We've been assembling some of the stuff for our second set of paperwork, and got two big envelopes in the mail yesterday that were VERY encouraging.
First, we got a pack of a few more apostilled documents back from Tallahassee (which we sent last week - some additional forms our agency wanted from us). We've learned that they have a fairly quick turnaround time by mail (thanks, Jennifer!), so it was much more convenient to send our few documents than to drive to Tallahassee again. We'll probably only drive there once more, when we are carrying particularly important stuff before our second trip.
Second, we got our adoption approval from the INS!! It was just two weeks from fingerprinting to approval - seems like some kind of record! It is a delight to check one more thing off the list. Especially if you're me. I've been known to add things to lists that I have already accomplished, just so I can check them off right from the start. But seriously, there are so many possible ways in which things can be delayed, it is extremely encouraging every time something goes smoothly.
I should also let you all know, in case you are watching the news really closely, that the recent threats to Russian adoption accreditation do not apply to us. There was recently a statement issued by the Russian Deputy Prosecutor General threatening to revoke the accreditation of 12 adoption agencies in Russia. Ours is NOT on the list. (Even if it were, there are often threats being made and it's not clear whether they will go anywhere).
***Please pray for the adoptive parents working with the threatened agencies, that they will not panic, and for a positive resolution to the whole situation.
***Praise God for some new online friends I have made who are adopting through the same agency, and from the same region, as us. I have been following their journeys as they go ahead of us - for example, some people who made their first trip in early February are now on their way home from their second trip with two new kids in tow! Another couple finished their first trip in early March and has been given a court date in mid-May for their second trip. Finally, another couple is on their way out for their first trip in a week. They turned in their dossier about a month before we did....so it is really encouraging and exciting to see things moving along!
I had anticipated writing some reflections, but you'll have to settle for this one: I do not really enjoy grading papers, but I have 35 papers (5-7 pages) to read, written on topics such as Sports Economics, Immigration and Higher Education. I love teaching....but I don't love grading.
That is my reflection.
We'll keep you updated :)
Sarah
Saturday, April 22, 2006
Friday, April 14, 2006
We are in the pipeline!
Our set of documents (Dossier #1) has begun moving forward! Valerie sent it off yesterday. It first goes to the umbrella agency with which our smaller agency is affiliated, and after approval from them it will make its way over to Omsk! This processing time overall is supposed to be about a month, and then we will hear from them soon after that with an invitation to travel. So don't expect too many new postings in the near future...although we may be able to do a bit more introspection now that the first batch of paperwork is done (don't worry, there will be more!).
Monday, April 10, 2006
I think it's going to be fine...
I talked with Valerie again - this time on the phone (for the first time! we've also just done email). It seems that I misunderstood one aspect of the checklist, so I need to send some additional stuff, but FORTUNATELY I already have it ready to go. (I would explain the misunderstanding, but you'd all agree that my interpretation was very reasonable!). I just need to go make a bunch more copies and send another Express mail out tomorrow. She'll get the package on Wednesday and should be able to start processing it.
I learned something about apostilles today. Even when you have two identical documents apostilled (such as two copies of Rob's green card), each apostille has its own identification number. This means you should not do what we did: for our records, we just photocopied one of each document, not realizing that we should have copies of both because they have different IDs. This, along with the misunderstanding, is the reason we need to make more copies and send some more stuff. Oh well. We're almost there!
I learned something about apostilles today. Even when you have two identical documents apostilled (such as two copies of Rob's green card), each apostille has its own identification number. This means you should not do what we did: for our records, we just photocopied one of each document, not realizing that we should have copies of both because they have different IDs. This, along with the misunderstanding, is the reason we need to make more copies and send some more stuff. Oh well. We're almost there!
A very short update
I just got the news from Valerie that she has received all of our forms and our check. She said she'd be checking everything over tonight, so I will hopefully know tomorrow whether anything needs to be redone. Pray that it doesn't!
