Nobody said this would be easy!  We jumped into this adventure with both feet, but we also had our eyes wide open.  We knew that our adoption would require a good bit of paperwork, a lot of money, and most of all, patience.  For us, the process has been very much like when we were kids at an amusement park (ok, it was really only last year) and we stood there looking up at a giant roller coaster.  We stood there for a long time, feeling small and intimidated.  We knew just how scary it would be, but when we looked at the people getting off, most of them looked happy and exhilarated.  But gosh, the coaster looked so daunting and fast!  We watched people getting on and off for a long time.  Finally, we decided to get a ticket and wait in line.  

The very first formal step for us was to file an I-600A petition to adopt a foreign child with the Immigration and Naturalization Service (now part of the Bureau of Homeland Security).  That application cost $600, paid up front.  When we sent that in, we were committed.  We had bought our ticket.  We rationally knew that we could still get out of the coaster line if we absolutely had to, but it would be an expensive choice.

The biggest job in the adoption process was assembling our "dossier", the collection of legal documents that we use to demonstrate to the proper authorities that we are who we say we are, that we are fit to be parents again, and that we are capable of following instructions.  Our dossier includes our birth certificates, our marriage certificate, copies of our passports, statements from our bank about our financial health, a statement from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh verifying our employment, and a copy of our "home study" report.  The home study was sort of a "background check" on our family.  A local adoption agency handled our case, which involved visits to our home by a social worker, interviews (both as a couple and separately), and a little bit of training on some of the adoption issues we'll face.  We also needed several letters of reference from friends and family.  Our favorite part of the home study was the SSAS (Subtle Substance Abuse Screening):  it was a questionnaire that we had to fill out regarding drug use/abuse.  It included questions like, "Never/Sometimes/Usually/Always (circle one) when I drink, I can't remember what happens."  We wondered what the non-Subtle Substance Abuse Screening is like!  

Once we compiled all the necessary documentation for our dossier, we needed to get the documents "apostilled."  This involved obtaining the official seal of the secretary of state of all the relevant states for our documents.  Faced with the daunting task of identifying and corresponding with the proper authorities for each the apostilles, we did the only thing we could possibly do.  We had someone else do the job!  World Partners Adoption offers a secondary service called "Paperwork Partners" which takes care of obtaining the apostilles for you.  It was just what we needed!

One difficult aspect of the adoption process for us that we had been warned about but that nevertheless was intensely frustrating was the waiting.  We were told that on average a Kazakhstan adoption takes about nine months (appropriate!), but we also thought that if we were diligent in our paperwork, we could do it more quickly.  But everything seemed to take longer than we expected.  Our dossier could not be sent out for apostilles until the home study report was in, which necessitated the completion of the study itself.  The study took place over several weeks, but couldn't even be scheduled until our until our reference letters were all completed... it seemed to go on and on.  And of course, as we navigated through the morass of documents, we snaked ever closer to the roller coaster.  

It was June when we finally climbed on.  Our adoption coordinator suggested at that time that we might want to start reviewing videos and medical records of some of the available children, searching for our son.  What  a strange idea that was!  Choosing one child from a list of such beautiful Kaz children was not a process we were comfortable with at all.  We hoped for a boy close in age to Joe, and we also wanted Joe to be the "big brother" in the family.  On the other hand, we tried to be open to other possibilities as well;  we had felt called to adoption from the start and we wanted to make sure that we continued to listen!  We were fortunate, though, in that our referral process was fairly straightforward.  When we saw his picture on the photolisting and then watched his video, we knew that Aidos was meant to be our son.  

Though we had never had any plans of abandoning the adoption process, we knew that after accepting our referral that we were fully committed to following through and completing it.  Having seen our son-to-be made it so much more real to us.  There is a little boy on the other side of the world, and even if he doesn't know it yet, he has a family waiting for him;  waiting to love him, waiting to be loved by him and waiting for him to become part of our family. 

So we're on the roller coaster now.  It's early  in the ride; we're strapped in and our cart is slowly being pulled up the first climb (Clink, Clink, Clink).  It is an awfully high coaster - we keep climbing and climbing and climbing - and we're sure it's going to be a wild ride when we hit the top and start down shortly.  But what a ride it's going to be!