Our marriage licenses and Jim's birth certificates have arrived. The document designers at the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services have implemented some nice changes in their birth certificate designs over the past 28 years. My original copy looks like it could be used as evidence in the Rosenberg trials. We're still waiting on Ohio. For the record (AKA the Google index), I highly recommend VitalChek to any other prospective adoptive parents out there. I placed the order a week ago. If you order these things directly from the state, they advertise 6-8 weeks for the order to be processed.
We also bought Quicken WillMaker Plus today, which will save us the bother of hiring a lawyer to do our wills for us. It looks like TurboTax.
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Saturday, July 22, 2006
Forms
Paperwork began in earnest today. We did the following:
- Downloaded Form I-600A (Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition) from the Department of Homeland Security. Discovered that the PDF form editing functionality of Adobe Reader has some bugs to work out.
- Called Harris County, TX for copies of our marriage license. Requested that they be signed by the county clerk herself.
- Bought fresh copies of our birth certificates from the vital records departments of Missouri and Ohio through VitalChek.
- Browsed through Guatemalan hotels for our stay there. Yes, it's very early for that. The hotels they recommend are the Guatemala City Marriot, the Hotel Residencial Reforma, and the Hotel San Carlos. I like how the Hotel Residencial Reforma web site has an English version and an Espanol version, and neither contain any text.
Educational Meeting
On Thursday we had what may be our last meeting at the Bethany office (and our last lunch at Ronald's Fuddruckers, which is down the street). It was the "know-what-you're-getting-into" meeting. Many parents think that adopted children will integrate into their family just like a birth child and are then surprised and unprepared for the issues which may arise (of course, we already know this--see the reading list). Pam had us watch a news report from the ABC show Turning Point from 1997. It was on adoptees several years after they were adopted from the big Romanian exodus in the early 1990s (which was prompted by a previous news report showing the terrible neglect in Romanian orphanages). Children lived in virtual isolation for up to three years before they were adopted, and adjustments were not always easy for them. Suddenly a large population of orphange-"raised" adopted children were present in the U.S., and a critical mass of children with integration difficulties was reached. Mothers began networking, looking for help for their kids, and finding pediatricians and therapists who began to specialize in such issues. Adoptive parents today owe a great debt to these families; they have told us what we can expect and where to go for help, two things which they didn't have.
We don't expect nearly these kinds of issues with Ronald, since he will have been raised in a foster home and be younger than many of the Romanian children, but we are by now pretty well educated in these matters and will be proactive in helping him adjust. Kudos to our agency for insisting that we read and discuss these issues.
During the news program, Jim was struck by the lack of men in the report, and realized that in general the men involved in the process are very quiet when they're involved at all. The books we read are written by women; the social workers are women; the adoptive parents interviewed are almost always adoptive mothers. Birth fathers are almost never involved in the process, and often there are no adoptive fathers in the family either. In fact, Guatemala has a regulation stating that they'll consider single women for adoption, but not single men. Where are the dads? Why aren't they advocates for their children too? Why aren't they speaking up?
Get with it, guys!
In other news, we accepted another offer for our house. We're supposed to close this one on August 11th. Cross your fingers, everybody, and no shopping sprees around here until it's actually over.
Deadbeat update: Our real estate agent told us that the deadbeats' agent has been calling her every day asking for their earnest money back. Our agent is as dead-set against them getting it back as we are now. She's having a good time repeatedly telling them no every day.
We were afraid that we would have to clear out the escrow account prior to settling on our house, but it seems there was a new law passed a year ago that allows sellers to keep the money in escrow for up to 15 years. That way there is enough time for the legal system to get involved if necessary, and the seller's house sale isn't held hostage to getting the money released. Seems like a good idea to us. Now that there's no time limit, we're free to leave the money there as long as we like, and we can take our time figuring out what to do about it.
We don't expect nearly these kinds of issues with Ronald, since he will have been raised in a foster home and be younger than many of the Romanian children, but we are by now pretty well educated in these matters and will be proactive in helping him adjust. Kudos to our agency for insisting that we read and discuss these issues.
During the news program, Jim was struck by the lack of men in the report, and realized that in general the men involved in the process are very quiet when they're involved at all. The books we read are written by women; the social workers are women; the adoptive parents interviewed are almost always adoptive mothers. Birth fathers are almost never involved in the process, and often there are no adoptive fathers in the family either. In fact, Guatemala has a regulation stating that they'll consider single women for adoption, but not single men. Where are the dads? Why aren't they advocates for their children too? Why aren't they speaking up?
Get with it, guys!
In other news, we accepted another offer for our house. We're supposed to close this one on August 11th. Cross your fingers, everybody, and no shopping sprees around here until it's actually over.
Deadbeat update: Our real estate agent told us that the deadbeats' agent has been calling her every day asking for their earnest money back. Our agent is as dead-set against them getting it back as we are now. She's having a good time repeatedly telling them no every day.
