Biometrics & a Travel Buddy

This week we received great news in the mail, the USCIS has scheduled our biometrics appointments, in plain English on March 18th, Nate and I will head to Nashville, TN to be fingerprinted. This is the last step for us to have our I600A approved - Our Advanced Petition to Adopt. Once we have been matched officially with our little girl, we will file the I600, which will be our approval to bring her to the US as our daughter.

This isn't a huge step, but it is one more step to the journey to our daughter - and  this week I needed to have just one more step to be on the way! I have been so thrilled to have the girls from the first two files matched with their families and knew now if we received a referral there would be no hesitance or regrets. What I didn't count on is now having this ever-present void, longing to see a picture of my little girl, her birthdate, the town she is from, and all the things you can learn about your child when they are halfway around the world.

So each day this week has held something to think of my daughter....

Sunday - My parents and brothers were in town. My mom and I went shopping at Peebles and I bought our little girl a cute little pink pant & jacket set with little pink flowers. After nine years of dressing boys & buying my nieces the cute girl stuff...I will get to enjoy the bows & lace!

Monday - A friend from work and I went to Yamato's a hibachi grill near work. I had bogulgi, my favorite Korean dish! The food was wonderful! I can't wait to eat Korean food in Korea!

Also, on Monday my travel companion received the exciting news that they will be travelling with me to Korea! We decided that we definitely wanted one parent to stay home with our kids, so I was nominated and eagerly accepted the "traveling to Korea" parent role and hubby chose the "stay in the US" parent role. So, can you guess who is going with me to Korea?

Wednesday - I took our oldest to the Orthodontist, both boys to the Chiropractor, worked, then went to church for dinner and worked there for a few hours, then came home and worked some more to finish out my 8 hours for the day. So, how does this relate to our daughter? Days like this make me question if I am totally crazy for wanting to add yet another person to our hectic life? You bet! The days may be long, our schedules may sometimes set us spinning, but I can't wait to add another member to our crowd!

I bet you are thinking...I can't believe she just left us hanging!!! Who is going to be the lucky person to go to Korea, to meet sweet Annalee, and tour the countryside? How cruel! Well, I wouldn't be that mean!

My travel buddy is our oldest son! He will most likely be ten by the time we travel and this would be such an awesome experience for him. Hubby and I were discussing that prior to getting married neither of us had flown commercial flight, rode in the subway, taken a taxi cab, and neither of us have been out of the country. We are hoping travel will happen on a school break, but either way we're pretty sure the headmaster will cut him a break for this type of learning experience!

When we told him, he immediately said, "NO! I don't want to go, what if something happens?" to which our youngest grabbed my arm and said, "I want to go wif ewe mommy!" We weren't surprised as that is the difference in their personalities, but after about a half hour of discussing all of the aspects of the trip and experience and how people fly everyday with no problems...he was finally excited about going and made sure to share with his teacher and friends the next day at school!

Now the two of us need to take a day and go get our passports submitted. We also both need a good camera to take with us to capture the moments and the country! I told him not only will he have great material for a school project, but he will forever be able to share with his sister the story of meeting her and all about her country! We know that these will be memories they will always cherish!

As for little guy, he will get some great one-on-one time with dad! Our oldest was home with Dad until Kindergarten and our youngest doesn't usually just get dad time without brother or mom around. I think they will have such a great time bonding, playing, and doing typical "guy" stuff!

Have a very blessed rest of the week and thank you for dropping by to check in on our journey...we are praying for lots of good news to share in the not to distant future! Only time will tell :)