We made a decision!

Well, it's official. We picked our agency. It's called Adoption Link and it's out of Yellow Springs, OH. We sent in our application this morning and requested that Rima send them our homestudy. After we are approved, we will meet with one of their social workers and finish our profile. Then we'll be a waiting family. Rima is leaving soon to go to India for her sister's wedding and to visit family. She'll be gone most of November so I hope we can get all of our information transfered to Adoption Link before she leaves! It's hard for agencies to give you a timeframe on how long you will have to wait to be matched since the birthmom picks the adoptive family. However, we were told by the director that other families who have the same preferences as ours usually wait less than 9 months.

So here's where we are at...

Wow.. I didn't realize it had been so long since I've updated! So here is where we are at in the process. We went to Rima's on Friday to sign our homestudy. It is officially done and can be sent to any agency at any time we ask.

On Saturday we went to the Adoption Fair at the Vineyard Church in Tri-County. There were a lot of different agencies, lawyers, adoption services, etc. with booths set up and loads of information. We spoke with someone from Adoption Link and with Graceworks. We think we are going to go with either one or both of these agencies. Nick and I are going to sit down tonight and compare the two and write up a list of questions we have for both agencies. Then tomorrow, I'll call them both and get our answers. Then we can decide what we are going to do and just do it! :-)

We printed our profile off last week and had a copy of it made for Rima. Once we pick an agency, one of their social workers will sit down with us and help us conform it to their standard profile. I'm pretty confident that we won't have to do much else with it though!

Hopefully I will be back very soon to let you know what agency we decided to work with!

ALMOST DONE!!!

The picture part of our profile is done!!! Nick is going to have them printed off tonight while I'm in class tonight. We have to finish our dear birthmom letter and then buy something to put them all together! I am so excited to get it all finished!

Nothing new going on yet!

I just wanted to check in and let you know that nothing new is going on. We are still working hard to get our profile completed. We have 4 pages completely done, about 6 are a work in progress and we have about 12 more to go!! But I'm almost finished gathering pics so that makes everything go a lot faster!!

I'll be back as soon as I have something new to add! :-)

One of my worst fears nearly happened today

I know this blog is supposed to be about our adoption, but I just had to write about this. I periodically check the news while at work in case anything major is going on in the world. I was on wlwt.com and saw a breaking news headline about a child bringing a gun on the bus. I always read these because one of my worst fears is opening an article and seeing that school/school bus is in Mt. Healthy. (I taught at Rex Ralph Elementary in the Mt. Healthy school district for 3 years.) The article said that a 3rd grader at Duvall Elementary (in Mt. Healthy) brought a loaded gun on the bus and pointed it at 12 students that were on board. Rex Ralph Elementary was moved to Duvall Elementary two years after I left... so that's where a lot of my former co-workers (and some of them still good friends) work!! Luckily no was hurt. I am so thankful it wasn't worse and I pray that this child only brought the gun to show off or to "be cool". I hope he never intented to use it. This is particularly scary after the recent Cleveland shooting where the gunman specifically targeted teachers and the discovery of the Pennsylvania teen who was planning a "Columbine" shooting. Guess how he got some of his guns?? His mom. What is going on?!?!

Just working on profile...

Just wanted to write and say that nothing new is going on at this point. I'm still trying to gather pictures and need a day to just sit down and work on it! :-)

Thank you to everyone who helped/is helping us gather pictures. You have no idea how much I/we appreciate it!

Our homestudy is complete!!

I am so relieved it's all over!!! Rima came back yesterday and finished our home visits. This time I had to talk all about my life and then there was more discussion about us as a couple, religion, etc. Now all that has to be done is to type it up (Rima does that.) We have to work on our profile which consists of a Dear Birthmom letter and lots of pictures. I was given a terrific example so we are in the process of gathering pictures.

For the next day and a half, I'm going to have to try not to think about adoption and study for my mid-term!

Day 1 Complete!

Our first day of the homestudy is complete. Rima will be back tomorrow to finish the homevisits. The first part of the morning, we went over our training. She asked us some questions regarding the training and then asked if we had any questions for her. The majority of the morning was Nick giving him background history. He told about his family, his education, his work history and his relationship with me. I will do the same tomorrow. Then Rima did our safety audit (by walking around the townhome.) That was about it. I didn't realize how exhausting it all was until she left and I fell asleep on the couch!

I'll let you know how tomorrow goes!

This is it!!

In 2 hours our homestudy will be underway. Our townhome looks pretty good and we've gone over all of our training materials again. I'm not really nervous, just anxious to get it over with!

I was talking to Scharlene on the phone last night and walked into the laundry room to get a stack of towels that were on the dryer. I had just started a load of laundry and when I walked in the laundry room, I stepped in a huge puddle of water! Isn't that just my luck?!?! Nick helped me clean it up and we tried to see where the water was coming from. I called Mom and Dad who were at a nearby mall and they stopped by to take a look at it. We still can't find the problem but the water is cleaned up. I guess I better go check it again to make sure the floor is still dry. I don't think a flooding laundry room would give the best impression! :-)

After the homestudy tonight, Scharlene, Philip, Nick and I will be going to me and Scharlene's 10th year class reunion. I can't believe it's already been 10 years! I'm not sure what to expect, but I hope we have a great time.

I'm not sure what time Rima will leave but if I have time before we leave for the reunion, I'll be back to tell you all about it. If not, I'll be back tomorrow morning.

Wish us luck! :-)

Another situation...

Rima sent me another situation just a few minutes ago. The baby is already here but the birthmom would like a family near California. Since Ohio isn't exactly close, we don't have much of a shot. :-) Plus, they want someone with their homestudy completed (and ours is sooo close, but not there yet.) Wow... it's such a strange feeling knowing that somewhere, a birthmom might be carrying our baby and we just haven't been matched yet. Even though I don't know her yet, she's in my prayers every night.

Tomorrow is the BIG DAY!

Tomorrow at 10am, Rima will be at our home to complete our homestudy. She initially said that it would take 2 days but since Nick and I have finished most of the training already, it may only take one day. But if she needs the 2nd day, she's coming back Sunday morning. Either way, our portion of the homestudy will be completed by the end of the weekend! She said it takes about a week to type everything up!

The next step will be to complete our profile. I've been trying to gather pictures that we want to use, but we don't have many pictures of both me and Nick. Most of the time, I'm the one taking the pictures so I have lots of Nick. I, however, avoid the camera so there aren't many of me or of us together. If you happen to have any of us together, could you please let me know??

My best friend's neighbor has been through this process before and has offered to help me put our profile together. (She and her husband now have an adorable baby boy!!) I can't wait to have it finished and ready to send out to potential birthmoms/parents!

Not much too report

Not much adoption-related info to post about. We need to read through our training materials again before Rima comes on Saturday.

Nick and I were in Louisville all weekend. Nick's mom had surgery Friday and the recovery has been rough so far. I really hope she's feeling better today but I haven't heard yet. I'm waiting for Nick to call me to let me know. Please keep her in your prayers.