The home study has begun!

We drove up to N. Andover this morning for the first interview with our social worker, Pam. Traffic wasn't too bad, once we were out of the city. The thing lasted about an hour and a half. Not too intimidating; it was mostly spent signing papers, including but not limited to:

• A release and consent form, absolving Bethany of any responsibility should we decide we don't like our kid
• A form about how to submit grievances, should one arise
  
• A fee agreement
  
• A reading list: we have required reading to do
• Acknowledgement that we believe children should be disciplined when necessary
• A statement of faith
• Agreement to alert them ASAP if one of us should die, get sick, or change jobs
• An emergency contact form
  

We also got a Guatemala travel guide as well as The Dossier. We read the travel guide first; it looked less intimidating. Full of very useful information about hotels, what to bring along, and what not to bring along.

Fun fact: When you fill out the purpose of visit on the customs form, you should always write Tourism, rather than Permanent Removal of a Guatemalan Citizen to America. Makes the process go smoother.

Our most pressing homework now is writing our autobiographies. We have 10 pages each to get into the darkest secrets of our families growing up, our marriage, our careers, and our beliefs on child-rearing. A sample question: What made you happy and what made you angry growing up? These will be used during our 3rd interviews, which will be taken separately with Pam. It's also time to start talking about getting appointments to have our fingerprints taken and contact Ohio and Missouri about getting more birth certificates.

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In other news:

We've been attempting to become ex-homeowners since March. We put it on the market and had a great offer two days later, which was terrific. Unfortunately, the buyers turned out to be deadbeats; they postponed the settlement twice, ultimately failing to show up for the final settlement which didn't occur last Friday.

Our real estate agents, having had enough of them, put the house back on the market on Saturday, which is fine with us. Today we got another offer on the place. Not too impressive--it was for the asking price minus a $7000 seller assist. We countered asking for $5000 more.

And what of the deadbeats? No idea. Their good faith deposit money is still in the escrow account, and it will stay there until both they and we agree on who gets it after it comes out. There's even a non-zero chance they'll end up buying the thing.

This leads to several possible scenarios:

• The deadbeats agree that we get to keep the money. This likely will not occur without lawyers getting involved.
• We agree that the deadbeats get to keep the money. This also likely will not occur without lawyers getting involved.
• The deadbeats and we come to some sort of compromise, neither of us leaving empty-handed.
• The money sits there forever.

First Interview Date Set

We're going to do the first adoption interview on Wednesday at 9:30. I look forward to this not only because it's another step on The Adoption Journey as I've heard it put, but this will also be our first morning rush hour experience in Boston.

The story so far...

We've felt for a long time that God's plan for us was to adopt our children. At the moment we don't have any, but we just signed on with Bethany Christian Services to adopt a kid from Guatemala. This blog is designed for our family and friends (you know who you are) to keep up with what's going on with our long, slow trudge through the international adoption process.

So far:

May: Attended a required informational meeting at the Andover, MA Bethany office. Received a preliminary application that we quickly filled out and sent back. Nothing much on this application beyond our vital statistics.

Preliminary application was approved, and we received the "formal" application a week later. This one was a lot more in depth; it read more like a college application: essay questions on why we want to adopt, whether we've had fertility issues in the past, personal and professional references, income levels, amount of debt we're carrying, past addresses, stuff like that. Oh, and a non-refundable $550 fee. The first payment of many!

June: Sent in the formal application. Quickly got an email from the director at the Andover office saying we were approved and would we please let her know when we would be free to come down for the first interview (there'll be three of them).