A time for family...

Tomorrow I head to Vermont to spend time with my family for a long weekend. I love Christmas. It's always been such a celebrated holiday in my family and Rich and I hope to pass that on to Nathan. As Nate's 1st Christmas approaches, I do feel a sense of sadness that we will not be spending it with him. However, I am comforted that he will spend his 1st Christmas with his mama Maria in Guatemala. We'll have all the Christmas' to come.

I wish you all a very Merry Christmas....with family, friends, and those you hold close to your heart.

Christmas Candids

BUSY weekend

It was a busy weekend! I started my Christmas shopping and I finished all in one weekend. I was brave- I don't recommend shopping at Target 9 days before Christmas in the middle of the day! It took me 30 minutes to get out of the parking lot. :-)

The holidays have come so fast. This past week Rich put up the Christmas tree and we decorated the house. We have a dept. 56 village collection and I love it. Rich made a tradition to buy a new piece every year.

We went to our neighborhood holiday party today and then came back to finish Nate's room. It's all done with a few exceptions. I ironed all his bedding and got everything in order. His curtain is up and we just need to hang one more piece. Then, I'll dust it and it will be complete.

I came to the realization today that this was my last full weekend at home before I leave to go down to get Nate for my extended pick-up trip. Next weekened I'm going to Vermont to visit my family for the holiday. Rich will stay home due to his work schedule and then I'll be back so that we can spend Christmas day together. Then, I finish my last 3 days at work and I'm off. I'm flying direct this trip out of JFK.

Finally, I talked with Maria this week through our translator. I am starting to feel so sad that Nate will be leaving Maria. She has cared for him wonderfully since he was 2 days old on May 10th of this year. I can't even begin to imagine the bond they have and how truly difficult it will be to say goodbye. I feel fortunate that Maria and I have connected so well. She is such a caring woman. While we were talking about meeting and saying goodbye on the phone, she began to cry. All she could say was how happy she was that we were going to give him such a good home, but that she would miss him terribly. It was clear to me in this conversation how much she really loves him and how much she has given to him and to us. We could not be more grateful to her. I promised her we would forever stay in touch and I hope to get back down to visit her in the next few years. I'm putting together a scrapbook of pictures of the last 6 months since we received Nate's referral. I think this will be the perfect goodbye gift...

Here are a couple pics of our holiday decorating and toy assembling fun (disclaimer: assembling an exersaucer should not be in the top 1 million things to do before you die. :-))

Our official BLOG Christmas card!

From our family to yours...

Merry Christmas! May 2008 be a year filled with health, peace, and happiness!

Warm Wishes ~ Emily, Rich, and Nate

Here's the latest...

I'm here! It's been such a busy week I've barely had time to keep my head above water. I wish I was reporting that we have a birth certificate....but we don't. We were told by our attorney that it would take a week and that we were submitted on 12/3. We should have had our birth certificate this past Monday...but updates came in from our attorney today and we didn't get one. Both Rich and I thought it was interesting that our attorney said it would only take a week as most birth certificates from where Nate was born take 6 weeks. I requested an update from our attorney again this week so we should hear something in the next couple days.

The good news is that I CAN'T believe I am leaving in 2 1/2 weeks to see Nate forever!! I will be meeting Maria at the Marriott on 12/30 and then we'll whisk away to Antigua....I'm really looking forward to spending some quality time together before we go home. At this point, we realistically don't expect to get home until the end of January. The embassy is officially not issuing PINK appts. until the 2nd of January already....so we're just hoping for an appt. in January. The holidays are sure to add at least 2 weeks to the process. Especially with how close we are now. We'll see.

I called Maria myself last night. My spanish is rusty but we could communicate. She was out shopping and said Nate is doing really well. His hair is growing like crazy and he's a happy boy. He LOVES his cereal. Just hearing that was enough to make my day. I've started getting all my things together for the trip. This time is different than all the other trips because I don't know how long I will be down there...so, I'm getting a cell phone and bringing everything and the house, too!
:-)

Kids and dogs - A perfect combination

I just can't wait to introduce Nate to Junior and Benny....I know we'll get a few good laughs out of their mischief together, too. :-)

21 days...

Until we see this sweet face FOREVER!!








I can't believe it's getting this close to Christmas! The time is flying. I was away for work this week so I haven't posted much. I talked with Maria last night and Nate is doing really well. He loves his cereal and he's over 15lbs now. You'd never know it because he is a peanut but he loves to eat-- he's going to fit in perfectly with mom and dad! :-)

We hope to hear an update this week on the birth certificate. Once that is received, we should have our embassy appt. in about 3 weeks or so. We are heading to GC on the 30th of this month and will be staying until the end. We plan to leave the day after we get our visa. We are hoping for less than a 2 week stay but as we have always said- this process is unpredictable. We did inquire about our birth certificate because the civil registries in Guatemala can be unpredictable also, and our attorney assured us it would only take him a week. That would mean we should hear news this week. We'll be staying at the Marriott if our stay is less than a week; if it's longer- we'll be staying at a bed and breakfast in Antigua - Hotel Casa Ovalle.

Here's wishing you all a peaceful weekend!

It's Official!

More great news to share (cue the drum roll please!): as of 11/30/07- Nathaniel is OFFICIALLY a Hoyt and is legally our son!! His birth mother signed off for the fourth and final time. This is GREAT news! Now we are just waiting on our birth certificate which we have been told will take one week. From there, it's 2-3 weeks to travel! Once we have the birth certificate, our attorney will get a passport for Nate and then submit the file to the US embassy. All that will need to be completed at this point is the 2nd and final DNA test on just Nate. That's a breeze! We'll have a more specific timeframe once we know the DNA has been completed.

I still can't believe we are this close to getting the little guy home! Prayers to all our PGN friends who are still waiting for that SPECIAL call! :-)

ONE WORD NEVER SOUNDED SO GOOD!

It's a MIRACLE!!!

WE are OUT! WE are OUT! WE ARE OUT OF PGN!!!

Nate's coming home!!

We have been approved by PGN to complete our adoption in Guatemala. I couldn't even begin to describe the happiness that we feel from this news. I called PGN this morning and Laura told me "Congratulations, you have been approved"!!!!! She told me we were approved yesterday and our attorney picked up our file today! Wow- I can't even believe it- I am officially speechless. It was one day shy of 8 weeks with NO KO's issued- we are SO thankful! We are now just waiting for our agency to confirm this wonderful news.

Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

I will post more this weekend about the process from here but most important is that our little guy will be coming home in 5-7 weeks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm COMING TO AMERICA!!!

Some great memories from the trip

Hello!



Nate and Mom...



My 1st cereal! I love it!



What's Up?!



Our complete foster family...Ana, Maria, and Albert... (and Nate's foster buddy Nick!)



Nate and Dad...