Glitches

Any time you do something important, there are bound to be glitches along the way. Especially if that important something involves multiple government agencies from two different governments! I am experiencing that in the adoption process right now! Last week we took inventory of where we were with that and what still had to be done. We were missing three key pieces of information: our police clearance report (criminal record report) from the state of Texas, the agency licenses for our dossier, and our home study report. Of these, the home study report is the most urgent because it is all that is holding us back from sending in our paperwork to immigration. The other two we don't need until our immigration paperwork comes back, but the agency licenses are troubling because we mailed in a large check for them June 2! On Thursday, I called the company for the agency licenses and left a message and e-mailed our social worker about both the agency licenses and the report. Then Saturday the criminal record reports came back in the mail!!! The good news is that the report accurately shows that we have no criminal history. The bad news is that on the official notarized reports, my birth date is typed wrong and Jerry's social security number is typed wrong! For both of them, they are off by one number. Oh, the frustration! I called the Texas Department of Public Safety today to find out what to do about it and tomorrow I have to fax the incorrect report along with the original request to them and they will send out corrected copies. Thank goodness! I was a bit concerned that I would have to mail everything back and get back in the three week que to get it back!

I also got a response from my social worker. She was on vacation last week and is typing our report this week. I guess I was on vacation the week before that, so I really cannot complain! She also said it is unlike the licensing agency to be so long in getting out the licenses so she was going to contact them. This afternoon, when I called the licensing agency they had just gotten off the phone with the social worker! Score one for doing what you say you will do! The lady that sends out the licenses told me that her mother had a heart attack four weeks ago and she is just getting back in the office. Well, I guess you cannot control heart attacks either. Her mother is doing much better and she will send out the licenses this afternoon! Whew!

So tomorrow I will fax the information back to the Department of Public Safety and send my birth certificate via Express Mail to the Illinois Secretary of State for certification and Jerry's to the Ohio Secretary of State for the same reason. Once those come back, they go to the Chinese Consulate (mine to the one in Chicago and Jerry's to the one in New York) and then they are done until they go to China!

In non-glitch news, I knit my first sock. It is actually called a sockabootie because it is like a cross between a sock and a bootie. It is the first thing I have ever knit in the round (with the stitches divided onto 4 knitting needles). I will have to take a picture of how that looks when I knit the second one, because I forgot to do that. But the first one is done!

Isn't it just so cute? There are a couple things about it that I don't like and hope to improve upon with the second one. If the second one is much, much better, I might even trash this one and do it again. It will depend on how perfectionistic I am feeling when I finish number two, because you know this is just project three out of about 12 I want to do for the baby! For the other two, see my other blog. (I am dividing knitting posts so that people don't get sick of reading the same thing over and over and over...)