Anna and Victoria's Adoption
December 31, 2008 - Victoria was born in Kiev, Ukraine
February 10, 2009 - Anna was born near Kiev, Ukraine
November 2009 - First discovered Reece's Rainbow and fell in love with a couple little ones who have since found their forever family. Didn't think it was possible for us to do an international adoption. Madalyn was having open heart surgery and our minds were occupied with that. The first "little tug" on my heart was definitely there.
December 2009 - Still looking and studying the RR website. PraYing for children to find their families. That little tugging is still there but trying to ignore it -- we can't do that, I am afraid to fly, we are going to adopt a sibling group first, we will adopt domestically, too expensive -- all kinds of reasons.
January 2010 - I am sick most of this month with bad stomach problems. As a matter of fact I got extremely sick on little Magda's first birthday (New Year's Eve 2009). Didn't look at RR as much because I was sick in bed most of this month. I had had several discussions with friends and with Mark about the sweet faces on Reece's Rainbow. That little tug is sure getting stronger!!
We had also inquired on a sibling group in foster care in Colorado of 2 little girls, one of which had Down syndrome, and were wondering if that was the sibling group for us. We waited for a reply....
February 2010 - Finally got word that we were not the family for the 2 sisters in Colorado. Still looking at the faces on RR...actually thinking about it, considering it. Could we really afford to do this? Looking at the requirements of international adoption seriously.
February 14, 2010 - Read the blog Cornish adoption journey - "How does your story begin?" Cried and cried, and cried some more. Tried to read it out loud to Mark on the way to eat out for Valentine's Day in Farmington, NM. Could barely get through a sentence without stopping...this is seriously affecting me. Prayed for God to intervene and move Mark's heart if it was actually His will for this to happen... He totally did because Mark came home from work a few days later and needed no convincing at all when I asked him what he thought about it all. Even about the financial piece...that was Mark's big hang-up...how can we afford to do this? Wow God you are amazing!
February 18, 2010 - began looking into a couple adoption agencies.
February 23, 2010 - emailed Andrea to find out more information about the process.
March 4, 2010 - inquired with Andrea about some little ones on RR website.
March 10, 2010 - decided to try to commit to Magda anD Arianna in Orphanage 25.
March 18, 2010 - All paperwork is finally in to RR! It is official!! We are committed to adopting little Magda and Arianna. Woohoo!
March 22, 2010 - Found out there is some confusion as to Arianna's year of birth. We thought her birthdate was February 10, 2008, making her 2 years old. However, that may not be the case...
March 24, 2010 - Got our official family sponsorship page set up. Yea! Still anxiously waiting for confirmation of Arianna's year of birth!
April 2, 2010 - Found out a little information about where the girls' orphanage is located and saw some pictures of it! Pretty neat to be able to see that.
April 7, 2010 - First homestudy appointment!
April 9, 2010 - Finally found out Arianna's year of birth....2009!! Wow she's a whole year younger than we thought she was! I will soon have 3 one-year-olds on my hands!!! How exciting!
April 14, 2010 - Finally received our dossier packet. Woohoo! It has made this even more real. And we found out our daughters' given birth names. They are beautiful! Will have to make some changes to the names we had picked for them...
April 23, 2010 - 2nd homestudy appointment, at our house.
May 1, 2010 - last meeting with our social worker.
May 3, 2010 - mailed CSP and power of attorney's to E.E . Hopefully our facilitator in E.E. will have our initial paperwork soon! Yea!!!
4/20/10 thru present - working on compiling dossier documents. Only have a couple left to finish, then we'll only be waiting on our approval letter from USCIS.
5/12 - 14/10 - Finished Medicals! Approved and ready to be apostilled! PHEW!!! That was stressing me for some reason, too complicated!
5/20 - 21/10 - Really this time was our last meeting with the social worker! :)
5/23/10 - Got new passports back!
5/25/10 - Rough Draft homestudy done
5/31/10 - Confirmed that our facilitator in country submitted our CSP's to the SDA!!
6/8/10 - Received a beatiful new picture of Magda!!!
6/10/10 - Homestudy/I600A packet received at USCIS!
6/18/10 - Received USCIS receipt and fingerprinting appointments for July 7th and 12th! Yay!!!
6/19/10 - Most dossier documents are done and apostilled. Received 3 back rejected. Ughh!! Have to re-do our medical forms!! :(
6/21/10 - Drove to Albuquerque - Got fingerprinted early!!!!
Waiting on USCIS approval
7/17/2010 - All but 2 documents for the dossier are apostilled and read to send! We are just waiting on the very special important approval letter from USCIS. Then both documents will be overnighted to Denver to be apostilled, and overnighted back! Then our very special group of papers can be sent to Eastern Europe!!! Hoping that letter will come next week.....
7/19/20 - Received our I-171H in the mail, our approval from USCIS!!! This is HUGE! Now we can finally send our dossier overseas! It was actually done 2 days after I talked to our officer on July 12, 2010. It was postmarked for the 14th! That means she got right on our file and approved it! May God bless her!!!!! :)
7/19/10 - Sent I-171H to Denver to be Apostilled.
7/26/10 - Received Apostilled documents from Denver via Fed Ex!
7/27/10 - Mailed dossier to girls' country! Also this is Mark Daniel's 9th birthday! :)
Waiting on dossier to arrive in country and be translated and submitted to the SDA (State Department of Adoptions).
8/3/10 - 3:05 p.m. their time - Dossier is delivered to our facilitator. :)
8/12/10 - our Dossier is submitted to the SDA!! Now we are just waiting on them to send us our appointment to officially accept the girls' referrals! :)
9/2/10 - SDA appointment date! September 15th!!!! We should receive our official permission to visit the girls at their orphanage at this appt. Oh how exciting this is!!!!
9/15-16/10 - Had our SDA appointment and received referrals for both girls. Didn't know at the time, but we were lucky to get both referrals at the same time. It doesn't always happen this way!
9/17/10 - Visit the girls for the very first time!!
9/28/10 - Court date! We are approved to adopt little Victoria and Anna! Now we have to wait 10 days (actually 13) to get court decree.
10/14/10 - Gotcha Day!!!! Yay! Applied for girls' passports.
10/18/10 - First Embassy Appt, turn in paperwork.
10/19/10 - Pick up passports in the morning. Then 2nd Embassy appt for medicals and to get visas.
10/20/10 - Leave for HOME!!!!!! Arrive HOME!!!!!!!!! Yay!!
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