Thursday, April 06, 2006
Hooray for bureaucracy!
Yesterday was our big day of bureaucracy, and it went remarkable smoothly.
It all began when we left the house around 6:30 a.m. and drove up to Jacksonville (2 hours) to give fingerprints at the INS office (now under "Homeland Security"). I was expecting a big stone building in the downtown area...trying to find parking, dealing with mean immigration officers, etc. Basically, I was expecting the Milwaukee office (we went there a few times for Rob's immigration stuff since he's Canadian). Well, in Jacksonville it is instead a one-story building in a business park, with its own parking lot. It reminded me of Rob's engineering firm in Madison! At the door, we were met by an officer who told us to put basically everything but paperwork back in the car (fine) and then we went in through a metal detector to find a place that looked remarkably like a DMV. They gave us a number and we just waited there, ready to renew our driver's licenses...er...give fingerprints for our adoption application.
While we waited, I noticed two large photos framed on the wall - George W. Bush and Michael Chertoff (the Homeland Security guy). It reminded me of my semester in the Middle East in 1997, where every place in Jordan had a picture of (at the time) King Hussein. I also know that some Catholic places have pictures of the Pope on display. I didn't feel like these guys really measured up, but oh well. Rob was less fascinated by this than I was. He had a Tolkien book with him. Anyway, they called our names and we gave our prints, and that was that! All told, it took maybe 45 minutes. Fantastic! Now we wait for an approval from the INS for our adoption -- we don't need this approval until our second trip to Russia, so there shouldn't be any problem getting it on time.
We then headed over to Tallahassee to the Secretary of State's office where they apostille documents (i.e. verify that the notarizations are legitimate). We were making such good time that we even stopped for a fairly leisurely brunch at the Cracker Barrel. As we got close to Tallahassee, I figured we'd need to head downtown to a big office building, find parking, etc. Can you believe....it was outside the city, in a business park, with its own parking lot! I guess I didn't realize how different bureaucracy is down here -is this a Southern thing? There was no line in the office, and they looked through all our documents - 24 of them - and stapled approvals on them. It took less than half an hour...and a bargain at 10 bucks each (ugh).
We immediately went to a UPS store and made multiple copies of everything (we ended up making about 150 photocopies!) before sending our packet off to Valerie, our adoption agency caseworker. She will receive them all tomorrow. So, do you think we forgot anything? We hope not. But actually, Valerie already figured one thing out....she asked if I remembered to include the first part of the fees to be paid to the Russian government. Ooops! That check will be sent express mail tomorrow!
If everything is on the up and up, our packet will go the umbrella adoption agency with which our agency is affiliated, get approved, and will then go over to the Omsk Department of Education (DOE). This processing should take about a month. Sometime soon after that we should get permission to travel. I just learned today that we probably will NOT get a particular child's picture/info before we go, but that we will arrive and meet someone at the Omsk DOE who will show us information on a particular child they've chosen for us - we can agree to meet the child or ask for a different referral if we have some kind of concern (such as medical issues). Once we meet and confirm our intentions to adopt a particular baby, then the ball starts rolling for the Russian government to organize the adoption - so we will come home babyless to wait, and go back a month or two later when everything is ready.
For all you pray-ers out there:
* pray that our documents are all in order
* pray specifically that the umbrella agency will accept some documents that were signed in black ink, which we've just been told were supposed to be in blue ink (I wish I were kidding - no one had told us about the importance of non-black ink, which helps them know it's not a photocopy). It wouldn't be too bad to do these forms over, since they are among the few that don't require notarization/apostilles, but it would still be a delay.
* pray for my work, as I need to do some catching up from my travel day on Wednesday
* pray that our baby is doing all right in his/her crib right now!
* also, we thank God for some very sweet new friends who (unfortunately) are moving away and (fortunately) have provided us with a crib, rocking chair, and dresser for the baby! How nice to have one less thing to think about (or really, three less things...)
