Homestudying...

HERE WE GO! Last Monday was our first official homestudy with the adoption agency - the first of three - and I'm pretty sure we passed! I have to admit that I was a bit nervous when we first sat down with our social worker and she started talking about what would happen if we didn't pass... but after she started asking questions, I relaxed a little bit. Her questions were really not as in depth as I thought they would be - they were actually pretty basic - I'd almost say easy! I think the worst part about the whole thing was worrying that she didn't think we were being real with her, but we just tried to be ourselves, so hopefully she knew we weren't just trying to say what she wanted to hear. So we've got 2 more to go now... the next one will be individual interviews of Troy and I, so I'm a little nervous about that, too - I think that they may do a little more digging as we progress, but I'm sure it won't be anything we can't handle. It's scheduled for Dec. 4th - next week! - and we're still hoping that we'll be all done with everything and paper pregnant by Christmas!!! Yay! 

I have to admit that now that we're ACTUALLY DOING this, I've been a little bit obsessed with baby thoughts. The nursery, names, the cute little clothes, baby stores! - I feel like I can actually go into stores like Babies R Us and not feel like an impostor!

We are SO excited. But now I have to keep reminding myself that once we ARE paper pregnant, I'm going to have to hold back and remember that it could be a long wait. But it's such a wonderful feeling that we're actually DOING this! I get more and more excited about it the closer we get! And we are surrounded by such supportive people! I was afraid that most of the reactions we would get throughout the process would be like the ones we got initially... about as much excitement as announcing that we had cancer or something... but now that we are going forward, most people are truly EXCITED for us. Of course there's the occasional "Oh. We thought you had some REAL news for us" comments (yes, someone really said that when we told them we were adopting), but for the most part, it has been great to see people's excitement about it. 

*Sigh* God is SOOO good. We are SO blessed in so many ways, and this year at Thanksgiving I'm reminded that I have so MUCH to be thankful for. We're feeling more hopeful about our prospects of having a family than we have in quite a few years. We're hoping and praying that next year at this time we'll have a little baby "B" to hold and love and let grandparents spoil. I can't wait!!!

Well, for our anniversary #5 (hard as it is to believe we're at that one already!) we decided to take a little trip to Niagara Falls, since I had never been there, and for some reason my husband likes to do things that I want to do! :) Because of everything going on, we had very limited time in which to take our little trip... so we opted to just make it a one-night, one-day thing, and travel through Canada since that would be faster than going all the way down and around. So, Thursday night we left the church at around 9 PM, and despite some heavy rain, made it to the Canadian border by about 10. Now, in our haste to pack up the car, we had forgotten one little thing that had been riding around in our trunk since we were in Wisconsin last... 

A chainsaw. 

And as we pulled up to the border and handed the guy (who appeared to be about 12, by the way) our ID's and birth certificates, unbeknownst to me, Troy decided that it would be better to tell him the truth when he asked us what we were carrying with us in the car, rather than try to cover it up. Which was a swell idea, right?, but for me, with no warning, and no hint of an idea that we actually even HAD a chainsaw in our trunk, it just so happened to strike me as HILARIOUS that we would be attempting to cross the border with a chainsaw in our trunk. Here we are at the border, a young pastor and his wife, headed to Niagara Falls for our anniversary, and we have a chainsaw in our trunk! Maybe it's not as funny as it was to me at the time, but when Troy said the word chainsaw, I started to get the giggles, there was NO stopping it! So this guy thinks that obviously SOMETHING isn't right with us, so he asked us to pull over to the side to be searched. Ugh. So we pull over, get out of the car, and stand in front of it as 3 or 4 guys - trying desperately to be as intimidating as they possibly could - go through our seats, suitcase, my purse, and the entire contents of our trunk as we stood there feeling like criminals!!! Seriously, they did everything short of frisking us. But obviously, they didn't find anything else to be questionable, and within 15 minutes we were back on the road again with nothing taken from us but a little bit of our pride. Note to self: next time traveling over the border, take the chainsaw out of the trunk first. Other than that little rendezvous, we had a wonderful time at the Falls, took some BEAUTIFUL pictures, and just enjoyed being able to spend some time together without having to think for a day about the big things coming up! And after a great time of sightseeing, one of the best parts of the day was the less-than-one-minute stop on the way back into the US, where we were very heartily welcomed HOME!!!

Life has been SOOOO busy the past month or so getting ready for this church-plant. I'm startin to think that it's actually going to happen! We're 4 weeks away from our first service, and almost every day it seems we hear of someone else who is interested or is looking for a good church in the area. It's so exciting to think that soon it will be more than just an ambiguous idea... that it will actually be a real, tangible, functioning, THRIVING church! We have great faith that it really will be thriving, too! God's going to do something awesome!!

As for the adoption, we have an official invitation to begin orientation with our agency on October 7! I can't wait to see how our lives are going to be different one year from now! :D So excited!

Well. Where to start?