We were afraid that we would have to clear out the escrow account prior to settling on our house, but it seems there was a new law passed a year ago that allows sellers to keep the money in escrow for up to 15 years. That way there is enough time for the legal system to get involved if necessary, and the seller's house sale isn't held hostage to getting the money released. Seems like a good idea to us. Now that there's no time limit, we're free to leave the money there as long as we like, and we can take our time figuring out what to do about it.
Friday, July 14, 2006
Note
One thing I really like about this town we live in is that it can afford to have an ice cream truck that is actually in tune. Listening to Pop Goes the Weasel all day is bad, but listening to Pop Goes the Weasel 20 cents flat, like in our old neighborhood, is akin to torture.
Not only that, but the Brookline ice cream truck splurged and went ahead and bought the extra octave for its organ. So now, when it plays Turkey in the Straw, when it gets to the "on down the road" part, it plays the low notes instead of faking it with the same notes an octave up.
When you're working at home with the windows down all day, this can make a real difference in your quality of life.
Not only that, but the Brookline ice cream truck splurged and went ahead and bought the extra octave for its organ. So now, when it plays Turkey in the Straw, when it gets to the "on down the road" part, it plays the low notes instead of faking it with the same notes an octave up.
When you're working at home with the windows down all day, this can make a real difference in your quality of life.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Second Interviews
Yesterday morning we had our individual interviews with Pam. They were about an hour and a half each. Basically we talked about things we had discussed in our autobiographies. Pam was particularly impressed with the quality of Jim's autobiography: apparently husbands don't generally measure up to his standards, but we always knew he was exceptional.
We're still finishing up our reading and some small bits of homework, but soon we'll be scheduling another meeting with Pam, this one an educational meeting, and then she'll come to our apartment for the final meeting of the homestudy. Then we'll be busy for a while gathering documents for our dossier.
Before our niece was born, my sister and her husband struck upon the great idea of coming up with a placeholder name for her to use instead of the baby. The placeholder name was obnoxious enough that they would never be tempted to use it for real, and it had the added benefit of putting strange looks on the faces of nosy strangers. We thought this was a great idea. Therefore, we will be referring to our kid as Ronald, because Ronald O'Donnell is just terrible. Not to worry, friends and family, it won't stick.
We're still finishing up our reading and some small bits of homework, but soon we'll be scheduling another meeting with Pam, this one an educational meeting, and then she'll come to our apartment for the final meeting of the homestudy. Then we'll be busy for a while gathering documents for our dossier.
Before our niece was born, my sister and her husband struck upon the great idea of coming up with a placeholder name for her to use instead of the baby. The placeholder name was obnoxious enough that they would never be tempted to use it for real, and it had the added benefit of putting strange looks on the faces of nosy strangers. We thought this was a great idea. Therefore, we will be referring to our kid as Ronald, because Ronald O'Donnell is just terrible. Not to worry, friends and family, it won't stick.
Wednesday, July 05, 2006
Meeting Postponed
Sorry, no news today--our next meeting with our social worker has been postponed to next Tuesday. We'll let you know what happens.
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Reading List
By this point my husband has observed that I was born to be an adoptive mom. I love the background reading, the time scheduling, and the lists (yay, lists!). So Pam gave us a recommended reading list, which I have now finished and have whittled down for anyone else who is interested (although if you live in Boston, you may need to wait until Jim returns them to the library).
A primary theme running through these books is that although birth and adopted children are loved the same, they are not the same. The joy of an adoptive family is by necessity preceded by great loss for the adopted child, and acceptance of the child's grief about that loss by the family is very important.
So here's Reb's list of recommended reading:
"Twenty things adopted kids wish their adoptive parents knew" by Sherrie Eldridge;
"Communicating with the adopted child" by Miriam Komar;
and the classic in the field,
"Toddler adoption: the weaver's craft" by Mary Hopkins-Best
If you're interested in a bit more depth, "Talking with young children about adoption" by Mary Watkins and Susan Fisher also has a review of the historical research about adoptive families and some great discussions about how adoptive parents can handle difficult questions or situations with their kids.
Our next meeting with Pam is Thursday, July 6. In anticipation of that meeting we have now finished our Bethany-requested autobiographies (10 pages each). I'll check them off the list!
A primary theme running through these books is that although birth and adopted children are loved the same, they are not the same. The joy of an adoptive family is by necessity preceded by great loss for the adopted child, and acceptance of the child's grief about that loss by the family is very important.
So here's Reb's list of recommended reading:
"Twenty things adopted kids wish their adoptive parents knew" by Sherrie Eldridge;
"Communicating with the adopted child" by Miriam Komar;
and the classic in the field,
"Toddler adoption: the weaver's craft" by Mary Hopkins-Best
If you're interested in a bit more depth, "Talking with young children about adoption" by Mary Watkins and Susan Fisher also has a review of the historical research about adoptive families and some great discussions about how adoptive parents can handle difficult questions or situations with their kids.
Our next meeting with Pam is Thursday, July 6. In anticipation of that meeting we have now finished our Bethany-requested autobiographies (10 pages each). I'll check them off the list!
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