And now the mad rush begins!

So take a look at what we got yesterday!

Yep, it is the LAST piece of paper we need to finish our dossier! Our immigration approval. We got it 4 days after walking in to get our fingerprints! The approval is the same date we got our fingerprints! You rock US*IS!!! So now the fun beings! Monday will start the notarizing, certifying and authentication process! Since we live in Ohio we have an extra step. My plan is to be have it notarized and walk it through the county clerk tomorrow! Then it is on to the Secretary of state and finally the Chinese Consulate in New York! After that to the agency and then to CHINA!!! It feels great to be almost done.

Fingerprints and Are you Kidding me?

Well we got our fingerprint appointment letter on Saturday. Our appointment was scheduled for 5/15! We through caution to the wind and walked in today and we had no problems!!! They were happy to take us early. Of course Jaden was with us and the lady was nice enough to "take" Jaden's fingerprints! We were outta there in 20 minutes! And the shocker is that once I got home I had to call the US*IS office to let them know that I had gone in early, I actually got a real person who put me right through to my officer. I got her voice mail and left a message and 5 minutes later she called me back! Yes she did! And told me she would check the prints and mail it out today or tomorrow because she had already looked at my paperwork!!! And get this, she emailed me to let me know it was approved and in the mail!!! Holy crap! This is the LAST big paperwork before we are DTC. We just have to have it notarized, certified and authenticated! Back in the day, you know with Jaden's adoption you were not allowed to call the US*IS! And when we did Jaden's adoption we waited 65 days from fingerprints to approval! Holy cow this was a shock to me! We are getting closer and closer to Warren!

Seriously?!?!?!

So it was a week ago today that the US*IS got their little hands on my I800A. I am sure they are working very hard on our application but I am pretty sure they are not working as hard as they would like me to think they are! You see Monday morning at 1:44 A.M. I got a text message from them telling me they now have my application! I guess they would like me to believe that they were working on it at that exact moment, but I am pretty sure they were not. My guess is that they set up these text to go off at some crazy hour to stress those of us who are already going a little crazy after dealing with all the paperwork. I can tell you that my heart skipped a beat when it went off because who would text you at 1:44 A.M. if it was not an emergency! Now we are waiting on our official letter to come in the mail so we can just walk-in and do our fingerprints. That should shave a few days off our wait!
And in other news, today I got my birth certificate and marriage license back from the Houston consulate. And once again I got a little stressed out! Why you ask? Back in the old adoption days, you know in the I600A days when you got your forms back from the consulate they looked a little something like this...

Thats a copy of what Jaden's looked like way back in 2006. But today I got the stuff back and there was no special sheet stapled to my forms! Nope there was this little sticker taped to the back of my Secretary of state paper!

This REALLY stressed me out because I thought something was wrong but no it seems that is how they do things these days! I feel a little let down that I didn't get a whole sheet of paper but at least I got a cool sticker! Oh how I miss the I600A days!

More room pictures...

Nothing new in the adoption but I do need to post pictures of some progress to the room. This blog is mainly kept so that Warren will have a record of what we did while waiting for him. But it is also so that my family, who live 13 hours away can follow along with our lives. So I want to post pictures so they can see what everything looks like and not miss out.
Anyway we bought this dresser at IKEA and it did not look this big in the store! I love it but it is huge! Poor Warren only has enough clothes to fit in one of the small drawers! I guess we need to work on that!
Jaden was a big "help" getting the dresser put together. She put together a few of the drawers with her hammer and of course Daddy was supervising!

I800A app. on it's way!!!

Yesterday we headed to Fed-ex to ship the I800A application along with all the other stuff they needed! They should have it by tomorrow and now they actually send you an email and/or text you that they got it! They sure didn't do that with Jaden's adoption! So now we are one more step closer to Warren!

Homestudy in hand!

Well yesterday we finally got our notarized homestudy!!! My plan is to mail it out Monday to immigrations. Lately approvals have been running 30-45 days so I am keeping my fingers crossed for 30.
Today I fed-exed our Mississippi paperwork to the courier for the Houston consulate so that is one more thing done!
We are slowly getting there!

At least the room is coming together!

I wish I could say that I had my homestudy in hand and on its way to immigration but I can't! My SW said we should have had it the first of this week but we don't. We have been told it was mailed so my guess is that when I emailed her yesterday she called the agency and they finally mailed it! I love my SW but I am NOT a fan of the homestudy agency! So when it gets here it will be mailed off to immigrations and our next wait of many will begin!
But while we wait to wait I have been busy trying to get Warren's room in some kind of order. Before this adoption his room was being used as a playroom or toy over flow room for Jaden. For some reason Jaden needs a play area on all three floors.(maybe she has too many toys!) But she did have to loose that one. The plan is to take the couch out of the loft and make that the new upstairs playroom soon!
So we moved Jaden's crib which has NEVER been used to Warren's room. I was going to leave it as a crib but once we got the updates from the orphanage that he climbs out of his crib we just decided to make it a toddler bed! We bought some shelves to put toys and books on and this weekend we bought him a dresser that has not been put together yet. Here is the progress so far!

I am not happy that the crib is white but I am determined not to buy a new one. We have already bought two that have never been used! The first one was a drop side crib that we trashed because they were recalled and then this one was for Jaden but we ended up co-sleeping! So I have to use it! The changing table will not be in his room either but I needed somewhere for it to go while we wait for our neighborhood garage sell, which I plan on making a killing on with all of Jaden's clothes!!! I have also ordered a few pictures and a decal of a plane for the walls that should be here anyday! I just can't wait to see our little guy in the room!