As far as paperwork goes, it is moving slow. We are trying to complete our paperwork this week and send it off to our social worker who is typing up our homestudy report. The goal is by the end of June our entire homestudy packet will be complete and approved and we can send off our I-600 which is our immigration approval (allowing us to adopt internationally). This will take a few months to get back approved.
I seriously have never been so excited about and dreaded paperwork so much. Excited because each form brings us one step closer to our son, dreadful because some of these questions are honestly, just ridiculous. The one form we have put off and put off is the Inter-racial questionare. I totally understand the reasons for us needing to think about and work through some of the issues that will arrise from us having an inter-racial family. There will always be stares, questions and some people who just don't approve. Our son and our bio kids will likely get made fun of at some point by a cruel, curious or uneducated child or even adult. Our son may go through times of feeling like he doesn't quite belong due to his skin color. These are all things that we have thought about and prayed about and will work through as a family in an age appropriate time and manner.
The form is about 8 pages of questions, scenarios and drawing your family and community tree, while marking anyone who may be against us adopting a child of another race and explaining where we have connections to people of our child's race. It's A LOT! Some of the questions I just want to write "Seriously, who came up with this?"
When we were considering adoption, the thought really never entered my mind of what RACE do we want to adopt? It was, there is an orphan crisis in the world, God has laid this on our hearts and he will show us where to adopt from and he did. He chose Ethiopia and we were excited. We will love this child and any other child that may come into our family later, regardless of their skin color. Color doesn't create or negate love. This child will be just as loved as my other 3.
Having to answer questions as to when I first realized I was a white American are just kind of silly to be honest. Like I said, I get it, we are being evaluated on every level possible. But geez! Either way, it is a requirement, so we press on and answer the questions, silly or not.
Thanks to this form, this song has been in my head all week long. Which hey, I can stand a little MJ going through my head.
So, keep us in your prayers as we press on and finish the paperwork and getting forms notarized. Pray for our social worker, as she has a lot of families she is over right now. As always, pray for our son and his birth parents.
Oh and don't think I have forgotten about our puzzle. We have still had people sending in donations for puzzle pieces, we just have not had time to update it yet. Thank you guys for being so faithful! Once we are through the paperwork, it is back to the puzzle. You can still buy a piece/pieces for $10 each.
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