Tuesday, March 30, 2004

Cleaning - 3/30/2004

Still cleaning for the impending social worker visit. Thought you would like to know that!

Wednesday, March 24, 2004

Social Worker Visit - 3/24/2004

The social worker gave us a couple of dates to come to our place and have our first meeting. One of the dates was this Sunday, not a chance. Those of you who have been to our place know that five days will not be good enough to clean up and I had to work at Disneyland both Saturday and Sunday. The next date she gave was April 10th. As luck would have it, I was scheduled to work at Disneyland on that day too. We read many places where people said it is not good to have too many date conflicts because the social worker might only be available those days and the next available might not be for two months. I called Disneyland and talked to my manager who, in turn, told me to email the scheduling dept. Well that turned out to be the best idea. Liz, my scheduler, was thrilled to hear that we were adopting and gave me the whole day off. She is the best! So our first visit for the home study will be on April 10th. More to come soon...

Tuesday, March 23, 2004

Social Worker Surprise - 3/22/2004

Last night Michelle was checking her email and there it was, an email from the social worker! An unexpected but welcome surprise. We knew we would be contacted soon to start the home study but we didn't think it would be that soon. We will have four meetings with her and she wants to come to our house on the first visit. YIKES! I don't think we are ready for that. Especially since she wants to come soon. We are on the move now. Time to clean up and get things ready. This is where the real fun begins.

Adoption Packet - 3/20/2004

Today we received our Adoption Packet from the agency. They have accepted our application and we move forward with tons of paperwork and the home study. Of course there are many, many questions. Some of the documents read like Japanese stereo instructions. Luckily, many others have done this before so we have lots of resources for questions and answers. Let the fun begin!

Application - 3/11/2004

Our Adoption Application is on its way with the first of many checks we will have to write. The whole process has really started now! More to come soon.....

Adoption Agency Visit - 1/15/2004

Today Michelle and I are going to our first meeting with an adoption agency to discuss the possiblities of adopting a little girl from China.

The agency we are visiting is Bal Jagat in Chatsworth, CA. We are having an orientation meeting with the director, Hemlata Momaya. The meeting went very well and we had several questions answered about the adoption process. Hemlata was very, very nice and was extremely patient in answering our questions and listening to us go on and on about the pictures on her walls. She had three full walls of pictures of children from all over the world that she had help place with families looking to adopt. We felt comfortable with her and she with us. At this point we start filling out the application and start preparing for our home study.

The adventure begins....