We're moving on over

If you have been reading our blog, you know that our agency has been suspended out of Russia. We have been given the opportunity to switch to a new agency ... but there has been one hurdle. Our home study, which was completed and approved on 7/10/08, was done by the suspended agency. There was some question as to whether or not the MOE (Ministry of Education in Russia ... this is who governs all Russian adoptions) would accept our home study from an agency that has been suspended. The director of our new agency contacted the MOE and ultimately received confirmation that our home study will be accepted and we are good to go. Yay! This was such a relief, as we don't exactly have another 1K-2K to shell out right now for a new home study. Not to mention the delay it would have caused us.

Next on the list: finish compiling our documents (i.e. dossier) to send to Russia and drive to Pittsburgh to meet with the new agency.

The wheels are turning again!

Home study complete and approved!

We just got back in town from attending the Down syndrome convention in Boston (so fun, BTW) and we had a notarized copy of our home study waiting for us in our mail box! Yay ... everyone cheer now! And ... I'm not done ... we also already have a fingerprint appointment with USCIS on July 25, 2008! Double yay!

No news is not necessarily good news

I heard from our agency today, but really nothing has changed. The suspension is still there and they are just working as hard as they can to get it lifted. We are pushing on regardless, hoping that things will be okay by the time our dossier is compiled. We hope to have our home study sent off to USCIS by the end of this week, so please pray that we get a fingerprint appointment fast!

Guess what?!

I have a rough draft of our home study in my hands!! Woo hoo! We would like to thank our social worker so much for her speediness in writing everything up. We will review it this weekend and hopefully move onto the next step. Our agency is still on hold in Russia, but we are praying that things get resolved quickly.

Home study, Part II: Check

Tonight Kyle and I drove to our adoption agency to meet one last time with our social worker. After getting stuck in traffic and getting there almost a half hour late, we each had one on one time with her and then answered some questions together. Our social worker liked Kyle's crazy biography he wrote, so that was funny to talk about. Our social worker will be meeting with my sister-in-law, Shay, on Monday as a collateral contact. And then, our social worker told us she thinks she will have a rough draft of our home study composed by next Friday ... woo hoo!

Home Study, Part I: Check

We have our home visit last night with our social worker and she is very sweet. She asked us a few questions, took a tour of the house and that was it. We will be meeting with her tomorrow night for our one on one interviews and then we are done. She also said that some of our clearances have come back, so that is great news too!

Home Study ... 2 more days

This Tuesday and Thursday are our visits with our social worker for our home study ... finally! The past few weeks have been really slow on the adoption front, but hopefully things will progress smoothly after this week. Yay!

One week to go ...

One week from today, we have our home visit with our social worker for our home study. The time is passing really slowwww.

Small delay ...

Our home study appointments were set for next week, but we've been pushed back one week. We will still be able to get both appointments with our social worker done that week, so that is good. We also are still waiting for our clearances to come back, so hopefully everything will fall into place time wise.

Home Study Update

We had our phone orientation with our social worker today. We just went over basic information. She also told us that the home study coordinator officially deemed us the fastest paperwork gatherers ever. LOL. We will have two meetings with our social worker for the home study, one here at our house and the other in the office. Both of those meetings will take place next week. Hopefully that will speed things along. Our social worker is now guessing that we may travel in September, or perhaps late August, at the speed that things are moving. Yay!

Social Worker Assigned: Check!

We finally got a social worker assigned to our case. We have a phone orientation with her on Monday at 10am EST. Our agency should have all of our home study paperwork by today (hopefully) ... once they confirm that, our social worker will schedule an appointment to come out for our first home study visit. Yay!

The Paper Chase Begins

We have completed the application for adoption, the home study application and the financial statement to send off to our agency, Cradle of Hope. Now the real fun begins ... paperwork, paperwork, paperwork!