our next step putting together the Dossiers

OK so I am a bit overwhelmed but happy to have the information I have been waiting for about getting together our Dossier. We should have the Dossier prep packet on Sat. We will have to do two Dossiers one Registration Dossier" is due as soon as home study is complete. It will be sent to our facilitator, she will translate it and submit it to the Committee in Josiah's region, who will officially register us as prospective adoptive parents. Shortly thereafter we will be given a travel date to meet Josiah.I am thinking this may happen in August.

"Court Dossier". is due just prior to our first trip to meet Josiah, The judge will not issue a court date until he/she has reviewed the "court dossier" in its entirely, which can take up to two months or longer depending upon such variables as holidays, vacations and the judges docket.so we want to send it before our first trip, but know we will have to come home before we get our court date and date for our 2nd trip. we will be praying for this to be fast and that nothing holds it up.so we can get Josiah home before his 3rd birthday on November 3rd.
Sounds like we have a lot more work to do I'm sorta scared to get the packet not knowing what else we need but we will get thru it and get it done like we have all the other stuff.I guess it was a good thing our social worker for our homestudy is going on vacation, it gives us time to get this done. Otherwise I may have tried to rush it and missed something. It's all in Gods timing so we just need to remember that.Plus we do still need time to raise funds somehow.
Also I wanted to say we can't say what country Josiah is in, We were advised not to on a public blog. But I will tell you from looking at the pictures it is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. I hope that while Mike and I are there we can take in some of it and treat it like a vacation. I know it will probably be stressful but I hope we can remember to have some fun and see all the beauty of this country.
excited and a bit overwhelmed for the next step but bring it on, Dossiers here we come!

To hear your name spoken out loud

I don't know why but this morning when Mike said Josiah's name it hit me in a way I have not felt yet I didn't know how to say it so I wrote this poem.
To hear your name spoken out loud
I have said your name so many times to myself,but to hear it spoken out loud is something else.
It is like a secret being told, a secret of my heart unfolds.
Shout it yell it say it clear,to say your name makes you feel so near.
How can a name make me feel this way,I know you will be in my arms one day.
How can a name spoken bring such tears,so many emotions love and  fears.
One day I will hear your name and it will be a common thing,for now I will let flow the tears that it can bring.
Happy tears and sometimes sad,to hear your name makes my heart glad.
To hear your name makes me proud, to hear your name spoken out loud.
 
:written by Mommy for Josiah:

we are ok to be parents the psychologist said so

well I guess we are ok to be parent s whowee! that was a close one! lol well at least I can use that on my kids now ha-ha! "I am A good mom because the psychologist said so ha-ha!" Well it was no big deal she just asked some questions and we had to take a little test is what she called it but it was just a bunch of questions about how you feel not any thing big. the plan was 30 min for Mike and 30 min for me,well I went first and took up 45 min so when Mike went he only had to talk to her for 15 min because we only had 1hour. I guess I just talk  a lot teehee! so anyways good to know we are fit to be parents after 16.9 years of already doing it.

psychologist visit today

Off to the psychologist today to see if we will be good parents haha! we have been parents for 16 years and 9 months to six great kids I hope the psychologist says we will be able to be good parents, I'm not sure LOL!
well still it is sorta strange having to go to someone that does not know you and have them tell you if you are fit to parent or not.I will let you know how it goes.

chose to listen to God

I took this from another Mommys blog they just got home with their baby girl and they went thru some tuff times to get her. I just had to share some of what she said now after they are home.
"I also thought about how I would not be in that moment, rocking my sweet baby to sleep, if we had not taken this leap of faith and listened to God's call. We had every excuse in the book not to adopt her. We convinced ourselves this couldn't be for us. Finances. Time. Travel. Work. Life. Comfort. You get the picture. Thinking about how close we were to choosing not to adopt her makes me sad. Rocking her to sleep, holding her in my arms, feeling her heart beat, overflowing with love and gratefulness....thinking this may not have been because we were afraid. It makes me wonder what I have missed out on in life due to fear, lack of faith, and selfishness. If you feel you are being called to do something, listen to the call, take the leap, jump out of the airplane, because you won't be left to crash to the ground....if you just believe. We are NOT great, wonderful, extraordinary people. We are average, weak, mistake-filled, every day people who chose to listen to God, listen to our hearts, push fear to the side, and take a leap of faith. The reward is great."

