I was told that last week on Thursday our approved home study was going to be notarized. And I hoped mailed that day too.
So I have been watching our mailbox. You see, the next step is to send immigration forms and documents off to USCIS so we can get approval to bring our daughter home from China, into America to become a United States Citizen. From what we have read and been told, this process can take up to two months, so I have been wanting to get the home study back so we can send it in, along with the other documents needed for this.
Yesterday I saw the mail truck coming as I was leaving the house and turned around so I could check the mail. There was nothing in the mailbox. Literally nothing.
So today I checked it once and then saw that other neighbors still had flags up so I was going to check it when Edmund, our son, woke up from his second nap.
For Thanksgiving my dad and brother are visiting, and my dad offered to go check the mail and see if it was there. I doubted it was there but said that would be nice.
He came back with a big manila envelope and said, "Pinebrook Family Answers?" I jumped up and said yes and grabbed the packet! I was so excited. I have been waiting for this for about six weeks, and at the longest I thought it would take four weeks. It may not seem that much longer to anyone else, but I wanted to hurry and get this so I could mail off everything to USCIS. The USCIS documents are the last documents I have to receive before we get them all certified (by the secretary of state) and authenticated (by the Chinese embassy of our region).
So this is the last huge piece we need to gather.
After checking and re-checking and re-checking that I had all of it correctly done and together we went to a mailing center and mailed the documents.
I feel so, so happy. I feel light. It seems like so much emotion for pieces of paper and mailing things out. But it is so much more. It is another step closer to our girl. Another step that brings us closer to having her in our arms.
It is amazing, how much we love her. It is joyous to know that she is growing in our hearts and that God is holding her in His arms for us.
