God's Timing Taking Over

God just has his ways of slowing down our process. I finally got a call from our social worker this morning, who we've been chasing for a few days, only to find that she didn't get our update done in the time frame she promised. So we are almost two weeks behind where we thought we'd be by now. Oh well. This could be an issue, or it could not matter at all. From what our agency is telling us, it is taking from 1-8 weeks for the USCIS to process our filing and get our holy grail to us. (And you thought the cable company gave you a big window for showing up.) If we get the 1 week processor, then we'll be way ahead. If we don't get it for 8 weeks, we'll be racing the clock. So I'm praying for God's timing while hoping for mine. Maybe they will be the same!

Meanwhile, our documentation should be returning today or tomorrow from the Chinese Consulate. I'll get our pictures printed out and take our dossier, minus the holy grail, to CCAI this week. They can go ahead and get it reviewed, translated and put together so that when that I-171H shows up it can be shipped out to China in a big hurry. Today I have the fun job of going through our pictures to choose just which photos we'll send with our dossier. Do we send the pictures with Jeff and old mustache, with Jeff and no mustache while we were on vacation, or with and Jeff and new, smaller mustache and matching goatee? Some decisions are just so hard!

Okay, now we do have BIG and FUN news!! We finally got a call from the Weld County District Court notifying us that we have, at last, been approved to be Samara's parents in Weld County. This is good news because now we won't have to move to a less picky county or state to keep her in our custody. And it means she will finally get a Colorado birth certificate so she can get that driver's license when she is 16. Whew! I'm speaking somewhat tongue in cheek, but the Colorado system really is a mess when it comes to finalizing the process. They make no distinction between domestic and foreign adoptions. While they must check home studies and criminal records, etc. for a domestic adoption, they do not recognize that adoptive parents of kids from other countries have already jumped through a zillion hoops. We've already proved to the US Dept. of Homeland Security and, in our case, the People's Republic of China, that we are adequate to parent a child. So they basically "reinvent the wheel" and check us out all over again. This is not only costly and frustrating as an adoptive parent, it is a waste of taxpayer money to put time and effort into a repetitive process. Jeff and I are thinking of jumping into the fray to find a legislator that will sponsor a bill to change Colorado law on this so that like many other states, foreign adoptions are accepted automatically at the state level. Through his job Jeff has a few crucial contacts, including a legislative liaison who has adopted from China twice. We're hoping he might jump in there with us. But I digress--big time!

So on Tuesday, November 1 at 9 a.m., Samara Jing Stoll will officially become our child, per Colorado statute. We've been told we can bring anyone to court we'd like for this momentous occasion. Everyone is invited to join us at the court to celebrate jumping the last hurdle of Mara's journey to our family. Personally, I'll be celebrating the last of the paperwork in her name and the last of the financial outlay towards this end, $35 for that Birth Certificate! Woo Hoo! Onward and upward.