Pretty gold seals...

After only 1 hiccup, we finally got our 2 Ohio documents and 1 Pennsylvania document authenticated at the New York Chinese Consulate. They arrived via FedEx yesterday! (FYI: we used www.legal-eaze.com for the currier service and they were fantastic!)

 

Authentication Seal

AND last Wednesday I traveled down to the Indianapolis Government Building. After wandering around for a while and finally finding someone to direct me to the certification office (in the basement, FYI), I got 15 documents state certified. I still have a couple more Indiana documents to get certified before I send them to the Chinese Consulate in Chicago for authentication. Thankfully, Indiana doesn't charge for this service and I was in and out in about 30 minutes!

Indiana State Seals

In other news:

Our social worker thinks she will have our home study typed up and ready for review by the end of the first week of May! Moving right along!

Also, we have looked at the website exactly 1 time since we've been told we could. It is very intimidating and a little sad to look at all those faces. There was one boy that kinda tugged at my heart a little bit. When we requested more info on him, we found out that we can not receive additional info until our Special Focus Child Application had been approved. 

We are patiently waiting for that to go through and have decided not to look at the site again until we have full access to everything. 

That's it for now... this waiting stuff is for the birds!

Minor Setback...

Thankfully, I belong to a Facebook group for people adopting from China through our agency. Why? Because yesterday I learned, through another couple's frustration, that the Chinese Consulate in Chicago will reject notarized documents that do not have a written 'notary lingo.' The signature and stamp or seal is not enough. It must also say "Signed before me on..."

I won't lie, I had a mini melt-down today because I was planning to go the State House tomorrow to get our Indiana documents certified. However, 6 of our documents have to get fixed; so that trip is postponed for now.

Bright side? I found out BEFORE we sent them to Chicago. I would have been devastated to have our documents rejected. I know that there is still that possibility, but I'd like to think we have everything taken care of- now.

More good news?
YES PLEASE!!
We had our final Home Study meeting on Monday. It went really well. Our social worker is confident we will get 2 kiddos! She also said we could start looking at the website of the children. We haven't yet... we are terrified. How are we supposed to look at all those faces and only pick 1 or 2? What if the ONE we pick gets adopted while we are still working on this process? Lot's of unanswered questions.

She also said that traveling this year isn't very realistic; her estimation is the beginning of next year. Honestly, that isn't that bad considering we just started in October.


There will be ups and downs... I just have to keep remembering that.