Application is Sent

Last night we completed our first set of paper work - the application.  It was exciting hitting the submit button.  We checked and double checked all of our info.  We survived taking our family picture.  Now we wait for them to approve our application, and then we start the home study.  We did find out that there is an International Adoption Clinic at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus.  It was one of the first kind started in the U.S.  When you get your referral, they will set up an appointment with a doctor where they will go over the information you have received about the child.  After you bring your child home they will also help you with all the tests and other things your child will need to bring all immunizations up to date.  I did find out that our pediatrician requires this before she will see them.

Keep praying!

Donna

Decision - Finally

After talking to a couple of agencies and adoption coordinators, we decided on which direction we would like to go. It is where we feel God is leading us, and we are very excited about it. We are going with America World Adoption out of Virginia. We have friends that has used them for their adoption from Ethiopia. When we talked with Mike Stone and Melissa from their agency, we felt comfortable with them and felt they would be the best fit for our family. It does also help that they give ministers a discount off their program fees. The country program we feel led to is the China Child Waiting Program. We also looked at Brazil, but feel better about the China program. The China Child Program is for children that may be healthy but older and children with special needs. Special needs in China is different than in the USA. We are able to also specify to which level of special needs we can handle. It can be anything from small, minor correctable to a major disability. So, it is a wide spectrum of needs. The ages we are going for is a 4-7 year old girl, and I would love to find twins if possible.

Our first step is to fill out the application, which is several pages. Noel is not excited that we have to take a picture for it. We have alot of paper work to fill out. Hannah is worried we will not be able to say their name and that China is communist. Emily is excited to have someone to boss around.

Please keep us in your prayers as we pray and prepare through all the steps we have complete. Pray for us in making decisions on how we are going to fund the adoption. Pray for the future child God has in store for us.

Donna

Overwhelmed

There are so many agencies to choose from. I joined a couple of yahoo groups to gain more information on agencies I had been looking at. WOW - information overload!! Noel and I had an unexpected trip last week, so we were able to talk a little more about the direction we would like to go. I think we have decided to go international which would allow for mission trips and so forth. Domestic adoption in Ohio may be more hoops than we want to jump through. We are meeting with one agency this week to gain a little more info. There are so many decisions to make in family in addition to this - school, church, piano, extra curricular activities, etc...

We were going to take classes offered by the state and potentially use the state for our home study to save a little money. We realized how far we had to go for these classes, the time away from home and our girls, and paying baby sitters - it doesn't pay to take them and the agency may not take the home study either. We just keep praying for wisdom and guidance we need.

Donna