Dossier Done Dance!!!

My dossier is back from DC!!!! Lindsay says it will head to Ethiopia on Thursday or Friday!!!! YippeeSkippee!!!

What happens after it goes to Ethiopia, you ask? I copied this straight from my CHI newsletter. Once the dossier is sent to Ethiopia , it will arrive in 3, sometimes 4, days. It will be processed again in the Children’s Hope Ethiopia office and translated. The translations are taking 1 week at this point. The translations will then have to be authenticated. The dossier will remain with our in-country representative until the family is matched with a child. Then a brief summary of the documents in the dossier is written, and upon acceptance of the child, the dossier and summary is presented to the Ministry of Women’s Affairs (MOWA) for review. After approval of the dossier by the MOWA, a court date is set for the case to be reviewed and approved by the Judge in the court. The time frame from MOWA review to the court date is approximately 2 weeks. If there are living birth parents they will be a part of the court process and our in-country representative has Power of Attorney to represent the adopting families in court, and the adoption is finalized and is irrevocable by Ethiopian Law.
Remember, though, that the courts are closing from August 5th until Octoberish. Everything can proceed as above but halts at the point of waiting for a court date. This means that a referral could be forthcoming in the next few weeks (I'm guessing 6-8 weeks from now because it will be about 2 weeks before it gets there and translated, etc.).

Also, Congrats to Jenni and Jim--they got a court date before closure! If all goes well (and it will!), they will be traveling by the end of August!!