Thanks again for so much support - please feel free to leave comments (you can do so anonymously, without an account, by clicking on any set of comments and then adding your own).
We'll let you know as soon as we have heard more about whether our packet is confirmed to be complete!
Sarah
It all began when we left the house around 6:30 a.m. and drove up to Jacksonville (2 hours) to give fingerprints at the INS office (now under "Homeland Security"). I was expecting a big stone building in the downtown area...trying to find parking, dealing with mean immigration officers, etc. Basically, I was expecting the Milwaukee office (we went there a few times for Rob's immigration stuff since he's Canadian). Well, in Jacksonville it is instead a one-story building in a business park, with its own parking lot. It reminded me of Rob's engineering firm in Madison! At the door, we were met by an officer who told us to put basically everything but paperwork back in the car (fine) and then we went in through a metal detector to find a place that looked remarkably like a DMV. They gave us a number and we just waited there, ready to renew our driver's licenses...er...give fingerprints for our adoption application.
While we waited, I noticed two large photos framed on the wall - George W. Bush and Michael Chertoff (the Homeland Security guy). It reminded me of my semester in the Middle East in 1997, where every place in Jordan had a picture of (at the time) King Hussein. I also know that some Catholic places have pictures of the Pope on display. I didn't feel like these guys really measured up, but oh well. Rob was less fascinated by this than I was. He had a Tolkien book with him. Anyway, they called our names and we gave our prints, and that was that! All told, it took maybe 45 minutes. Fantastic! Now we wait for an approval from the INS for our adoption -- we don't need this approval until our second trip to Russia, so there shouldn't be any problem getting it on time.
We then headed over to Tallahassee to the Secretary of State's office where they apostille documents (i.e. verify that the notarizations are legitimate). We were making such good time that we even stopped for a fairly leisurely brunch at the Cracker Barrel. As we got close to Tallahassee, I figured we'd need to head downtown to a big office building, find parking, etc. Can you believe....it was outside the city, in a business park, with its own parking lot! I guess I didn't realize how different bureaucracy is down here -is this a Southern thing? There was no line in the office, and they looked through all our documents - 24 of them - and stapled approvals on them. It took less than half an hour...and a bargain at 10 bucks each (ugh).
We immediately went to a UPS store and made multiple copies of everything (we ended up making about 150 photocopies!) before sending our packet off to Valerie, our adoption agency caseworker. She will receive them all tomorrow. So, do you think we forgot anything? We hope not. But actually, Valerie already figured one thing out....she asked if I remembered to include the first part of the fees to be paid to the Russian government. Ooops! That check will be sent express mail tomorrow!
If everything is on the up and up, our packet will go the umbrella adoption agency with which our agency is affiliated, get approved, and will then go over to the Omsk Department of Education (DOE). This processing should take about a month. Sometime soon after that we should get permission to travel. I just learned today that we probably will NOT get a particular child's picture/info before we go, but that we will arrive and meet someone at the Omsk DOE who will show us information on a particular child they've chosen for us - we can agree to meet the child or ask for a different referral if we have some kind of concern (such as medical issues). Once we meet and confirm our intentions to adopt a particular baby, then the ball starts rolling for the Russian government to organize the adoption - so we will come home babyless to wait, and go back a month or two later when everything is ready.
For all you pray-ers out there:
* pray that our documents are all in order
* pray specifically that the umbrella agency will accept some documents that were signed in black ink, which we've just been told were supposed to be in blue ink (I wish I were kidding - no one had told us about the importance of non-black ink, which helps them know it's not a photocopy). It wouldn't be too bad to do these forms over, since they are among the few that don't require notarization/apostilles, but it would still be a delay.
* pray for my work, as I need to do some catching up from my travel day on Wednesday
* pray that our baby is doing all right in his/her crib right now!
