June 18, 2008

What a flurry of activity since our fabulous news one week ago Monday, June 9, 2008. Initially, after our virtual shock of FINALLY hearing about the boys, reality soon set in. Through talking with our agency, we realized that our paperwork completed in January of 2008 will expire in mid July 2008 - which means it all needs to be updated, notarized, and then sent to the State of Wisconsin to be "Apostilled". Apostilling a document is a process in which a document becomes a "Legal Document" in a foreign country.

Well, here we go again. Hurry up and wait! In fact, the document with the longest lead time is the certification of our fingerprints from the FBI. So, we spent the first night of our great news at the West Bend Police Department getting fingerprinted (again - read below). We are not sure that our fingerprints have changed, but I guess you never know! Fingerprints successfully mailed and we are awaiting their return to us for the Apostilling. What a celebration!

We still have a lot of documents to pull together before we can finalize our travel dates. Too bad we already completed this process in January of 2008, which means the documents expire while we would be in Colombia. Going to Colombia with expired papers - That would have not done us a lot of good. So we wait. Once we have the documents finalized, Notarized, Appostilled, delivered, (and it seems like an ounce of blood, the kitchen sink, one left shoe and latest worn pair of underwear) the documents will be sent to Colombia, at which time we will be notified of our travel dates, then we can apply for our Visa to travel to a foreign country. All in all, our best guess is that we will be traveling in the first 10 days of July, but this could get pushed out a bit.

We continue to develop a transition plan to integrate the boys into our family. Joyce and I are studying Spanish very hard. In fact, we had Enchillada's with Spanish Rice tonight for dinner to try and help the process. The CD rom is spinning to beat the band, pages are turning left and right, and we are thanking the high heavens that we have our jobs as a distraction. We have translated some of the VERY easy childrens books into Spanish and neatly written the Spanish translation on the pages in Spanish so that we can read to the kids in both English and Spanish. We are video taping our reading of the books for the kids to watch prior to our arrival. We have also sent some small gifts, pictures, and videos for the kids. By the way, we will be available for signing autographs due to the video production, but after we return from Colombia.

Shopping has been a hoot! There are some VERY CUTE childrens clothes out there. We bought enough to get us through while in Colombia, but since we are not certain of their actual sizes, we did not go overboard. YES, the "brainwashing" will begin in ernest once we arrive in Colombia. There are enough Packers, Brewers, Badgers, and Bucks clothing for Wisconsin to be well represented. No sons of ours will get away without becoming Packers fans - this is/will be the most stringent requirement we will have of the boys. Certainly non-negotiable with the Packers, the other teams are optional. By the way, did I mention we LOVE the clearance racks. Also, it is amazing what you can find at a rummage sale. In fact, the deal of the adoption is a Leap Pad. We found one at Sears on the clearance rack, with no price on it! Thought that since we need two, may be a bit pricey, so left it there, after all, it was with only ONE of the "educational modules" included. Went to a rummage sale purely by accident (yes- hit the *&^% mail box with the new van). We found a Leap Pad on the table with 6, yes seis, "educational modules" included for the price of $8.00. Yes, Ocho deniero! It is literally brand new - not a scratch on it, except the batteries were dead. Tried to talk the little girl out of new batteries from her doll - until Grandma stepped in! Well, at least the batteries proved it worked. Grandma was even indicated they were having a 1/2 price sale. Got the entire deal done for $4.00 - including the modules! Ran back to Sears to check on the "clearance price" - it was priced at $49.99 after talking with a very hard to find sales person. Then argued about the "50% off clearance sale" they had going that day. Yup, we bagged it for $25.00. Two Leap pads and 7, Siete, "educational modules" for $29.00. Wish that all kids toys were always that cheap!

We have our first marital disagreement. We can not decide between a larger or smaller backpack for the boys. Since Eric thinks he will need to carry them most of the time, he likes the smaller ones. Joyce thinks the bigger ones with lots of small pockets to "hide" things in are better. We settled on a compromise. We got the bigger ones with lots of little pockets to "hide" things in! Hey, we did manage to agree on the sunglasses for the boys - I hope they don't argue over who's is who's - they will not fit Eric (he has tried them on). Oh yah, we agreed on hats as well (as long as they say Packers on them - see above). Swimsuits? Well, Joyce gets to pick those out - Eric says they are fine as long as the kids have their butts covered.

That is pretty much it, we are just looking for very successful days with the Post Office deliveries. More later.

Love you all - Adios!

By the way, Brewers are winning 5 - 4 in the top of the 9th against Toronto as we write this.