When we first brought Liam home, I immediately went to work on getting his Social Security card and other documents for him.   When I inquired about getting him a U.S. passport, I found out that the process would require me to send in his one and only original Russian birth certificate.   I was willing to make the 10 hour drive to Houston or wherever to show the birth certficate in person but I was told that it would have to be mailed on to another agency no matter what.   This is something that I refused to do since it is the only certified copy I have or can ever get.

So we began searching for a local attorney who could help us do a readoption so Liam would have a Texas birth certificate before we applied for his passport.   After lots of phone calls, we quickly found out that there are no attorneys in this area with experience in this sort of procedure.   So, back in July we talked to an attorney in Austin about doing the readoption and she informed us that the state of Texas only requires a Recognition of Foreign Adoption unless we felt for some reason that our international adoption was not leagal.   This was great news especially since the cost was less than a readoption.

The paperwork process was pretty easy (especially compared to the mountain of paperwork we completing for the actual adoption).   We sent all the forms in and copies of documents they needed to get us scheduled for court.   The attorney talked to the judge and arranged for our court hearing to be over the phone so we wouldn’t have to make the drive to Austin.

So, this morning from 8:45 to 9:00 a.m. we had our court tele-hearing and now our little man is not only an American, but also officially a Texan.   We’ll be receiving his Texas birth certificate in about a week.   Woo hoo!   Another thing to check off the list!
 

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