to have it behind us. We're headed through VA this weekend and will pick up our last background check and then be ready to finish the document collection (for this stage).

Fundraising Idea

2007-08-26T08:41:00.001-04:00

We have been tossing around some fundraising ideas since starting our international adoption process this spring. One idea that has intrigued us most is the idea of a birth country cookbook. What does that mean? Well, one of the ways I (Becky) like to spend my time is making handmade books. I have been doing this for years and have made many blank books as well as the occasional cookbook, blessing book or day planner.

We have already begun to incorporate Vietnamese cooking into our kitchen, and we hope to learn more recipes after bringing our baby home. Assuming that other adoptive parents have similar plans, we thought they might also be interested in supporting a project in which they can submit recipes from their child's birth country that they use and love. I have recently found a few bloggers that have mentioned cooking in their posts. So, we thought that maybe this is the time to put the idea out there and see what kind of feedback we receive.

Once the cookbook is assembled we will feature one on the blog and then take orders from people who'd like to have one. I think that if we had between 40-80 recipes that would be ideal size. Anyone is welcome to submit more than one recipe.

So, here are my questions: What do you think of the idea? Would you participate? Would you be willing to link to the post as a way to get the word out there?

Here's a recap in case I buried the details in too much information:
Proposal: Birth Country Cookbook
Participate: Send one or more recipes with your name, child's birth country and any other information that can/should be included about you or your experience with cooking from your child's birth country. (Entries do not mean you need to purchase the book later.) AND--let other APs who might be interested in participating know about the opportunity.
Send Recipes To: ourlittlespringroll@gmail.com
Fundraising: Purchase a cookbook--there would be a bit of a discount for those who submit recipes.

Email Us!

2007-08-16T15:00:00.000-04:00

One thing I have noticed in the blogging world is that if you have a direct question for someone unrelated to a specific post, it is difficult to do...either because I'm either missing something or it generally does not exist.

So, for that reason, I have added an email address at the bottom of the page. It may never be used. But then again, it may.

The address is ourlittlespringroll@gmail.com. Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out how to link this as an email address. So, if you know how to do that, please let me know!

Home Study Paperwork

2007-08-14T17:18:00.000-04:00

We will meet with our social worker one more time before our Home Study is completed. However, meeting with her is only one part of the process. We also have a lot of documentation to collect. So, between now and when we next meet, we are working on the following:

1) Criminal Background Checks in all of the counties we've lived in over the last seven years. For us, this equals four.

2) Guardianship letters.

3) Physical exams and the appropriate documentation filled out by the doctor. (One for the home study and one for Vietnam).

4) Getting our health insurance set up so that we can prove that a: we have it, b: new baby will too.

5) Life insurance policies. We've talked about this for years and finally got around to it just before we realized we had to in order to adopt. We had our physicals three months ago and Nick's information has been back over a month...we're still waiting on mine.

6)Update the passports. This year apparently marks year 10 since each of us first traveled outside of the country. So, we need to head to the DMV next week and get new pictures taken and mail the old passports out in order to get new ones. (We don't need this for the home study really, but obviously will need it soon.)

So, that is what we're working on. The paperwork of our lives continues. Each of these on their own doesn't feel like much. The fact that each of them also requires us to wait on other systems in order to make them happen is what gets somewhat annoying. I have said from the start that I thought the paperwork portion of this process would be more difficult for me than the waiting. We'll see how true that is when we are waiting on a referral, but at that point it really seems like we'll be on the final leg and we can just finish up some house projects, take the time to do things that will be easier to do and enjoy without a child and find ways to patiently live in the present. Constantly having to think through what needs to be done next is more annoying than practicing patience. Patience is something with which we have had MUCH experience.

Great Adoption Blog Conversation

2007-08-13T18:53:00.000-04:00

I follow several different adoption blogs daily. Recently there has been some good conversation surrounding gender selection. We're still learning a lot about all adoption related issues, however, we did feel that it was important for us to be open to either gender for our own process.

