I'm Back!

  

Hey All ! ! !

 
I've finally found a few moments of peace where I can settle down and put some words together on this blog again. What has it been? Well over a week I think. Gee... that's a long time in between posts.
 
So.... what have I been up to?
 
Well, last weekend we went to another PIP Class with other pre-adoptive parents. Met some more really awesome folks, and had an opportunity to see some of my old pals from our last PIP Class -- all in all it was a fun day.
  
During the class an adult adoptee came in for a visit and was kind enough to share many of her experiences with us. She also shared with us her (very personal...very touching) reasons for wanting to search for her birth mother, needing to connect with her Korean culture, and desires to work with young adoptees. It was an amazing (AMAZING) discussion, and there wasn't one dry eye in the room during much of it.
That day we also met with our wonderful social worker to discuss a few issues that, looking back, were really not issues...lol, but you know how things go when you're in the moment. :o)

Finally we drove over to my MIL's house for dinner with the family who were eagerly awaiting news and updates on how things were going with the adoption process.
 
All in all.....it was an awesome week/weekend!

Wordless Wednesday

Ode to Peddler's Village

We had a wonderful visit to Peddler's Village over the weekend.

One More Step

Our Home Study Is Done... all required paperwork (both our personal statements complete with multi-page questionnaires...) done; all supplemental paperwork (job letters, financial statements, proof of insurance, medicals, fingerprints, photos, etc.) done; all supporting documents (certified copies of birth certificates, marriage certificate, etc) attached; and all references....done! All sent to our agency via UPS... and confirmed today that it was received.


Hooorrrraaayyyyyyy!!!!!
 
 
Now we wait. We wait for them to review it all and let us know if anything is missing or needs to be updated. If all is well the home study package is approved and we are visited at home by 3 ghosts (Christmas past, present, and future....). Uhhh....No...wait…that's wrong. That's Charles Dickens....lol. Okay, WE will be visited approx. 3 times by 1 social worker....who is actually very nice (and not at all a ghost). And, if our visits go well we may only need to do two.
 
Once we are cleared by the social worker we will officially be H.S.T.K. (aka Home Study To Korea). This is a milestone marker. Most families celebrate when they are HSTK because then (and only then) they are OFFICIALLY placed on the waiting list for a referral. While waiting we MUST file two sets of paperwork with the US government for approval of our adoption. This paperwork is needed in order for us to travel to bring back our baby, and for our baby to enter into the United States.
 
One more small step on the road to forever...

My soul aches for Seoul

Let us keep South Korea in our prayers.  Many of us adoptive parents are concerned at the backlash that may come from these new developments in the news, especially with regards to traveling for our children.  But while the world may look chaotic, we know He who holds the world in His hands, and trust that His will be done.   Amen.


The NY Daily News

The U.S. played good cop-bad cop in the Korean crisis today as President Obama struggled to defuse tensions that boiled over into deadly artillery duels.
 
The nuclear aircraft carrier George Washington and its battle group of guided missile destroyers and frigates sailed from Japan to back up the South Korean navy in a show of force near the disputed maritime border between North and South Korea.
  
On the ground, Gen. Walter Sharp, commander of U.S. forces in South Korea and head of the United Nations Command, pressed for meetings with his North Korean military counterparts "to de-escalate the situation."
 
Sharp suggested an "exchange of information" in a sitdown at Panmunjom on the DMZ, the site of talks that led to an uneasy truce in the Korean War in 1953.
  
The U.S. has refused to renew diplomacy with North Korea and rejoin talks on an overall regional peace agreement until the North takes action on disarming its nuclear weapons.
  
South Korean officials said that death toll from the North’s artillery barrage aimed at Yeonpyeong Island rose to four today. The bodies of two men, believed to be in their 60s, were found at a destroyed construction site on the tiny island.
 
Two South Korean marines were killed and about 17 other people were wounded when about 50 North Korean artillery rounds hit the island on Tuesday, triggering a counter-battery South Korean artillery barrage of about 90 rounds.   [...more]
 

National Adoption Day

Conceived on Paper, Grown in my Heart


Congratulations and Happy Gotcha Day to all those new Forever Families!
 

November 20th is National Adoption Day: http://www.nationaladoptionday.org/


National Adoption Day is a collective national effort to raise awareness of the 114,000 children in foster care waiting to find permanent, loving families. This one day has made the dreams of thousands of children come true by working with policymakers, practitioners and advocates to finalize adoptions and find permanent, loving homes for children in foster care. In total, more than 30,000 children have been adopted from foster care on National Adoption Day.


To learn more about some of the families who have adopted through National Adoption Day in previous years, please click here.