going....going....GONE

Yes - that's right - dossier is in the hands of AGCI - praise the Lord!!! Tim and I are going to Mexico tomorrow (I know...dirty job - but someone's gotta do it), so we won't be here to get our #'s. Julie is going to call us though, so we'll let you all know when we get back on the 4th! So stay tuned for our #. We are VERY VERY excited!!!!!

Congratulations to everyone who got referrals this week! Hope everyone has a great week!

P.S. Did I mention that we are SUPER excited?!

P.S.S. It feels SO good to have all that paperwork OUT of our house...UGH - I was getting sick of looking at it all. Ok...maybe the pictures is a TAD bit exaggerated, but you get the drift.

Evening at the park

Tonight I had the pleasure of having ALL 3 of my nieces. Tim had 2 softball games tonight, so I took them there thinking we could watch him play....ha! They were not so interested in watching softball. So, we went and looked at ducks, and played on the swings, and went for some walks. Here are a few pics.

Good Weekend

SATURDAY
Tim and I have been saving the $ in our change jar to get a new camera. Well, we are wanting to make the switch from a point & shoot to a SLR, so obviously we'll need to put some money with the money in our change jar, but we're hoping to have a big chunk of it already in that jar. So, Tim had the idea that he wanted to count all of the money to see how much we had. I suggested just taking it to the bank because it's much easier and faster. No, no no...I can do it. Uhhhh....ok. Well, after 1 hour of counting he gave up because he only got through the quarters. I bit my lip, but wanted to say "I TOLD YOU SO!!". And now the money is sitting on the kitchen table waiting to go to the bank.

After he finally gave up on counting all the money, we decided to go mini-golfing. Although I had 3 hole-in-ones, I still lost to Tim. Here is a picture of me on my 3rd hole-in-one, I was pretty excited!

After mini-golf, Ana got into her swimsuit and wanted to go in Addy's pool with her. Yes, our dog is a weirdo and LOVES the water. She wants to be in it as much as possible!

SUNDAY

Sunday was our 6th wedding anniversary! :-) We had Ana until mid-afternoon and then had kickball in the evening, so we made plans to go to dinner on Monday night. But, we still enjoyed our day with Ana and won both kickball games. Although I am dealing with shin splints right now and it is incredibly painful. So, as I'm blogging I'm icing both legs right now. Hopefully they are good to go for next Sunday. I thought I'd post a couple wedding pictures of us since it's our Anniversary. (we got married in Jamaica - for those of you that don't know)

MONDAY

We were expecting to receive our notarized versions of our home study today or tomorrow. And we are very disappointed that it won't be happening. :( We were REALLY wanting it in this week because we are on vacation next week and wanted to leave knowing that we were on the list and we could just relax because everything is in. To make a long story short...our social worker needs to have her boss sign it as well and he is in a different state and there's a notary issue, so not going to happen until next week Monday. However, she will send everything out for us while we're away. But, still wanted it this week. Oh well, not much we can do about it and there are people far worse off so I don't feel I can complain too much, just frustrating.

Tim and I went to dinner tonight up in Milwaukee to an Italian restaurant that we really like and it was delicious! Afterwards we found this little gelato place and stopped in to take a peak. The guy that worked there was VERY passionate about his gelato. He was pretty funny and was making us sample lots and lots of flavors. So, of course we had to get some then. It was soooo good. Here is their website - you should check to see if there is one in your area. I definitely recommend it! http://www.paciugo.com/

Good night everyone, hope everyone had a great Monday!

P.S. please say a prayer for my aunt who is having surgery tomorrow to remove a lump in her breast. She was diagnosed with breast cancer 2 weeks ago. She is doing really well so far and has a great attitude and I know she'll do great. Love you Debbie! :)

Night at the Zoo

We are watching our 6 yr old niece Ana this weekend and we went down to the zoo tonight to watch the movie Surfs Up on a big outdoor screen. We were only down there for 1 hour because the rain started to come, but got a couple of pics in.

TGIF!!!