The adoption? Still waiting to start. Still tired of waiting. It feels like literally all of my friends are mommies now. And I'm feeling sad again that I have yet to join the ranks of mommyhood. I've been so distracted by everything else that I hadn't been thinking about it much, but the past couple of days I've been thinking more again about things. It's almost starting to feel like it's not really ever going to happen. Like for so long (5 years next month!) it has been just the 2 of us, that I can't even imagine what it will be like for our family to be 3... and eventually more. When I talked to our social worker at the end of May, she told me we'd be getting started by the end of summer... so I hope she's right. Sigh. I just really want a baby. :*(

The church? It's going well... we're getting SO close to the church-plant! The first service is September 28th, and I can hardly believe that my husband is going to be a pastor!! He's so ready, which is awesome to see. God's still working on me about my job as a pastor's wife, too, but I'm getting a little more comfortable with the thought. He knows what He's doing, even if I don't! :)

Life in general? Busy! But good. We got to go "home" to WI last week, and spend time with lots of both sides of the families, which was really good. It was hard coming back this time, though, for some reason. Guess just with my sister's new baby and all, it was a reminder that we're not 5 minutes away anymore. Any time spent with them is precious. And as great as phone and email and all that is, it's just not the same as being there. But it does help to know that we're here for a good reason! :)

Well, my time is limited. God is good. Life is good. Just can't wait to be a mommy.

The waiting. Oh, how I hate the waiting.

So, I know the waiting is just beginning in the adoption process, but seriously. I hate waiting.
That whole, "oh, the first 3 months went really fast!" thing? Yeah, it was true, but this last month? Felt like a year. Is it too much to ask to just get things rolling??? I just want to be doing SOMETHING!!! It's just more true than ever to me that this life is just one big waiting game. Seriously, when I think about it, we waited until I was done with college to get married (maybe not as long as some people wait, but still...). Then we waited for 2 years for Troy to be closer to graduation before we started ttc. Then went of the pill, only to wait for 2 more years before we could take the time to have testing done. Then we waited for results. Then we waited to apply at the adoption agency just in case our apartment situation wouldn't work out. And now... we wait for them to contact us. Then when they do, and we get our homestudies and everything else all done, we'll wait again.
Sigh. Guess I better just get used to it.

My, oh my, oh my

And once again I find myself apologizing for the lack of entries... I have no excuse except to say that I only get on the internet about once a week these days, and what precious time I have is usually spent emailing or... well... I hate to admit it but Facebook usually pulls me in for a good hour or so! What? Really, it's NOT my fault, I swear it's like a time-warp that as soon as you sign in you go into 'Facebook time' and it feels like half an hour is equivalent to about 10 minutes of real time. Crazy. So anyway....

Call me a glutton for punishment, but I went to the girls weekend. It really wasn't all THAT bad. Not something I'd want to do every weekend, or even once a month for that matter, but it was definitely worth it to see my mom and sisters again. My sister is so great... she totally understands what it's like to be in my shoes, and she's SO considerate of my feelings. I'm so thankful for that. And I have the sweetest husband in the world who was praying for me the entire time, which I'm convinced made all the difference in the world. There was one point where I could have cried... but I didn't. I sucked it up and kept looking at the cute little clothes that I can only dream of having someone small enough to fit into someday. So that's what I did. I pretended that I COULD be buying things for OUR baby if I wanted to, but I was just choosing not to at that moment. Ha ha ha. Oh well, it worked for the time being. I know I could be buying things here and there for our baby... but I just haven't been able to bring myself to do it yet. Not yet. Maybe when we're officially invited to begin orientation. Maybe then it will feel right. But not quite yet.
Soon... soon our time will come.
As I was just looking back on my old posts I realized that I never really mentioned WHAT exactly we were waiting for. See, the adoption agency that we have chosen to go through (click here if you want to see their website) is a smaller agency, so they have set it up that they only work in a pool of 10 couples at a time. They gave us the reasoning that that way the birthmom (by the way, birthmom is not a real word according to Blogger. Ha!) isn't overwhelmed by too many couples to choose from, and also so that our money isn't tied up longer than it needs to be. Which, the money part is actually nice for us in our situation, but at the same time we're kind of chomping at the bit to actually BEGIN something. We were told that we had the option of going ahead with the homestudies if we'd like to, and then if anything comes up where a baby would come available from a source outside the agency we'd be all set to go, and then we'd just have to refer the birthparents to our agency... but I guess we're just a little hesitant to do that. SO, all that to say that we're just waiting to be put in the next pool of 10 couples that comes up. When that happens, we'll be invited to 'orientation' with the agency and then we'll be able to start homestudies and paperwork and our profile/birthparent letter. We also found out that if our homestudies come up while we're still in our 1 BR apartment, we'll be okay since MI doesn't have any laws stating anything against that. That was what we thought would be a major setback, but it turns out it won't be a problem. HOPEFULLY by the time we actually bring a baby home, we'll be in a house or at least a bigger apartment, but, well, if it were to happen sooner than we're expecting and we had to squeeze for a little while, we wouldn't complain. :) It just hit me yesterday that it's already been 3 months since we sent in our initial application. If the rest of the waiting time goes this fast, I'm thinking that we'll have a baby here before we know it. I hope...

