Update ... Noticias

We're still gathering all of our documents for the dossier. As soon as we have all the paperwork collected, Jaimie will drive to Lincoln to get them apostilled, and then they will get sent to CHSFS who will send the dossier to La Casita in Colombia. Once the necessary people have reviewed our dossier, La Casita can send us the referral. Who knows when that will be?

Todavia estamos en el proceso de alistar los documentos para el "dossier," tan pronto que tenemos todo, Jaimie ira a Lincoln, Nebraska para la estampilla del estado, y despues los mandamos los papeles a CHSFS y ellos mandan el dossier a La Casita en Colombia. Cuando han revisado los documentos, La Casita nos pueden mandar la referencia de nuestro bebe. Quien sabe cuando sera?



On Saturday, we started to get the baby room ready. We had a lot of cleaning to do! This is what the room looked like before ... and later we'll show you the finished project.

El sabado, empezamos alistar el cuarto para el/la bebe, habia mucho que limpiar! Esto es el cuarto antes ... mas tarde mostramos una foto del proyecto completo.

La Casita de Nicolas

La Casita de Nicolas is in Medellin, Colombia. We chose La Casita because of the positive reputation the orphanage has in Colombia and through our adoption agency in the United States. Although Jaimie's mom, in-laws and she visited many orphanages while we were in Bogota in May, ironically, La Casita was not one of those. However, we did talk with Cecilia Mora, who was very kind. In the end, God was the one who ultimately confirmed our choice of La Casita through a series of answers to prayer.

La Casita de Nicolas esta localizada en Medellin, Colombia. Escojimos La Casita por la buena reputacion de el orfanato en Colombia y con nuestra agencia de adopcion en los EEUU. Aunque Jaimie, la mama de Jaimie y sus suegros visitaron muchos orfanatos mientras que estuvieron en Bogota en mayo, ironicamente, La Casita no era una de las agencias que visitamos. Sin embargo, hablabamos con Cecilia Mora quien nos mostraba mucha bondad. Al final, era Dios quien nos confirmo la decision escojer a La Casita en las formas que contesto nuestras peticiones de oracion.

This is the website for La Casita http://www.lacasitadenicolas.com/ . Unfortunately, it is currently only possible to view it in Spanish, but you can probably figure out some of the words like galeria means gallery or photo gallery and historia will tell you the history. (See, Spanish isn't all that hard!) They also explain the mission and objectives of the orphanage. If you look closely though, most of the pages are bilingual.

La pagina web de La Casita es http://www.lacasitadenicolas.com/ . Afortunadamente para ustedes, es todo en espanol. Explican la mision y los objectivos y hay fotos de las facilidades.

Just a bit of trivia for you... Jaimie worked at a Mexican restaurant called La Casita when she was in college!

Y una curiosidad... Jaimie trabajaba como mesera en un restaurante Mexicano que se llama La Casita cuando estudiaba en la universidad!

The adoption process - El proceso de adopcion

The process of adopting a baby is a tedious one. Many people ask us about the process, so we thought we would share some of that with you.

El proceso de adoptar es muy trabajoso, muchas personas nos preguntan como es el proceso, entonces pensamos en contarles un poco de eso.

The first thing we had to do was identify which adoption agency we wanted to work with. Our number one criteria was that the agency facilitated adoptions in Colombia. Secondly, we were looking for an agency that was friendly and eager to help us understand the adoption process. The agency we ended up choosing was Children's Home Society & Family Services (CHSFS), located in St. Paul, Minnesota. Olga Tasso is the person at CHSFS who has helped us since the beginning, and she has been a wonderful resource. Our entire experience with CHSFS has been really great. For more information about CHSFS and their Colombia programs, you can browse their website: http://www.childrenshomeadopt.org/Colombia_Adoptions.html

La primera tarea que nos toco hacer fue identificar la agencia de adopcion con quien queriamos trabajar. El criterio mas importante era que la agencia facilitara adopciones en Colombia, segundo buscamos una agencia simpatica y listos para ayudarnos entender el proceso de adopcion. La agencia que escojimos es Children's Home Society & Family Services(CHSFS), que esta localizada en St. Paul, Minnesota. Olga Tasso es la senora quien nos ha ayudado desde el principio y ella ha sido un buen recurso para nosotros. Toda nuestra experiencia con CHSFS ha sido muy buena. Para mas informacion acerca de CHSFS y sus programas en Colombia, puede mirar su pagina web: http://www.childrenshomeadopt.org/Colombia_Adoptions.html

