Home Study........APPROVED!

Hi everyone,

We are counting our blessings...the home study has been approved! We are one step closer to bringing home our baby from Kazakhstan. Thanks so much to all of you for your support this far.

Overall, the process went very smoothly. It took 4 1/2 months from start to finish. For the other families adopting -- don't let the length of the home study throw you off. We definitely could have finished this sooner, but we took it at a more natural pace to make sure we stay energized throughout this process. Both Amy and I had a few months of crazy schedules at work and very little free time. The timing is actually perfect, as we are now in a much better financial situation to adopt. All the credit goes to God there...we had been praying about this regularly. We knew we could get the funds, but, obviously, the less debt the better when you're starting a family.

The past few days have been a real whirlwind of blessings. I don't know why everything is happening at once, but it is.

Now it's dossier time! We're off to an awesome start. Amy applied for her passport about a month ago with non-expedited service, since we figured that it was only needed to travel. Right after she applied, we realized that all of our dossier documents need a passport number! We spent a few weeks searching around on the Web and making calls without any luck. We had been given an expected date of November, so it was looking like we were headed for a bit of delay. Out of nowhere, they completed it and mailed it to us! I got an email on Friday that they were processing it, then got another email a few minutes later that it was done and on its way :)

Please continue to pray for us and our baby.

Thanks everyone and God bless...

Love,
Phil & Amy