This post and the subsequent comments share arguments on both sides of this debate. (And, this happens to be one of the blogs I enjoy reading most.)

Home Study Meeting #2

2007-08-09T12:53:00.001-04:00

Last night we met with our social worker for the second time. We actually met her somewhere in the middle instead of paying her for mileage. It worked well and the salad bar was great!

We focused on each of us as individuals as well as our marriage:
~relationship with parents
~relationship with siblings
~how much our child will see the extended family
~significant childhood memories
~career experience and ambition
~personal strengths
~personal areas of growth
~how we met
~how long we dated
~what attracted us to each other
~the strengths of our relationship
~areas of growth in the relationship
~how we individually and collectively deal with stress and crises situations

And then we talked about adoption details. We followed up on some of the conversations from last saturday and talked about her adoption experiences. We also shared some of the things we're most excited about, questions we have about things we can't predict, etc.

For the last week I've been daydreaming a lot about waiting for the referral, getting a referral, the days between the referral and travel, meeting the child and ultimately bringing him or her home. I guess that just about covers every aspect of the process...and yes, I've been thinking through every bit of it!

Last night for the second (and very different) time, I dreamed about meeting our child. The first dream I had was about two or three months ago. In that dream I actually birthed our adopted child about 4 weeks early. He had huge jowls and a double chin, and not in the chubby baby way...it was a bit strange. It wasn't how I had visualized our child...but figured I'd get over that. In last night's dream, we were at the orphanage meeting our child for the first time. We were shocked to learn that the majority of the children in the Vietnamese orphanage were actually Caucasian. We received a very mature 7 year old who wanted to remain Vietnamese--in all his Anglo Saxon glory--and therefore requested that he keep his full Vietnamese name. Before having that conversation with him though, I hadn't figured out how to refer to him b/c we had thought we were getting an infant and had chosen a name for that child...which didn't make sense anymore. It was all very odd. He was a very diplomatic child who communicated his wishes clearly and respectfully. I kept looking at the other babies and thinking, I still want an infant, maybe we should just adopt two now. It was a bizarre dream that seems to prove that subconsciously I am not trying to pigeon hole our child into some ideal but instead trying to be open to whatever happens. (At least I hope that's what it means!)

AdoptPrep Seminar

2007-08-05T11:32:00.000-04:00

Yesterday morning at 6am we got in the car and drove two hours to the CAS office for our adoptprep seminar. When I had talked with our program coordinator on the phone two days earlier she had said it was going to be a small group of only about eight families. Well, there were only two families in the end. So, it was small and intimate and Great! Instead of a formal presentation, we sat at a table and discussed the different parts of her presentation but were free to ask whatever questions we wanted. The other couple is also adopting from Vietnam so everything was specific to our process. We learned a ton about what we can expect and received a bit more clarity on some of our unknowns. So, here are few things we learned yesterday:

(1) We may still get a girl. We must be open to a child of either gender, but we can specify if we want--we want to be surprised so we chose not to. However, they do still get referrals for girls and so it is a possibility. Although deep down I still suspect a boy, we really don't know if we'll have a girl or boy...and that is really fun.

(2)Although there is a possibility that timeframes will continue to increase, there is a good possibility that we will go to Vietnam next spring or early summer.

(3)We need to find a pediatrician familiar with international adoption and Asian children, or willing to learn.

(4)Many of the orphanages CAS has worked with have one or two children per nanny. Which ideally creates a better opportunity for attachment between us and our child in the long run. Apparently a child who has had the opportunity to attach to a caregiver previously will have an easier time transferring that attachment to us than they would have if they had never experienced attachment.

(5)There will be between 3-6 other families that we will travel with to Vietnam. They could be from anywhere in the states.

(6)The referrals have a lot more information than I had originally thought. We were able to see one from a few years ago and there were about three pictures, a medical history, information about the child's history (as much as they had) and a brief social history of the child's personality, preferences, schedules, etc. while in the orphanage. I think this was the thing that fascinated me the most. I probably looked at that referral 10 times yesterday during the seminar.

