Baby Todd's adoption

2007-01-04T12:16:00.000-08:00

Jan 4, 2006

It's been some time since my last post. Not sure if anyone is following anymore. After spending 3 weeks in Kaz and deciding the older child and I weren't a fit, they were able to find a baby for me to adopt. I had to sit and wait in the apartment for a week but they were able to get the proper paper work done and then I was able to go visit Todd.

When I first saw him he was 8 months old. A happy baby who loves everyone. After spending the required time visiting him I finally had my court date on November 13, 2006. This region is special, special baby house, so I was able to get an immidiate decree and picked Todd up on November 14, 2006.

I spent two more weeks in Kaz. We were there for Thanksgiving but our coordinator there arranged for a Thanksgiving dinner at the American Bar and Grill cafe. It wasn't our home cooked meal but it was really good.

We arrived home on November 28, 2006 and Todd fit right in. He acted like he had been around everyone his entire life and just took things in. He's still a happy baby. Entertains himself but knows how to get your attention. He is now 10 months old and not far behind an American born and raised 10 month old.

2006-11-06T00:57:00.000-08:00

November 6, 2006

Sorry it's been a month since I last posted. I got out to Kazakhstan on October 11th. I was first told that there were two children available for adoption in the region I was allowed to go to. A 6 year old and a 2 1/2 year old. Yeah not the baby I was expecting. I was basically told it was either of these kids or I will go and get a plane ticket home.

I went out to the baby house and saw both the kids. The 6 year old seemed more interested that the younger one. For some reason the younger one seemed to have some "issues", lack of better term. I started my visits with the 6 year old. It was trying. He only spoke Russian and I only spoke English. Towards the end it got harder and harder each day. It got to the point where he wouldn't listen to anyone and would purposely do what he knew he was not supposed to do, one right after the other.

I determined it wasn't in his best interest to be adopted by me. He needs a two parent family with a father figure and someone to be there to devote their entire time to him.

After a weeks wait they found a baby that was coming off the registry soon. He is so beautiful and happy. I have been here for 4 weeks now and still not sure when I will be home. We are waiting on another release form and then a court date. Hopefully all that goes fast and we can get home soon.

2006-10-03T11:28:00.000-07:00

October 3, 2006

Well it's been a week since I received my call and I still do not have my LOI. I have my travel date of the 9th but still no VISA. Hopefully it will be here today or tomorrow the latest. I don't understand how they called and said my paper work has gone through, that I have to be in country by the 12th, yet no LOI for me to get my VISA. I have everything set to leave on the 9th. Work knows, mail being forwarded, rent taken care of, ect... I would hate to have to delay my flight in any way. Not to mention it will cost a couple hundred to change my departure date. Guess you can't get anything done easily.

2006-09-27T04:09:00.000-07:00

September 27, 2006

Well I have my travel dates. I got a call yesterday from my agency. I have to be in Kazakhstan by October 12th but my VISA will start on the 10th. So I am trying to make my flight for the 9th. Don't want to get there too early or else we will be sitting in the airport till my VISA starts.

I will be going to Almaty and then to the baby house in Chilick, I know I spelled that way wrong. Not to sure where that is. I have to wait on the correct spelling of the town. Hopefully we will be home for Thanksgiving.

2006-09-12T08:42:00.000-07:00

September 12, 2006

It's been 4 weeks and no new news yet. I wasn't expecting there to be but now it could be any day for the next 4 weeks. Hopefully it wont be that long. I do know that my dossier is still with the Ministry of Education, but that doesn't tell you much. I'm not sure what their process is on approving dossiers or where they are in it. You never know till it makes it out of there.

Just waiting and hoping to here something good soon.

2006-08-17T11:00:00.000-07:00

August 17, 2006

Well my dossier made it to Kazakhstan. It was signed for on the 14th. So mid september early October I should hear. Now it's time to just get everything else in order that I need and start packing. I always think of things I need to do while at work but forget when I get home. But I will eventually get them all done.

2006-08-09T12:25:00.000-07:00

August 9, 2006

My dossier has left the DC Embassy and is on it's way to Kazakhstan. It left there on the 7th and is in transit. It took one week for them to do what they had to do and get it out. I was told they were getting them out in two but for some reason it only took 1. Not complaining.

Now I can track when it gets into country but then that's it. Again I was told 4-6 weeks in country. I'm preparing for atleast 8 but maybe that will go faster too.

2006-08-01T08:13:00.000-07:00

August 1, 2006

The translation is FINALLY done and my dossier has been sent to the Embassy in Washington. They said to expect it to be there 2 weeks, my luck it will be longer. Then it's off to Kazakhstan for about 4-6 weeks, again mine will probably be longer. I have tracking numbers for the dossier but can only track it till it gets to Kazakhstan, then it will be hard to track where it is.

I asked about what regions the agency works in. Different adoption agencies use different regions to adopt from. She said they use many but they are looking to go more north because there are more caucasian kids there. But ultimately it's up to the Ministry of Education on where you are invited to go.

Then I get an email about VISAs. I have no clue how to fill it out. I will wait till my agent gets back from her vacation to fill it out. I have time. Can't submit it without the letter of invitation to go over there for that long.

2006-07-24T12:35:00.000-07:00

July 24, 2006

Here we go again. My packet is being translated but the translator notice one of the documents wasn't right. The Parents Consent form. Now going over the packet with my agent many of times, I was told that specific one wasn't needed because there was another form that covered that info. Ok.

