Certification and Apostille

Well I took all of our paperwork to be certified and apostilled on Thursday, September 27.

Here is how it all went. I called ahead on Wed. to the county clerks office to let them know I had about 50 documents that I needed certified. Jessica was so nice and helpful and all she needed each notary's name and the number of documents for each notary. I gave her the breakdown and she said don't come from 11-1:30 as it can get crowded. I then called the Secretary of State to see if they needed any info before I came in the next day. The lady on the phone said no that there was nothing that needed to be done.

I got up Thursday morning and was over at Metro Center to the County Clerks office by 8:20am. Of course it has not rained in months and it was pouring. Luckily I was able to park right in front of the door. I did not want any of my paperwork to get wet. I met with Jessica inside and it took her about 20 minutes to staple each sheet to each sheet of my paperwork. We did have an issue with one stack of paperwork that the staple did not want to go through. I had her redo it about five times until the staple went all the way through. I was afraid it was not going to be strong enough and could have potentialy come undone from the paperwork. I know I was probably being paronoid but all this paperwork is so detailed and the smallest thing can make your paperwork be rejected.

Next I went to the Secretary of State between 7th and 8th avenue. The address is actually 8th avenue but the entrance is on 7th and there is NOwhere to park. Since this building is right by the capital all the parking is for state workers. It was absolutely pouring down otherwise I would have walked but again, I did not want the paperwork to get wet. So I drove around...and around...and around. I finally found a little side street with a 2 hour parking limit on the curb and walked about a half mile to the building. One good thing about my driving around was that the sun came out by the time I found a parking place. I would recommend that you take someone with you and have them drop you off while they drive around. Or be prepared for a hike.

Once inside I made my way to the apostille counter on the 6th floor. Jamie was very helpful and it took her about 40 minuties to attach her paperwork to my paperwork. I did not realize how thick all the paperwork would become. It went from about an inch of paperwork to three inches of paperwork. She even put all the paperwork in a couple of boxes for me. She said she would probably see me again as people usually come back because they have mistakes. I do have to go back anyway for the I-171H whenever we get that.

Both offices were very easy and not too bad to deal with. Later that day I made copies of everything. Just don't unstaple ANYTHING when you make your copies.

I then took everything to our agency and now it is off to the St. Louise office to get translated into Russian while we wait on our I-171H.

Birthday Shoes

Not much new to report. We are notarizing all our paperwork tomorrow and then I will take it all to the county to get certified and to the state to get apostilled. We are still waiting on our I-171H. It has only been 30 days since we got fingerprinted but I am curious if I can find out our status. I have read so many blogs where people having been waiting on the i-171H only to find out that the government had a question about it and instead of tracking the applicants down the paperwork just sits and sits on a desk somewhere...nice. So I will be checking with our agency tomorrow to find out if I can get a status update.

Dusty and I have been keeping our eye out for baby items. It is hard not knowing what to buy as far as clothes but I guess the closer we get to traveling we can pack a variety of sizes that will work.

I wanted to share with everyone some really cool shoes that Dusty got me for my birthday. I actually had my eye on a pair of pink converse but they did not having my size. I ended up getting some pastel polka dot Converse All-Stars that I like even more. They make me happy!!!! Thank you Dusty!



Our cat Rascal says Hello!

Final Dossier Push

We have had alot of family things going on over the past few weeks and now it is time to finish the last part of our dossier. All we have left to do is our pictures. We did them a couple of weeks ago but after printing them we realized that we had the camera on the wrong setting and the pics did not turn out as clear as we would have liked. So...we will redo our pictures. Our agency took at look at what we had ready and I just need to make a couple of changes and then get everything notarized take all that paperwork to the county clerk and get it certified and then take all that same paperwork to the secretary of state to get it apostilled. After that we will turn it into our agency who will send the dossier to St. Louis to be looked over and if there are no problems it will be translated into Russian. After that we will be waiting on our I-171H to arrive and then everything will be sent off to Kazakhstan. And then the real wait begins.

Here are some more pictures of my time spent with my brother and his family for the birth of my nephew Osby James and the birthday of my other nephew Charlie. It was a really fun time.

Charlie and his dad!


Osby James


Charlie at his birthday party!