(7)Once we give our dossier to CAS they will review it and send it to Vietnam either that day or the next and at that point we'll start our wait for referral.

(8)We have so much more to learn...about the process, attaching to our child, raising an adopted child, etc. But also about the Vietnamese culture. We borrowed some materials from the CAS library to help us out a bit.

This is just a brief list that pertains more to the process than to the other aspects of adoption. I felt like we learned a lot of other things such as suggestions for adapting to our child and helping our child to adapt to us and our home, adoption-friendly language, and much more.

I think I mentioned this before, but our little hiatus from the adoption process during my surgery and our coming home and developing a rhythm again really made it all feel like a far off possibility. Yesterday made it much more really and exciting for both of us.

This morning we started our first house project which will eventually be our nursery. For the last months it has been our guest room, and we had decided that once we saw a lull in visitors, we redo the soon-to-be nursery before moving ourselves into it and redoing our own bedroom and bathroom. This morning as we were stripping the wallpaper I said to Nick, "This is the first step in creating our nursery!" While we most likely will not set it up as a nursery until we have our referral, it is exciting to be starting the process now...even if we just do little by little.

Home Study Meeting #1

2007-08-02T22:00:00.000-04:00

We met with our social worker tonight. It was really comfortable. Not at all intimidating and very casual. She was very friendly and an adoptive parent herself. In fact, she has a 5-year old from Russia and is in the process of adopting a second child from Russia as well. And, she has worked with CAS on both adoptions. It is nice to talk with someone who is currently doing this, familiar with our agency and also very aware of the entire process/experience.

Here is a list of some of the things we discussed:

~Talking to our child about being adopted.
~Talking with our child about his/her birth parents.
~Meeting our child for the first time.
~Adjusting to our child.
~Expectations.
~Grieving infertility.
~How we plan to include our child's heritage in their/our lives.

I have been really excited again this week as we begin the home study and prepare to head to the agency for a weekend seminar on Saturday. With all that we have had going on over the last months (and the reality of time line possibilities) bringing home a baby has felt really far away. Meeting with the social worker and preparing to meet our program coordinator and other families adopting through CAS has been really good.

Back on schedule

2007-07-31T19:07:00.001-04:00

This Thursday we are having our first home study appointment. I'm really excited to meet our social worker and start the process. In addition, we are headed to an adoptprep seminar this weekend with our agency. I'm hoping to meet some other adoptive parents and learn more. I'll update soon....

Change of Plans

2007-07-18T19:21:00.000-04:00

We canceled our home study visit for this evening.

Nick's grandmother passed away early Tuesday and so we're preparing to go be with family for a few days. Last month we were able to visit with her a bit while we were in town. She was so sharp and seemingly healthy. The news of her death came as a bit of a shock to us. And so, we make an unexpected, yet important trip home this week.

We will reschedule our home study after we return and life once again finds it's balance.

Timeline

2007-07-12T10:51:00.001-04:00

Many of you have asked us at different times what our timeline looks like for the adoption. As a side note, let me also clarify that the caterpillar Nick and I are so leisurely walking past at the top of site counts up from the day that we mailed in our original application to CAS.

The estimated process times have increased from when we started looking into the program, applied and began the process. When we started looking at CAS's program last winter, the wait time for referral after submitting the dossier to Vietnam was 1-5 months with a 1-2 month wait for travel after referral. Most people had their baby with them within 10 months of submitting the original application to CAS.

By the time we sent in our application, the wait time from dossier to referral had increased to a 3-6 month wait.

