The Stuff...

A few weeks ago, we went and registered.  I know it sounds crazy – I mean, shouldn’t we wait until we get word of placement before we do such a crazy thing?

Well, here’s the thing.  We are going to be NEW parents.  We have NO idea what we need and what we don’t need.  We didn’t even know what all was out there or where to start.  For example, did you know that there are at least 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 types of bottles to choose from, all claiming to be the only bottle that will work for your child? :) 

For most things, we’re going to wait until we have word of placement before we actually go buy them.  But, to save time when that happens, we wanted to at least get some of our research done and have some decisions made.  We don’t want to get word of placement and have to go out the next day and make all of these decisions.  Instead, we want to have most of the decisions made and be able to just go and purchase stuff off a list.

So, we registered.  Yep, we got to use the cool little scanner thing and go around the store scanning things we needed or wanted.  It was a two-day process totaling six hours.  It was overwhelming.  And exhausting.  And fun.  And quite educational.

And we realized just how expensive everything could be.  Even the basics, like a car seat, stroller, crib, changing table/dresser, and rocking chair were insanely expensive.  Add that to the already-staggering cost of adoption, and we decided we’d need to start being smart about this whole endeavor. 

Enter Craigslist.

Yep, I’ve been trolling Craigslist every few days to look for some of the big furniture items – crib, changing table, and rocking chair.  We figure that if I can find some of these major things for a good price on Craigslist, why not go ahead and get them rather than purchasing everything new?  So far, we’ve purchased a glider and ottoman for only $100 and a crib for only $40!  The glider/ottoman is exactly what we picked out new (even the same wood and fabric colors), but $900 less than what we would have had to pay new.  $900!  The crib isn’t exactly what I pictured, but for $40, we figured we couldn’t go wrong.  We just have to make sure that it meets current safety regulations – if not, we’ll get rid of it and start looking again. 

So, are we crazy?  Are we just getting our hopes up too early?  Maybe, maybe not.  For those of you who have adopted or had biological children, when did you start amassing the basic and big “stuff?”

Encouraging Moments

I have been so encouraged these past few weeks!  Here are some of the highlights I want to be sure to remember:

1. On two separate Sundays, the two men who led the “shepherding prayer” at church (where someone prays for the needs within the congregation) has prayed specifically for Jason and me and our adoption process.  It has been such a blessing to be counted among all of the other expectant mothers in our congregation!

2. A colleague brought me flowers as congratulations for the approval of our homestudy.  It was such a lovely encouragement on an otherwise mundane day!

3. Several friends have offered to give and lend me baby stuff.  They have sent me lists of things they have found essential, lists of things they’d be willing to give us, etc.  It’s been so encouraging to be surrounded by friends who are willing – and excited – to support us in these ways!

4. A friend added me to a mom’s facebook group that has already been an amazing source of help regarding kid-related questions.  It’s been so cool to start participating in that whole “moms-transferring-knowledge-to-other-moms” phenomenon that usually happens when a woman is pregnant.

5. I saw someone who works at an organization which partners with my school.  She said that she heard that we were adopting, and that she and her husband had adopted, too.  What a blessing to get to chat with someone else who has gone through the process!

May you be encouraged as well!

Jeannine

What's Next?

So, you are probably wondering what, exactly, it means that our homestudy was approved.  What’s next?  Basically, we are now officially “cleared” to be adoptive parents.  We have to formally sign the document and send it back in, and then we enter the “waiting period.” 

During the waiting period, our profile* will be shown to any birthparents whose preferences match our preferences.  If a birthparent looks at our profile and likes what she sees, she can choose us to be parents of her child or opt to meet us first before making a choice.  Our agency says that this can take anywhere between four months and five years.  Quite the range, eh? 

*Our profile is basically a book containing pictures of us and text explaining who we are, why we are adopting, what we like to do, what our families are like, etc.  If you’d like to see an electronic version of our profile, click here.  Enjoy!

BIG news!

We got big news today.  BIG news, people!

Our homestudy was approved!  This means that we are now officially approved to be adoptive parents!

From Jeannine:  I got a notice in my email at 4:50pm that I had a message waiting for me on our adoption portal (how we communicate with the agency).  I was driving, on my way to a BBQ, but knew I had to check it right away.  I pulled over, put my four-way flashers on, and used my phone to log in to the portal (thank goodness for smartphones!).  There was a message that we were approved, and that we needed to review our homestudy document for any errors and then sign-off on it.  Of course, I had to read the entire thing right then.  Even though it was a fifteen page document with small text and I was reading it on my phone.  Half an hour later, I finished, and called Jason (whom I was meeting at the BBQ) to say that I was running late.  I was itching to tell him over the phone, but really wanted to do it in person.  The whole rest of the way there I just kept laughing – it was such great news!  As soon as I got to the BBQ, I found Jason and said, “So, you want to know why I was late?  I was pulled over in my car (at this point he thought I meant by a cop – I may or may not have paused dramatically at this point...) reading our APPROVED homestudy!”  He was really excited and we told our friends at the BBQ right away.  Our friends were wonderful and rejoiced with us and tolerated us talking about it the entire night!

From Jason:  Last night, Jeannine told me that she had gotten a call from our social worker regarding our home study.  She had said that we would most likely get word today about whether we were approved by the agency.  I was pretty confident that it would go well, but at about 4:00 this afternoon, I was wondering if we were going to hear.  I didn’t really want to call Jeannine and ask, but I was definitely disappointed we hadn’t heard anything.  Then when she showed up at the BBQ we were at tonight, she started to say she had been pulled over.  My first thought was “HA, now we are even.”  (We have a little competition regarding speeding tickets, and I’m winning.  Or losing, depending on how you look at it.)  Then she told me the rest, that we had been approved.  I was completely speechless.  The process has seemed to fly by so far, especially when you hear other stories of how long EVERYTHING can take, but I was very relieved to get this part out of the way.  I know waiting from this point will be very difficult, but this is one big part of it out of the way.  And of course, I have been smiling all night.

Thanks to everyone who has been praying for us.  It’s so wonderful to have such a great support system.  Please keep praying:

1.    That the Lord would prepare us to be parents,

2.    That the Lord would be preparing the right child for us, and

3.    For wisdom and peace and strength for the birthparents of our future child.

Love,

Jason and Jeannine