homestudy, dossier, I-600 oh my

We are still waiting on the final version of our homestudy to be completed. When this gets in our hot little hands we can send it on to IAG. International Adoption Guides (IAG) is our placement agency. It should be 6-8 weeks after we submit our dossier to IAG, when we have court in Ethiopia. After court, if we pass the first time, then we wait another month or so for an Embassy date. The shortest time from dossier to Embassy would be 4 months. This is rarely ever the case though.

  Generally the court dates are 6 weeks or so from dossier to IAG. Passing court the first time is abotu 50%. Commonly a paper is missing from one place or another. Typically it takes another month or so for another court date. Then hopefully the paperwork is in order. It can take from 4 months to a year from dossier submission to have our two new sons in the US. More time to get our home in order I guess.

We will travel to Addis Ababa to pick up R and M. This is the capitol of Ethiopia. Very cool place by the way with a lot of interesting history. We aren't sure who is going now or if we will just go alone, Scott and myself. The trip will be about 5-7 days. Anyone want to go?

I will update again when we actually send the dossier.

Haley Graduated Today!

Today's was Haley's last day of High School.  We are very happy for her!

Here are Haley's senior pictures.

Christmas Pageant

Today was the Christmas Pageant where we go to church.  Here are a few pictures.

This is the kids singing Away in the Manger.

Zach also got to play a shepherd after he was an angel.

Footprints from Africa

We received the most special gift in the mail today. A set of traced footprints of our future sons. It is so special to see something that outlines thier foot. It makes it more real some how.

Susan