Here we are at Polish Fest 2009 held at the Henry W. Maier Festival Park in Milwaukee. First and foremost, we had a blast with our family and clearly a very close 2nd were ALL THOSE PIEROGIs & POLISH SAUSAGES !!! .....and cold beer, but we won't go into that!

The Polish Dancer's were amazing and full of incredible energy! Even at almost 90 degrees they smiled and kept us entertained.

I really have no idea what kind of warriors these are, so I guess I will have to keep reading up on my Polish history.

Non-Stop Polka from 12 noon to Midnight is what the festival advertised and they weren't kidding! It went on and on and on all day and on multiple stages!

Here is our Family!

Clearly, I really liked the Polish Dancers! This was the Syrena & Syrenka Polish Folk Dance Ensemble.

This was Stas Venglevski - Accordionist. One of his songs was the "tornado" polka becuase of how fast he played. Which was ironic because a real tornado had been reported in the area the day before!

The family again...I think they are getting tired. Who wants to POLKA????

Don't we look like "Fun-Parents-To-Be-Someday?"

Truly the Milwaukee lake front is beautiful and Maier Park is a great venue. The lake breeze was a life saver!

ahhhhhh......Just one more!!!

Okay, last one I promise. They just look like they were having so much fun!


I saved the best for last...Through this blog, Lee and I made a connection with a couple who adopted from Poland on three seperate occasions. We met at the fest and had the privledge to meet them and their family. When I had said the research possiblities would be endless at Polish Fest, I never imagined we would discover a live referral! They were wonderful people and I hope we meet again at Polish Fest 2010 with our children! Wouldn't that be something?

A field trip to Homeland Security

I thoroughly expected my finger tips to be BLACK for this post! I was all excited about showing them off as "proof" that Lee and I had really gone to get our BIOMETRICS done. Oh well! Now, my job will just have to wonder if I played hooky for the afternoon!!
Lee and I had a nice afternoon driving downtown and exploring the city a bit. We found a great deli and enjoyed a delicious grilled roastbeef, cheese and sweet red bellpepper panini. Yum! We were prompt for our 3 pm appointment and only had to wait a few minutes. The finger printing process was very interesting. They roll each of your fingers out on a flat surface, kindof like a Xerox copier and the image appears on a computer screen. The staff then presses a button with their foot and a picture is taken which appears on the screen. I seriously really wanted to ask a bunch of questions, but do you know the feeling when it is best just keep your mouth shut to avoid raising suspicion? I kindof felt that way. The security guards were probably profilling us and I wanted to shout out "We are ADOPTING and We are SOOOO Excited!!"



This is the Homeland Security building in downtown Milwaukee. Since I couldn't bring my camera inside, I asked Lee to drive past so I could take a picture. Well, this UPS truck pulled up right as I was about to take the picture! Which was probably a good thing because there was a security guard standing out front and I am sure he would have looked at me funny while taking pictures of the federal building! I was taking my time snapping a lot of pictures when Lee said so sweetly "honey, will you please get into the car now?" I love him for wanting to keep me out of trouble! Again! It is all for the blog and to document the Journey! Stay tuned......Polish Fest is 2 weeks away. The research possibilities will be endless!

The WWW brought us together

If someone were to ask me 6 months ago, I would have said something like "What's a Blog?" Now, I am facinated by reading posts especially those with content that is near and dear to my heart. Through "Blogging", I have been able to find other couples who are in various stages of adopting internationally in Poland. Some are in Poland at this very moment and others are awaiting news to complete their forever families! I am so thankful they are sharing their journey. Their stories are beautiful and loving and full of emotion. It is so interesting to learn about what they are going through and understand a little more thoroughly what lies ahead of Lee and I. I wish them all the best of luck and pray that God blesses each and every one.

What will I wear?

What will I wear to my finger printing appointment? Ha! No gloves and something with short sleeves for sure! Ha, ha!
We received our ASC Appointment Notice for June 3rd to have our BIOMETRICS taken. Of course the paper work says no cameras which sincerely bums me out. Doesn't the Government know that I am trying to blog about all this?

Are we working backwards?

Hello! So, yesterday I pulled an envelope out of the mailbox from the Department of Homeland Security and about jumped 10 feet into the air. Could it be? Did our I-800 form truly get processed in 2 weeks? We were told 30-60 days! WOW! I ran into the house and yelled for Lee. "Lee, it's here!!"....... I tore open the envelope and raced to read it aloud....... and at that moment all the air went out of my breath and the bubble was burst........ What we received was the I-797 FORM! Goodness gracious if we started with the I-800 and are now only at I-797 this process is going to take FOREVER!! Can you imagine how long it will take to get to I-Numero UNO????
Well, that's a joke because it doesn't work like that and I am truly laughing...on the inside. If you could have been there to see Lee and I's faces you would be laughing too! I didn't have my camera close by or I would have definitely captured it on film and posted it here. We received a "Notice of Action" letter from the Department of Homeland Security telling us that they are in receipt of our I-800 paperwork and are sending us an acknowledgement notice. We are awaiting notification from them telling us when and where we will have our Biometrics done . (That's a big fancy word for Fingerprints). We will be given the "Specific time, date and location of the Application Support Center (ASC) where we must go to be fingerprinted". Sounds so....well, stuffy. I wonder if they'll let me take a picture of the event? Te, He, Hee! You KNOW I will have to Sneak one!!!

Form I-800A?

Some of you might recognize this board game as "Last Word" (Excellent fun by the way). I recognized while playing it this weekend that it could symbolize the steps from Start to Finish that Lee and I are on. I often wonder....and many ask....so how much longer? I guess we truly won't know until we get to the finish. I like believing that we are 1/2 way through, you know, like we are on step 40 of 80, but then there are days when I feel like we are on step 15 heading backwards. None the less, I recognized that every start has a finish and some day we will look back upon this journey and say...."Oh, were weren't even 1/4 of the way into the process", or maybe we will say, "Wow, we were closer to the finish then we realized!". And then maybe....we will say...."We REALLY had only just begun!"



This is the I-800A form. The official name of the document is Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country. Half of the papers on the table are the DIRECTIONS on how to fill the form out and the other half of the papers are the ACTUAL form. Pretty crazy, huh?! This is the overwhelming part, but look below because that is where the comedy comes in.....



In this picture, Lee is using a RULER to mark the boxes with "X". Isn't that hysterical? Our Right-Angled friends will say that makes perfect sense, while our more "free-spirited" friends will probably say, Huh?! I just started to take pictures because I couldn't stop giggling while thinking about it! I love him for wanting to make it perfect!


Okay, back to business.... :)

This is how it all Began...

Actually, it all began back on December 23, 2004. We sat next to each other on a United Airline flight from Denver to Chicago; we were both headed home for the holidays. 2 1/2 hours later we landed at O'hare and exchanged phone numbers, hugs and a feeling that something incredible had just begun. God really brought two people together on that day at 30,000 feet. We were both picked up from the airport and shared with our respective families, "I met someone really special tonight!"