Good News, Bad News

Okay, the good news first- Our visas came back from the courier in Washington DC today. We had to send her our passports too because the visa is actually a sticker that is put on one page of the passport. So, those are safe and sound again in the fireproof, waterproof lock-box! I was also informed today that the Beijing staff checked in with the CCAA and they said that they will be issuing our TA (travel approval) very soon. CHI said that there is still plenty of time for us to travel with the May 8th group!

FYI- the courier service I use in Washington DC is Dependable Adoption Courier Service. It is run by an adoptive mother, Carol Fredericks. She does an excellent job and is very attentive! Here is the link to her site- http://www.dependable-acs.com/

Now, the bad news-We were informed today that the American Consulate in Guangzhou, PR China has issued a new.... rule, if you will. Previously, if you accepted the referral of a child with special needs but had not originally requested one, all you needed to do was show up at the American Consulate in China with a notarized addendum from your social worker stating that she approved you to adopt that child. We got that last month! Well, now they have decided that if your original approval from US Immigration was not for a special needs child, you need to pay $585 and file a form to have your approval amended! We can not go to China without a new approval! In some places, it is taking 10 WEEKS to get this approval! Didn't anyone tell them, yesterday was April Fools Day!?!

I emailed the officer at our Citizens and Immigration Office here and asked her what we need to do. The agency told us to fill out and file the I-290B form with an updated home study, our original approval, and our fees. We just had an updated home study done to extend our original approval so I am trying to find out if we need yet another updated home study! And, in this state, if you need to submit a home study to CIS, it first has to go through DSS! Of course, that takes weeks. Our sweet social worker already begged everybody to get everything pushed through so we could have our extension in time to travel. We just got it two weeks ago! Now it looks like we have to start over! We seem to be wrapped in red tape right now. Could someone had me the scissors?

HOLD ON CLAIRE, WERE TRYING TO GET THERE!