Ahhh the nasty "what ifs"

Turns out the thing we couldn't possibly have expected to happen did...the MOE in the region placed all referrals and trips to meet children on hold pending the outcome of an investigation. So on 11/21, one week after we got new dates and 2 weeks before we were to go over our trip was cancelled - again. I won't go into publicly the reasons for the investigation but needless to say it didn't bode well for a speedy resolution. We also found out that weekend that the coordinator at our agency was due to change for yet a 4th time. This was pretty much the last straw. Between the uncertainty in availability of children in this region, the new investigation and frequently changing coordinators, we had really had enough. So the following Monday we called our agency and said we were withdrawing from their Russia program. They weren't really all that surprised as I imagine we were not the first. We already had another agency in mind and before we pulled the plug on our current one, we had checked in with Lighthouse Adoptions in Michigan and luckily they were accepting families for boys! We had been in touch with LH a couple times previously during the year when things weren't going so well but the thought of switching seemed so daunting. But we felt we were on a sinking ship now and needed to move on.

Right after Thanksgiving we began working on our new dossier for LH. We will be registered in Moscow City this time, which has different requirements. There are some benefits including less travel (all baby homes within city limits), no 8-panel medical and generally paperwork is somewhat less intensive. The bad news is that our previous agency was holding our home study hostage and would not allow us to use it if we were going to another agency for a Russian adoption. Apparently not unusual but still just plain wrong. We were blessed to get in contact with Ilze at Florence Crittenton League in Lowell, an accredited and licensed agency that agreed to do our home study quickly. So began the next stage in this lengthy process to our next child...