2 down, 2 to go...

Darryl and I both completed our second meeting. I had mine on Monday and Darryl's was on Tuesday. We were both nervous about it but Jamie is so understanding and does a good job of asking the right questions to get us talking. (Darryl and I are both pretty quiet at times....and being nervous doesn't help that) She asked a lot of questions about our childhood and related those to how we would raise our future children. So now, we are working on our letter to the birth mom which will go in our portfolio. There is so much I want to say to her but don't know how to get it all on paper and in the right words. I don't want to sound too needy and I don't want to seem like it's an easy decision for her either. But as I sat here listening to the Joshua Radin channel on Pandora on my new Iphone (yay) I began to think how much God has blessed us and how I feel like he is guiding us through this process with one hand on our back. And I found this verse which I think I will include in our letter...

“In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will - to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.” Ephesians 1:5

I don't know....maybe it's too cheesy but I like that it mentioned adoption and how he knew we would be part of his family from the very beginning. Kind of cool. Well....thank you again for all the prayers and please keep thinking about us as we are remodeling part of the house....(I know....perfect timing right?), attending these meetings, and baby proofing our entire house for our February 21st meeting. We can't wait for the day our family will be Darryl and Jen plus 1....or 2....or 3! :) Thank you for the prayers! xoxo

1 down, 3 to go...

Yay! We are done with our first meeting! We were both a little nervous but our social worker Jamie was and is awesome! She's very understanding and knew that we would both be a little nervous. We had to answer a bunch of questions about how we met (hee hee), when we decided we wanted children, and all about our fertility journey. I was very happy that I only cried once. She asked what the hardest thing for me was during all of this. And I told her it was watching friends around me get pregnant with no problem. As soon as those words came out of my mouth I started crying. She asked if I had a lot of anger towards them and I said no, of course not...just very jealous sometimes. (even of those who have had really hard pregnancies.....I would trade them in a heartbeat) But I do want to thank all of my friends especially those really close to me who have never complained in front of me. I know that pregnancy isn't always hearts and rainbows but I really do appreciate how loving they all have been. I know it's not easy for them either. They feel bad telling me about it and they shouldn't. I am so happy for all of my pregnant friends and those who have had babies. And me bursting into tears when I hear your good news has just come to be a normal reaction. I seriously have no control over it but I'm hoping with children of our own that it will get much easier for me.
But anyhoo, on that note, :) we were able to plan our next 3 meetings. We have one a week and our last one will be on February 21st! So we may even be on the list sooner that what we thought! :) These next few weeks are going to be filled with cleaning, cleaning, and baby proofing the house for our home visit. Please continue to keep us in your prayers over these next few weeks. Our next meeting with Jamie is going to be one on one...so she will talk with Darryl and I separately. They do this to make sure the husband and wife are both on the same page with their thoughts about adoption and about their marriage. I'm hoping again that she will see us for who we are and realize how ready we are for this. :) Thanks again for all those prayers. They are definitely helping! xoxo

Our first home study meeting!

Well tomorrow is the big day! We have our first home study meeting with a counselor at Bethany. We are so excited to get this going but I'm also nervous because we've been told there's lots of crying that normally happens during the first meeting. We will be asked to talk about our fertility journey and why we decided to choose adoption so I'm just praying that I won't be too much of an emotional wreck. We hope that she sees us as the loving and caring people that we are and how much we want a family of our own.
I'm also handing off our pictures to my brother tomorrow so he can start our portfolio. It was fun going through years of pictures and picking the ones that will represent our lives the best. I can't wait to see what my brother will be able to do with all of them. Our last assignment will be to write a letter to the birth mom and add that to the portfolio as well. I really want to spend a lot of time on this since it will be the first thing the birth mom will read from us.
Please keep us in your prayers as we go through these next 4 meetings. We are hoping to get one in a week so we can be done by March. Pray that they go smoothly and that God is preparing the perfect baby for our family. Thank you all! And I'll let you know how tomorrow goes. xoxo

Done and Done!

We finally turned in all our adoption paperwork! Yay!!!! We turned it in last Thursday and are now waiting for our counseling appointments to be set up or.... for Bethany to call us and let us know if we are missing anything. If all our paperwork is complete, our next step will be to attend 4 counseling sessions. However, one of those will be individual appointments so I guess it's really 5 sessions. We are hoping this will only take a month or so and that we can be on the list by mid February. Darryl and I are so excited and today we received our first baby shower present!

