Thanksgiving is here!!

How is it possible that Thanksgiving is already here!!  This year has been full of preschool, football, paperwork and LOTS of praying!!!  When we started the adoption paperwork in March I thought for sure we would be logged in by the end of the year and I am sure now that we would have been had the government not shut down :(.  We submitted our I800A Oct 10, and it is usually a 2 week turn around.  However, with the government shut down they are just simply too far behind to make that happen!!  It is also policy that the people needing immigration approval who have already received their referral get their paperwork put in front of ours, (this is a bummer now but when we have our referral and are submitting this paperwork we will be very happy about this!!!!).  So yesterday I called for an update since it had been about 6 weeks since we submitted immigration and the officer said that it will probably be another 3 weeks.  Well there goes my hope to be logged in by the end of the year.  This isn't a HUGE deal as I am hoping to still be logged in by January but still a bummer!!! 

Once we get the immigration approval, which I am hoping will be the week of Christmas, I will have to send it for authentication which seems to take a couple of weeks.  However, with the holidays  we will have to really have divine intervention to be logged in by January but I am still confident that it could happen!!!  The only other issue is that the end of January is Chinese New Year which will shut down the government in Ch*na and probably means no referrals going out in January.  The real question is how long do they shut the government down and that I don't know. 

I have no question that God is in control and that this wait is needed to get us to Mabry....it's not fun and getting more difficult the closer we get.  The good news is that we are almost there!!!!!  Once we are logged in we immediately become eligible for a referral.  I do know that it will take them about 3 months to translate our dossier so I would be ok waiting those 3 months before we get a referral because I know that the longer we have to wait to see her face the quicker we will travel once we see her.....and that will be a blessing.  This is the crazy thoughts of an adopting mom.....don't want to wait now, want to wait then, don't want to wait then......sorry for the ramble. 

Anyway, specific things to pray for are of course Mabry, her health and that she has someone loving her.  For Mabry's birth mom that so bravely chose life for this sweet child even though it probably was the hardest thing she ever did.  Timeline, pray that we get immigration approval before Christmas (just because I am seriously struggling with this wait).  And then for me because I am struggling a bit with patience.  However, I know that with Thanksgiving here, Chesney's birth day next week, my birthday, Christmas parties and Christmas the rest of this wait will move right along!!!!!!! 

Thanks for following this blog....I am thinking about setting up a full family webpage where I would keep my blog on and also be able to post a lot of pictures.  I know that it would be an easier way to keep everything in one place and I would be able to blog about more than just the adoption.  I will let you all know if that happens or now!!!!  God's blessings to you and your family and hope you have as much to be thankful for this year as I do!!!!!!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!

Prayers appreciated!!

Ok....so I am sure you all saw the dossier paperwork picture where it was laid out on the floor!!!  The process goes that you take 3/4 of that paperwork and get it to the IL Secretary of State office in Springfield and get it with the state seal, then once you have the state seal you get it to the China Consulate in Chicago to get authenticated.  Once that stuff is done then it is ready to go to China.   We chose to send our stuff to a courier and let her take it to springfield and Chicago.  After talking to her, she suggested that we go ahead and send all of the paperwork that we have (we are still waiting for the immigration approval which is backed up and taking longer than expected) so that if there is a problem with any of these documents we will have time to fix them while we are waiting for the immigration paperwork!!  The immigration approval will also need to go thru this process but once this round is done the stress level goes WAY down!!!!!  So...today I mailed off the paperwork that I had to the courier and I should know in a couple weeks if all is well or if there are things I need to fix or redo......so this is where the prayers come in!!!  If you could all be in prayer that this paperwork is right and that the Consulate finds no problems with it that would be great!!! 

I did speak to the Homeland Security office that is in charge of our immigration approval and they said that right now they are running 60-75 days even though it use to only be 2-3 weeks.  SO we could be waiting thru December for that paper still.  I am praying that we get that approval early December so that we can move on to the next step but either way at least I got this paperwork in the mail today so I will have a little less stress!!!  As soon as we get immigration approval and send it to the Sec of State and Consulate and as long as the other stuff I just sent is fine...we will be ready to send our Dossier to China!!!!!  It seems there is an end in sight to the paperwork (at least this paperwork). 

Prayers are appreciated!!!!