Making it to court in the adoption process

Since this is National Adoption Month I have been blogging every day about an aspect of adoption... tonite I would like to share about the process towards the end of the adoption process called court.... We have experienced the court hearing now for 17 almost 19 children in 5 diff. countries... first was our son, Abraham from Mexico and his readoption in a US court room a few years later. For his Mexican court hearing we just had a lawyer representing us during the hearing and we received the new birth certificate and court decrees for his adoption thru the mail. We had brought him into the US on a medical visas ... because he had some medical needs that required urgent attention. Then later we adopted him but he never returned to Mexico. For our 6 children from Russia ( Jacob, Isaac, Lily, Anna, Mya and Josiah) we were present in the court hearing but they all were not. Jacob was taken to the judge before the hearing and spoke with her and gave his ok to being adopted as well as he wrote a letter stating this. For our 10 children from Ukraine ( Luke, Naty, Joseph, Cate, Leah, Olivia, Rachel, Tia, Jonas and Caleb) we were present for thier court hearing and so were they except for Luke. He was just 3 . Usually the judges will have the older child present during the adoption process. We have also readopted our children in the courts here in WV.. this makes it easier for them to get a US birth certificate from our state if they need one in the future. They are US citizens as soon as we land on US soil after our adoptions if we have met the USCIS criteria... which is both parents have met the child, the adoption was finalized in the country of birth and both or at least one parent is a US citizen.

It is always an emotional time when I hear the judge read the new names of our children in court... I actually cry every time. It is also a very emotional time for us when we do land back in the US after the adoption....

Well Tuesday- tomorrow is our court hearing for Andrew and Gracie ( Dancho and Diana) in Bulgaria. Tomorrow we should have 2 more precious blessings in our family.... we are not present in the hearing but represented by our lawyer, Toni. It will be at 9 am their time or 2 am our time.... please pray for this. We expect a positive outcome but, you never know what can happpen when you go before a judge... also pray that they will not require the notificiation of the birth parents ( a new law- but one that is not always being done). Our family has set our alarm clock to wake up at 2 am to pray during the time it should be happening.... so if you are up ...join us at least in spirit.

Hoping to share some good news Tuesday!