USCIS Fingerprinting!!!

On September 6, 2007 we were fingerprinted for the adoption process a 3rd time. We received notice from the Department of Homeland Security USCIS of our ASC appointment. In other word we received a letter stating when and where we were to report to get fingerprinted. Everything went really well. Our appointment was for 10:00 am on September 6, 2008. The boys came with us and they were great. The entire appointment was over in an hour. Although Rudy almost got sent home without getting fingerprinted. In the letter they send you it states: if you have open wounds or bandages/casts when you appear, the USCIS may reschedule your appointment if it is determined your injuries will interfere with taking your biometric. Well Rudy had one spot of poison ivy on his finger with a band aid over it. The girl who was taking his fingerprints called over the girl that was taking my fingerprints to see if they could get a good fingerprint or was the band aid in the way. My face was probably turning red at that moment, because if his appointment needed to be rescheduled, who knows when that would happen and that means things would be delayed even longer. We are approximately 60 days into our potential 90 day wait for our approval form I-171H. So far God has done wonders for me. I have really been at peace while we are waiting for the approval.

3rd Time is a Charm!!

Last Friday August 29, 2008 we received notice from USCIS that we have been scheduled on September 6, 2008 for our fingerprinting. Yeah!!; this means USCIS is processing our paperwork for our Orphan Petition. My guess is that after we get fingerprinted tomorrow it will take another 2 months for us to get our approval back from them. This is just based on how long is has taken others in this area recently to receive there approval. Lets hope things have gotten faster. This will be our third time getting fingerprinted for the adoption.

We are waiting for USCIS

We sent our paperwork to USCIS on Friday July 25, 2008. They received it on Monday July 28, 2008. We are now waiting for their approval. They sent us an acknowledgement of our application. The letter said it could take up to 90 day to process. Typical time in Atlanta these days seems to be 1 month for your fingerprinting appointment (yes, we need to get fingerprinted for a 3rd time), then it takes approximately 3 months from application to receive approval.

While we are waiting on USCIS approval we will be finishing up all of our dossier documents and doing some reading.

It Arrived

Our home study arrived in the mail last Saturday (July 19, 2008). We were so excited. I opened the mailbox took it out and was waiving it as all three boys (Rudy, Lawson, and Eli) were looking out the window. I opened it and immediately read it, and immediately found some major typos. They typed Lawson as Dawson and they called us the Wilson's instead of the Gleason's in a sentence. I couldn't believe my eyes. I have been checking the mailbox everyday for this documents and when it arrives it arrives with typos that need to be fixed. This only means it is going to take longer. Monday morning I called our social worker to discuss the typos. She called back on Tuesday. We received the corrections yesterday. Now we have everything ready for USCIS. After the boys wake-up from nap time we are headed straight to the post office to send this packet to USCIS and then the wait starts.......

Our consultant at our agency told us it currently a 3 month processing time in Atlanta, but she heard they (USCIS) are trying to speed things up in here. I hope so. We can't send our dossier to the state until we get our USCIS approval...which means receiving our I-171H in the mail.

Checking the Mailbox Everyday.

I have been checking the mailbox just after the mailman leaves everyday in hope to find our homestudy report. I has been four weeks and one day since our last visit. The homestudy was suppose to be in our hand with in three weeks. I called on Monday as we were approaching the 4 week mark and they said it hadn't been processed as of Friday and we should receive it by the end of this week. I was very nice and said okay, but I don't think I will be as nice on if we don't receive by next Monday. The other documents for USCIS are ready to go we just need our homestudy report.

When Rudy and I were talking about the adoption this week we realized that our baby girl is probably due or was just recently born. It may be possible that Kennedy will have a July or August birthdate. WOW!!!!

Our Home Study is Complete.

On Monday our social worker called and told us that she had finished our report, however there were two missing documents. Immediately I gathered them and brought them to her home. She said she was sending the report to her agency and ours that day. Hopefully we will have the completed notarized home study report in our hands this week. Yeah, I can't wait to see it and send it off to USCIS.

Once the home study is in our hands, that along with other required documents can be delivered to USCIS by courier. Please pray that the approval from USCIS is quick. I have heard it can take anywhere from 2 weeks to 3 months. We can't submit the dossier until we get the approval in the mail from USCIS.

In the mean time, this week I plan to drive all over Atlanta to get my notarized documents for the dossier authenticated. This means going to three different county court houses to get a stamp on each of my documents with the boys in tow since our sitter is busy. Luckily a friend has offered to go with me to help entertain the boys. ---That's all for now!

We celebrated tonight!

All weekend we prepared for our social worker for our home study to visit our home today. As usual our social worker for our home study is great, real easy-going. The morning began with me waking up before everyone and not being able to go back to sleep, so I started getting breakfast ready for our visit. Finally, I heard Lawson waking up, so I went to get him and the day began; soon after we were all up and going.

Then the phone rang it was our social worker, she almost forgot we had an appointment. When we scheduled it, we were both in the middle of something else, so I can understand. So she was just confirming the appointment and checking if it would be okay to bring her 3 girls with her. Of course I didn't care; our house is kid friendly, there are plenty of toys to entertain and we did not want to cancel the appointment. Rescheduling the appointment wouldn't happen until July because our schedule is so busy until then.

The visit was about an hour, just after she arrived, we ate breakfast while discussing a few things such as the final home study processing, what our community is like, etc,. After that we showed her all around the house and that was it. Nothing to it. I really enjoyed the home study process and am looking forward to reading the report. We will get the report in approximately 3 weeks. Lets pray for a quick return, in other words shorter than 3 weeks.

It felt so good to have this part our the process completed, at least on our end; so we celebrated by going out to dinner. Our next celebration will be when we get our I-171-H form back from USCIS.

So what's next: we are going to fax our dossier documents to our agency to have them check them for errors, etc. When they are complete I will get all our notarized documents authenticated and sealed.

This was a big day for us and we are so excited that things are going so well.