Catching Up.....We are on a roll!!

Wow, I really need to get my lurkers up to speed. I have to say that the adoption process has it's "ups and downs", but at least you keep going forward. It's also not always as exciting as it seemed to be. January 13th-14th We attended our Adoption Seminar and learned a great deal about: Meeting Birth Parents Grief and Loss in Adoption How a Child Forms Attachments Issues in Transracial Adoption Talking to Your Child about Adoption January 26th & 31st We met with our social worker and completed our homestudy. She was wonderful and set us at ease right away. She also had dealt with Endometriosis herself, so she understood a great deal and I didn't have to go into all the issues surrounding my battle with Endo. She adopted a 15mo daughter from China 10 years ago and is a wealth of information. February 2nd & 3rd We filed our Form I-600A and had our finger prints done. The fingerprinting process is much different that when I worked at a brokerage firm. It's all digital. Took many tries to get mine though. Small fingers and I had a hard time relaxing b/c the guy was rather rude. We also requested/recieved our criminal history reports from the State Troopers. Nothing surprising. *wink* We both have no record. March 6th Our homestudy is approved by WACAP and our file is transferred to the China Program. Our homestudy is also sent to USCIS so our Form I-600A can be approved/denied. March 8th We learned that the wait time from Log in Date (LID) to referral is now at 8 - 9 months. We also learned that the certification/authentication process through the state and consulate levels takes about 4-6 weeks. Then once we are Dossier to China (DTC) it can take up to 4 weeks to be logged in (LID). *sigh* That was very devastating news to hear. We had hoped to be DTC by end of March with LID by mid-April. March 20th Anchorage office of USCIS mailed our Form I-171H. This is the favorable determination letter that says we are approved to adoption one child from China. March 26th We return from vacation to find in our stack of mail our Form I-171H!! Woohoo!!! We are delighted and excited. Slightly disappointed that it only states one child, but figure God knows what's best for our family. I also found an Asian CPK Babies doll. Her birth date is May 26th and her name is Jada Faith. I had been looking for one since before Thanksgiving.