Time frame

Found out today that our homestudy will be done the first week of June. Our social worker gets home from her vacation on may 24th and she said she will have it done the first week of June if not sooner. At least it gives me a time frame to think about .We can work on getting everything ready for the dossier so it's all ready to go (even though I don't know what all that is yet because my agency hasn't gotten me the information yet) After she gets the homestudy done we will file our I-600A form and wait for our finger print appt. I think that will take maybe 4-5 weeks so maybe by the first of July we can send off the dossier to Josiah's country. I hope to get the dossier prep packet soon so I can start to work on it then the wait will begin. It is already hard to look at his sweet picture and not want to just grab him up and kiss on him. Its sorta like waiting for the baby when you are pregnant but the only thing is he is learning so many new things without us and I just pray he is being taken care of well and at least the caregivers are nice to him and treat him good.



We will need to get some fundraising done too if you have been thinking about donating to bring Josiah home this would be a great time,you can donate to the puzzle fundraiser it is down lower on this page. or to our sponsorship page on Reece's Rainbow by clicking on the button to the side. or you can send us a check in the mail or money thru PayPal just email me for our address katrina9@clear.net or if you are going to see us in person cash is great. I know that times are hard right now for everyone but anything helps. We can't apply for any grants until we have a completed homestudy so that can't help us right now.But we will be applying as soon as we get the homestudy done if you know of any good grants please let me know.We are so grateful to all of the ones that have already helped thank you so much.

Thank you Randa-Kay

Thanks to Randa-Kay! she fixed up our blog and made it look so cute,I can even see our followers now. and she made us a button that you can click onto and go to our family sponsership page on Reece's Rainbow. please feel free to grab our new button for your blogs.I will be adding peoples buttons to our blog after I learn how lol, maybe Randa-Kay can help me with that too. Thanks Rand-Kay!

Followers

I want to thank all of you that are reading my blog even though I can't see you lol I don't know much about this blog stuff but for some reason I can't see my Followers.I did read all of your comments thank you,at least I can see them.If anyone reading this knows how I fix it so I can see my Followers let me know.

Does anyone even read my blog?

ok so I am just wondering does anyone read my blog? I never have any comments and I can't see my followers for some reason. so it makes me wonder if anyone can even read it. If you are reading my blog will you please post a comment under this post? just to say hi so I know I'm not just talking to my self. but I guess if I am just talking to my self it will be nice to look back on one day lol.

Frustrated

Frustrated! our social worker that is doing our homestudy is going on vacation and the agency we are working with just got her the info she needed to finish the HS. Because of a few things still needed our Social worker is not going to be able to finish our HS before she goes on vacation. This is going to put us five or six weeks behind from where we could have been. I know she has done her best and I know she deserves a vacation she is such a sweet lady,It just makes me sad. I will try not to stress about this and think of it as a good thing, maybe there is a good reason for it only God knows. I will just continue to trust and know that in the end no matter how long it takes we will have Josiah home with us. I think about a lot of the friends I have made that are stuck in their Childs country and can't get home or can't get to their childs country for the court date because of the ash from the volcano and I count my blessings. I feel so bad for those families.

Passports

we went to get our passports today well order them anyways. we got to the post office at 8:15am in hopes to not have to stand in line. They open at 8:30. So we go in and the doors are still locked the light are still off it's 8:35 by now there is a line forming behind us. A man opens up the half door peeks out and says "Sorry folks we are having a hard time getting the safe open!" lol so we wait. Finally at 8:45 he turns on the lights and lets us in. but he still didn't get the safe open so they could not do any money transactions. we thought good thing Mike brought the check book. So a guy from the back comes up to help us with the passports so the other guy could help the other people sending packages. He was dressed in a t-shirt and jeans and kept apologizing to us for not having is postal uniform on. we didn't care we were just thankful he came to help us.He goes to take my picture and says "don't smile!" ha-ha so now I can't stop smiling I felt like a kid when you use reverse psychology on them. So it took him 3 times to get a picture. Then it was Mikes turn he had no problem. The guy goes to print our pictures and while he is doing that he messes with the safe some more and what do you know he got it open. We were happy because I had brought cash to get a money order. He brings the pictures to us and both of our eyes are half closed we look dead tired or drunk lol and I had fixed my self all up I dressed in a shirt that would look good because I knew this picture would be on my passport that lots of people would see. I told Mike "oh well I bet we will look like that while traveling anyways so no biggie lol." So we got our passports ordered, one more thing to check off the list yaaaa!