* also, we thank God for some very sweet new friends who (unfortunately) are moving away and (fortunately) have provided us with a crib, rocking chair, and dresser for the baby! How nice to have one less thing to think about (or really, three less things...)
Thanks again for so much support - please feel free to leave comments (you can do so anonymously, without an account, by clicking on any set of comments and then adding your own).
We'll let you know as soon as we have heard more about whether our packet is confirmed to be complete!
Sarah
Sunday, April 02, 2006
Timeline & a few pictures
Lots of people are curious about the adoption process. Ours involves all the steps of a typical adoption, but will likely take less time because of the agency and region we chose. There are an incredible number of details (probably more than some of you are interested in hearing about!). We've been marking off milestones so far and thought you might be interested in them...occasionally we've included a picture too.
Jan. 6 Registered with our agency to adopt from Siberia, Russia. This agency helps us with all the paperwork and connects us with a child (and a translator!) in Russia. Our caseworker is Valerie, who is from Russia but works here in the U.S. for the adoption agency.
Jan. 25 Spent 5 hours being interviewed for our Home Study (conducted by a local psychologist)
Jan. 26-Feb. 22 Got background checks from the City, State, and FBI; got medical approval from our doctors.
Feb. 22 Received Rob’s birth certificate
Feb. 23 Sent Rob’s passport renewal application (w/ birth certificate)
Feb. 23 Sent packet of background checks & copy of Rob’s birth certificate to the Home Study agency, to finalize their report
Mar. 18 Received final Home Study – we are officially approved! I was so happy that I even took a picture of the envelope.
Mar. 20 Sent I-600A (immigration form) and Home Study to U.S.C.I.S. (Citizenship and Immigration Services, formerly “INS”) in Jacksonville
Mar. 24 Received invitation for fingerprinting from Jacksonville U.S.C.I.S.
Here's me, scraping a wall that had layers of paint and wallpaper.
Rob was sanding the walls. The air was full of dust - you can see it in the picture!
Mar. 29 Received Rob’s new passport
Mar. 30 Got our results from our psychological exams (the MMPI personality test). The official letters state: “Results appear valid and not consistent with any psychopathology.” Phew!
Mar. 31 Got documents notarized at the bank for Dossier # 1 (first of 2 packets of forms). The ladies who work at the bank are so excited!
*** below are the plans for the future and all dates are subject to change! ***
Week of April 2-9 Planning to give our fingerprints at the U.S.C.I.S. (Jacksonville) and to get our notarized documents apostilled (Tallahassee) so that we can submit them to our agency. An "apostille" is a document/seal from the Secretary of State verifying that a notarized document was notarized by a legitimate notary (no, I'm not kidding!).
The following month or two: wait for a referral of a child from our agency
Soon after referral: travel to Russia for a week to meet our child
The following one-three months: get additional documents for Dossier # 2 and wait for a court date from Russia
Soon after court date is announced: travel to Russia to go to court and pick up our child, and stay for at least 10 days (the government’s mandatory waiting period)
Jan. 6 Registered with our agency to adopt from Siberia, Russia. This agency helps us with all the paperwork and connects us with a child (and a translator!) in Russia. Our caseworker is Valerie, who is from Russia but works here in the U.S. for the adoption agency.
Jan. 25 Spent 5 hours being interviewed for our Home Study (conducted by a local psychologist)
Jan. 26-Feb. 22 Got background checks from the City, State, and FBI; got medical approval from our doctors.
Feb. 22 Received Rob’s birth certificate
Feb. 23 Sent Rob’s passport renewal application (w/ birth certificate)
Feb. 23 Sent packet of background checks & copy of Rob’s birth certificate to the Home Study agency, to finalize their report
Mar. 18 Received final Home Study – we are officially approved! I was so happy that I even took a picture of the envelope.
Mar. 20 Sent I-600A (immigration form) and Home Study to U.S.C.I.S. (Citizenship and Immigration Services, formerly “INS”) in Jacksonville
Mar. 24 Received invitation for fingerprinting from Jacksonville U.S.C.I.S.
