The process

Quite a few people have been asking me about the adoption process...steps involved, paperwork, timeline, etc. In response, I have decided to post a bit about the long road ahead.

Below are the main steps our process:

Ø We apply to the Ethiopia program (Done)

Ø Upon acceptance, we have a huge list documents to prepare for our home study. Once the home study is complete and we have had our required social worker visits, the documents are reviewed by our agency and approved for Ethiopia (Working on this part now)

Ø File I600A immigration form (This is a form letting the government know that we are preparing for an international adoption and will be requesting to classify a child or children as immediate relatives and therefore US Citizens)

Ø Prepare dossier (The dossier is a large packet of information i.e. police and medical records, financial information, etc. that is sent overseas to the Ethiopian government)

Ø Agency reviews dossier and obtain state certifications and forwards the Dossier to the US State Dept. & the Ethiopian Embassy for authentication

Ø Dossier is forwarded to Ethiopia representative in Addis Ababa who has dossier translated and prepared for court

Ø Child is referred to family (This is the good part)

Ø Paperwork is submitted to Ethiopian court

Ø Court order is issued, subsequently the birth certificate is issued

Ø Child is issued visa and we are ready to travel!!!!

Basically, in the end it looks something like this:

Wish us luck!