We miss and love you Uncle Billy

                                                      Just one year ago.

Camping 2012

We still haven't gotten our approval from USCIS yet. I forget the name (or number) of the form we are waiting for....only know it's not here yet. We are going into the city next week to hand deliver all forms since there are a few places we need to go to and it saves us 5 weeks in the wait doing it in person. We are so hoping we will have everything here by then so we can do it all at once. In the meantime we are playing the waiting game. We took the kids to go camping at the beach for the week. It was fun, but we were seriously missing Billy. That was his place and being there without him just wasn't right. :(  The kids decorated and wrote messages on shells to him and we placed them at a private place off the camp ground. It was hard. Many tears and a lot of memories. I regret now not having taken a picture of it because they worked so hard on it. I didn't take my usual photos this time. It was good we went. The kids needed a change of scenery and they had a good time. It's always beautiful at the beach. But someone needs to tell the puppies that is going to be Fu Quan's bunk. :) I wonder if he will like camping like his brother and sisters.

Timeline

We have been busy getting things done today. The police department had our clearances. USCIS was wonderful and let us walk in and have our fingerprints done. The staff there was so nice and helpful. That bought us major time back. We should now get our clearances in about 1-2 months.  It was so much easier than when we went for Allie's adoption, and was located right in Holtsville! This was great since this time we had the kiddos with us. We then got everything certified by the county. When we get our approval we can just go back and get that done to add to our dossier. Hopefully New Jersey will be moving quickly and we will have that certified form back in time for us to go into the city to finish certifications and have everything certified by the state before Michael heads back to work. Feeling very positive. But if I sit and calculate times, it still seems we will be bringing him home in 2013 around Feb.. I'm not going to look that hard at that time line. Miracles happen. For now we are moving forward, and that feels really good!

Great News!

The mail came and I am beyond excited that our appt from USCIS was there!!  It is such a relief that everything was done correctly and made it here. Michael is not home for the appt. but I am not stressing because everyone says you can usually get a walk in appt. So we will be there 8:00 Monday morning with my best pleading face on.  I'm feeling better that things will be picking up. Hopefully we will also get our last pieces of documentation needed on Monday from homestudy, FTIA, and the police dept. Then off to the county!!! Deep breath. I am starting to be able to breath again. A great reminder that God is in control! Thank goodness, because I definitely am not! :) Wouldn't want it any other way. I have to keep reminding myself that he will come home at the exact time God has planned for him to come home. And He will continue to take care of him until then. Feeling very relieved to have these papers in my hand!! Do I dare think we may get everything to the Chinese consulate before Michael heads back to work? Hhhmmmm

So confusing!!!

Thank God for Teresa and her very compassionate and giving ways. My friend (introduced through our very wonderful social worker) offered to look over my dossier before we took it to get certified/ authenticated through the county, state, and ultimately the Chinese consulate. Teresa use to own a dossier business and really knows her stuff. Well, long story short, she graciously gave up at least an hour of her day off to show me where things were missing, and where things had to go to different places than where I was taking them. So now I am back to trying to gather more papers to correctly complete our dossier before going to the county. Our fingerprint forms didn't come in the mail yet from the USCIS. Teresa had sent hers in the day before us and got them on the 3rd, so I am hoping this doesn't mean something is wrong. And the police still didn't do our letter of good conduct for clearance. She left a message that I would be picking it up on Monday (but said to call first, incase....). How angry can I get with them... it's the police. I did send Michael's employment letter to New Jersey for certification. Teresa had told me about that not needing to go to our county since Michael's company is out of NJ. That will take atleast a week and cost another $43. Also, our birth certificates need to go to the city not the county since we weren't born in Suffolk. I was just suppose to know this stuff. But didn't. Once again, thank you Teresa! She said that could take weeks! So we want to go in person while Michael is home.  I was so hoping to have everything ready to go to the state while he is home this time. He just got home yesterday, and the count down begins. I am so frustrated. It just should not be this difficult. Oh, and I forgot. As I was going through our dossier reviewing everything I realized on the back of our marriage certificate the clerk put the wrong year. She put 2013. So that has to be redone. All documents need to be under 6 months old when it goes to China. With all these hold ups, that count down is going quickly as well. If we don't have everything back and done, things start expiring and have to be redone. :(  It just should not be this hard. Just want him home!!!!

Pampered Chef

All the Pampered Chef is sorted and ready to deliver tomorrow. Thank you so much to everyone! Our fund raiser was a huge success! Everyone got such cool stuff. I absolutely love Pampered Chef. And we are a little closer to our goal of getting Frankie home!  Thanks guys.