It occurred to me as I went back and re-read all of our posts yesterday that the blog format makes it difficult to scan for the basic outline. Perhaps I could organize things differently or give titles to entries or some such thing, but in lieu of that, let me just give a summary to date to catch people up on our journey to date.

We began to research international adoption in Aug/Sept 06.

Settled on our Agency and Kazakhstan in Sept 06

Submitted the last of our paperwork in Nov 06

Translated (into Russian) paperwork was finished Jan 07

Completed Dossier submitted to Kaz Embassy(NY) Feb 07

Sent to Kaz - Ministry of Foreign Affairs(MFA) April 07

Forwarded to Ministry of Education(MOE) May 07

Received Letter of Invitation(LOI) June 07

Traveled To Kaz (Astana for 3 nights) July 07

Received 2nd LOI to Astana Oct 07


That's as basic as I can make it. It is roughly correct, though I may be off a little here and there. To learn more, you can scroll down, or go into the column on the right and select entries by month.

As it stands, we are just more than two weeks away from heading back to Astana, and if all goes to plan, should expect to be there roughly two months as we complete the adoption process. As is customary with current adoption practices in Kazakhstan, we will not have any photo or information about any particular child prior to arriving at the baby house in Astana.

With any luck, our two months in Kazakhstan will be mostly routine. We will arrive and settle into an apartment that has been arranged for us by our agency representative. We will go to the Baby House, meet with the director, and meet our daughter.

Kaz adoptions essentially have 4 components. Two of them are fairly fixed to time lines, and the other two can vary quite a bit which leads to the timeline that most families anticipate of 7-8 weeks in country.


1 -The first fixed step is a 14 DAY BONDING PERIOD during which we will visit the child daily(except Sundays) for 2 hours a day.

2 -After the bonding period is complete we ASK FOR A COURT DATE to be set to request to adopt. The wait for a court date becomes the first variable timeframe. At times it is as little as a week, at other times it can be several weeks. Court itself is often a fairly straightforward process that culminates in the court's approval to adopt pending an appeal period.

3 -The 15 DAY APPEAL PERIOD is a fixed timeframe in which the court allows a final window for the child's family to rescind relinquishment. Upon the passage of the 15th day, the adoption is recognized as official and the child is now legally yours in the eyes of the Kazakh government. It is at this point where the child transfers from the care of the Baby House to the adoptive famiy. Up until this point, adoptive families have continued with 2 hour visits six days a week.

4 -The last step in the process is traveling to Almaty, Kazakhstan's former capital, to fulfill the paperwork necessary to OBTAIN A PASSPORT AND MEDICAL CLEARANCES to travel to the US. Often needing several days to complete, weekends and holidays can extend this to a week or more.

Our anticipated timeline puts this step somewhere just before the Christmas holidays, and we are hoping that we can complete everything before then, rather than have it get dragged out a week or more because of it. Time will tell. Take Care.