2007 At A Glance

Wow! What a year this has been for us. The big news is of course our adoption of Liliana Maria. Our precious baby girl is still in Guatemala waiting for us, and Dave and I are thrilled to know we are going to be parents again to this beautiful baby girl. So, here is a recap of everything we've completed this year on our journey to Liliana.

1. Paperwork, paperwork, and more paperwork. First we had paperwork for our home study agency and for the State of Illinois Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS). In Illinois, potential adoptive parents are required to be approved by DCFS. At the same time we began collecting and completing paperwork for our dossier. In total, we had to collect 26 documents. All documents had to be notarized and/or certified, then authenticated by the Guatemalan Consulate General's office in Chicago.

2. Then we had our fingerprints taken 4 times. We travelled to St. Louis to have our fingerprints taken at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). This is a requirement of all families adopting Internationally. We also had our fingerprints taken locally for the required background check for DCFS. Then we hit our local police department for two more sets of prints. One set was sent to the FBI and the other for our IL State background check. Our fingerprints are on file everywhere now.

3. We had 5 interviews with our home study agency and completed the required on-line and in class training sessions. The first interview was on January 2nd and at the end of March all our interviews were completed, the home study report was done, and we received approval from DCFS.

4. In May we had our 171H, which is approval from USCIS giving us authorization to adopt from Guatemala, and our dossier was on it's way to Guatemala.

5. All the paperwork, signatures, fingerprints, interviews, classes, training and trips to the post office finally paid off on June 8th when we received a call from our agency telling us they had a baby girl for us. They emailed us pictures, her birth certificate, and health information. We immediately accepted and were again on the go getting the acceptance paperwork completed and notarized. With everything in the mail, the hard part really began. The Wait!!!!

6. On October 4th we boarded a plane in Chicago for a trip to Guatemala where we would finally meet Liliana. We had 5 wonderful days and nights with her, spent some time bonding with her foster family, and then on October 9th, I had to hand her back to her foster mom and return home. While it was certainly one of the most difficult things I've ever done in my life, the love I witnessed between Lili and her foster family gave me great comfort at the same time.

7. On October 10th, we visited the old capital of Guatemala, Antigua. It is a beautiful city, rich in history. We walked along the original cobblestone streets, saw the remnants of many of the original churches and buildings, and saw fountains galore that were brought to Antigua by the French.

8. On October 16th our agency informed us that we had finally reached a major milestone in our adoption when our attorney submitted our case to PGN (Procuradoria General de la Nacion). PGN is the equivalent of our Attorney General's office here in the U.S. We had high hopes of our case being completed before the end of the year, however, after a previo (kick out) on December 11th and a resubmit on December 18th, our case is still being processed.

So, 2007 comes to an end without Liliana legally being our daughter. However, in our hearts she has been our daughter before we ever knew her. We now anxiously await the new year with hope and anticipation that we will travel back to Guatemala together to bring our baby girl home to her "forever family."

Our adoption journey came with another unexpected, but wonderful surprise, new friends!!!!! Not only have we made new friends locally, but we now have new friends across the U.S. So, to all our new friends, our old friends, our family, and our new friends to come, we wish you a safe and wonderful New Year and hope that great things come your way in 2008.