I am an idiot

June 12, 2010

So... for the past 2 weeks, I've been waiting... VERY impatiently... for our fingerprint appointment. I know exactly how many days are left until the appt. I'm SO excited and hopeful that the prints clear quickly and our officer can approve our I800A ASAP.

So, what did I do today.... Went out in the yard, dug around in the mulch and pulled weeds. Without gloves. And what do I have now... finger pads FULL of dirt... dirt that can interfere with the delicate fingerprint machine... dirt that's so ground in it won't come off with several rounds of soap and water... dirt that I can NOT scrub off too vigorously bcs that too could impact the prints.

Now... anyone who's visited our home knows that gardening is no where near our forte. We probably weed about twice a season... so WHY in the WORLD did I pick today??? Ack! Why didn't I realize what I was doing to my fingers!!

I've got three days to hope that I haven't screwed things up too horribly... if my prints fail and I need to wait for another appt, that just more weeks that Jack has to stay in an orphanage. That will be a horrible feeling. For the next three days, I'm on a strict regimen of applying Corn Huskers Lotion, which apparently is highly recommended by the fingerprinting folks for being great for prepping your fingers for prints. Please please please let this work...

A mixed bag

June 9, 2010

Exciting day - for both good and bad reasons. Lets start with the good news...

Today our entire dossier (minus the I800A/I797C we are waiting on from USCIS) arrived at our agency. It will now undergo a series of multiple reviews to make sure everything is in perfect order. Here's hoping I didn't make some crazy mistake somewhere down along the line... I'll breathe a lot easier once I get confirmation from them that everything looks good. Its quite a milestone to send this huge bunch of precious papers off to the agency... I was freaking out the entire 24 hours that it was in transit. What a relief it was to get the "Dossier Rec'd" email from them today!

So now the bad news... I emailed USCIS to determine whether our I800A case had been assigned to an officer yet. The officer is the person who reviews the case and all supporting materials, and makes the determination of whether we are approved to immigrate a child into the US. You can't get any movement until you are assigned an officer. So anyways, I emailed my inquiry and received a response from our officer (yay!). Unfortunately, she told me that she issued us an RFE ("Request For Evidence")... our homestudy contained some verbage that apparently it shouldn't have (even though our agency has sent many many homestudies with the same verbage and had no issue... apparently we got lucky. ) Normally, an RFE means a delay in getting your I800A. In our case, since we are still waiting on our fingerprint appts, hopefully everything will be resolved with this RFE before it causes us any delays. We have an amazing officer, thankfully... when she emailed me, she told me about the RFE but also told me that she had already contacted my agency, told them what needed to be fixed, and knew that they would be sending it along soon. It was like a major crisis that was handled completely by someone else... Normally, the adoption crisises are all on me, so its nice to breathe easy on this one.

No go on the fingerprinting

June 2, 2010

Well, we tried to walk-in for our fingerprinting with USCIS today and failed miserably. DENIED. Unfortunately, we picked a bad day to walk-in.. the office was getting a new fingerprinting machine installed that very day. I should have volunteered to wait for the install and be the first set of prints on it, but didn't think of that until we were leaving. They were none too thrilled that we even were trying this, so I'm not sure that would have worked either. Oh well... at least we know we did all we could to get to Jack sooner, now we just have to wait for our appts in a few weeks.

Finally got our fingerprint appt notices

May 30, 2010

After waiting nearly a MONTH, we have finally gotten our appt notices for fingerprinting with USCIS. Unfortunately, we still have a ways to go... our appts aren't scheduled until June 15. The I800A can not be approved without a cleared set of prints from both parents, so this is going to be the long-pole in the process. Other families have had good luck trying to walk-in earlier than their appt time in hopes of expediting the process, so we're going to try that next week. Here's hoping we get a very kind officer who's willing to help us

Happy Birthday to our son!

May 15, 2010

Today is Jack's second birthday... Happy Birthday little man!

Here are a few pics from his party with the cake we sent. Look at those cutie patootie cake pictures! And love the pink... LOL After having four girls, it cracks me up that some of the very few pictures we have of our son have him wearing pink. Real boys wear pink, apparently!

Ordered birthday care package

May 9, 2010



Last week I placed an order with Ann of Red Thread China to have a care package and birthday cake delivered to Jack at the orphanage. Many families have been able to receive photos of their child having a birthday celebration, so we are really hoping we are able to get some as well.

Here is a photo of the care package we sent:

Hopefully, the nannies will give our sweet boy some extra hugs and attention, and let him know that we love him very much. This is the last birthday he'll need to spend without a family.

Homestudy approved & I800A sent

April 29, 2010

We got official word today from CCAI that our homestudy has been approved! This now means that we can submit our I800A application to USCIS (immigration) to get approved to bring a child into the US for immigration. Lately the process has been taking 4-6 weeks, so we're really hoping to be on the shorter end of it. :::fingers crossed:::