Getting Our Bearings

So the common question is what now? Now we wait. We have a slew of paperwork that we must complete. I actually don’t know why we have to complete some of this now. It seems that these are things that should have been done prior to meeting any children, but we’ll play the paperwork game if that is what it takes. We have to have an FBI background check as well as one from the state. Those take about 3-4 weeks to get back to us. We have to have ANOTHER medical evaluation and blood tests. Those are only valid for 3 months so if you do them too early you have to get them updated, but you want to have them done so that they are not waiting on your paperwork. Quite an interesting procedure really. In addition we have to have a psychological evaluation done. Funny that people don’t have to do any of this to bear children huh? We are fortunate that there is a man in town that will get us in in January. We found that many of the doctors are scheduling into March and April for new patients. We don’t have that long to wait so we were relieved to find another person in Macomb that is qualified to do the paperwork. Anyway, many of the documents are a repeat of the things we did for our homestudy. The biggest hurdle is that we are waiting on a couple of documents to arrive from the Vlad region for us to sign, notarize and return. Our agency is closed for business from December 22-January 3. And then the Russian New Year holiday is celebrated January 1-5 and then the Russian Orthodox Christmas is on January 7th. So they will return to work on about January 12th. Now that we have met the little guy and have connected with him, waiting is so much harder. Justin is anxious to travel and return before planting season. Brady and Madison are beside themselves with anticipation. They are so sweet and love to look at the pictures we brought back. We explained to them that when we go for trip number two that we will be gone about 3 times as long as we were on this last trip. The families we met were averaging about 25 days away from home. Brady says, “Ohhh that’s ok Mom. It will all be worth it. You will get to bring Blake home.” Kids are so understanding. Also they both want to make sure that everyone knows they are getting a little brother. We wrapped a couple of Christmas presents (I am soooo far behind), and I told Brady to write on the tag that the gift was from he and Madison. He said that he was going to put from Blake, Brady, and Madison and that Blake’s name would be first so that everyone could see it. So Justin and I have been trying to prepare them. Not squash their enthusiasm, but prepare them that a little brother will get in their things; and will need a lot of help; and will take quite a bit of attention; etc… They just say yeah yeah mom we know – we know.

In order to survive the holiday craziness, keep our sanity, and be cheery for the Christmas season, Justin and I are trying to remove ‘extra’ items from the plate so that we can avoid feeling so overwhelmed. That means no Christmas treat baking this year. Also I am not going to attend WIU graduation this Saturday so that we can finish our shopping and getting our house back in order. I have also decided not to do Christmas cards this year. I am thinking maybe we’ll do like an Easter or Fourth of July cards instead :o) We try to catch ourselves when we start to complain. We have so much to be grateful for and the things we complain about are just small details in life. We just hope that things continue to go as smoothly as possible and that we can bring Blake home sooner than later.