Letter of Intent Approved, Dossier Filed!

Yesterday and today have been big -- we heard yesterday afternoon that our letter of intent was approved, and we received confirmation today that our dossier has also been filed with ICBF! We are really pleased to be this far along in the process. We are still hoping that we might be able to travel to adopt in November, but we are prepared for the more likely scenario that we will be travelling in January/February (the courts close from mid-December to mid-January, so travel must be planned around that). It could even be later, depending on whether ICBF requests any more information as they consider our dossier. But at least we've done what we can to move the process along as much as possible. Now it's in ICBF's hands. For the praying among you, please pray that things will more along speedily and efficiently (words not usually associated with international adoption, but we're hopeful anyway.)


We were able to talk to the girls again on Monday -- we called as we were driving back from Tivoli. They are still very shy on the phone and mainly have one-word answers to any questions. Though I did get a little more out of Wendy this time -- I was telling her that Happy (Feliz) was in the front with me because he always wants to ride on my lap, etc. She answered, "Donde esta Suertudo?" ("Where's Lucky?") I explained that he was sleeping in the back, as usual! Overall, the dogs have been great in helping keep our spirits up, not that they know that's what they're doing. It was wonderful to be the six of us this summer, and we hope it will be that way again soon.

Email Received, Package Sent, Dossier Translated!

We received our first email from the girls today -- their psychologist Camila read our email with them and they wrote us back together. They wrote that they are doing well in school and that they miss us and hope we can talk soon. We miss them too! We're hoping to call them again tomorrow.

We also drove to Jackson Heights in Queens which has a large Colombian population to look for a travel agency that sends packages to Colombia. We found one, and sent our first package to them with books and some other little treats we thought they would enjoy. We also found a birthday card that plays music when you open it for Fer, and a card for Wendy with a cute picture of dogs on the front. She loves dogs and one of her favorite activities was to "consentir a Feliz" (pet our dog Happy). Both girls actually told us when they were here that when they grow up they would like to be veterinary nurses or doctors so that they could "consentir" the animals.

Finally, great news about our dossier! We heard from our agency on Friday that it has been translated and registered! This is big news because this step can take awhile but our agency's representative in Bogota is clearly on her game and working hard to have our paperwork ready to submit in a little over two weeks since she received it. We were very pleased to hear this, as you can imagine! The next step is to confirm with ICBF that our Letter of Intent is approved and that we can officially submit our dossier. Hopefully we will be able to do this early in the coming week.

Happy Birthday to Fer!

We were able to call the orphanage this evening and speak to both girls and wish Fernanda a happy birthday! They are both very shy on the phone and pretty much stick to one-word answers. However, it was wonderful to hear their voices again after almost four weeks and to be able to assure them that we now can be in touch with them frequently.

We were also very lucky that their psychologist came to the phone to speak with us after we talked to them. She was very gracious in expressing gratitude that we called, in taking time to advise us about best times to call in the future (apparently calling in the early evening is not optimal because the buses stop running and certain staff need to be on their way home), and, best of all, in giving us her personal email address so we can send emails to the girls. She also told us that she would be giving Fer a cake and a present to help celebrate her birthday.

Happy 10th birthday Fer! We miss you!!

Communication Authorized!!

I emailed the girls' defender today as well as the Kidsave contact at ICBF to ask again about being allowed to communicate with the girls, and the defender wrote me back immediately to say that she had authorized us to call and email! YAY!!! We were particularly concerned because tomorrow is Fer's birthday, and we were so hoping to be able to talk to her as she turns 10. And now we can!


And, for those of you who would like a glimpse of the fundacion where the girls are (San Mauricio in Bogota), here is a link to a recent video on YouTube to raise awareness of the godparent (sponsor) program there. You can see both girls at the end of the clip in the group of children.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfvjWftZLUQ

Big Decision: We're Moving Forward!

We have had the chance to share our happy news with many of you, but we wanted to make it "official": we have decided to move forward with applying to adopt Fernanda and Wendy! We had an incredible summer with them and we are very hopeful that our paperwork will proceed smoothly and that they will be home soon. That said, this could take awhile. We filed our Letter of Intent with ICBF (the Colombia child welfare authority) on August 12, and completed the paperwork for our dossier on August 14. It went down to Colombia to be translated by our agency's representative in Bogota on August 17. So, now we are waiting to hear back from ICBF that we can submit a formal application, and ideally by then our dossier will be translated and ready to hand in.

We are also waiting to talk to the girls again on the phone!! We had the chance to call them on August 5 (the day after they went back) and it was amazing to hear their voices, though they did sound very far away. We are now waiting for permission to call again, and we hope that itwill be very soon. Fer's birthday is next Tuesday, and it would be wonderful if we could call on that day.

We are very grateful for the outpouring of enthusiasm and support for our plans -- thank you all! We will update here with news (though probably not as frequently as we did this summer), so check back if you want to follow along.

Farewell . . .

We had a really nice last day (Monday) with Fernanda and Wendy. After spending some time at Christine's house with her and Jack, we went over to Sengstack to say goodbye to Gigi and Grandad. Then we came back to the city to pack their bags and get ready. Thankfully, everything fit in their suitcases! I had been thinking it might be hard to have to decide what to leave behind, but no need.

We let the girls stay up late so they would go to sleep more easily, which meant we had time for some ESL videos (they really got interested in learning more English in the last week of their visit), tacos for dinner, a walk to the library, and a drive over to the other side of the parkway to pick up the last set of photos and to get some groceries. Chris asked me to wait outside and the girls helped him pick out some flowers as a surprise. They were so excited to give them to me! When we got back we went for a swim and then watched Kitty as we finished their photo albums.

Then yesterday, though it was 4:45 in the morning, they got up immediately and got ready and we made it out to the airport on time. We were able to go through the first set of gates with them right up the security gate, and then we had to say good-bye. It was very hard to see them go . . .

It has been a little more than a day now since they left, and the house is so different without them. We have a lot of thinking to do, and we ask your patience for a little while longer as we take some time to reflect and sort out our next steps. We will definitely let you all know when we have anything to announce.

We had a wonderful time and we feel so lucky that we got to be with the girls for the 5 weeks. We also are so grateful for the support of all of our family and friends as we went through this incredible experience. Thank you all!

The Last Weekend

We took a few pictures in Riverdale on Friday before going up to Tivoli:
Wendy took this one:

The girls got really interested in learning more English and began writing words in notebooks that Valentina, a new friend, gave them:

On Saturday we went over to Christine and Matt's house for Jack's first birthday. The girls had never been there and had a great time playing.

Sunday we spent a little time at Sengstack and said goodbye to Amy and Aaron, Henry and the twins.

Fernanda hadn't shown much interest in the dogs, but in the last week she really started to enjoy walking Lucky, and Chris certainly enjoyed having his helpers go with him on the walks!