Merry Christmas Little Mister

Yesterday, Christmas Eve, I had a chance to walk the dog between the kids going to bed and Santa's arrival. It was a cold crisp night, but also very clear and I could see lots of stars. As I was walking and looking at the stars, my mind drifted to my trip to Haiti and all the stars I could see each night there. The sky seemed very similar.

Now, Leslie and I know we will be adopting a boy, but we don't know our son's name yet. Leslie has taken to calling him Little Mister. We call Eli Little Man, so the term Little Mister for our second son just fits.

As I thought about the stars, I began to wonder if Little Mister happened to be looking at the stars on Christmas Eve as well. Oh, how we wish he could be with us to celebrate Christmas this year. We really wish he was home with us to enjoy the holiday.

All of these thoughts start rolling through my head on the walk and the next thing I know I'm overcome with emotion and start crying. The emotion is equal parts sadness (that he's not with us yet) and equal parts joy (knowing that it won't be long).

I hope he clings to the thought that it won't be that long. Merry Christmas Little Mister.

Creativity in woodworking

So, somehow, I became motivated to build a carrier of some kind to hold and keep upright, 1/2 gallon growlers. The local breweries have tasting rooms where you can get a half gallon of your favorite delicious local craft beer.

It's tough to get just one filled, so when you have two, it makes carrying them a challenge. So I went online and searched for some options. I found a couple of places that sell wooden carriers. In looking at them, it looked like something I could do. Plus it might give me an option to buy more cool power tools.

Here is the first one I created. This is made out of pine and finished with tung oil. There are dowel plugs to help give it a nice finished look.

Pine growler carrier with tung oil finish

One of the cool new tools that I bought was a stacked dado blade. You can see that in this overhead photo. There is something really cool about ripping a 3/4 swath through the piece of wood you are working on.

Notice the dado cuts

I've also created 6 (yes that is right six) more. But these are made out of rough cut cedar. I used the cedar because the walls of the tasting room of my favorite Indy brewery, Flat12, are cedar. The rafters in their building are also put together with pin construction. So the dowel plugs tie in that element as well.Working with the cedar also was nice because of the aroma.

Cedar growler carrier

Dossier received by GLA

We hit another milestone with the adoption process. On November the 28th, we were informed our dossier was received by GLA, our orphanage. This is great news. First it took very little time to have the dossier received once it was sent. Second, it means the next big step is the referral.

We've been informed that referrals take 1-3 months, so maybe by the end of January we will have face, name and description of our son. This will be the understatement of the blog, but that will be incredible. To know our son's name and have photos wow. At that same time I think it will make the process even harder, along with the patience aspect of this all.

Thanks for your continues prayers.

Documents being legalized

The paperwork journey is just about complete. About 10 days ago, a portion of of Dossier was sent to the Haitian Consulate in Chicago to be legalized. This is the final step for some of the documents. They first needed to be notarized. Then they got state sealed by the Indiana Sectratary of State's office. And finally, they will get legalized by a Haitian Consulate.

The US work is complete. Now we start in Haiti.

Once that is done the full Dossier and copies will get sent off to the orphanage, God's Littlest Angels. I think that will be the real test of patience as we shift into waiting mode. The next major milestone is child referral. This is when we get photos and a description of our son. As I typed the word milestone, I realize that the term is not significant enough. The referral put's a face to the child God has chosen to join our family.

In September, I had hoped to get the referral around Christmas time. I don't think that is possible now, given the timing. *sigh* This is teaching me patience right?

Dossier is ready to send

Did you ever wonder what 6 copies of our Dossier would look like? Well here you go.

 

 

 

Six copies of the Dossier

We made some progress these last few weeks. We completed all the Dossier documents and then sent a sub-set of them off to France to be translated into French. The total pages that were translated ended up being 53. That is a lot of darn French.

Along with all the original documents we also needed to create 6 copies. So, we worked today (10/23) to create the big pile that you see above in the post.

I also updated our progress chart. On Monday (10/24) the Dossier and 5 of the copies will go off to the National office for our agency. They will look things over and then send some of the documents to the Haitian Consulate in Chicago to be legalized. From there, the full packet is shipped off to the Orphanage and we start the process in Haiti.

Making Progress

As you can see we are almost complete with the USA portion of the process. This is exciting and scary at the same time. We've experienced a few bumps along the way in terms of getting the Dossier documents together and "official". However, now, it all gets turned over the Orphanage and the Haitian government. The unknown and inability to control any of it is the scary part. Yes, we had bumps with the documents, but we could control how they were put together. That sort of control is going to go away. Prayers for patience are always welcome, and I imagine, needed.

The next big milestone is referral. That is when this will begin to feel real and tangible.

What kind of morning will it be?

As I go to bed the night before, I always wonder, "What kind of morning will it be?" Will it be cold and windy and surprise me so that I am inappropriately dressed? Will it be crystal clear so that the sunrise is breathtaking? How close will be be to that October morning in 2005, when the temperature was mild, the sky clear and the sunrise beautiful?

The early mornings remind me of Dad. He was the definition of a morning person and when we worked for him the mornings always started early. Need to get that good jump on the day.

Watching the sunrise on October 1st is my annual tradition to remember Dad. Oh, this is certainly not the only time I think of him.For example. with all the adoption "stuff" going on these past few weeks, I often wonder what advice he would provide and how he would keep me sane. He was a great sounding board and I miss being able to share with him.

October is also prime football season and he loved college football. Today would be a good one for Dad. OSU versus Michigan State. Penn State playing IU. Then a night game of Purdue versus Notre Dame. He'd have a rooting interest all day long.

Today's sunrise wasn't bad. Still not to the quality of 2005, but beautiful enough to warrant a photo.

Enjoy!

2011-09-11 Adoption Update

It has been a while since an update on our progress was posted here on the blog. Things continue to move along at a steady pace. To us it seems like a crawl, but we realize we can't control the actions of others.

With our Home Study complete and approved, we filed a 1-600A with USCIS (US Citizenship and Immigration Services). This is an initial application for international adoption. It is a document that states our intent to adopt from Haiti with the US government. This is the initial steps for our son's visa. This takes about 30 days to complete, so hopefully we will have the Dossier completed by the beginning of October.

I did get an interesting lesson in a service the State Government can perform. If you have a document that has been notarized, but that notary needs to be confirmed, you can have the Secretary of State validate it with a Sate Seal. The Secretary of State looks at the notary's signature and compares it to what is on file with the State and then they applied a state seal.

Here is a chart the shows our progress. Hopefully this is a nice visual representation of where we are. We do need to get some documents translated, but we are hopeful they will be sent off by the end of this week

 

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When we complete this chart, we move on to all the steps in Haiti. I have another chart for the steps once we get the Dossier sent to the orphanage in Haiti, God's Littlest Angels. That is when the exercise in patience will really come in.