Francis Family Happenings: August – October

Wow…it has been a crazy couple of months.  A lot of you have been asking for updates, so I will give you the short and sweet version.  In most cases, people get to travel to Poland within a month of accepting their referral.  However, A&K fell just outside of what we were originally approved for regarding age, so we had to update our paperwork.  We used expeditor services and found that they are worth every penny.  Why didn’t we use them on the 1^st round of paperwork?  We will know better for next time.  As you will probably notice in our timeline below, we did slow down a bit in October and didn’t expedite anything.  I know what you are thinking…are you guys crazy? Don’t you want to hurry up and meet your boys?  I was thinking the exact same thing and it took everything in me not to expedite things.  And for the record, YES…I cannot wait to meet them!!!  For reasons beyond our control, there was going to be a delay in getting travel dates no matter how quickly we got the paperwork to our agency.  We decide to save money and practice patience.  It wasn’t easy, but we did it.  Well almost…we did end up sending the final paperwork overnight to our agency.  I just couldn’t help myself!  Even longer story short – there is a very good reason for the delay.  I just can’t tell you about it yet.  I know, I know….so many secrets!  I hate keeping them, but I promise I will spill the beans once the boys are officially ours.

Now what?  Well, we are running around like crazy trying to get ready for our 1^st trip.  We leave shortly and there is so much to do.  We have also started renewing our paperwork.  That’s right, round 3 of the paperwork is already underway.  It should be fairly simple since we just had to update our paperwork.  We weren’t able to renew when we were updating because we were not within 90 days of the expiration of our approval.  So many rules and so much paperwork!  A&K are beyond worth it!  All of this paperwork will be a distant memory soon!

We are so excited to share our journey with you and are so very blessed by all of your love & support.   We ask for your continued prayers as we prepare to travel.

Paperwork Round 2:

·         August 14^th - received our referral for A & K 

·         August 18^th - met with an international adoption doctor

·         August 18^th - accepted the referral for A & K

·         August 19^th - began paperwork update

·         August 29^th - completed our part of the paper work

·         September 8^th - home study approved

·         September 15^th - sent paperwork to USCIS

·         October 1^st - found out USCIS paperwork was approved

·         October 4^th - received USCIS approval in the mail

·         October  9^th - dropped paperwork off at Secretary of State to be apostilled

·         October 14^th - picked up apostilled paperwork from Secretary of State & sent to our agency

·         October 27^th - received travel dates

We even found time to carve little A & K a pumpkin!

   

       Philippians 3:14

       I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.