Home Study Complete...At Last!

This pile of papers is our completed homestudy, which arrived in the mail today!  This is a huge relief because we both feel like for a long time, when someone asks "how's the adoption going?" we've been saying: "We're almost done with the homestudy."  Well, now we're done.  Really.  Look at that picture.

So now what?

Now we need to put this pile of papers together with another pile of papers to complete our dossier, and get the whole thing notarized (we have a romantic date with our local notary this Thursday).  Then, Bethany will take it to the circuit court to have it certified.  It would be far too easy for this all to happen in one county, or the county we live in...so of course she needs to go to Howard and Frederick counties to do this.  After this is done I will head to Annapolis to have it apostilled (certification that is internationally recognized).  Notarized, certified, apostilled...got that?

When we've done that we send the whole thing to our child placing agency in Arizona, and all the forms pass inspection by the agency, they will send it to the facilitator in Eastern Europe.

Moving along!  Please keep us in prayer during this process (and keep the process itself in prayer, as well).  As you can see there are many steps along the way, and each one has its own uniquely nerve-wracking quality.  But this is a big step, so we're thankful!