Wish I could go on, but unfortunately that’s about all I have time and battery juice left for tonight.

I’m thinking of you all and wishing you well! ;)

A little help, please?? :)

So, I have a question....

What would YOU do if you were living an 8 hour drive from your family and had the chance to spend a weekend with your sister, mom, and sister in law? Well, that's a no-brainer, right? Okay, then let me complicate it a little.
For one, you... you're infertile, and on a waiting list with an adoption agency, with no clear timeline of how long you'll be on that waiting list, and you're so early on in the process that it isn't really real to you yet. Yeah, you'll be a mom... someday, but you're definitely not feeling like an expectant parent yet.
Okay, so with that out of the way, let me add that the sister? She's pregnant. 23 weeks, and really showing. And glowing. And although she was infertile for almost 10 years, she is (and rightfully so) thrilled and overwhelmed about this pregnancy and it's just about all she can talk about.
The sister in law? Oh, she'll have her 18 month old son with her, who is absolutely adorable, but in a room full of women will be ALL that she will talk about.
Add to that a mom who loves you very much, but has never been and will never be infertile, therefore doesn't really understand what comments hurt and which ones don't, so will undoubtedly say something over the course of the weekend that is hurtful. Of course she has the BEST of intentions, but sometimes things are just said that, well, you can't help it if they hurt.
And as much as you LOVE spending time with each of these girls... when they're all together... you just KNOW that ALL that they will be talking about, and shopping for, and eating for, etc etc etc... all weekend long, will be BABY. And unlike other family get-togethers, your ever-understanding husband WON'T be there, and well, since you'll be sharing a hotel room with these girls, there will be no. escape. No place to go cry. No place to go and NOT think about babies.

But you really want to see your family. And maybe, just maybe, it won't be as bad as you think.

What would YOU do?

Thoughts

Where oh where to start? Guess I'll just jump right in with some thoughts that have been bouncing around in my head regarding the adoption, in light of my sister's pregnancy and another friend announcing a pregnancy. (I still need this place as my "release" for my infertile thoughts, I guess. Funny, cause I've really been thinking about things less since we've committed to the adoption, but I def still think about them... and now that I don't have this outlet, I feel like things are getting bottled up, even though I still have my husband and my sister. I miss you girls. *tear*) Now where was I? Oh yeah, so we sent in our preliminary application with the first fee so that they can do the background checks and all that on us, and with that being done, and my sister arming me with a whole library of adoption reading (most recent read is Raising Adopted Children by Lois Ruskai Melina - which I'd definitely recommend! Oh, and some sweet anonymous person sent me a free subscription to Adoptive Families magazine! Wow! Love it!) So in light of these developments, lately I've been thinking about the whole pregnancy vs. adoption thing, not that there needs to be a comparison, but you know, when you can't have one, you kind of tend to compare these things. Sheesh, what's with the rabbit trails tonight? Guess that's what happens when it's been so long! :) So anyway - as I'm thinking about this, I started feeling bad again about missing out on the whole pregnancy experience. And as I'm sitting there feeling sorry for myself, I start analyzing why exactly it is that I'm feeling badly about this. I mean, I really think I CAN go without the whole pregnancy/birthing experience, I mean REALLY, I don't think I mind not having morning sickness and sore boobs and crazy hormones and weight gain and all that fun :), I'm really okay with that. I'm even okay with not ever being able to have a positive pregnancy test, with never feeling that first "flutter" of feeling my little baby inside me, never being able to let my husband feel a kick for the first time, or see a combination of the two of us in a sweet little face. I've come to terms with all of that, and I'm okay with it. Really.
What I really think that I'm missing now is just the... "normalness" of all of it. I'm missing the absolute time-frame of everything, where you KNOW that bada-bing, bada-boom, nine months later out pops a baby. I'm missing expectancy of it - KNOWING that my husband and I are going to be parents soon, and being able to announce it as such. I'm missing having other people be as excited as we are about the FACT that we will be parents soon. I'm missing having the constant reminder of it in front of me (literally!), and hearing sweet comments from strangers that I'm going to be a mommy soon - the way I feel when I see a pregnant girl - all the warm, fuzzy feelings of excitement and congratulations and questions of a due date and how they're feeling and... and, I don't know. Does this make any sense? Cause in my head it does, but I guess now that I get it all out in the open it doesn't seem quite as valid.
Troy says that things will get better when we get into it a little farther, when we're closer to it and people will recognize that we really, truly are going to be parents through this. Since, you know, we'll be talking about it so much that they won't have a choice but remember it. :) But I want that now! I want the simplicity of just.being.pregnant.
I guess I really just want to communicate that I am SO excited about the prospect of adoption and ALL that goes along with it, but I wish that other people got as excited about it as they do about pregnancy, and treated it as such. I don't mean to complain. I'm more than content... I'm elated, knowing that we will get the privilege of being a part of the adoption community, which is a special thing that not everyone does, and that we will get to see God working in our lives in this way. I know that in the end we'll have a baby, that we'll be parents, and even have a richer understanding of what that means and what a huge blessing it is...
but if I'm perfectly, blatantly honest, I wish some things about adoption could be different.