Finally!

It's official now.  We finally have our home study approval.  I was going to be blogging about the whole process, but there was so much waiting involved, it didn't feel like I had anything to say. But that part at least is over. We went in today and signed and signed and signed. 

I was so nervous before our first home visit. I cleaned the house in a frenzy. I didn't know what she was going to be looking for so I prepared for an invasion of Martha Stewart type proportions.  At one point, when I was on my hands and knees with an arm stuck in the fridge, I wondered what the likelihood was that she was going to have an urge to pull out the lettuce drawer-but still, I was prepared. (Sadly, she didn't, and so the gleaming, white underside remained an unseen testament of our adoption worthy house.)

The whole process was partly fun. After all, I got to sit there and talk about how amazing my kids and husband were, definitely my favorite subjects. In fact, I think our social worker wanted to be adopted by us at the end, but that could have just been the sugar high from the chocolate chip cookies I was feeding her.

It was also partly invasive, uncomfortable, and definitely stressful. I'm mostly a private person and not the sort to give all the intimate details to the hairdresser. So having a fresh faced collegiate ask all sorts of personal questions while busily bullet pointing on her laptop was not my favorite thing. I would have rather she just looked behind the lettuce drawer.

Now on to the dossier which is a HUGE stack of papers that makes me want to cry just looking at it. Basically, I think that we have to find the originals of every scrap of paper detailing our lives and have it notarized. But this part is on me to gather and submit. Part of the reason that our home study took so long was that we had to wait on wheels to turn in our agency that were not turning. People left, and new people took their place...things got lost and had to be resubmitted...etc..etc.

Oh, I never mentioned which country we are adopting from. Next time then, because there is a wee story involved and I need go make a pumpkin pie.