Let's Rock N' Roll, USCIS

Way to go, Fed-Ex. Our I-600A arrived a day early in San Antonio and is now ready to be processed! For those of you who are not well-versed in the rare and complex language I call "International Adoptionese", the I-600A is the "Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition." This form gets us pre-approved to bring an orphan into the country. Basically, it's one of the first steps for the federal government to make sure we are legit. I guess it's not ok to bring random babies into the country for permanent residence without permission.

We had to send in copies of our birth and marriage certificates (to prove our citizenship and marriage) and a copy of our home study. Oh, and of course, a decent chunk o' change because nothing in International Adoption is free! Once they review our documents, we will be issued a fingerprint appointment. We will have to travel to the USCIS San Antonio office to get fingerprinted so they can do more background checks. The final step is for USCIS to issue us an I-171H, which gives us permission to bring an orphan into the country. I plan to strap that form to my body during trip 2 so it doesn't get lost.

Our social worker told us that the San Antonio office tends to take a full 90 days from start to finish before we get our I-171H. I say, let's rock n' roll USCIS! Other adoption bloggers in other states have seen their forms get processed in a few weeks, even a few days!!! Show us what you're made of, San Antonio USCIS!

Hopefully that was a good enough pep-talk for my friends at San Antonio USCIS. I'm thinking they will be inspired to work super fast thanks to my encouragement! :)