Dossier Update

February 27, 2006
This weekend we received our appointments to be fingerprinted by the department of Homeland Security in Birmingham. We have also forwarded all of the forms and documents to Villa Hope that were requested recently. This should be the last of the paper chase on our part. It is finally looking like our paper chase is coming to an end. We are so glad for that. Villa hope is telling us now that our Dossier-To-China (DTC) date will be in late April. If we do the math, that puts us traveling to China around March or April next year. Our hopes of having little Alison Rose home for Chirstmas this year have faded.
We can now begin to look forward to the long wait. We still need to put the finishing touches on the baby room and stock it full of clothing, toys, and essentials. I think Lisa and I are as ready as we will ever be for this to happen and the long wait will be the hardest part for us. We will just have to keep busy somehow to keep our minds off of it. Looks like a lot of golf and fishing for me this spring and summer.

Baby Room Update

February 19, 2006

We are still waiting for the crib to come in but have made good progress and the baby room. We still plan to put some shelves on the walls and do some more decorating with some of Lisa's carousel horses. She must have a collection of about one thousand of them.
As promised, here are some pictures of the room.

Dossier Preperation

February 10, 2006
We received a package from our adoption agency yesterday that came as sort of a surprise for us. We were under the impression that all the paperwork that we have previously sent to our adoption agency would go towards the official Dossier package. We were wrong about that! Today we left work early to go to the County Dept. of Records to order "recent" certified copies of Lisa's birth certificate and our marriage certificate. I had to go on-line and request a "recent" certified copy of my birth certificate from the state of Colorado. I found a web site that I could do this in and I expect it will show up some time in the next week or so. We also went to the Athens police station to get an official letter stating that we have never been arrested and have no criminal background as far as the local police are concerned. We also stopped by our doctors office to get signed letters stating that our past surguries would not prevent us from raising a child. Lisa's doctor will send her letter next week and my doctor is not open on Fridays so I will have to try agian next week. We also went to get two passport type pictures of each of us. They look like mug shots. We also had to fill our another financial statement and letter of intent to adopt complete with a description of the child we would like to adopt. These two things we will have to get notorized.
All of this is very frustrating because we have done all this before. It seems very repetitive. Apparently, all the documents that we gathered before were to satisfy the requirements of the state of Alabama and the U.S. Government. Now the second round of documents is to satify the requirements of the Chinese Government. Apparently they are sticklers for accuracy and all documents must have a "recent" issue date.
Again, instead of getting frustrated, I try my best to stay motivated on the end "prize". I know that both Lisa and I are tired of gathering paper work together and are starting to wonder if it will ever end. It seems like every hurdle we jump over just reveals another to us.