Approval!

We are on the island right now...got here on Friday afternoon and will head home on Monday afternoon...It rained all day yesterday but today the sun is shining and it looks like it will be a wonderful day! I always like coming here because Niklas' parents make us feel so welcome, we always have delicious meals, and it is a chance to rest up. There is no place like this island for having a great night's sleep (no noise and no lights)!

On Friday before we left we had the final meeting with the Social Workers. They wanted to talk with us about our views on spanking (Sweden is the only country in the world where spanking is illegal). We discussed our thoughts with them, they discussed their thoughts with us, but that was about it. We have been approved to become adoptive parents! The next step is for them to write a report recommending us to the social services committee, who will make the final decision (but they always accept the social workers' recommendation). Unfortunately that is not until the end of November, which means yet another month of waiting without being able to take any further steps. BUT we still hope to have gotten pretty far in this whole process by the time 2007 rolls around.

We finally decided and agreed upon a girl's name! Up until now it has been hard to envision us with a little girl, but somehow when we came up with a name it became far more realistic...weird how that works. So, now that we have both a boy's and a girl's name, we are ready for that life-changing phone call!!!