Indecision

It's been a crazy couple of days with our dossier compilation. It might be less crazy had we decided to stick with our current placement agency, but after speaking to a couple of families who switched we're rethinking everything. We're at a point where we haven't given them our first large payment for dossier submission, so we have the luxury of rethinking now (a huge blessing, as many families are 'stuck' with an unexpectedly long wait for referrals). We're only about 90% decided on the new agency....they've been prompt about returning e-mail inquiries, they run their own "model" orphanage in Ethiopia with two US doctors on staff, and they have no waiting list (which amazes me). They are a small agency and do mostly Eastern European adoptions. I was told referrals for Ethiopia are at about 12-16 weeks after the dossier is completed, then travel 1-3 months after that. They even offer an escort service that we're considering, rather than travel. The drawback with an escort is that we won't see her birth country and it will extend her wait to get home by about 4-6 weeks. I'm concerned about it because we traveled to bring Sky & Andrew home and she may ask why we didn't do that for her.....Daniel has no problem with the idea and says we'll tell her "she flew home to us like a beautiful bird." We could always plan a trip with her when she's older, I suppose.

Anyway, everything feels a bit 'up in the air' and ungrounded right now until we decide 100% on switching. Meanwhile, I've been working on the documents needed for the other agency just in case. I have to make a trip to Topeka for Liam's original birth certificate, and Daniel has to get Sorin's in Missouri. We only have an Indian birth certificate for Andrew and I wonder what to do-- we only have one original and don't want to part with that. If it looks like too much trouble we'll stay with our first agency because they only require the parent's birth certification. Oooooh but we would love to switch to an agency with no waiting list! If we did, I'm guessing the dossier would be completed by late February and we could have a referral by May or June. How I don't like to project and guess like that with international adoption, though.....it's a very tricky process! We're bracing ourselves for any possible outcome...

Meanwhile, with our original agency we heard that 10 families received referrals yesterday! I was so happy to hear that and was jumping up and down for all the families who had been waiting 8-9 months. It's also good news for the other families on the list as they move up...I hope the referrals keep pouring in because the list was at about 100 families and God knows there are far more children needing homes.