Fun with Fingerprints

We had our fingerprints taken last Friday, the 13th! Here's a photo of us outside the USCIS office in West Ashley just after we finished. They wouldn't let us take photos inside -- it is the Department of Homeland Security after all! We had to sign in, get wanded for weapons, and leave our cell phones in the lobby with the security guard. The other photo is of the main entrance to the building, which is a very nice, large office building with beautiful landscaping. Makes for a pleasant experience, and I must say the staff was very quick, professional and courteous.

Funny, they call it having your “biometrics” taken, which is very appropriate since it was done electronically. You place your fingers on this futuristic piece of glass and your prints appear on the computer screen and are captured digitally. First they do them all together, and then one at a time. I felt like I should have gotten into my flying car afterward and jetted off to another galaxy -- or at least another time zone (cue music from the Jetsons.)

We now have to go down to the police station to get more fingerprints done -- but using old-fashioned ink and paper. These will be sent off for an FBI Background Check. These are also the fingerprints we will carry with us overseas, but since they expire after 6 months we may have to get them re-done before we travel. Yes, very redundant and strange I know, but we're just trying to go with the flow and not question the inefficiencies of this process too much.

Frank's renewed passport came in today! It took 3 weeks longer than mine, although we applied at the exact same time and place. Weird. Speaking of weird, his passport photo looks so funny because there is a big shadow that makes his neck look as thick as a linebacker's. We're just glad it's here, and would gladly put a neck-thickening prosthesis on him if we had to in order to get through security!

We are getting so close to completing our dossier, we can almost taste it. We have just a few more items to complete, but the biggest thing we're waiting on our elusive I-171H Form, also known as the Notice of Favorable Determination Concerning Application for Advance Processing of Orphan Petition. (Who names these forms???) The USCIS will mail this form to us after they marry our Homestudy with our previously submitted I-600A Form and our Jetsons fingerprints. The I-171H will most likely be the last piece of the dossier puzzle -- the Golden Ticket!

Once we have everything, and then have it all notarized, we will send our entire dossier off to our coordinator to proof. Then she will send everything off to be Apostilled, which is a process by which the state verifies that all the notarizations and documents are valid. I know, it's overkill, but again that's just how it is. There's no need to waste precious energy lamenting about it.

Our adoption coordinator says we're coming along very quickly on our paperwork. That was certainly nice to hear. We have so much more to go, but progress feels good!