Adoption update

Since our first three children are usually the stars of this blog, I thought it was time to write about Baby #4 for a change. Where are we in our adoption process? Right now, we are waiting for the State of Wisconsin to apostille our documents so we can send off our India dossier and officially join the other families on the waiting list.

We hit a few snags with pulling our documents together -- one notary on a reference letter had forgotten to write when her commission expired, and somehow we didn't see the fine print about our birth certificates. They needed to be issued in the past 12 months, and Peter's was too old.

So, we hopped in the car and drove to another county to get new copies. We made a fun trip of it, just Peter, Anya Rashi and me (the boys were in school). He showed us the school and church he went to, where his parents worked, and the house he grew up in until he moved to our city when he was 15. We made the best of a minor frustration. :o) I was just grateful that he didn't grow up in another state!

But we had hoped to already have our dossier sent in by now, so we feel a bit like we're wading through molasses to get this step finished. We will breathe a big sigh of relief when it's officially out of our hands. It is a little funny to think how eager we are to join the waiting list -- by next autumn, I'm sure the waiting list won't seem nearly as exciting to us!

So, that's where we are. Meanwhile, we have our three to keep us busy. The picture at the top of this post is Anya Rashi, all ready for "school" at the YMCA. She is so proud of her lunch box, which she calls her back pack -- and she is the best reminder that someday, this wait will be over.

6 hours later:

And right now, I just have to add that she's charging through the house with a frisbee balanced on her head, a wooden back scratcher in one hand, hollering "I'm Super French Fry!" And then, "I'm going to India!" This will no doubt convince the authorities to speed up our adoption . . .