We're almost there!

On Friday Josh and I went down to an application service center to have our fingerprints taken for our I-600A application. They will be sent off to be checked by the federal government and then they will send us our form (I-171) that says we have been approved to bring on orphan into the US. This all has to be sent to the embassy in Ethiopia where we will have an appointment eventually with our child where we will get our visa to bring our child home. This assumes all goes smoothly and this is all still a ways off.

Back to where we are now...we are waiting on our last piece of paper (the I-171) and then we'll have our dossier complete. We will overnight our dossier to our agency who will review it and then send it off to be authenticated (translated I believe) and then the whole thing will go to Ethiopia! We will THEN be in line for our child. Right now our application letter states that we would like a girl (which we have written before) and the wait time for a girl is 9-11 months. That seems like a long time to wait but that is how long a pregnancy takes I have to keep reminding myself. I'm definitely learning patience here. I know that time needs to be treasured. It's time spent preparing, praying, getting our finances in order, and enjoying being a family of 4 for this season. I know that soon enough we'll have a little one who will have great needs so I'm hoping to focus on the two little ones who are growing up so fast now. I'm also trying to remember that I cannot go faster or slower than God will allow this process to go. While we are anxious to bring our daughter home we are praying for peace during the waiting. So here's to the last little bit of waiting on our final paper chase stage and to the next phase of waiting for a referral for our daughter!