Who knows??

You might have noticed the little "Esther" book on the shelf in Little Sister's room. Esther 4:14 says "......Who knows if you weren't put in this position for just such a time as this?" We felt like that was the question we were being asked when we were trying to decide whether or not to adopt. Like God was saying, Who knows if I haven't put you right where you are, and blessed you beyond belief, and showed you exactly what I wanted to show you, to prepare your hearts.....for just such a time as this???
Well, the psych visit went just fine. The boys did great! They just spoke truthfully and straight from their hearts. It was sweet:) But.....He didn't have one of the tests that the dossier requires. So, he will have to download it and FedEx it to us real soon, hopefully. He still needs to update our evaluation, since visiting with the boys, but I have a feeling that this probably won't get finalized until after the holidays.
Speaking of....Merry Christmas and Happy 2009. It's going to be a great year..I just know it!!

One bite at a time......

I have added a few more pics of Little Sister's bedroom....per request.

We have our pysch visit tomorrow at 4:00. I spoke with the Alabama agent (@Villa Hope) and she said we are nearing the end. Yeah!!!! I remember Ally telling me when they were going through their adoption process, that the way to eat an elephant was....ONE BITE AT A TIME. We did not realize how true that statement would be until we've found ourselves going through a similar situation. Its just that some bites you seem to have to chew on for a while!!! All in good time....All in good time! ---That's actually the statement that Larry said to me yesterday at Wal Mart when we walked by the 'Barbie' and baby doll aisle when he saw me steering the cart in that direction. :)

FBI Clearance and other goodies!

Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhhewwwwwwwwwwwwww! Larry passed the FBI background check! They arrived today and it seems we BOTH are ALL CLEAR!!:) Yahooooo! I went to the Jackson County courthouse today to get certified copies of our marriage license and deed to our house. Fairly uneventful, Yeah!! Now, I will send copies of everything that we have compiled so far to Villa Hope for them to review and see if there are any corrections or additions that need to be made. To my knowledge, the only thing left is a couple of notarizations that need to be done and the final psych visit which was rescheduled for next Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Dakota has his first 8th grade basketball game tomorrow in Warrensburg. Go EAGLES!! And Dayton, after a long break from any sports at all, due to his accident, started basketball practice last week. He is very excited to say the least! :)

Hey Family & Friends!
Welcome to our blog! We certainly hope that this doesn't bore you to tears but we just wanted to keep you aware of what's going on and up to date on where we are on our time line for our adoption proceedings.
On the 19th of the November we received notice, via message on our home recorder, that we were approved from the USCIS. For those of you who don't know, that means that the United States has approved us to bring our daughter home. VERY, VERY, VERY exciting news! Over a years worth of compiling paperwork and discovering a whole lot more about the adoption process then I could have ever imagined, boiled down to that message and a few days later - official documentation in the mail. So, now we are busy preparing our dossier, all of our documentation that's sent to Peru. We only have a few things left on our checklist and then it's ready for all of the "seals" that it requires. All have to be notarized, sealed from the Secretary of State, and finally seals from the Peruvian consulate, in Chicago. Then off to Peru it goes and we wait for approval from them. It is THEN that we will technically be 'WAITING'.
Part of our dossier will include about 18 pictures of us and our home, including what will be her room. The pic at the top of the page is of us in HER room. Thanks to our wonderful friend AMY for our little photo shoot today!
This week: finalizing our physician visits forms from last week and on Tuesday returning to the psychologist for 2 more tests and for him to interview the boys. Also, we are waiting for our FBI clearances in the mail. These are the last items on the list before seals, seals, and more seals!
We are very excited and can't wait to see how God is going to lay all of this out for us.
Thanks for coming along on this journey!
~Laci