DOSSIER....... SENT!!!

Well, we met another milestone today. We sent the dossier on the way to Holt International in Eugene, Oregon. A lot of folks say assembling the dossier is one of, if not the most difficult, stressful, task in the international adoption journey. We didn't think it was so bad. All together it took us about ten days. We feel confident everything is in order. The only doub't we have is the signing of tons of documents in Vietnamese, that maybe we missed one, or signed in the worng place. Fortunately Holt will review everything before sending it to the Vietnamese Embassy in San Francisco. So, I guess we'll take a deep breath and celebrate, for a moment anyway. We still have a long way to go, with many questions still unanswered. Next step, dossier approval and match with our child. We'll keep you posted. UPDATE (02/22/08) Michelle from Holt says Dossier was received and looks good! She is sending it to the embassy in San Francisco. We did miss signing one Vietnamese document. She e-mailed a copy, we signed it, and it is on it's way to Oregon as I type!

Putting the Dossier Together

I-600A Approval Form

Okay, I am sure your first question is, "what the heck is a dossier?" Here is what the dictionary says.

dos·si·er /ˈdɒsiˌeɪ, -iər, ˈdɔsiˌeɪ, -siər; Fr. dɔˈsyeɪ/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[dos-ee-ey, -ee-er, daw-see-ey, -see-er; Fr. daw-syey]

a collection or file of documents on the same subject, esp. a complete file containing detailed information about a person or topic.

Well, in the international adoption circle, it is basically presenting your life to adoption officials of whatever country you are adopting from.

"What exactly is in the dossier?"
How about marriage license, divorce decrees, employment letters, doctors letters, police clearance letters, home study, homestudy updates, I-600A approval (from Immigration), copies of passports, family photographs, and passport size photographs of Cathy and I. Seem simple enough? Not quite, every document has to be notarized AND state certified by the Oklahoma Secretary of State ($20.00 a document). Like I previously said, it's all paperwork and more $$$ :)!!! Oh yes, I also forgot about the mountain of applications in Vietnamese, but all we have to do is sign and print our names about twenty times on those documents!

Originally we were to be matched with our baby, then start the dossier process. However, recently our agency, Holt International has changed a few things and want us to go ahead and start now. This is a good thing as we feel it may speed up the process after we are matched with the baby. With the U.S. - Vietnam Adoption Agreement set to expire September 1, 2008, we know there are no guarantees. But, we do feel better about everything than we did a few weeks ago.

We still feel as though we will be matched with our baby sometime between May - July 2008. Hopefully with the Dossier process already done, we will travel to Vietnam in the fall or winter. Keep us in your prayers.

Dossier Photos

When we have more time, we'd like to tell the story of assembling our dossier. However for right now, we thought we'd share the six photos we chose for the dossier. These photos will introduce our family to members of the Vietnamese government.