Adoption update

We have sent in our official acceptance paperwork and it is already on its way to Korea. That is the good news. We are still waiting to hear from our specialist as to what we can expect now, when we can send our first care package and when it becomes really official.

So because there are a lot of unknowns and to protect our baby girl, she will be called for the time being Baby K and we won't be posting any pictures of her. You will just have to trust me that she has a full head of hair and is just plain adorable.

Baby K does have a name here at home and among family. It is the name she was given by her birth mother. Her birth mother chose for her an American first name and then a Korean middle name. We aren't going to change it. We love it and we love that it came from her mother.

For now we also aren't sharing all of the details about sweet Baby K. Some details will for sure come out and other's will stay private but for now it will be private.

This adoption is so very different. We likely won't meet Baby K's mother possibly ever. We will meet her foster mom and family which is amazing. She isn't in an orphanage as was Kiya. Things are just different. One big difference is Baby K weighed at 3 months what Kiya weighed at 6 months. Kiya was well loved and taken care of by the nannies at the care center. Baby K gets a mom figure that takes care of her. A person that she can attach too.

I am anxiously awaiting to hear what the next steps are in this long part of the process besides just waiting. We know we are being fingerprinted by USCIS in a couple weeks so that piece will be done.

So while we wait we will talk about her and look at her pictures. Kiya insists on looking at her pictures all the time. She also insists that "baby walk now". She also said today in the car that she wanted to play with Baby K. I think she is going to make an amazing big sister. It will be an adjustment and I suspect the first months home will be a challenge but in the end. I think Kiya is going to like have a sister to play with. They will be about 2 1/2 years apart in age.

Ok I am officially rambling. I am just so excited to hear the squeals of two beautiful little girls in this house. I am very blessed.

Guess what......IT'S A GIRL :)

We got the call on Monday afternoon. We were shocked, thrilled and super excited. It was about 4pm when I saw that I missed a call on my cell phone. I saw the phone number and my heart skipped a beat. I just knew. This was the call about our son. The day we had been waiting for.

When I called back and started talking with the social worker, she first confirmed that we were open to adopting a boy or a girl to which I responded yes. She then said well, I have some news about a referral for you. It is a baby girl. At that point, I probably should have pulled over as I was in tears. We knew it could happen but really thought we were going to have a  boy. We had even started a list of boy names.

As we started to hear the details, things just clicked. This little girl fits in our family. We listened. We discussed. We sent the email of info to our international adoption doctor, the same one we used for Kiya's referral. We waited.

Our doctor called us at 6:15am on Tuesday. We were up and packing to head to the hospital for Kiya's 4th cast. I spoke with her for a few minutes. All medical info seemed in line and good. She is in the 50th percentile in most metrics. She is obviously well loved by her foster mom.

For now she will be called Baby K. She is currently 4 months old and doing very well with her foster mom. She has chubby cheeks and a head full of hair.

We now settle in to wait again. It could be up to 14 months before we travel to bring her home. Kiya is in love already. She sees her picture and says baby sister. Melts my heart every time. We showed her the picture right before we left to head to Chicago. When we stopped at the oasis for food, she asked if we were picking up baby sister now. So we told her no. I think the adoption will allow for a more open dialogue about Kiya's adoption. I know she will be a great big sister. Though this morning we asked her if she would share her toys and she said, "no my toys. not K's toys."

Never dreamed I would be blessed enough to be a mom to two beautiful girls, Kiya and baby K.

Time to shop for her first care package :)

Long overdue adoption update

So apparently people (I mean Leah) still read this blog and informed me that I changed my side bar to say we are officially waiting yet failed to blog about it. So here it is.

On May 10 we were officially put on the wait list for Korea. Right now the timeline for waiting for a referral is as such

0-3 months for a boy
4-8 months for a girl

Once we accept our referral, we will do an acceptance dossier. No worries not nearly the amount of paperwork involved this go round.

From there we wait for a visa and then travel clearance. Here is where the long wait comes in. It is estimated that it could take as long as 14 months from time of referral acceptance until travel clearance.

So far the longest wait I have seen is 10 months. During the wait to travel we can send 2 care packages and request two updates on top of the other updates we will receive.

We are currently on the wait list for a boy or a girl. We know that we will likely bring home a child closer to 2 in age so a full fledged toddler. We are both excited and nervous about this.

In the meantime we are trying to learn as much as we can and wait for that phone to ring.  It could be tomorrow or it could be August or heck it could even be December whatever is meant to be will be and we are at peace with that.

At last check there were about 18 families waiting for girls and 8 waiting for boys.

So there you have it.

Stay tuned for Wordless Wednesday...pics of Kiya and Badger just for you Leah :)

Adoption update

Okay time to spill the beans on what we are up too.

First let me say that it is with a heavy heart that we have decided to leave to Ethiopia program. It was all becoming just too much. The corruption, the changing timelines, the lack of timelines....it was not settling well with us to just sit at the bottom of this long waiting list. We were waiting for an orphan to be made. We had no end in sight to how long that wait might be and given the current vibe of adoption from Ethiopia we couldn't be sure it would be in the next 2 years or so. That and all the talk of corruption and massive slow downs, etc. It just didn't feel right anymore.

It breaks my heart to leave behind a culture and country that gave me my beautiful daughter. We know we will visist but it does sadden me that my children will not share this beautiful heritage. I know a piece of my heart will always belong in Ethiopia.

And it will also now belong in South Korea.

We are officially making the switch. We have sent in all the updated paperwork to both our local agency and CHS. Why Korea? Well, there are orphans that need families. There are kids in the system waiting for a forever family. We searched our hearts and truly feel we can be a family for one of those little ones.

The other big change is that we are likely adopting a toddler. Given how the timelines work in Korea our child will likely be over 1 year and possibly even as old as two at homecoming. We are excited about our new journey.

Our Little Man may turn out to be a girl which we are fine with as well.

This was not an easy decision for us. We truly wanted to adopt from Ethiopia. We were excited by the two trip rule as that meant we could spend more time in this country that we love.  I am sure some will say we are jumping ship because Korea is faster. And to that I say mind your own business. We shed tears about this decision. We second guessed ourselves. Long before we settled in and found Korea we were looking at national domestic adoption agencies and other countries. Korea hadn't even been brought up but was mentioned to us as a possibility.

We did some research. We did some soul searching. We talked. We thought. We talked some more. It felt right. It made sense. We envisioned our future son or daughter. We couldn't stop talking about Korea. About learning about a new culture about traveling to Asia and Africa with our kids. It fit into our future.

So there you have it. There is the news. We should hopefully fingers crossed be officially in the Korea program before the end of April. We are waiting on Adam Walsh paperwork to come back from California and yet another fingerprint check.  And then we settle in to wait with the news of our future child. We don't know how long that will take. It could be a month, it could be 6 months, it could be 8 months. From there we could wait for as many as 11-12 more months before we would travel to Korea.  Either way our hearts our open and we are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our child.