Another Step Forward! (Adoption Update)

In the midst of all of the Chinese New Year celebrations, we made some more progress of the adoption paperwork.

Just a quick recap...on Dec. 21, 2012, we received "the call".  We found out that our match with our daughter had been approved by China and we could move forward with finalizing the adoption.  

The next step was to submit our paperwork to US immigration to have our daughter approved to immigrate to the United States.  This form is called the I800.  At the beginning of the adoption process, and before we could submit any paperwork to China, we had received I800a approval, which is to bring an orphan to the US, but now we need approval to bring a specific orphan to the US, our daughter. 

Our US immigration officer had agreed that because of our daughter's medical condition, that her case would be a priority.  We were so happy to hear this!  I waited as patiently as I could for almost 2 weeks and finally decided to contact my agency for an update before the week of Chinese New Year.  

I woke up to great news on Saturday, Feb 8th.  Our I800 had been approved on Wednesday, Feb. 6th and was now on it's way to the National Visa Center (NVC) to apply for an immigration visa.  It should have arrived on Tuesday, Feb. 12th and hopefully we will have a quick turnaround time. 

We also had a nice note from our immigration officer, wishing us all the best and safe travels.  If you want to read more about our immigration officer, she was featured in a piece on the Today Show!  http://todayhealth.today.com/_news/2012/12/24/16111223-one-familys-christmas-wish-a-healthy-heart-for-teresa?lite

The remaining steps we have are:

1) NVC approval-US visa for our daughter to return to the US

2) Immigration & Visa forms to be forwarded to the US consulate's office in Guangzhou

3) Article 5 issued by the consulate's office in Guangzhou (which means all of our paperwork is in order, generally takes 2 weeks)

4) China issues our Travel Approval (TA) and we can travel to make the adoption final!!

Wahoo!! I800 has been approved!

We have been asked a lot of questions about the time frame and what will do when we return to the US for her surgery.  And, we really don't know.  We have many decisions about where we will stay, how long we will be in the US, if Jamie will stay the whole time or have to return to China for work, what LBean will do for her schooling.  If anything, moving to China and wading through the paperwork and uncertainty of an adoption, has taken my Type A personality and worn off the rough edges.  I would classify myself as a Type A-Reformed.  It will all fall into place as it should!