Well I get an email stating the one we filled out to go through the NY Embassy probably wont due going throught the DC Embassy so I have fill out this new one. Well we didn't know at the time we could change and go through NY so all during getting the documents together it was always going through the DC Embassy.

So now I have to mail this page out, she'll notarize and apostille them but again another 2 weeks or so. What the $%#^? But not once did she try to call me and speak to me about this, always through emails. I getting pretty fed up with this. Again she had my packet since May 22nd but now they are noticing things are wrong.

2006-07-19T08:47:00.000-07:00

July 19, 2006

Well I let some time pass before I contact the adoption agency. Well would have thought they would have kept me up on what was going on. So today I emailed my homestudy social worker just to check on the status of the shortened homestudy. She apologized for not emailing me, but she has sent it out last wednesday to the adoption agency. Great that was a week ago so they should have it.

So I call the adoption agency and the lady said she would have to check with the homestudy department to see if they got it. But the translator went ahead and started translating the long homestudy. That's great! Why didn't they call to let me know this? I don't know. Yeah it's long but I'm paying the lady $600 direct to translate the packet not to mention what ever she gets paid normally. But anyway the dossier should be done this week or early next week. I'm thinking it will be late next week or the following week.

So do count the weeks with me again. If it gets out next week it should arrive in country August 1 or so. About 4 to 8 weeks there, agency is saying 6 weeks. So mid to late September should be the time to hear something. Hopefully, again.

2006-07-12T11:21:00.000-07:00

July 12, 2006 Yet another delay

I just got an email from my adoption agent. She say my homestudy packet is to large for Kazakhstan, they like it to be 4-5 pages. Well can I tell you I was pissed off. I mailed my dossier to her on May 22nd. It took a couple days but she said she went through it and everything was good. June 13th she said she would mail it out to be translated despite my birth certificates were not in it, she would send them when they arrived. On June 16th I called to see if she had mailed out my dossier and again she said she would mail out my dossier for translation. Then July 7th she said she had everything and would mail my dossier our for translation. Get the pattern here? Now the homestudy is to long? So that means they just went through my dossier to make sure everything was ok and it hasn't been translated yet. I've called twice and sent her and email. Bet she's delaying calling me because I have proof of things she said she was going to do but yet did not . 15 years experience and you just notice now that Kaz wants shorter homestudies? Yeah right.

2006-07-10T04:58:00.000-07:00

July 10, 2006. New Information

Well I finally heard back from my adoption agency on Friday. She came in to check all her emails. She said that my packet was out being translated, again I don't know the specific date on when it was sent out. But at most it will be two weeks to translate. Then the DC Embassy will take 2 weeks. I don't know if they got more help there or what ever but I'm being told 2 weeks there. I have a feeling it will be longer though. Then 6 weeks over in Kazakhstan for review and hopefully a quick LOI, letter of invitation for those who don't know. You need that in order to get your travel VISA. So if you're doing the math with me, it seems like middle September I will hear, hopefully anyway.

2006-06-26T12:37:00.000-07:00

June 26, 2006.

It has been 6 months since I officially started my Kazakhstan adoption process, 8 months since I first started looking into adopting. In the beginning I have to say the process was a bit overwhelming and fustrating, but now it seems like it all just flew by.

The beginning was selecting an agency and country, finding an agency to do my homestudy. Starting the I-600A and all the other fun filled documents. Getting fingerprinted for this, fingerprinted for that. Waiting on this to come back then waiting to get that back. But again, all that paperwork is behind me know, so I hope...

I had a little trouble in the beginning finding an agency to do my homestudy. First one agency wouldn't do it because I wasn't using them for my adoption. They didn't want to take the chance because I was originally wanting to adopt from Russia, I have since changed to Kazahstan. Then another agency said they would do mine and sent me the packet to fill out. Then the lady said she didn't feel comfortable because I was a widow of only 6 months at the time. "They say you should wait a year to do anything" Who's they? and why should I wait to continue my life?

But I finally found a great agency and social worker to do my homestudy and had that done in about a month from start to finish. By that time my immigration approval was back and my packet was off to be apostilled. So I thought. I had papers apostilled in NJ, VA and one from TX and yup, they all had to go back to those states to be apostilled. Then with a some confussion with my birthcertificates, they had to go back seperately to be done, and sent again because they were returned because they basically went to the wrong floor of the building.

In the mean time of waiting for them, I sent the rest of my dossier to my adoption agency. My Agent, or what ever we want to call them, looked over my packet and made sure everything was good to go. She had told me that she would sent them out to be translated and would send the birthcertificates out when she got them. A couple days later I called and she still had not sent them out but said she would, she kind of sounded like she never said that. My birthcertificates finaly arrived and she said she would send my packet out to be translated. Well I didn't bother to ask why they weren't sent out the two times before.

Then she said we have a small issue, yeah always great to hear that. The agency has to send their dossiers to the DC Embassy. They were getting backed up and taking a while to get through there so she made arrangements to use the NY Embassy. Well the DC embassy said the packets had to go throught them. So I will have to resend the new fees for DC and wait on them. It has been about two weeks and I haven't received my old money orders back, so I'm hoping that she was able to get my packet through NY. With the holiday everyone is away, so I wont find out for sure till Monday.