Whew! That's Over!

Home study--Done! Jenna came today, and I just have to say to anyone who may be in the process of working on your home study: Don't worry about cleaning your baseboards! There was no black light or briefcase of vials to take samples of anything that looked like it might sprout spores. Go ahead and clean the ceiling fans though--more on principle than anything else. I certainly need an excuse to do that and a social worker coming to your house qualifies for me. I ended up cleaning my Jeep out yesterday afternoon. I was afraid Jenna, after witnessing my pristine home, would peer into the window of my car and see the 16 pairs of kids' socks, dried out french fries, markers with the caps missing, and other paraphernalia covering my floorboards, and think to herself, "FRAUD!" (The last time I cleaned my floorboards Annsley said, "Mom! You have carpet in your car!") It was in vain I tell you. She didn't even ask about the state of my vehicle let alone peer into the window. I haven't the slightest why in the world I thought the cleanliness of my home would override my answers to questions like, "How would you describe your marriage? What discipline measures do you use? Why do you want to adopt?"

Unfortunately, Asa came out from underneath the bed, but I don't think she put the physical state of our 16 year old cat in her report. I'd post a picture of him for those of you who haven't gotten to see him lately, but I'm afraid PETA might come looking for me. We had to shave him a few months ago--Doug was the barber and just giddy with excitement and rather than do a full body shave, we elected to just shave off the matted hair balls. A quick glance and you think he has the mange, and coupled with the fact that he is much too skinny because he has gotten very picky in his old age, he looks more like some nappy eel in a Chihuahua's body.

Thank you all who were praying for us. This home study was a big deal as it goes on to the USCIS office as well as Russia. We should get Jenna's rough draft in a couple of weeks. It will be interesting to see how she writes it up so that Russia will receive it well. Our adoption agency will look over it, tweak it, and then we'll get the final copy. We should have all that finished within 4 weeks.

Tomorrow I start on the papers needed for our mini dossiers.