The Miskellys' Haitian Adoption Journey: December 2013

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

At the End of 2013

At the end of this year we want to be thankful for all the things that God has done for us. We have had many changes in our life this year. Our oldest child graduated from High School in May. She moved out in the fall and started college in August. My other two biological children are both in high school and you can imagine how busy it is. We also got to meet our two boys we are going to adopt for the first time. This was absolutely amazing. We were excited and we tried not to scare them but we may have been a little overwhelming. By the end of our visit they were laughing and playing and melting our hearts. At this end of 2013 we want to share that first meeting with our boys when we first got to hold them and touch them. It is about 14 minutes if you have the time to watch. For us, and for those two, we will always have this memory to share.

Our hopes and prayers are that by this time next year our boys will be home and our entire family will be together for the Christmas holidays.

Merry Christmas to all and have a happy new year.

Saturday, December 14, 2013

Christmas 2013

Christmas is coming quickly and we finally have the house decorated for this joyful time. The only thing missing are our two boys from Haiti to make our family complete. We have hung their stockings at the fireplace so that Santa will know they are coming, but sadly they will not be with us on Christmas Morning to join in the festivities. Our hope and prayer is that they will be with us next Christmas, and we will leave that in God's powerful hands. I will put a picture of that fireplace and notice the CCM stocking and DCM stocking on the end will make us a family of seven total. Some people count our dog Lucy as eight, but she is not going to get into the official count in my book.

We also received two more pictures of the boys that were taken within the month. These pictures are always awesome for us because we can keep their photo books up to date. They are growing each day and it is hard for us to see them grow up without us, but we know we will make up for lost time when they get here and give them the love and attention that every child needs.

Davidson (November 2013)

Cherdinor (November 2013)

On 12/15/13 it will make 15 months now that our paperwork has been in IBESR with no movement. I do not know if we are in that department or waiting on the President's desk for dispensation but if we will get dispensation and out of IBESR at the first of this next year maybe they will get home by next Christmas. This is our prayer every day. It will be time once again at the beginning of next year to update our fingerprints and get our I-600A updated to stay current until we can go further in this process. Everything on our end is completed and we just have to wait.

Thanks to everyone following our blog for the continued prayers and for the nice comments that you have sent our way. We will do our best to keep you updated this next year as things develop.

Merry Christmas to all!!!!!!!!!!!

Miskellys' Adoption Journey Timeline

01/06/07 - Baby Paul born

04/02/07 - First ever home study

06/05/07 - Entire completed and translated dossier arrives in Haiti

06/28/07 - Baby Paul's physical and he is healthy

06/30/07 - Baby Paul has been sick and getting worse

07/01/07 - Baby Paul dies

Long Pause for almost three years as we mourn and contemplate trying again.

03/10 - Met the first Davidson and family decided to try adopting a child again

03/11 - continue to work with grandmother trying to adopt him

07/11 -Grandmother finally agrees to proceed with adoption

08/08/11 - New home study done

09/11 - Pretty much completed Dossier

09/11 - Signed agreement with His Home for Children to do the adoption.

09/22/11 - First fingerprinting done

09/23/11 - Recieved I-171, approval to adopt children

03/12 - Grandmother finally refuses to let us adopt the first Davidson and moved on to other options

05/12/12 - Tell Chris Nungester at HIS Home for Children to find us a child placing this in God's hands. She chose a boy named of all things "Davidson".

07/26/12 - Dossier arrived in Haiti and ready for Minister of Foreign Affairs to legalize the paperwork

08/23/12 - Due to new law changes in Haiti we were asked about taking a beautiful, sweet boy named Cherdinor to go with Davidson

09/15/12 - Paper sent to IBESR (institute du Bien-Etre Social et Recherches - Institute of Social Well-Being and Research)

12/04/12 - Updated home study

01/18/13- Updated fingerprinting

06/01/13 - Met the boys for the first time Face to Face.

05/06/14 - Updated fingerprinting

05/29/14 - Travelled to Haiti for mission trip and for first bonding trip with the boys and spent 3 days in hotel with them.

07/16/14 - Received notification from lawyer that we are out of IBESR and that she has dossiers in hand and will move them to the court system this month.

09/12/14 - 09/16/14 - Went to Haiti for our second bonding trip and spent 4 days in hotel with our boys.

09/15/14 - Had embassy appointment to file our I600.

09/30/14 - Cherdinor moved to the boys home to start his first day of school.

10/15/14 - Cherdinor's parents go to American Embassy to give away their rights. We learn more detail about his family.

03/22/15 - We spent a day with CJ and Davidson at our guest house in Port-au-Prince. Loved the play day. We were in Haiti on medical mission trip.

07/15/15 - Updated home study one more time to get our fingerprints updated. They would not do this without a new home study since Wilson has turned 18.

08/25/15 - Finally out of Haitian court system and we have moved into MOI. We have our official Adoption Decree and their names have been changed with the last name of Miskelly. THEY ARE OURS IN THE EYES OF HAITI.

09/01/15 - Davidson moved over to boys home with CJ and they will be together until we bring them home. They are learning English at American run school.

10/04/15 - Learned that our paperwork would have to be converted from a simple adoption to a pleniere or full adoption. This is the first time in Haiti they have required this law to be followed that was passed in 2013. This will affect several families who are almost finished to turn around and make corrections.