Mar. 24 Finished redoing the walls in the baby's room, after a couple weeks of scraping/painting with much help from friends!
Here's me, scraping a wall that had layers of paint and wallpaper.
Rob was sanding the walls. The air was full of dust - you can see it in the picture!
This is our housemate, Sara Joy, who is an intern with a campus ministry for the year. We are sad that she'll be moving away this summer - it's been a great time! And as you can see, we put her to work too :)
Here's our good friend Burcin from the Econ department. She came over for two different painting days and we listened to 1980s power ballads - quite memorable!
Mar. 25 Got carpet installed in the baby’s room! Below is our final product. The walls are very light green, with one a shade darker and textured. The carpet is actually a light beige, but the flash on the camera made it look darker. We'll be decorating it with a border of musical notes (pictures to come later).
Mar. 29 Received Rob’s new passport
Mar. 30 Got our results from our psychological exams (the MMPI personality test). The official letters state: “Results appear valid and not consistent with any psychopathology.” Phew!
Mar. 31 Got documents notarized at the bank for Dossier # 1 (first of 2 packets of forms). The ladies who work at the bank are so excited!
*** below are the plans for the future and all dates are subject to change! ***
Week of April 2-9 Planning to give our fingerprints at the U.S.C.I.S. (Jacksonville) and to get our notarized documents apostilled (Tallahassee) so that we can submit them to our agency. An "apostille" is a document/seal from the Secretary of State verifying that a notarized document was notarized by a legitimate notary (no, I'm not kidding!).
The following month or two: wait for a referral of a child from our agency
Soon after referral: travel to Russia for a week to meet our child
The following one-three months: get additional documents for Dossier # 2 and wait for a court date from Russia
Soon after court date is announced: travel to Russia to go to court and pick up our child, and stay for at least 10 days (the government’s mandatory waiting period)
Welcome to our blog! Intro and FAQ
Many of our friends and family have been curious about our upcoming adoption, and we thought this site would be a great way to keep you updated with all of our news and prayer requests.
This first post will be pretty long, to answer lots of the questions we've gotten about our adoption. We'll also be posting a timeline and pictures of our preparations as things move forward. (No, we don't have a picture of the baby yet!)
THE HAMERSMA ADOPTION F.A.Q. (Frequently Asked Questions)
1. Why are you guys adopting a baby?
We have always planned to have children, and we have been praying that God would send a baby our way. While adoption is not the way we initially expected to build our family, we are really excited to see the way God’s plan is unfolding! There is a child out there who belongs with us, and though he or she is still unknown to us, this baby is part of our family. Since I (Sarah) am from a family where adoption isn’t unusual – in fact, my brother is adopted – we’ve seen firsthand the way that families are built on love and commitment, and not simply genetics. It’s becoming more and more clear what a privilege it is to start our family this way!
2. Why are you adopting a baby from Russia?
There are an overabundance of American couples who want to adopt children – far beyond the number of babies given up for adoption each year in the U.S. (this is partly due to the ~ 1,000,000 pregnancies terminated every year here). However, when one looks overseas, the story is exactly the opposite. I found a statistic stating that only one in ten Russian orphans will ever be adopted. Similarly, there are thousands of children in China (mostly girls), Guatemala (mostly boys), Korea, and other countries who are waiting for families. We prayed about this and decided on Russia – the timeline is fast (more on that later) and we could adopt a fairly young child. This is particularly true for the region of Russia we have chosen, which is part of Siberia. We also think it will be very interesting to travel to Russia and experience the culture our child has experienced for his or her early life.