ALMOST THERE!!!!

I am SOOO excited!! We should be sending everything in Monday or Tuesday next week - YAY!!! I can NOT wait to get on that waiting list. Although I think that will be the hard part. At least now we've been busy gathering paperwork and having appts and then we will just be waiting and waiting and waiting some more. But I still cannot wait.

I have to tell our fingerprint appt story because it was pretty funny. So, we get to our 8am appt and get in pretty much right away. The guy is doing all of my prints and he starts doing some of them over...and over....and over again. And he kept looking pretty confused. He then says "what galaxy are you from"? I said "hmmm...thats a good question". Well, he said that in all of his years in doing this that he has never come across someone like me. Apparently my fingerprints on both hands are exactly the same. Usually people have some variances or different lines...nope not me. I have twin hands!! So...that's my funny hand story.

Tim and I have been so busy lately, so feel like I'm blog slacking so I'm really going to try and be better! I'll post some pictures of what we've been up to lately.

We had two of our nieces for the weekend 2 weekends ago and here are some pics that we took.

We've also been to a couple of Brewer games...

That's all I have for now. We'll be busy with another one of our nieces this weekend, so I'll be posting more pics soon. Tim and I are so blessed to have the BEST nieces in the whole world. We love them so much and feel so blessed to be able to spend so much time with them and be involved in watching them grow. And we are very excited about our new nephew Ethyn and can't wait to meet him when he makes the trip from Minnesota to Wisconsin!

Heartbreaking...

As Tim and I are deciding what to make for dinner we get an email from a friend of ours with the video, which is linked below. As we watch this video it is heartbreaking to see the devastation the people of Ethiopia are facing. And to think we are going back and forth, on our many options, of what we should eat for dinner and all these people want is any bit of food they can get.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7444753.stm

~Dawn

Home Study - DONE

We had our last home study visit this past week, so now we are just waiting for our first draft which we should be getting next week. We are very excited to get that in our hands! We have a few more things left to do on the dossier. My goal is to have everything sent in by the end of the month. The only frustrating thing that we have run into is trying to get copies of our marriage certificates from Jamaica. They are in NO rush at all. We put the request in about 5 weeks ago and they still aren't sent out yet. So, we've made several calls and we keep getting "it's no problem man." And it WILL be a problem if we don't get them soon! So, praying we get those by the end of the week so I can stop worrying about it. We also have our fingerprint appt on Monday morning at 8am. That's pretty much all on the adoption front. We are still enjoying reading all the blogs and following along with everyone's journey!

~Dawn

Memorial Day Weekend

Ok...online classes - DONE! Thanks for the tip in printing everything off Amy - that helped a lot. We are getting ready for our homestudy visit at our house next week Monday. Of course I want things around the house to be perfect, so I'm driving Tim a little nuts. We also received our fingerprint appt in the mail today. So, we'll go to Milwaukee on June 9th to have that done. We feel so blessed to not have hit any major bumps yet, things are really going smoothly.

A friend forwarded this article to us today and well it's interesting and frustrating to say the least. Check it out...

http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/wayoflife/05/27/tranracial.adoption.ap/index.html?iref=newssearch

Here are a few pics from this weekend. We had Tammie, Levi and our adorable nieces over for a cookout and some smores.

Ava "roasting" her marshmallow that is nowhere near the fire. hehe

Marshmallow in one hand...chocolate in the other...

Me & Bayli

Tim & Ava (best buds)



I hope everyone had a nice long weekend! I'm very happy to have a 4 day work week! :)


~Dawn

4th homestudy visit

We had our 4th homestudy visit tonight, so only 1 more to go. Tonight was more of an educational session. She was informing us of a lot of issues that could come up and just basic info we should know. We really enjoyed the session tonight. She will then come to our house in 2 weeks for our final visit. This gives us some time to get a few things done around the house and gives our references time to get their packets sent in. We also need to get started on our on-line classes. So, we will continue to be busy the next few weeks in getting everything done. That's it for now....off to watch American Idol!

