What's next you ask??

WHOOOO HOOOOO! I will be home soon! FINALLY!!!!

I will be leaving on June 11 to stay with Anne Pearce until she can come home. Our attny. is hoping she will be ready to come home in 5 weeks, so I should only be there 2 weeks by myself. I am honestly looking forward to some time alone for us to get to know each other. I wish Andrew could be there the entire time, but he and the boys will come a few days before the appt. I will be so happy to see them when they get there. Tomorrow I will write the entire story down, I promise. I know you guys want the details.....I am just so relieved and TIRED right now. I feel like the world's biggest burden is off my shoulders. Of course, it was never really on my shoulder anyway, it was on God's! Thank you my heavenly Father for this miracle! Please bless all these other babies. Show them your favor and send them home! I love all of you so much. I couldn't have asked for a greater group of people to take this journey to Anne Pearce with me.

More tomorrow....I'm gonna take a nap!!

I have had several people ask me what happens next. This was taken from Guatefam.org.

~PGN issues its approval for the adoption to proceed.
~The lawyer then meets the birth mother for the 4th and final sign-off.
~The adoption decree is then written and issued by the lawyer and the child is legally now the child of the adoptive family.
~A new birth certificate is then issued by the Civil Registry with the child’s first and middle names unchanged, but with the names of the adoptive parent(s).
~Lawyer takes new birth certificate and applies for a Guatemalan passport (although the child is adopted by US parents, he or she is still a Guatemalan citizen).
~All documents are translated into English by certified translators, as required by US INS regulations.

Visa Issuance and Travel Procedures

~ Passport is issued.

~Child gets a visa photo done.

~Lawyer takes all the paperwork back to the Embassy, including the passport, your dossier, the Family Court findings, the adoption decree, the DNA results, all translations, and the visa photos, and requests approval for an orphan visa to enter the US.
Embassy authorizes visa. This approval is on pink paper and is called the "pink slip". It is usually issued a day or two after submission of the documents.

~Child gets an exit physical by an Embassy-approved doctor (to make sure the child doesn?t have unrecognized handicapping conditions or infectious diseases). Note that this exam used to require prior embassy approval, but can now be done any time after the passport is issued, without prior approval of the embassy

~Embassy appt. is done one day, the visa is issued the next afternoon, and you can fly home the next day!!