3. How did you select an adoption agency?
We registered on the websites of several agencies to get more information. We became familiar with the basic process and costs, so just needed to figure out the next step. Then one day we received an email from a specific agency (we are asked not to discuss agencies by name on the web) describing the particular need for people to adopt children from parts of Siberia in Russia. The process seems to be more streamlined than some other regions, and the children tend to be healthier than in some other parts of Russia. We looked through the pictures in the email of children who’d recently been adopted, and (of course!) they were so adorable that we were sold! We also like the organization – while they are not officially a Christian organization, the ideas of “having faith” and “being faithful” are prominent in their mission. The online message board for parents like us is full of encouragement from the Bible as we all wind our way through this process. There are so many great Biblical examples of prayerful waiting…and that is what we are trying to do.
4. How old will the baby be?
Babies in Russia are not considered officially “orphans” until they have been in the orphanage system for at least 6 months. Combining this waiting period with bureaucracy, the youngest are usually 12-18 months when they are adopted. The most recent adoption I know of (by a couple working with the same agency as us, adopting from the same region) involves a baby who was 11 months old when the adoptive parents went to meet him, and will be 13-14 months old when they bring him home.
5. When do you go to Russia?
We will need to make two trips to Siberia. On the first trip, we will get to meet the baby that has been selected for us and (prayerfully!) confirm that we want to proceed with adoption of that baby. If for some reason we feel wrong about the particular match that has been made, we will have an opportunity to meet a different child. We will leave (after about a week) knowing the child we will adopt…but we don’t get to bring them home yet. At this point, the adoption enters deeper into the legal system and we wait for a court date, hopefully within one-two months, at which time we will go back and legally adopt our baby in Russia and stay for about two weeks. We hope to make the first trip in May or June, but it will depend upon the speed of bureaucracy in our region in dealing with our application. If we get to go by June, then we would expect to make our second trip by the end of the summer! (However, there are many places in which the process can be delayed so we are trying to be flexible.)
6. Have you been “accepted” to adopt a child?
Yes! We are not waiting to hear whether we will adopt, but simply which child we will adopt. We have been approved through background checks and a careful study of our home life (a 5-hour interview!).
7. Will your child be a U.S. citizen?
Yes. We will need to fill out some paperwork, but they will certainly be a U.S. citizen. Some Canadian friends have also told us that our baby will automatically be a citizen of Canada as well, since Rob is Canadian – hopefully that is the case, since it would great for our child to have dual citizenship. We still need to look into this.
8. Is there a chance you will come back with more than one child?
Not really – all of our documentation is set up for one child only. I am sure it will be hard to leave the rest of the children behind in the orphanage, but realistically it makes sense for us to start our family with just one child, particularly since it is our first child and neither of us plans to stay home full-time. Instead, we plan to stagger our work schedules and get some part-time help with child care in our home. I will be doing a lot of work from home in the Fall semester, as I do not have teaching responsibilities but instead will be focusing on research projects. I will still spend a few days each week at UF and plan to stay fully connected with my work as a professor there. I will be teaching again next Spring. We both love our jobs, and our colleagues have demonstrated a lot of support and flexibility already. We feel so blessed!
We're happy to answer other questions too! We'll be using this blog to keep you updated, answer questions, and reflect on this fascinating experience.
This first post will be pretty long, to answer lots of the questions we've gotten about our adoption. We'll also be posting a timeline and pictures of our preparations as things move forward. (No, we don't have a picture of the baby yet!)
THE HAMERSMA ADOPTION F.A.Q. (Frequently Asked Questions)
1. Why are you guys adopting a baby?
We have always planned to have children, and we have been praying that God would send a baby our way. While adoption is not the way we initially expected to build our family, we are really excited to see the way God’s plan is unfolding! There is a child out there who belongs with us, and though he or she is still unknown to us, this baby is part of our family. Since I (Sarah) am from a family where adoption isn’t unusual – in fact, my brother is adopted – we’ve seen firsthand the way that families are built on love and commitment, and not simply genetics. It’s becoming more and more clear what a privilege it is to start our family this way!
