A Little More Info

Three weeks ago, I posted here to announce, officially, that we are beginning the adoption process. I didn't realize how many people didn't know that we have planned on adopting (ever since before we were married), so here is a post about some of the specifics.
*Disclaimer: This post has the potential to be exorbitantly long, and the Johnsons are in no way responsible or liable for any damage or harm that occurs to your eyes by staring at your screen too long for the purpose of reading this post.

First, to start things off, I'll list a few answers to some FAQ:

Adopting from?
Bulgaria - a country in Southeastern Europe. It is slightly larger than the state of Tennessee. (You can click on the map to get a larger picture.)

Gender?

BOY! Nope, I don't know what I'm going to do with a boy! (Except buy coordinating outfits to go with the girls' matching dresses.) Yes! Andy is very excited that, counting our cat Felix, he won't be outnumbered anymore! Seriously, we are all very excited to bring a little boy into our lives! After all, the girl's have only been begging for two years for a baby brother!

Age?

We are planning on somewhere between 2-3 but are somewhat flexible on that. The big thing is we don't want to mess up the birth order in our home, so he will have to be younger than Kerri and the youngest they adopt out is 1 year old, so really somewhere between there. 

The timeline/process?

After we submit our dossier,* it is translated into Bulgarian, legalized, and presented to the Ministry of Justice, which is the central adoption authority. Our names are submitted into the Registry, and we are matched with a child** - this can take 9-18 months. After this, we make our first trip to Bulgaria, for about a week. We will have daily visits with our little boy, fill out paperwork and then return home (without our little boy, which already makes me cry just thinking about how hard that is going to be). While we are back at home, the paperwork is presented to their court. Once the adoption is final, we make our second trip to Bulgaria. This trip typically comes 3-4 months after the first trip. We will be in Bulgaria for 4-5 days for this trip and will be finalizing things by interviewing for his immigrant visa. We return home - with our little boy, who then automatically becomes a US citizen! We then have to work on things from this end, like "re-adopting" him in the state of NC.  So, the short answer is with everything going miraculously as fast as it can, one year; with everything taking the longest amount of estimated time, two years. (This timeline all starts AFTER the things we need to finish up on our end like some paperwork and the home study, which we are now ready to get busy with after hitting our first little bump in the road.)

*dossier  (dȯ-sē-ā) A set of legal documents and adoption papers used in international adoptions. The adoption papers include the home study, marriage license, financial statement, and health certificates - to name a few. 

 ** This referral will include information about the child's background (as much as possible) including his medical, social, and developmental information. We will also receive pictures of him.

 

What YOU can do for us:

PRAY!! 

• Please pray with us as we begin this crazy race called adoption. We started out by having to hit pit road pretty early on, but we are back on the track. I know that it is pretty impossible to expect a completely smooth and perfect adoption process, but we have our "spotter" who is able to see the whole course and lead us around and through any obstacles that come up. (Sorry about all those metaphors! That's all - I promise, mostly because that's the limit of my nascar knowledge, although I think I threw enough in there to make my  husband proud. See - he needs a son to actually care about and enjoy these type of things with him!)  

• On the IMB website, I found this virtual prayer walk through Bulgaria that will give you a little more information about ways to pray for the country. 

• Also, please pray for our future son. The orphanages in Bulgaria, like many other countries, are overcrowded and understaffed. They are full of Romas, or gypsies, who experience a great deal of prejudice in Bulgaria and surrounding countries.

• Please pray for the financial aspect of adoption as we trust in God to provide, as well as do "our" part.
  

• Please pray for our patience as we go through the "hurry up and wait" part of adoption.