Slacker McSlackerson

I know I know... I haven't posted in 1 1/2 weeks! It's been a very busy 2 weeks. Tim was in Seattle for a little over a week for work and I had lots going on and still trying to do as much paperwork as possible. We've done really well in getting stuff done. We have almost all of the homestudy paperwork in...just a few things left to do. We had 2 homestudy visits last week and have another one this Tuesday. After that one - we'll have just one more left. Then it's finishing up the dossier work and awaiting for our fingerprint appointment. We are just trying to take it one day at a time. We're SO excited about all of the referrals that were given out and for all of you that have moved down that list now! And also for all of the families that just came home this past weekend. Can't wait to read all about it and see lots of pictures!

Hope everyone had a good weekend!

Dossier

We received our dossier in the mail today - YAY!! Now I can REALLY get started. I also talked with Martha (Ethiopia Program Director) on the phone today and she assigned Julie as our caseworker. I should be talking with Julie soon to meet her and go through all of the paperwork. Ok, I'm off to do some reading!

Please say a prayer for the Gresham family as they are traveling in a few days to Ethiopia to pick up their son! How exciting!!

~Dawn

1st Homestudy Visit Done!

We had our 1st homestudy visit tonight and it went really well. We went through lots and lots of paperwork and then started the interview process. Our socialworker is really nice and very easy to talk to. Tim and I both felt very comfortable talking with her. We now have lots of paperwork to go through, read and fill out - we'll get started on that right away. Our next visit with her is on the 15th and then again on the 20th. She said that we should be done by end of May or first week in June. So, we're hoping that we don't hit any bumps so we can indeed move that fast. We are really excited because we were a little nervous going in for our first visit, but it turned out to be just fine. We are hoping to get our dossier in the mail next week, so we can start checking stuff off the list. I'm a big list person - love them, so very excited to get that started. We are learning new stuff everyday and are loving all of it.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

~Dawn

Moving right along...

Tonight we had our orientation conference call with AGCI and went over all of the contracts and asked some questions. Everything went well, so tomorrow we will send out the signed & notarized contracts along with our 1st payment (GULP!). We have our first appointment with our homestudy agency on Thursday night. She will start the interview process with us and go over lots of paperwork. We are very excited to be moving along!! We'll let you know how Thursday goes. Thanks for checking in on us!

~Dawn & Tim

Accepted!!!

AGCI contacted us today and informed us that we've been accepted - WAHOO!!!!! So, now it's official! About 30 minutes after we heard that we were accepted from AGCI, the social worker from the homestudy agency called just to see if we had heard anything and I said "YES - just 30 minutes ago!" So I think that was God's way of letting us know that he knows how impatient we are and that he is taking care of us. She also informed me that there is a family in Appleton (1 1/2 hrs away) that is adopting from Ethiopia as well and she is meeting with them on Monday. She thought I would be glad to hear that another family would be going through this with us at the exact same time and that we live kinda close to eachother. I was really excited to hear this, so can't wait to exchange contact information with them. Next step is to wait for our orientation packet from AGCI and once we've reviewed everything we can call and set up a conference call to review everything with them. Tomorrow we will be sending in our application to our homestudy agency and should be able to start with them right away. We are very excited to be moving along!!


~Tim & Dawn

Kids say the cutest things...

Well...we're still waiting to hear if we are accepted by AGCI yet. They called on Friday and again today wanting some additional information pertaining to our fertility issues. As soon as we hear something, we will definitely let you know.
I did however want to share a conversation with you that I had with my 3 year old niece who is just the sweetest little girl. Bayli & Ava slept over this weekend and we had a great time with them as always. Tim and I were driving them home and Bayli was telling me about her new baby sister that is coming, so then the conversation turned to babies. And this is how it went...

