Adoption 101: Starting from the beginning

Many of you know we are currently waiting for our referral of a baby from South Korea, some of you might not know what it took to get here:  I will go through the steps up until this point (this is all from memory, so may not be exact)...the rest of the process will come at a later date after we get our referral!

Initial Application: Done 11-2008
Agency informational meeting: Attended 12-2008
"Official" application: Done 12-2008 ( Had to clarify some medical information etc.)
Await acceptance from the program.
Begin Home study Process: February 2009...this entails the following

• Physicals from our family doctor
• Drug Tests
• Blood test for various conditions or diseases
• Letter from physician for each of us that we will make a fit parent. (due to really old medical stuff from childhood)
• Complete a contract with the agency
• Background checks done with our city, county, state and federal level for every where we have lived since we were 18 years old.
• Fill out lots of paperwork, including answering very invasive personal questions.
• Changed from the China program to the Korea program, ****(perhaps I will expand on this later, a sign from God was involved)
• Complete our foster care license and CPR and first aid requirements.
• Gave the agencies 5 names for personal references. ( Giving those close to us the uncomfortable task of telling the agency why we would be good parents and why we would not be good parents!)
•  Collect letter from our employers verifying employment and health insurance.
• Collect all of our tax records, financial statements, car titles, and any other assets or liabilities we might have.
• Meet with the Social Worker 4 times once together at her office, once separately for each of us at her office and our actual home study visit at our home.
• Our home study was off to Korea on 5-11-2009!
• Completed our Immigration forms that allow us to bring a child from another country, including fingerprinting at the Department of Homeland Security.
• Updated Homestudy ( for US purposes it expires after 1 year)
• Began our Reading and education for inter country adoption, 18 hours or more is required. (our last class is Saturday!) 

I think I covered it all.  If not, I think you will get the picture.  It is a laundry list for sure, but all necessary steps to bring our child home and it will be worth it in the end. 

Until then...the wait continues. As of today 1 year 2 months 1 week and 1 day...It's time to get that phone call, I don't know how much more I can handle.