Baby Kisses & Birthday Wishes

Nothing new to report on the adoption front this week. We are continuing to process mounds & mounds of paperwork. Kris spent most of Memorial Day weekend at the river for River Camp and had a great time as always. I spent the weekend hanging out with friends and family. My sister Brenda turned 30 this past week so we put together a little surprise BBQ for a few local friends and family at her house Friday evening, she was surprised and a good time was had by all. We also spent time with Abby this week, she is such a sweet baby and a wonderful addition to our family.

Here's Abby at 5 days old:

Our little niece, Jenna having some fun at the BBQ:

Looks like somebody had a little TOO much fun at the cookout:

Our New Baby Cousin

Last Friday evening we welcomed the newest member into the family, Ms. Abrielle Jean. Congratulations to Brent & Tory!!!

Here she is with Cousin Kris:

And again with Cousin Staci:

Paperwork & More Paperwork

Well, this week we were able to put a considerable dent in our mound of paperwork. The biggest accomplishment came last night when we finished our 10 hours of Hague Parent Ed. classwork. Now, if only we are able to pass our last test. The first 3 tests were all multiple choice but this last one was the dreaded short-answer test. We submitted it last night and should find out within a week if we passed. It takes 7 days to get the test back because it IS short answer and it has to be hand graded. I swear, I've had college classes that were easier than this stuff!!! Oh well, it's done and that's one more thing checked off the paperwork list.
Other things accomplished this week: Saturday we sent off for our passports which we were told have been taking 2-3 weeks to get back. Not that bad, it's checked off our list. Hmmm, what else??? Oh yes, got certified copies of our birth certificates in, completed a financial report, finished our Letter of Introduction, got a notorized copy of our Marriage License, sent off for our Criminal Background Records, got our employer letters back from our supervisors (awaiting notorization), and received our medical-clearance letters (also awaiting notorization). I think that pretty much sums up our week. I believe the plan for next week is to get as much notorization of our documents done as possible and hopefully get our reference letters back [no pressure guys :) ].
River Camp is this weekend!!! I know what I'll be doing!!! I think Staci is planning on hanging out at the cabin Saturday night with Kim while I'm doing the River Camp thing. Hopefully the River Camp thing doesn't include a trip to Heartland and a huge medical bill like it did a few years ago hehe. Hope everyone has a good weekend!

Now the Real Work Begins

Well, this week we were officially accepted to the Ethiopia program and now can begin the long, tedious climb up the mountain of paper work. CHI is in the process of updating our home study but can't finish until we get our passports so we sent off for them on Saturday and were told that the current wait time is 2-3 weeks which is a lot better than the 6 months it was a while back. In the meantime we were able to start rounding up some doctor bills (ie: medical clearance, police clearance, birth certificates, etc., etc...) The biggest headache is that most all of these documents need to be notarized, then sent to the Sec. of State for certification and then on to D.C. for authentication. Sometime this week we plan on starting our Hague parent ed. online program. We are required to complete this 10-hour course and test before we can send our dossier on to Ethiopia. Right now it's all about paperwork and trying to remain patient. We are trying to blow through as much paperwork as possible, as quickly as possible. Hopefully we can blow right through this in a few weeks. We'll see.

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