Fingerprints are DONE!

We drove four hours to the USCIS field office last Friday and they graciously agreed to do our fingerprints, even though our appointment wasn't until July 2nd. We received an email from USCIS yesterday saying they will note in our file that the fingerprints are done, but our file is not yet up for review. We're praying it comes up for review this week. We will keep you posted! We just continue to pray that the paperwork will move at amazingly fast speeds. We want to get Zeb home!!!

In the Wait

So, now that we are waiting and the process is moving forward again (as opposed to just waiting for the home study to get done), how do we pass the time? Well, we're planning a road trip to visit grandparents this summer. That will be a great chance to have fun and see the people we love. Also, there's more paperwork to get done. While we wait, we're doing paperwork for the next phase. The same day we get the approval for which we're waiting now, we will have a FedEx envelope on standby so we can overnight the next round of paperwork to the USCIS office. We don't want to waste even a single day! Thank you for all your support. It means so much on this long journey!

Home Study Done and I-800a Filed!

I feel like the clock is ticking again!! We got our home study yesterday and overnighted it and the other documents to the USCIS office. It arrived there this morning. We are really hopeful we will be able to have our fingerprints done in just a couple of weeks. And we are PRAYING that we get approval of our I-800a in a matter of days after the prints are done. Please keep praying for things to MOVE ALONG!! We continue to get donations and they are right on time. Various payments for paperwork, fingerprinting, and post-placement reports are coming due. Thank you to everyone who has helped us on our journey to Zeb!!

Cleft Feeding Resource List

Feeding a baby with unrepaired cleft lip/palate will be new for us. We're still learning. Missy is on a Yahoo group for families who have adopted or are waiting to adopt a child with cleft lip/palate. One of the mothers there posted a list of bottles and cups that work well for these babies/toddlers. So, you can check out the list here. We're trying to figure out how best to meet Zeb's needs before and after surgery. We're also making progress on finding a cleft team to treat him once he's home. We're learning toward the hospital where Quilla had surgery. We've heard lots of great things about the surgeons there.

Home Study Countdown

We received an email from our adoption agency today indicating that they had signed off on our home study! Hooray! This is great news, but the home study still has to get approval from the home study agency itself. (Really, you never knew how MANY hoops there were for an adoption, did you?) The home study agency approval is the last step before we get the final, notarized, signed, dipped-in-chocolate-and-covered-in-sprinkles home study. That same day (maybe later this week?), we will overnight it along with some other paperwork that's ready to go to the appropriate USCIS office. Now, a good friend of mine who just went through this part informs me that the wait for USCIS to respond and issue a fingerprinting appointment is fairly quick...about two weeks. So, please pray that all goes well as we move on to the next steps. We've been so pleased with how quickly everything has gone so far...here's hoping the next part moves along too!