We need a place for our newborn to sleep and have to have it by our fifth counseling session or home study as they call it. So my parents and my grandma pitched in and got us our co-sleeper! It's tan and polka dot so it could be for a boy or girl. My sister in laws both have one and love it! Thanks Mom and Dad and Grandma! And thank you everyone for being so supportive through this. Please continue to pray that this will be a smooth process and that Darryl and I can bring the baby that was meant for us all along home very soon. Also, please pray for our baby's birth mom.....she could be pregnant right now and in the middle of making a very tough but loving and responsible decision. (ooooo....gives me goosebumps!) :)
We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and wish you a happy new year! We are praying this year will be the best one ever!

Almost ready...

So over the past month or so, Darryl and I have been filling out the piles of countless paperwork and making appointments at the Doctor for physicals, going to Quest for blood tests/urine tests, taking CPR and first aid courses, and still need to make the appointment for the DMV to pick up driving records and finish our self evaluations. It's amazing how much some people have to go through to have a baby added to their family. If the state made every parent go through this before getting pregnant, there would definitely be a lot less unwanted children in this world.
We hope to get all our paperwork done and turned in by January 1st (my birthday...Yay!) and hope to get our home study and portfolio done by February 1st. My brother Anthony is an amazing artist and computer graphics designer who is planning on doing our portfolio for us which is awesome!!!!! All I have to do is send him the pictures and he's going to lay them all out in a book format. (for those of you that don't know already, our portfolio is what Bethany shows to birth moms who are planning on placing their children.) And Darryl and I have also learned that the term "putting up for adoption" is no longer correct. "Placing" is the correct term now. :) When a birth mom decides to place her child, she tells Bethany what she expects and what type of parents she would like her child to have. From there, Bethany picks four families and lets the birth mom view their portfolios. The birth mom can then pick from those families who were best suited for her needs or ask to see more.
The office we are going through is also known for their "surprise babies" which means once we are on the list, we could get a call at any time letting us know that there is a baby waiting for us and we need to go pick him/her up immediately. For this reason, we do need to have some baby items ready and waiting. (somewhere for the baby to sleep, car seat, bottles, diapers, and a few outfits)
I will get much more into the details of all this once we are going through it....but there is much more to it. :)
In the meantime, please pray for our unborn baby (our birth mom could be pregnant with him/her as I write this....scary and exciting thought) :), pray that this experience goes smoothly and that we don't end up in an adoption nightmare that ends up with us losing the one thing that we've wanted for so long, and pray for us to continue to trust God and his planning. We are excited and can't wait for the blog where we get to share our good news!!!! We love you all and thank you for your continuous prayers.

Adoption, here we come! :)

Darryl and I met with our friends Matt and Melanie last Wednesday night and on the way home from their house, decided adoption was what we wanted to do. This couple was such a blessing to talk to. We were able to share a lot of the same feelings about infertility and they were able to share their joys of adopting their little girl. Thank you Matt and Melanie, for being so supportive and for openly sharing your experience with us. :)
The next morning, Darryl and I filled out the first application and sent in our first payment. We found out today that our application was approved and we attend an orientation meeting on Wednesday. We are so lucky that the class is this week. They only hold this mandatory meeting once every couple of months. The next class will be held in January, and most likely when we are out of town. We would have had to wait 4 more months just to get the ball rolling so thank God we turned in our paperwork right away. We will let you know how it goes but for now please keep us in your prayers. Pray that this process will go by smoothly and as stress free as possible. Pray that the birth mom that picks us will be carrying the exact baby that God wants us to have. Pray for her safety and the safety of our future baby (babies). Thank you again for checking in on us. xoxo

Trying to move on...

Hi everyone...well, it's been a long couple of weeks. We said goodbye to my Grandpa last Saturday at a beautiful memorial service at Knott Ave. Christian Church. Many people came up to me and said it was the best they had ever been to. My Grandpa was a wonderful man who will not be forgotten.
It's taken me a couple of week to compose myself and try to move forward with the baby process. It's been hard but, as we all say...we aren't getting any younger. :) As of now, I'm taking a vitamin called "Fertility Blend" and will start another vitamin called "Bee Propolis" which is supposed to be very helpful to people with endometriosis. For now I'm staying off birth control but we have also decided to move ahead with the adoption process. I wrote Bethany Christian Services yesterday and will receive the packet in the mail in a couple of days. Darryl and I will sit down this week to fill out an online questionnaire and send in the first fee. We are meeting with some friends tomorrow night who have gone through Bethany and had a wonderful experience. They said they would love to share their journey, have us meet their daughter, and let us know when the next Bethany information meeting is. Darryl and I just need to figure out how much this will all cost and think of some ways to finance it so we can have our family started as soon as possible. It will definitely be nice to talk with another couple who has gone through it all.
Thank you to all of you who are keeping up with our blog and for keeping us in your prayers. We know that God has the perfect baby in mind for us and he is just waiting for the perfect time to send him/her home. Hope you all have a wonderful 3 or 4 day weekend and we will keep you updated. xoxo