Hallelujah!!!

Guess what we got in the mail today??!!! (Imagine a very sing-songy voice because that's what you'd hear right now).

Curly Fry's Amended Birth Certificate!!!

For those of you unfamiliar with the bureaucratic beast that is adoption legal procedure, this means his adoption is now completely done. WOOHOOO!!! It has been legally finalized since January, but we couldn't do any taxes including him without an amended birth certificate. Typically, when an adoption is finalized, it takes just a few months to get an amended birth certificate (with our names on it). Curly Fry, however, was born in California and their Vital Records Office is open for calls all of 15 hours per week. They take 4 times longer than almost every other state to process any information, which is why it took so long.

An amended birth certificate gives us the legal right to apply for a social security number in his name. It's hard to imagine how important those 9 little digits are unless you don't have them. Now we can finally get the numbers the government both supplies us and then requires of us. Then we can amend our taxes so we can actually claim our adoption expenses and claim Curly Fry as a dependent!! Hurray for us!!!

We have always been so thrilled to have him, but it has been a bummer to not get the government kickback that a child brings or claim any of the thousands of dollars it took in legal and other fees to bring him to our family. Children are priceless; but they are also pricey.