2. Why are you adopting a baby from Russia?
There are an overabundance of American couples who want to adopt children – far beyond the number of babies given up for adoption each year in the U.S. (this is partly due to the ~ 1,000,000 pregnancies terminated every year here). However, when one looks overseas, the story is exactly the opposite. I found a statistic stating that only one in ten Russian orphans will ever be adopted. Similarly, there are thousands of children in China (mostly girls), Guatemala (mostly boys), Korea, and other countries who are waiting for families. We prayed about this and decided on Russia – the timeline is fast (more on that later) and we could adopt a fairly young child. This is particularly true for the region of Russia we have chosen, which is part of Siberia. We also think it will be very interesting to travel to Russia and experience the culture our child has experienced for his or her early life.
3. How did you select an adoption agency?
We registered on the websites of several agencies to get more information. We became familiar with the basic process and costs, so just needed to figure out the next step. Then one day we received an email from a specific agency (we are asked not to discuss agencies by name on the web) describing the particular need for people to adopt children from parts of Siberia in Russia. The process seems to be more streamlined than some other regions, and the children tend to be healthier than in some other parts of Russia. We looked through the pictures in the email of children who’d recently been adopted, and (of course!) they were so adorable that we were sold! We also like the organization – while they are not officially a Christian organization, the ideas of “having faith” and “being faithful” are prominent in their mission. The online message board for parents like us is full of encouragement from the Bible as we all wind our way through this process. There are so many great Biblical examples of prayerful waiting…and that is what we are trying to do.
4. How old will the baby be?
Babies in Russia are not considered officially “orphans” until they have been in the orphanage system for at least 6 months. Combining this waiting period with bureaucracy, the youngest are usually 12-18 months when they are adopted. The most recent adoption I know of (by a couple working with the same agency as us, adopting from the same region) involves a baby who was 11 months old when the adoptive parents went to meet him, and will be 13-14 months old when they bring him home.
5. When do you go to Russia?
We will need to make two trips to Siberia. On the first trip, we will get to meet the baby that has been selected for us and (prayerfully!) confirm that we want to proceed with adoption of that baby. If for some reason we feel wrong about the particular match that has been made, we will have an opportunity to meet a different child. We will leave (after about a week) knowing the child we will adopt…but we don’t get to bring them home yet. At this point, the adoption enters deeper into the legal system and we wait for a court date, hopefully within one-two months, at which time we will go back and legally adopt our baby in Russia and stay for about two weeks. We hope to make the first trip in May or June, but it will depend upon the speed of bureaucracy in our region in dealing with our application. If we get to go by June, then we would expect to make our second trip by the end of the summer! (However, there are many places in which the process can be delayed so we are trying to be flexible.)
6. Have you been “accepted” to adopt a child?
Yes! We are not waiting to hear whether we will adopt, but simply which child we will adopt. We have been approved through background checks and a careful study of our home life (a 5-hour interview!).
7. Will your child be a U.S. citizen?
Yes. We will need to fill out some paperwork, but they will certainly be a U.S. citizen. Some Canadian friends have also told us that our baby will automatically be a citizen of Canada as well, since Rob is Canadian – hopefully that is the case, since it would great for our child to have dual citizenship. We still need to look into this.
8. Is there a chance you will come back with more than one child?
Not really – all of our documentation is set up for one child only. I am sure it will be hard to leave the rest of the children behind in the orphanage, but realistically it makes sense for us to start our family with just one child, particularly since it is our first child and neither of us plans to stay home full-time. Instead, we plan to stagger our work schedules and get some part-time help with child care in our home. I will be doing a lot of work from home in the Fall semester, as I do not have teaching responsibilities but instead will be focusing on research projects. I will still spend a few days each week at UF and plan to stay fully connected with my work as a professor there. I will be teaching again next Spring. We both love our jobs, and our colleagues have demonstrated a lot of support and flexibility already. We feel so blessed!
We're happy to answer other questions too! We'll be using this blog to keep you updated, answer questions, and reflect on this fascinating experience.
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