Opening It Up to Questions (and some prayer requests)

Here's a few questions and answers on children adopted from Bulgaria. Most of the information is taken from Creating a Family's Website - "25 Factors to Consider When Adopting From Bulgaria". Have to give credit where credit is due. If you click on the link you can see other questions and answers, but keep in mind that most the information is from May 2009 so some may not be current. For example it states wait times to be 18 months, but we now know that they are between 24-36 months.

What descent/race are the children being adopted?
"Most children are of Roma (Gypsy) ethnicity or Turkish decent, with dark skin tones.  Prospective parents are not allowed to request ethnicity or skin tone, and must be open to all children of any ethnicity." - Creating A Family

How are the children cared for?
Most of the children reside in orphanages although the country is trying to move toward a foster care system.

Why are the children given up for adoption?
"Unwed motherhood, poverty, cultural acceptance of abandonment.  Most of the children available for international adoption from Bulgaria were relinquished or abandoned at birth and have not been removed from the home due to abuse and neglect." - Creating a Family

What is the youngest age a child can be adopted?

Enjoy the rest of your weekend everyone.

18 months - According to some recent information, there may be a move to allow even younger children to be adopted.

If you have any questions at all regarding adoption, why we adopted, or anything else about us in general please feel free to leave the question in the comments, email me, or facebook me. If I think the question is too personal or off limits, I'll let you know, but feel free to ask away. I'll try to answer them as best as I can in an upcoming post. If no one asks, then I'll assume I've done a pretty good job of keeping ya'll informed.

I also have a couple prayer requests. First, the FBI clearance still hasn't made it into our mailbox. Please pray that it gets here. Our mail has been known to get "lost" on occassion. Second, pray that we get everything completed by the time I go back to work on August 9. That gives us a two month window, which is doable, but it doesn't leave any room for error. And we have a deadline of September so we need to get this done. Also, pray that I'll have favor at work both now and when it comes time to travel. I'm pretty sure I'm covered by FMLA, but I really don't want to have a confrontation with anyone. Sometimes I feel like certain people in positions of power don't understand that this is just as important as having a baby biologically. I'm not going to go into detail. I'm just asking for your prayers.