We Need Your Help!

Yesterday, one of our favorite people in the world became our favorite PHOTOGRAPHER in the world! Our good friend Kelsey and baby-friend Drew sacrificed their Valentine's Day to the Adopt-a-Baby-K cause. Kelsey brought us (and her amazing photography skills) to the Arboretum where the goal was to take one good picture of Jonathan and I together.

That "one good picture" will go on the front page of our "Dear Birthparent" letter. This one page (front and back) letter uses words and pictures to describe our life together. Women considering adoption for their baby will see our letter (and those of 50 other families) when they visit our agency. From these one page letters, they choose a few families that they would like to talk to and/or meet.

SO. The picture we choose to put front and center needs to be fairly large and close-uppish (agency requirements.) It also needs to make us look loving and not psychotic (our requirements.) Kelsey worked her magic and took several pictures that fit those criteria! Now here's the tough part. We can't decide which one to use! PLEASE vote in the poll on the top, right hand side of the blog and tell us which one you like the most. Remember- the woman who's looking at these will be seeing 50 or so other very similar letters. We obviously want to stand out somehow.

Number 1:


Number 2:


Number 3


Number 4:


Number 5:


THANK YOU very, very much for helping us decide!

I bought what?

Our agency strongly suggested that we have some baby basics on hand. Bottles, formula, diapers, wipes, a place for the baby to sleep, etc. So today, I bought these:

DIAPERS! For a BABY! Honestly, it felt really weird. I felt kind of like a fraud. I know that nobody in Maple Grove Target could care less if I'm buying diapers! Or even notice that I'm buying diapers. Of course I know that.

Nonetheless, it felt like I was playing grown-up and somebody was going to call me out on it at any moment! Ha.

The other thing I realized is that I know NOTHING about baby products! Time to start researching, I suppose...

Lists are my friend

I like lists. I like crossing things off of lists. It's very satisfying. That's why I was thrilled when our agency gave us an outline of what needs to be done to begin the adoption process.

*The things in bold are steps we have already completed*

1. Orientation (see if you are interested in this agency)

2. Intake Meeting (are you SURE you're interested? Okay, here's a ream of paper to fill out)

3. Adoption Study (make sure you are relatively sane and law-abiding)

• 1st Home Study Meeting (at the agency's office)
• 2nd Home Study Meeting (at the agency's office)
• 3rd Home Study Meeting (at our home)

4. Training

• Adoptive and Birth Parent Panel
  
• Developing a Birth Parent Letter (a 2 page description of our life together; pics and text)
  
• Working with Birth Parents (will attend on Feb 15)
  
• Networking (will attend on Feb 27)
  

5. In "The Book." (Our birth parent letter joins those of fifty other waiting families in a binder kept in our agency's office)

Once we have completed the last step and are in "The Book," our information is available to all birthparents who visit the agency. That's when the waiting technically begins.

Do you see how many things are in bold already?! It makes me happy to see so many things checked off the list. The saying "Hurry up and wait" comes to mind... =)

Decisions, decisions!

When we made the decision to adopt, we felt like that was the Big Decision. We are going to adopt! Decision made. Done. Whew. Now everything just falls into place, right?

Not exactly. Turns out, there are about 130 million different ways to adopt. International? Domestic? Foster-to-adopt through your state agency? Pick one.

Domestic? Okay. Do you want to work with an attorney? An agency? A facilitator? Pick one.

Agency? All right, which one? Large? Small? Nationwide? Local? Affiliated with a certain faith? Pick one!

Do you want open adoption? Closed adoption? Do you feel prepared to parent a child with special needs? How do you feel about twins? How much time will you take off when the baby is born?

AGHHHH!!! For an easygoing Midwestern couple that can't even decide where to eat on a Friday night, this is a lot of decision making!

But, we did it. We're doing it. And we feel really good about our choices. At some point, it all just started to make sense and one direction felt more right than the others. Thank goodness. Now I can return the mountain of adoption books I borrowed from the library. Maybe.

Take Two

I'm considering changing the name of the blog to "Here we go (again!)" Hee hee. But seriously. Here we go again.

As you all know, Jonathan and I have gotten the adoption ball rolling. Here are some little factoids:

1. We chose to go the "domestic infant adoption" route. A pregnant woman will find us (either through our agency or by hearing about us from someone who knows that we're adopting. That's you guys!) She (or they, depending if there is a father involved) will choose us to be her baby's family. In most scenerios, adoptive parents bring their new baby home from the hospital at the age of 2 days old!

2. We are working with an agency called Adoption Minnesota (also called Wellspring Adoption Agency).

3. We have no idea when we will be parents. Because we are being selected by an expectant mom or couple... there is no order, list, time frame, rhyme, or reason. It's just a matter of waiting until the right woman finds us. It could be one day (!!) or five years. Both of those are very rare but it could happen.

So- all in all, we're back at it! We hope this blog can be one way we can keep everybody that we love up to date.

Also, I want to apologize for the fact that the last post before our 16-month hiatus was about diarrhea.