Finally...here's another update

Sorry it's been a while since our last post. This semester has been incredibly hectic for both of us. People keep telling us that things will be hectic after the baby comes too, but in a different way. We're sure that they are right!

Since February, we received approval from USCIS (Immigration) to adopt a child from Taiwan. So, all the fingerprinting and paperwork are a distant memory. Now, we are waiting for a referral from the orphanage. Hopefully, we will receive information on a specific baby in July. This is where they will tell us if it is a boy or girl and exactly how old the baby is. They will give us any known information on the baby's medical and social history. Also, we will hopefully receive pictures of the baby.

Then comes the hard decision. We have to decide if this is the right baby for us. Our fear is that we will be so anxious to have a baby that we won't be able to say no, even if it's not right for us. We have heard other adoptive families say that they knew as soon as they saw the baby that this was or wasn't the one. Hopefully, we will share the same experience.

Assuming that we accept the referral, then we will have another 7 months or so to wait until we can travel to Taiwan for the adoption. This allows time for two things to happen: USCIS can approve the adoption of our specific baby and our paperwork can make its way through the Taiwanese courts. With all the fear about kidnappings after the tsunamis of last year, we appreciate USCIS' need to verify that the baby is actually an orphan before we adopt.

So, it looks like we may travel for our adoption around the beginning of next year.