Happenings around Here

I think I've used this phrase before, but a lot of the adoption process is hurry up and wait.  I am gearing up to a hurry up phase, which will then lead to a relatively long wait phase.

On Thursday of last week, I received back all of the documents that I sent to the Embassy in Washington, D.C. two weeks prior.  They had seals from the U.S. State Department and the Chinese Embassy.  Definitely the most official looking documents I've ever held.

So I put those, along with some pictures and a few other documents in the mail yesterday, and at 10:34 this morning, Colorado time, they arrived at my agency.  Because it is an incomplete dossier, there is no guarantee that it will go through critical review (where it is read three times!), but I am hopeful it will.  Either way, when the other documents get there, it will go through critical review then off to China it goes!

So now I just wait, wait, wait for my I-800a approval.  That should come in the next couple of weeks.  After that, it is mad dash to get that authenticated!

I am getting so much closer to Ella.  Some days, it seems like it's SO close and I have to get things done NOW.  Some days, it seems like it couldn't possibly be farther away.  Today I am kind of in the middle.  Most days it just doesn't feel real.  But I am getting there, slowly but surely!  I'm ready to get this girl home!