On Friday at about 12:18pm we received our travel call!! Sean is ready to come home!!!This was particularly auspicious as it was Sean's 1st birthday. I have to say, I remained fairly calm, possibly because I was in my office. Or more likely, because I was in my office, lots of noise and screaming and excitement would've caused my co-workers to come running, and then I wouldn't have gotten anything done. Well, I probably would've rudely shut my office door in their faces if need be (sorry guys) but I had to call my husband first!
The dilemma though, was that I knew Wade was at lunch with a co-worker, and I also knew that the first travel call was basically our East Coast office telling me that Sean was ready, and that I had to call the West Coast office to get details. I debated briefly calling the West Coast office before calling Wade so I'd have more information to give him, but then I nixed that idea. So I called Wade. He, like I was, tried very hard to keep it in check in the middle of a crowded restaurant. I said he should go back to lunch and I'd get more details and we'd talk later.
So I called the West Coast office and got a ton of information. Basically, we have 10 days to get our butts to Seoul. The first day there, we chill out, the second is our city tour, the third we pick up Sean (!!), the fourth we can chill and get adjusted, and the fifth day we come home. (Of course, we can stay longer to soak up our son's homeland, but I imagine I'll be ready to head home by then.)
I started pricing out flights using their recommended travel agency. Although I've gotten plenty of air fares myself on line, I figured that maybe I would want to let the experts handle this. I was extremely disheartened by the prices-- we're kind of getting screwed by the approaching Labor Day holiday. Grrrrr. In fact, if we were leaving in the middle of September, the fares would be about $600 cheaper, if you can believe that. One of the options we were looking at was $1500 cheaper than the others, but that requires stopovers in Tokyo and San Fran before heading back to NYC. With a 1 year old we just met?? I don't know... I suppose there is something to be said for being able to get out and stretch your legs a bit, but we'd be increasing the entire trip by how many hours? It's already a 14 hour flight! (Maybe 12 on the way back, actually, but still...) I think we're just going to suck it up and get the more expensive flight back that is the most direct. Besides, from everything I read the stewardesses on Korean Air (besides being stunningly beautiful) are extremely helpful with babies who are coming back to the States. We'll figure this out tomorrow and get everything booked. The itinerary we liked best leaves next Sunday. I thought I needed a week to get my head together, but now I feel like I just want to go already!
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Another Incremental Update, It's Getting CLOSE!
I again called the National Visa Center in DC this morning. As you know, Sean was checked in and then out of the National Visa Center last Monday, Aug 9. The information was then sent to the US embassy in Seoul. The embassy sends a packet of info called P3 to the adoption agency with some instructions. I now know that the P3 was sent from the embassy to the adoption agency on Friday, Aug. 13. The agency complies with whatever instructions are included in the packet, I don't even know the details, but they then send the P3 back to the embassy. Once the P3 is back at the embassy, Sean's Visa Interview will be scheduled. The travel call is generally received the same or next day as the Visa Interview.
It's gonna be soon, everyone!
It's gonna be soon, everyone!
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Another Step Closer...
You know, I take a break for a few days to regroup and recover from a hangover and a cold and then, whoosh! My life starts zooming by again.
We had our toddler shower on Saturday-- you know, open some gifts, play some beer pong, polish off a keg. This wasn't your average baby shower, and I wouldn't have had it any other way. (All the pics are here: I only put a handful--a large handful-- on Facebook) Thank you to everyone who was able to make it; I'm sorry I wasn't able to invite the entire world, all my Facebook friends, but there's only so much room in the house. People are just so excited about the adoption and really seem genuinely interested, the outpouring of love, support and goodwill we've received has been amazing. I wish everyone could've been there (and not just for the presents!)
Anyway, after getting our I600 approval notification on Friday (effective July 31) I noticed that there was an incorrect date on the form. So stupid. It's the expiration date for Wade's fingerprints-- it's listed that they expire in October 2010 while mine expire in October 2011. We just had them done last month, so obviously 2011 is the correct year. Such a stupid, stupid clerical error. So frustrating. We weren't sure if this would cause a problem or not, but I decided to call the National Visa Center today. In the meantime, Wade got back in touch with our USCIS officer about the typo.
