WHAT'S NEXT??

Once we receive our approval, I-171H, we can send all of our documents off to be certified by the state of FL.  Each document has to be certified, which basically means, they look up the notary that signed our docs and state that he is indeed a licensed notary for the state of FL and they affix a certificate to each document.  

When the state certification is complete,  our dossier will be mailed off to our agency.  We will be completely done with all paperwork!!!  We are guestimating that after being certified, authenticated, and approved, it will arrive in Ethiopia sometime in late September.  This may be a little underestimated but we are hopeful!  Then we are officially waiting for our referral!! 

The Ethiopian courts close during the rainy season and also this year, they will be celebrating the year of 2000!  The courts close down normally from early August and reopen the first or second week of October.  The court closures create a backlog of cases to be heard so this makes the travel time after your referral a little longer.  We are unsure if the celebrations of the new milennium will keep the courts closed for a longer period of time but we will soon find out. 

So.......after all of this........we are probably looking at April or May before starting to gear up for a referral for our new daughter!  Our agency says expect 3-9 months from dossier submissionl.  There have been three referrals so far (one family with a referral of 2 children) and they have come a little sooner than expected but there are several families  with their dossiers already in Ethiopia or close to being sent so the wait times will start to increase!