Next, we began all the paperwork - applications, a homestudy (we had our homestudy done through Adoption Consultants, Inc. Michelle Warner is our social worker, and she is terrific, too!), fingerprints, background checks, petitions, notarized documents ... so much to do! Just today we received our appointment notice from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to complete our "Advanced Processing of Orphan Petition," which means we go in for more fingerprints and background checks that will hopefully result in official approval to bring our baby back to the United States. In addition to this, we are currently working on putting together our dossier (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Dossier). Once all this is done, we simply wait for our referral - a picture of our baby with his/her medical history - and then we travel to Colombia to get our baby.

Nuestra suguiente tarea fue empezar con todos los papeles ... aplicaciones, un estudio de la casa (el estudio lo hicimos con Adoption Consultants, Inc. Michelle Warner es nuestra trabajadora social, y ella es maravillosa tambien!), huellas digitales, pasado juicial, petitciones, documentos notarizados ... mucho que hacer! Hoy mismo recibimos notificacion del Servicio de Inmigracion de los Estados Unidos para completer nuestra peticion para traer un huerfano a los EEUU, lo que significa es que vamos para hacer mas huellas digitales y pasado juicial que ojala resulta en aprobacion oficial para traer nuestro bebe a los EEUU. En adicion a esto, tambien estamos en el proceso de alistar los documentos para el dossier. Cuando ya tenemos todo hecho, simplemente esperamos la foto de nuestro bebe con su historia medica - y despues viajamos a Colombia para recoger nuestro bebe.

Somewhere in between all of this, Jaimie traveled with her mom, Sue, to Colombia to visit different orphanages. We'll tell you more about that trip later ... but the most important decision that resulted from that wonderful time spent with Edelmira and Jose (Jose's parents) was that we identified the orphanage from which we will adopt. More about the orphanage in a later post.

Entre todo esto Jaimie viajo con la mama de ella, Sue, a Colombia para visitar los diferentes orfanatos, mas tarde les contamos de ese viaje ... pero la decision mas importante que resulto de ese tiempo maravilloso que pasamos con Edelmira y Jose (los padres de Jose Fernando) es que identificamos el orfanato desde que vamos a adoptar. Mas tarde les contamos mas del orfanato.

Adoption is a long process, and it takes a lot of dedication to jump through all the hoops, but it is very worth the effort knowing that some little person is waiting for us to come and bring him (or her) home!

El proceso de adopcion es largo y uno necesita mucha dedicacion para cumplir con todo, pero vale la pena saber que al final, hay una pequena persona esperando que le llevamos a su hogar!

Besos
XXXX
Jose & Jaimie

The Story of our Baby - La historia de nuestro bebe

We are adopting a baby! In January, we began the process of adopting from Colombia, Jose's home country. We always imagined that we would adopt a baby, and now we are in process of making that dream a reality.

This blog is purposed in giving you - our family and friends - the opportunity to share with us in this journey. We hope this will help with communication to all of you - especially for our friends and family in Colombia as we walk through the remaining adoption process here in the States, and for our friends and family in the States when we go to Colombia to pick up our baby. And perhaps more importantly, we hope to be able to use this blog to tell our baby his or her story exactly as it unfolds.

Nosotros hemos decicido en adoptar un bebe! En enero empezamos el proceso de adopcion de un nino, un nino de mi pais natal Colombia. Nosotros siempre sonamos en adoptar un bebe y ahora estamos en el proceso de hacer nuestro sueno realidad.

Este sito de internet tiene el proposito de dar le a ustedes - Nuestra familia y Amigos- la oportunida de compartir esta fantastica experiencia con nosotros. Esperamos que este lugar nos ayude a comunicar con todos ustedes, especialmente para nuestra Familia y Amigos en Colombia a medida que nosotros avanzamos en el proceso de adopcion desde los Estados Unidos, y para nuestros amigos y familia aca en los Estados Unidos para cuando viajemos a Colombia a recivir nuestro bebe! Y tal vez aun mas importante, esperamos que este blog nos ayudara contarle a nuestro hijo/a la historia suya exactamente como paso.