I found out that Sean's case has been checked IN and OUT of the National Visa Center! That's another step done!! All the paperwork now gets sent to the embassy in Seoul. They will then issue instructions to our adoption agency, and a packet of information called the P3 will be sent back and forth (or something like that, it's such a long, drawn-out tedious process) and then Sean will be scheduled for his Visa Interview at the embassy. (It's a formality. They are not going to question a 1 year old about his political leanings and try to figure out if he's a terrorist or something.) After the Visa Interview, we get our travel call, and we're on our way!
Based on our agency's message board postings, there's a number in DC I can call to check and see when Sean's Visa Interview has been scheduled. I figured it was too soon, but I called anyway. It was too soon. The packet has been just sent, it hasn't even gotten to Korea yet. The nice woman on the phone told me this next part of the process could take a couple of weeks or a month. (But people posting on the message boards have much shorter time frames, so who knows?)
In the meantime, our USCIS officer got back to Wade and seemed upset about the date mix up and said it had to be fixed and she'd take care of it right away. Ok, but if it's such a problem, then how did we already clear the National Visa Center? And what sort of holdup is this now going to cause??
That's all I got for now. It's enough, no?
We had our toddler shower on Saturday-- you know, open some gifts, play some beer pong, polish off a keg. This wasn't your average baby shower, and I wouldn't have had it any other way. (All the pics are here: I only put a handful--a large handful-- on Facebook) Thank you to everyone who was able to make it; I'm sorry I wasn't able to invite the entire world, all my Facebook friends, but there's only so much room in the house. People are just so excited about the adoption and really seem genuinely interested, the outpouring of love, support and goodwill we've received has been amazing. I wish everyone could've been there (and not just for the presents!)
Anyway, after getting our I600 approval notification on Friday (effective July 31) I noticed that there was an incorrect date on the form. So stupid. It's the expiration date for Wade's fingerprints-- it's listed that they expire in October 2010 while mine expire in October 2011. We just had them done last month, so obviously 2011 is the correct year. Such a stupid, stupid clerical error. So frustrating. We weren't sure if this would cause a problem or not, but I decided to call the National Visa Center today. In the meantime, Wade got back in touch with our USCIS officer about the typo.
I found out that Sean's case has been checked IN and OUT of the National Visa Center! That's another step done!! All the paperwork now gets sent to the embassy in Seoul. They will then issue instructions to our adoption agency, and a packet of information called the P3 will be sent back and forth (or something like that, it's such a long, drawn-out tedious process) and then Sean will be scheduled for his Visa Interview at the embassy. (It's a formality. They are not going to question a 1 year old about his political leanings and try to figure out if he's a terrorist or something.) After the Visa Interview, we get our travel call, and we're on our way!
Based on our agency's message board postings, there's a number in DC I can call to check and see when Sean's Visa Interview has been scheduled. I figured it was too soon, but I called anyway. It was too soon. The packet has been just sent, it hasn't even gotten to Korea yet. The nice woman on the phone told me this next part of the process could take a couple of weeks or a month. (But people posting on the message boards have much shorter time frames, so who knows?)
In the meantime, our USCIS officer got back to Wade and seemed upset about the date mix up and said it had to be fixed and she'd take care of it right away. Ok, but if it's such a problem, then how did we already clear the National Visa Center? And what sort of holdup is this now going to cause??
That's all I got for now. It's enough, no?
Thursday, August 5, 2010
Sheepish
Naturally, after slightly ranting a bit in my last post, I came home to find an envelope from USCIS. We are I600 approved! This means they have approved our "Petition to Classify Orphan as an Immediate Relative." It means that our paperwork passed, including those that indicated that Sean is indeed an orphan, relinquished under the proper, legal circumstances and that we are in good standing with all our paperwork, from our fingerprints, to our medical records, to our home study-- everything--to become his adoptive parents.