As some of you may have noticed on their website, CAS has recently put a temporary hold on accepting new clients into their Vietnam program because of increased interest in the program. This began on June 30th, and therefore does not effect our participation in the Vietnam program. We can only speculate on how it may effect our process: (1) possibly things are moved more quickly in order to reopen the program--I don't even know that this is possible, (2) We are sped up or held back in order to have specific families travel together or (3) with increased program numbers, things may take a bit longer. I did notice this morning though that the wait from dossier to referral has been increased again to a 3-9 month wait and a 6-16 week wait from referral to travel.

In order to submit our dossier to Vietnam, we have some paperwork take care of including our home study, fingerprinting, dossier document collection, and the I-171H. A lot of this is stuff we can move forward by just doing it, however the I-171H is the result of submitting the I-600A. It is filed with the CIS (U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services) and can take anywhere from 90-120 days to receive the subsequent I-171H in return.

We originally mailed our I-600A to Charlotte, NC on June 8th. It was returned on the 15th and picked up by us on July 1st at the post office. Apparently we forgot to date one of our signatures. We resent it on July 2nd and they received in on July 3rd. It was stamped at the original reception (June 9th) and so we don't know if the 90-120 days will start on June 9th or July 3rd.

So, with all of those factors in play, I thought I would play out the shortest and longest scenarios for us to meet the babe.

If everything moved as quickly as possibly:
I-600A received June 9th, receiving the I-171H 90 days later = Sept 6th
If the dossier is submitted by Oct 1st and we get a referral in 3 months = Jan 1st
If we travel 6 weeks later = Feb 12, 2008

If everything is drawn out and happens at the end of the suggested times:
I-600A received July 3rd, receiving the I-171H 120 days later = October 30th
If the dossier is submitted by Dec 30th and we get a referral in 9 months = Sept 1st
If we travel 16 weeks later = Dec 22, 2008

That is a fairly large spread. I think that either one of those dates is unlikely and that it will happen somewhere between. We're hoping to travel sometime next spring, but who knows. Maybe once our dossier is submitted we should let you all guess our referral date and then whoever is closest will get something from Vietnam. We could do the same with naming the travel date as well. Could make things fun.

Home Study

2007-07-10T10:21:00.000-04:00

Our first home study appointment is scheduled for next Wednesday. We'll meet with our social worker three times. The first will be at our home and the following meetings will happen somewhere between our homes. (We pay mileage for her drive, so this makes the most sense for all of us.)

I am looking forward to meeting here and having some guided conversation around adoption. I talk about it all of the time, but it feels a bit difference to sit down and work with someone who helps to educate adoptive parents on a regular basis. I recognize that for many people the home study may be a bit daunting, especially if you think of it as an approval process. Our communications with her so far have been really good and we both consider this to be an opportunity for guidance and furthering our own understandings. So, we'll see how it goes next week and let you know.

Adopting!

2007-07-03T18:06:00.000-04:00

Almost three months ago Nick and I began the process of adopting a child from Vietnam. We knew that we wanted to adopt internationally for several reasons. First of all, we both had amazing experiences in our respective abroad stays and got excited at the idea of incorporating another culture into our daily lives. Secondly, we've been through enough with trying to start a family: 1.5 years trying to get pregnant, and 2 uterine surgeries and finally a hysterectomy. For us, international adoption seems like a more predictable process.

We chose an agency before we chose a country. After some research and references, we both felt that CAS was our agency. They currently have 11 different country programs. However, each country has different adoption eligibility standards, processes, and child availability. We chose Vietnam because children could be adopted as early as 4 months and the process seemed reasonable--each of our references had a 10 month process from application to returning home with their child. In addition, Vietnam had recently mandated that childless couples must be open to a child of either gender because of the number of boys in need of adoption. If we were having a biological child, we would not have a choice in gender, and so it seemed appropriate to follow a process that needed people to be open. We expect we'll get a boy--but who knows, we may be surprised. AND, as a bonus, we both LOVE Vietnamese food!

We decided to start this blog now, fairly early in the process, so that we had a resource for friends and family. We'll post as significant things happen. We're open to any questions/comments you have regarding our process, decision or whatever else comes to mind.