Me: So, Bayli what would you think about Tim & I having a baby.
Bayli: OH I WOULD BE EXCITED IF YOU HAD A BABY!!!
Me: Well good, but what if the baby was brown and not white like you.
Bayli: Oh Dawny...you are so silly - you can't change their color.
Me: Yes, I know. But, what if I didn't have a baby in my tummy, but we went and got a brown baby that didn't have a mommy and daddy.
Bayli: I think that is just a PERFECT idea!! That way we can go and find them a mommy and daddy.
Me: Well, Tim and I would be the mommy and daddy for the baby.
Bayli: That would be just perfect! And I can get them a piggybank.
Me: Well, I'm glad you think it's such a great idea. What do you think about the baby being brown and not the same color as you.
Bayli: Dawny... I would love your baby even if it was blue.

At that point Tim and I were in shock that this came out of a 3 year old's mouth. She absolutely melted our hearts. She is such an amazing girl and we are so proud of her!

Application is SENT!!!

So after waiting and waiting to get all of our medical letters together to send in with our AGCI application, we decided to send it anyways. We are waiting on one more letter, which we will just forward on to them when we receive it (which should be tomorrow). We had to send it 2 day because we are being a bit impatient with getting this whole process started. We feel like its been so long since we received our application to fill out for AGCI and yet we still haven't gotten it to them (close to 2 weeks). Anyways so Dawn takes everything to work with her, has it all planned out to go to the post office right after work and send it off. Well we forgot to include the check for the application fee. Not a HUGE deal, but Dawn was not happy (believe me when I say that). So she decides to come right home, rather then do the other errands she had planned. Right when she gets home she goes right to blog stalking and came across this video that I posted below. Needless to say, her mood changed 180 degrees. I can't wait to have our child as I can only imagine more examples where you have a bad day and they do something that puts life right back into perspective.

Here's the video you have to check out (you'll need sound). This little boy was adopted a month ago and this is him trying to have a phone conversation with someone on his play phone. He's speaking Amharic (language in Ethiopia) along with a little English.

The next step right now is to start our application for the homestudy. This will take some time, but our goal is to have this done by Sunday night (4/20). We will then send that out as soon as we hear from AGCI that we have been approved, which should be early next week.

Looking forward to Friday night with the Ketelesen Girls!!!

~Tim

Why did we choose Ethiopia?

Many people have asked why we chose Ethiopia. There is a video that I think will answer that question for you. Go to the link below and click on "AGCI - Hannah's Hope Ethiopia". That is the home where our baby will come from. You might want to grab some kleenex!

http://www.allgodschildren.org/about/videos/

~Dawn

Trouble with Comments

Several of you have mentioned that you've had problems with posting comments to our blog. Tim changed the settings so that you no longer have to register before posting. So, if you use the "anonymous" button to post a comment you'll just need to make sure to type your name on the bottom otherwise we won't know who the comment is from. Hopefully that will be easier for everyone.

Hope everyone has a great weekend.

P.S. Thank you Gus & Ali for the beautiful memory book!!!

Ethiopia Facts

Just thought we'd share some facts with you on Ethiopia...


~ One in ten children die before their first birthday
~ One in six children die before their fifth birthday
~ 44% of the population of Ethiopia is under 15 years old
~ 60% of children in Ethiopia are stunted because of malnutrition
~ The median age in Ethiopia is 17.8 years
~ 1.5 million people are infected with AIDS (6th highest in the world)
~ 720,000 children have been orphaned by AIDS alone, and there are 4.6 million orphans in Ethiopia.
~ Per capita, Ethiopia receives less aid than any country in Africa
~ In the 90s the population (3%) grew faster than food production (2.2%)
~Drought struck the country from 2000-2002 (first year no crops, second year no seeds,third year no animals)
Half the children in Ethiopia will never attend school. 88% will never attend secondary school.
Coffee prices (Ethiopia’s only major export) fell 40-60% from 1998-2002.
Ethiopia’s doctor to children ratio is 1 to 24,000.
In 1993, after 30 long years of war, Eritrea broke from Ethiopia and became an independent nation leaving Ethiopia landlocked without any major seafaring ports.

Best Buds

Just had to post this picture because it's so darn cute!!!