This blog hasn't been updated in 5 years!  And there is a good reason for it, but reading all the posts again and looking at the timeline, it seems like this blog is missing a closure chapter.

So here it is.  Short and sweet :-)

Adoption never happened.  Which it is a blessing as we are not longer married.  It has been 4 years since the divorce was final.  We got reimbursed for some services we payed ahead of time but that they were never going to be used.  Both agencies were very easy to work with to withdraw our application.

I still think of all those children who need family.  And who knows, I may decide one day to adopt one by myself.

Peace and love.

~Nancy

Last renewal??

It is difficult to try to write something new to this blog after my previous post. The day we came back from Venezuela we supposed to get our fingerprints done for adoption, luckily my smart husband remembered hours before we left that we wouldn't be able to make it on time, so we requested a reschedule of bio-metrics. So lets look at the positive side, for anybody who needs to reschedule the fingerprints it is as simple as sending the appointment letter back and checking the box asking to reschedule. The date is moved about a month.

We got fingerprinted again Monday Sep-19, and the approval for the renewal arrived to our house on Saturday with date Sep-20! It took only one day to get us re-approved! Amazing!

Home Study and the USCIS approval have been notarized and have apostille. They are now on its way to our wonderful agency Adopolis to later be sent to Colombia, just to keep our records up-to-date.

So for any person out there who is still reading this blog (other than Megan, Hi Megan!), we are still in the process waiting for our Colombianito or Colombianita. Our hope is that this is the last time we have to go through the renewal process -I called our agency today to try to convince them of that... not sure it worked, but I took it out of my chest.

I just stole this cartoon from another blog. I just love the irony behind it. Yes, we are approved, but it is still a long way before we can reach our child, hopefully we don't have to fight alligators, boiling acid and marshmallows packed in ammonia!

OH.... I almost forgot! We bought a twin size bed for our child, and I put it together this weekend... YEAH ME! Now we just need to have a child :-)

In memory of my dad

I miss my dad, I wish he had the opportunity to meet our little one. He passed away on August 15, 2011. The full family was there for the funeral on August 18 in Puerto Ordaz, Venezuela

This is a video made by my sister Aida.

Song: Te Extrañaré.

I'll miss you, be sure
So many beautiful and bad times we live together
The details, the little things, it seemed important q
There are the ones that invade my mind when I remember you

I wish I could turn back the clock
To see you again
To give you a hug
And never let go

But I understand your time came
God has called you to be by his side
So the you wanted, but I never thought
That hurts so much

(CHORUS)

Do not cry for me
I am in a place filled d light
Where there is peace, where there is no evil
Where I can rest

Do not cry for me
It's so beautiful here, I never imagined
I want you to be happy, to go well
And when it is your time, I will be waiting for you

I'll miss you, be sure
How to think life can end
In a second
Life is dust, it can spread at a time
You didn't bring anything, you didn't take anything, just what you had inside

I wish I could turn back the clock
To see you again
To give you a hug
And never let go

But I understand your time came q
God has called you to be by his side
So the you wanted, but I never thought
That hurts so much

(CHORUS)

Do not cry for me
I am in a place filled with light
Where there is peace, where there is no evil
Where I can rest

Do not cry for me
It's so beautiful here, I never imagined
I want you to be happy, to go well
And when it is your time, I will be waiting for you

Home Study Renewal - Getting ready for social worker visit

This is our third time when a Social Worker comes to visit our house to make sure we are still suitable to become parents. At this time, I would say we are pros! You have to see us today, just relaxing even that tomorrow is the "visit".

If you are new to this process, my best recommendation is to relax. Yes, you want to make a good impression to your social worker, but they are not doing a white glove inspection. They just want to make sure you have a place where you can raise a child, thats all. So don't freak out!

This is what we have done for tomorrow to get the house ready:

• Mow the lawn
• Clean the house: clean bathrooms, bedrooms, kitchen, pantry. Picked up any clutter. This is regular weekly cleaning!
• Wash the dog
• Made iced tea (I know, it sounds silly, but we need to have something to serve other than water and beer!)
• Maybe I will bake cupcakes (I rarely bake, but I like to do it! So the visit is just a good excuse to bake right now!)

Of course, when the social worker comes, it is not just a walk through the house, we also have an interview! My husband and I talked about any changes that happened during last year, any changes we want to do in our home study.. and that is it. We are in the same page, so we should be re-approved with flying colors!

NOTE: in the first visit when preparing the report for the first time, they do ask A LOT of questions and even flush the toile! See my post about it back in 2009

Nesting

It has been very long times since last time I posted, but believe me, there hasn't been even one day that I have think about becoming a mother. We started our process in 2008, and we got approval from ICBF on August 2009. Almost two years later, and we are still here, waiting. So what does a mother do when she is expecting? Nesting!Well... my paper pregnancy is too long to be decoraring the room or baby-proofing the house. It is also very uncertain, as we don't know the gender, age, or taste of the child to be buying clothes, painting walls, buying toys. But that doesn't take away that I can be nesting! A good friend of mine suggested a brilliant idea. I can build my child's library! So each month I have been buying children’s books. Some are in English, others in Spanish. I can only imagine getting to the end of the day and sitting with our little one and reading these books. Again, this is a brilliant idea! I already have like ten books, and the collection will keep growing each month. Lets see how many books we ended having! The other thing I bought for our child is a Sock Monkey. My husband has memory of his childhood with this monkey, so I thought it will be the perfect first toy for our child. I had never seen one in person, but now it is sitting in our living room and I think it is adorable. Other way of nesting is changing furniture. We had a hand-me-down sofa, and the sitting space in our living room was limited. So... new sofas arrived! And I'm waiting a little bit longer to replace our coffee table with an ottoman with storage, so we can keep toys there :-) That is it with the Spillers for now. We are still working hard, playing harder, and enjoying ourselves. Stay tuned for the next episode: Homestudy III (coming to this blog next May, after successful homestudies I and II)