Now everything gets sent to the National Visa Center. You're supposed to be able to check the status of your paperwork, but the number from the I600 approval form isn't coming up as a valid case number. So either it's not that number, or we haven't been checked in yet. Our I600 approval is dated July 31, but we didn't find out until today. I guess we'll get another letter from the Visa Center with the case number via snail mail that takes a week to get to us. Hello, U.S. Government! Internet! You may want to try it out, give it a whirl. Information gets passed along instantly, it's really quite amazing.
Either way, we still don't know when we're going to Korea to get Sean, so my previous post stands. Now leave me the fuck alone. ;)
(I can hear my mom's voice in my head saying, "You're such a joy.")
Now everything gets sent to the National Visa Center. You're supposed to be able to check the status of your paperwork, but the number from the I600 approval form isn't coming up as a valid case number. So either it's not that number, or we haven't been checked in yet. Our I600 approval is dated July 31, but we didn't find out until today. I guess we'll get another letter from the Visa Center with the case number via snail mail that takes a week to get to us. Hello, U.S. Government! Internet! You may want to try it out, give it a whirl. Information gets passed along instantly, it's really quite amazing.
Either way, we still don't know when we're going to Korea to get Sean, so my previous post stands. Now leave me the fuck alone. ;)
(I can hear my mom's voice in my head saying, "You're such a joy.")
The Waiting
Everyone keep asking me what's going on, when is Sean coming home, when are we going to Korea... don't you think if we knew, that you'd know too!? I'm not keeping a big secret here. We honestly don't know. And believe me, we'd really like to know. It's so hard to plan things, schedule things, go to work, do any of that when you know you're suddenly going to have to spring into action and jet off on a 14 hour flight to pick up your new baby! I try not to get mad at people for asking, but it usually doesn't work out so well. I guess I kind of feel like, if you know me at all, if you know me even a little bit, then think about what you're asking-- if we knew, you'd know!!! I'm a pretty good broadcaster about the minutiae of my life, so it stands to reason that something this BIG would be made public pretty damn fast. Trust me, as soon as we know, you'll know. Now stop annoying the shit out of me, ok?
What we do know is that Sean was scheduled for his visa physical yesterday in Korea. That's pretty much the last step in the Korean paperwork process. We're waiting for the U.S. to catch up. Two weeks ago tomorrow we went for our re-do fingerprints for our I600. We know our case worker at USCIS received the results of the fingerprints, and she told us that if she needed anything else, she would let us know. We haven't heard anything-- so can we assume she doesn't need anything else? Did she approve our I600? Was our packet sent to the National Visa Center? Could maybe someone let us know, communicate with us? An email, a phone call? Do we really have to sit around waiting for some snail mail to get to us? So frustrating. Just so, so frustrating.
So with that, with no news, no updates, and NO WE DON'T KNOW WHEN WE'RE GOING TO GET SEAN YET, I'm going to start my weekend a day early. Big happenings this weekend-- baby shower/kegger at our place!
What we do know is that Sean was scheduled for his visa physical yesterday in Korea. That's pretty much the last step in the Korean paperwork process. We're waiting for the U.S. to catch up. Two weeks ago tomorrow we went for our re-do fingerprints for our I600. We know our case worker at USCIS received the results of the fingerprints, and she told us that if she needed anything else, she would let us know. We haven't heard anything-- so can we assume she doesn't need anything else? Did she approve our I600? Was our packet sent to the National Visa Center? Could maybe someone let us know, communicate with us? An email, a phone call? Do we really have to sit around waiting for some snail mail to get to us? So frustrating. Just so, so frustrating.
So with that, with no news, no updates, and NO WE DON'T KNOW WHEN WE'RE GOING TO GET SEAN YET, I'm going to start my weekend a day early. Big happenings this weekend-- baby shower/kegger at our place!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)