Psychologist

So today I am trying to find a psychologist to do our review. I have a list of them I have called but no one answered the phones so I leave messages with them all. hope they call me back tomorrow. we are still not sure if it will have to go into our homestudy. our social worker is ready to send us the draft for the homestudy. but we are waiting on our agency to send her their guidelines. and they are waiting on the facilitator in Josiah's country to send it to them. because he has DS they think there may be something different that needs to be added and they don't want to miss anything. that is all well but our social worker is going on vacation on may 5th and does not get back till may 21st. so if she can't get the homestudy report done before she goes that is going to halt everything for us while she is on vacation. because we can't even send in the I600A form to get our finger print appointment without the homestudy.

I sit hear and wonder will there ever be a day that I don't have to do something or think about something that has to do with the adoption? probably not until he is home. oh well it is worth it just a bit stressful.Mike and I are going to order our passports tomorrow morning, it will take 6 weeks to get them. we can't get our Dossier sent without them so guess that gives us 6 weeks to get together what we need for the Dossier. that seems like so long.

ok so as I was writing this the psychologist calls me she was the first one I called she was referred to me not only by our social worker but also our friend. Her office is close to us and she can get us in on Monday and is only charging us $250 wow! Is God good or what! before I sat down to call my list I prayed and everything I asked for was answered. As I sit hear and type tears roll down my face because of the grace God has shown us.

when you say yes to God

This was written by another Mom who is adopting but it was just so good I had to bring it over to our blog!

Incredible things happen when we say "Yes" to God! The journey may be a  little [or a whole lot] daunting or scary...but obedience to God gives Him such an incredible opportunity to open the floodgates of heaven and pour down more precious blessings than our hearts could ever hope or dream of.

Homestudy

  God continues to amaze me with his grace. We had our homestudy this morning I was like a mad lady cleaning the house all week and the kids and Mike and even Papa(Mikes dad ) helped. Boy didn't know so much junk and trash could be in one house lol. Well it was something we needed to do anyways we got our spring cleaning done. But really I didn't need to bother she walked thru the house, she peeked in each room, made sure we had proper exits "(windows and doors), made sure all the smoke detectors worked, looked at our first aid kit,evacuation plan, looked at our fire extinguisher, gates on stairs,made sure we had locked cabinets where we keep knifes,plastic bags and cleaning supplies, (guess it helps that I do childcare and I already have all that stuff and my house is already safety proofed). She spent time with each child asking them questions and getting to know each of them. She spent time with both Mike and I too and then we had a family meeting. My kids had no questions lol. Then she went over all the paper work with Mike and I. she prayed with us and that was it. It did take over 4 hrs but it was not stressful more like a friend or relative coming over. Actually the time we had with her was very helpful as far as her telling us what's next. So all of you reading this who have not yet had your homestudy visit don't sweat it. Your social worker is there to help you, she wants the best for you and will help guide you. So don't be stressed out. Just clean up your home like you would say if you were having a family party or something really it is not bad at all.

Break down of the cost of Josiah's adoption

Some people have asked us what things cost so I thought I would break it down.

We already paid for

commitment fee $1,275

agency application fee $375

homestudy application fee $300

finger prints $40

birth certificates $205

Dr health check don't know yet.
passports are $115 each so that's $230
physiologist evaluation $250
home study $1,625
2nd set of finger prints $40

Total $4,340

The next few things we need
Family Picture for Dossier ?

 I600A  $675

FBI fingerprints $80 each so $160

We have to pay our agency $2,500 before they start on the dossier
documents apostilled  not sure yet $200
postage to send Dossier $120

total $3,655

ok then we have our 2nd payment to our agency of $1,925

and $8,500 support and service fees includes coordination fees orphanage donation ,translation and notarization of dossier, country tax humanitarian aide and assistance fund

$200 for gifts for officials

our visa $560 each so $1,120

parent medical exam $200 each so $400

transportation by car while in country $2,000

train in country $200 each so $400

translator fee for court $100

authentication of legal paperwork while in country $100

our airfare $2000 each round trip we travel twice so $8,000

hotel $200 per day we will be there 7-10 days first trip and 10-14 days the 2nd so $4,800

food for us while in country $50 per day each $1,200

Josiah's medical exam $150

Josiah's passport $75

Josiah's visa $400

 Total $19,670

Total for all $27,665

Any and all help any of you can give us will be such a blessing, please help us bring our baby home.