I thought I’d give y’all an update on where we are in the adoption process.
You may remember that we’ve already received our LOA (or LSC) at the end of July.
We’ve also just received our I800 approval letter. This means that Maddi is approved by the US government to be eligible to be adopted and immigrate to the US. YAY! Now we can we can actually go get her, right?
Nope…of course, there are a few steps before that.
Now the agency needs to send off the paperwork to apply for her visa (I’ve already completed it and it was waiting for this I800 approval so it could go off right away.)
Then we need an Article 5 to be issued stating that we are approved to adopt her (this should be done by the beginning of Sept.)
We then wait about two more weeks for China to issue a Travel Approval (TA) inviting us to come to China to get her.
Typically one would leave about 10-14 days after that TA, but we’ve run into a problem.
China will be celebrating Mid-Autumn Festival and the government agencies will be closed from Sept. 19-21, 2013. So we can’t really travel at that time.
AND…China will then celebrate National Day and the government offices will be closed Oct. 1-7, 2013.
Totally sucks, but nothing I can do about it.
Gotcha Day (the day you actually get the child) is usually scheduled for a Monday, but the agency is waiting to hear if they are allowed to schedule one on Tues., Oct 8th since they will have been closed the previous week.
If they can then, I will hold Maddi in my arms on October 8th! If not, it won’t be until the next Monday, October 14th. (These are not set in stone, but my best guess currently.)
It seems so far away, but in reality I will more than likely be in China 2 months from today! OMG!!!
So, keep your fingers crossed that we continue to move through this paperwork process quickly and can be on a plane that first week in October!
I’ll keep you updated!
