Saturday, September 27, 2014

The Paperwork that NEVER ENDS…

My most sincere apology for the lack of updates on our adoption journey. For the most part, it was supposed to be a quiet wait for our sweet Koen to reach the age of 5 in November, but unfortunately that didn't happen. And we've been a bit busy!

But here's the only picture we have of Koen just to remind you of this amazing little boy that we're trying to adopt:


So we are still transitioning from Hawaii to California as the Navy is taking us down a path that hopefully will be a great season for our family in regard to time together. To be completely honest, we're not in love with California thus far, but to be fair… Hawaii is a hard act to follow up! And I'm cold. I don't like being cold. It's going to get colder. I don't like being cold.

We've been living out of suitcases for a month and a half and it's getting old. Paki's grandmother has been awesome letting us stay with her while we're working out the housing situation and I think our children almost have her house childproofed at this point. Only a couple broken items and spaghetti stained walls courtesy of young Konale!

Back to Koen. We received an e-mail about a week after flying off Oahu that the country we are adopting from has changed some formatting on 9 of the required documents, and they are asking for additional copies of our Home Study, passports, etc. Oh, and now we needed a Federal background check vice the state background check. Did I mention our medical documents were on the cusp of expiring and we don't have doctors yet here in California because we JUST GOT HERE!?!? Let the paperwork scramble begin. AGAIN.

We got the first round of documents signed notarized and sent off for apostille to the state of California. (Did I mention CA charges $20 per document while it only cost $4 in HI????) After 2 weeks, I called to check on them only to find out they were rejected due to the incorrect jurat that the notary didn't mention… I panicked. PANICKED. I kept looking at the calendar and counting days. We weren't going to make it. Our Home Study was going to expire and we would be starting all over again. I cried some ugly tears and finally prayed with Paki. (Why do we/I always wait until the ugly tears come before we/I turn to God??) I asked God for discernment, wisdom and encouragement, to know that we were still moving in line with God's will. And I felt peace. Complete peace.

THE NEXT DAY. Paki's aunt sat down across from us and encouraged us to not lose sight of all the wonderful things we have in our lives right now- that we can trust God with this adoption. Later in the evening, Paki opened his e-mail and had a message from a friend encouraging us in the adoption and to persevere through the low times when all seems lost. The. Next. Day. How cool is God?!?!

And we've continued forward. All of our documents are either done or in the very end of the process. But they're still here in the U.S. so we're not in the clear just yet. We MUST be submitted in October before any other documents expire. (Documents are only good for 6 months from the date they are signed in front of the notary.) We started this process back in April so we're starting to hit that point. We are working to get the documents over to the country so they can be verified, translated, and complied to be submitted to the courts. From the date we are submitted, the average time is about 8 weeks to our court date. If you do the math…I will (hopefully) get to freeze my fanny off in December. Did I mention that I HATE BEING COLD???

And that's the update. That's where we stand as of today from the UPS store as I sent off documents to Pennsylvania to be apostilled. We are praying that everything will be finished in time without anymore hiccups. So who wants to go with me???? No, seriously. Lots of unknowns still on dates, but at this point I'll be traveling by myself. If you're reading this and have the time, and desire to freeze with me for 6-8 weeks (or portion there of) in an Eastern European country, let me know. I can give you more details. Thanks for reading!! I hope to have great news by the end of October!



No comments:

Post a Comment