We have exciting news to share........

For those of you who continue to follow our story through our blog, we are finally giving you a well over due update. We informed you in November that, due to the wait time increasing, we began looking into our other options in hopes to add a child to our family sooner. Had we continued with the China adoption we would have potentially waited as long as 7 years to add a child to our family, which we were simply not willing to do. So, the other options we had were domestic adoption or using donor eggs. Well, long story short, we began looking into the egg donor process and beleive it or not, WE ARE PREGNANT WITH TWINS!!!!! I am in my 12th week and things are going as well as expected. You can imagine how excited we are! Due date is Dec. 1, 2009.

We have been down a very long road and we want to thank our family and friends, and most importantly, our donor, for being there for us. We have had so much support during this process, from day one, which helped us make this dream or ours come true!

Lots of love,
Robin and Dave

Finally.....

we received our approval from U.S. Immigration/NBC of our I-800A Application. This approval means that we are "eligible and suitable prospective adoptive parents to adopt a Convention Child." This is something that we should be very excited about because with this approval our Dossier can finally be sent to China. Unfortunately though, as stated in our last post, because of the wait time increasing, we are not sure if we are going to pursue the adoption. We are looking into other options in hopes to add a child to our family sooner. I contacted our agency to let them know what we are doing and to find out how long we can hold off on sending our Dossier. They informed us that we have until March 9, 2009, as that is when documents in our Dossier begin to expire. So we do have several months until we have to make a decision as to whether or not we are going to follow through with the adoption.

To think that it has taken almost 8 months to get to this point is extremely frustrating and mind boggling to me. It is very sad for the children that need homes and very sad for the couples that want to give these children loving homes.

Feelings of discourgement....

For those of you who are following our blog for updates, I thought it would only be fair to let you know the latest. We are seven and half months into the "paper chasing" process and we continue to wait for Immigration (NBC) to give us our final approval so that our Dossier (China Application) can be sent to China. Our Dossier going to China is when our official "waiting" time would begin. Apparently, NBC has assigned our case to an Official and the review process started this past Thursday or Friday, but we have NO idea how long the review process will take.

Unfortunately, the wait time continues to increase, which means people are waiting longer and longer to get their child from China. Statements made by some waiting parents were told by their agencies that they could be waiting until the year 2010, or longer, and these waiting parents have been waiting since May 2006!

Dave and I are very discouraged by this and with the wait times increasing feel like we should look into other options that may give us the opportunity to add a child to our family sooner. We are afraid that if it is the only avenue we choose, we won't have the opportunity to become parents for years. We have a lot of money and emotions invested in this process so far, but at this point we do not know if we will pursue the China adoption.

So, when will they process our application.....

This was a comment made by a family that has a July receipt date like we do. So their 90 day wait has also passed. She has been calling USCIS to find out the status of their case and still has know idea. This is what she posted about her expience when calling them: "I've called the U.S. Dept of Homeland Security to get an update of where we stand, twice. The first time was 3 weeks ago. They told me they just started on July's files and we should be soon. I just called again this morning to get an update, they now told me our paper work was flagged with others to let them (Officers) know that our files are going over the 90 day mark and they should address it now. Not sure if that meant "Hey get on the ball", "Did you pass over our file", "Did you forget about us." All she could say to me is "It should be assigned an officer very soon to look at because it is past the time frame it should have been in there." Now I'm not sure how long it will take the officer to look over and send us an acceptance letter, etc. So now we just sit a wait again."
So, if they are just starting to process July cases now, who knows how much longer we will wait for our acceptance letter. Another 30 days? Another 60 days? Another 90 days? Who knows......

Status of our case....well, not really....

I emailed NBC (USCIS) on Sunday to find out the status or our case. This is what my email read:

Dear Hague Unit,

We are inquiring about the status of our case. It is our understanding that our case was received by your department on July 31, 2008 and that your expected turnaround is 90 days. At this time we would like to know if our case has been assigned to an officer and being reviewed.

We are anxiously awating your approval and would appreciate any information you can provide at this time.

Thank you in advance for your time

I received a response from them today which read:

Hello Robin & David,

The case in question will be processed for initial review/processing soon. All cases are targeted for completion within 90 days of receipt, as we are aware that this case is past the 90 day target goal. Once the processing of the case is complete you will be notified. We ask for your patience as we continue to process applications.

I hope this information is helpful.

The response is disappointing and extremely vague, as we still have no idea as to the status of our case.

Very frustrating.....

PS - Mom, keeping hunting for those ladybugs!

Not that i'm counting.....

but today is 90 days since the Hague Unit of National Benefits Center received our I-800A application. Do I want to rush to the mailbox today in hopes that something will be there? Of course. Do I think that something will actually be there? Of course not.....

But, with anticipation, I will rush to the mailbox……

"One Step At A Time"

While driving into work this morning I heard this song "One Step At A Time" by Jordan Sparks. While listening to the song, as cheesy as it sounds, I felt as though this song was written for me, so I thought I would share it with you:


Jordan Sparks-One Step At A Time with Lyrics - Watch the best video clips here