Still Waiting...Unofficially

We are not patient. I spend my days helping 10-year-olds (who aren't really ten anymore, but everyday I remind them that they will always be ten to me) maximize every minute of their day. And I'm pretty sure the first complete sentence that Jimmy had something to do with me not driving fast enough. So how is it that we have been fated to wait an indeterminate amount of time before we get to bring home Ellie? First, we waited to see if we would be accepted into the Ehtiopia program. Then, we waited to start our home study. Now, we're waiting for passports, birth certificates, marriage certificates, doctor's appointments, and on and on.

It's really not that bad and we knew what we were signing up for when we started this. But, for today, I wish we had a timeline that cleared away the mystery :) Mostly, I'm impatient today because we're almost there, I think. Jimmy has a doctor's appointment tomorrow and will get the last bits of our paperwork to finalize our home study. The next big deal when we get that will be something that goes to USCIS that officially allows us to get an adoption visa, submit our dossier, and become official "waiters."

From the looks of things, other families have been waiting about 12-16 months after submitting their dossier to Ethiopia. There was a pretty big slow down in Ethiopia last summer with adoption processing so we're hoping now that things are back on track that our wait might be a bit shorter. It's definitely been amazing how many wonderful adoptive families we've met along the way. I can't imagine doing this without their wisdom. As I write my way out of my impatience, I realzie that we're really just totally excited and our excitement increases with every tiny task that I get to check off of our adotion "to do" list.