So Much to Say vs. So Much to Do

The title of this entry really sums it up for me. There is a lot that I want to say about our adoption, our move, our process, etc, but at the same time I have so much to do because of the adoption, the move, the boys, etc. I do have good intentions to keep blogging faithfully except that during this settling in period I'm giving myself some grace.

Adoptionwise we received our official acceptance into Holt's Ethiopia program. Hooray! (Oh, that reminds me, I need to put a timeline up on our blog sometime soon) Along with our acceptance comes our dossier instructions and what Holt calls the "Guidebook".

What is a dossier? A dossier is basically what our life looks like if you reduce it to personality-less pieces of paper. We have to get marriage certificates, birth certificates, letters from the bank, letters from the Air Force, letters from doctors (oh, and all those have to be notarized). Then there are personal references, and we have to include a state certified copy of a home study (which has it's own paperwork trail) and then we have to get Visas, passports, fingerprints and on and on the list goes.

I admit to feeling overwhelmed by the dossier and homestudy lists. It just seems like so much and all of a sudden to me. It might also have something to do with the general upheaval that we've been in because of moving over the past month. Andrew, however, is pretty cool with the list so that's good, we're balancing each other out. Apparently, being in the military one gets used to long lists of checklists and papers to be signed so he feels like he's in familiar territory. :)

What is the "Guidebook"? It's basically the Bible of Ethiopian adoptions. It explains everything. It has a ton of great information in it. It's just a lot to take in. There are instructions for the paperwork, hints and tips from families who have already traveled, parenting resources, information about travel, more explanations of fees, cultural facts about Ethiopia. You name it, it's in there.

For now, we're familiarizing ourselves with the contents of the Guidebook and the paperwork for the dossier. I have a call in to our social worker about getting started with a homestudy, and we're hitting up our families to help us pick up our various certificates. :)

It's definitely a lot, but we are very excited. Really being at the point when we're getting started is exciting. It's also bringing everything home to us. We are really doing this. There is a little girl out there depending on us, even if she doesn't know it yet, and this will really happen. We're going to fill out this paperwork, pray our way through the waiting, raise this money, travel to Ethiopia, and bring home our daughter! All of this will happen (most likely) within the next nine months. It's amazing. It's frightening. It's real. It's God will for us. It's going to be a time of growth for us individually, spiritually, and as a family. And it will end with a daughter, a sister, a granddaughter, a neice. We love it. We can't wait.

New Name

So, we have a new url. Did you notice? You must have because you're here. :) So, there were only a few of you anyway, but I apologize for the inconvenience. Here's what happened:


The blog originally was going to be a secret because I didn't think that we were going to be adopting soon and I was just looking for something that no one would find even though no one was going to be looking. :) Clear as mud? Beyond that, the whole secret name thing wasn't working out for me. I'm just not a person who can refer to her husband as "Daddio". I think I only typed it once or twice, but it made me cringe and it just wasn't feasible. Maybe that's an issue I need to address, but I'm just going to leave it alone. So, in the interest of honesty and less squirming when I'm typing my husband's name is Andrew. My name is Jamey.

There you have it. Please don't steal my identity because you know my first name. Oh, the kids are going to stay Pickle & Peanut.

(Second) Oh yeah, ZEHLAHLUM means "forever" in Amharic. Such a better name. Such a better future for my little girl.