the gifties keep rollin' in

Merry Christmas to our sweet baby darling deer.

we did not ask for any presents this year that were not baby oriented.  after all, we need tons of things before this little one gets here!  everyone entertained us and purchased items off the registry.  super helpful, so we will be ready whenever we get this process started.

our dear friends delaine, alex, and caleb sent a giant box of prezzies last week - all of which were for the sweet baby deer!

this box was chock full of cloth diapers, diapering notes, and washes.  the adorable little giraffe goes ever so sweetly with the giraffe mama and papa taylor gave us back at my birthday.  delaine took special care to write notes on each type of diaper and wipe, and even pre-washed items that required extra laundering!

Christmas this year was at will's folks.  his folks got us the baby monitor and diaper sprayer from our registry and also picked up some additional books for the baby's growing library!  (we are heading out this afternoon to check out some sales on shelving to get the things out of what was formerly the craft room closet to get this back into the baby zone.  we need a place to put all of these wonderful things!)

so touching how so many people have given us such special treasures before our little one has even been scheduled to arrive.  we cannot thank everyone enough for their love and support through this process.  all of this preparation has helped us to finally see how this is really happening for us, and that after all of the years of planning we really are nearing a family of three.  Merry Christmas indeed.

making Christmas merry

sometimes when things are difficult you take what is right in front of you for granted. 

not being 100% sure why, this Christmas just seems more difficult than any other has ever been.  last night i walked past a picture in our bathroom that we took on a trip to the ilse of palms in sc after having to cancel our trip to mexico when we found out our first sweet baby was probably not going to make it into this world.  i see that picture every day.  we were so happy - even with the news we'd been given - because we held out hope that the dr. was wrong and that this precious baby inside me would grow to term and spend it's life with us.  looking at the picture last night reminded me of all of the stepping stones we've used to get across this river, and that no matter how raging the river was, that will was there - right beside me - holding my hand.


i know that there is a possibility that this will be our last Christmas alone, and so i hope we can take it slowly - minute by minute - and treasure every single thing that unfolds between now and then.  will is my protector, my best friend, my soul mate, my reassurance, and the daddy-o of our future babies.  i hope on this Christmas, more than ever before he knows how wonderfully remarkable he is, and how i just cannot wait to raise babies with him.

MERRY CHRISTMAS 2010!

books

i've never been a big reader.  my folks never really read us too many bed time stories and i when i had spare time, i was sure to find something "better" to do than to sit down and read a book.

however, i love reading books to children.  i love adding the voices and inflection to help keep the story interesting.  when i worked at a pre-school right after college i made sure to have story time every day.  will and i have chatted about how we plan on reading bed time stories and keeping a bookcase full of books in the baby's room.  hopefully our teaching our baby to love reading will help me regain appreciation for it as well.

it was a great surprise when kathy and mark gave us this story book for the baby last night.

i attempted to make my way through the story while we were making dinner last night.  i got a few pages in and found the tears were making it too hard to read.  this is the page that hung me up.

will took over and finished the remainder of the book.  such an amazingly sweet little story about God matching the adopted baby to the perfect family.  even though i know this is exactly how this is supposed to work, i was still getting antsy about the pace at which things are moving.  we are not even at the point where we are on a wait list (nor will we be for some time yet), but i was already getting worked up about the waiting game.  however, this story book will help me remember that this is all happening at God's pace - and God has the perfect plan in store.

baby it's cold outside

in the patience there is a stillness.

sometimes GOD gives us this wintery mix to slow us down, remind us of what is important, and show us how beautiful our world is. 

so thankful for the slow down so we could refocus today.

patience

got an email from Bethany Christian tonight.  i was hoping for a packet - the next steps - the seminar - something.  it was a Christmas card - and don't get me wrong, it was wonderful - just not what i thought we needed right at that moment.

seems like we've had lots of lessons in patience through the years.  i mean, it's not like we just showed up on this journey without a lot of hard work to get to this point, and it took us 6 years of being infertile to know we were on the right path.  however, now that the initial paperwork is in it seems like we need patience now more than ever.

we know there are going to be things we cannot control - the time line in which everything happens on everyone else's end is one of those things - the critical one of those things.  we are just so over the moon ready for this to happen it seems like we're in the home stretch, when really we have not even begun.

so - we're going to work on our patience, and trust in GOD to know that when the right baby is born HE will send us right to them.

generosity

lots of things begin for us with food.  we're what you call - foodies - so it's only natural that one of my goals this past year was to become YELP elite.  YELP was a way that i could justify my fascination with taking photos of food, and we figured it would be a great way to get out and meet people with common interests.  when i received the honorary YELP elite status i had to call those family members who'd even know what YELP was, so they could help me celebrate my new status. 


we went to multiple elite events, husband even received the elite status himself - yet we never found anyone at those events that seemed to mesh with us.  being a nosy nelly i find myself interested in other's profiles.  you can learn about people, see what their favorite food groups are, what they like to do outside of their food obsessions, and see what you have in common.  i'd friended a gal  a while back who seemed to share common interests in her profile, and we'd briefly chatted on the website, but nothing had gone beyond this. 


that all changed a few months ago. 


i'd stumbled across her profile again - i really do not even know what lead me back to the page - but i'd noticed that she'd changed her settings talking about her "new son".  i'd followed links before to her blog and found myself wrapped back up in her family's story.  come to find out - they'd just adopted.  i reached out to her, not knowing what type of response i'd get, but knowing that we had nothing to loose by trying to touch base and make a connection to another local couple who'd been through the adoption process.


cathy and steve surprised us with their welcoming open arms approach.  we shared emails back and forth for weeks - just getting to know each other.  we met them for lunch, they introduced us to their sweet baby, brought us gifts, shared their profile book with us, and really connected with us and where we were in our journey.  will and i were in awe of how tremendously giving they were - even after the first time we met them.


we've continued to email back and forth and they've been a constant source of inspiration for the use of cloth diapers, guiding us to answers for questions we did not even know we had, sharing their struggles and triumphs with us, and encouraging us every step of the way. 


last night we met them again for a meal at their home.  knowing that our friendship all started with YELPING, we knew we had to come up with a tasty little dessert.  will and i baked up a nice little batch of cupcakes and resisted the urge to sample them on the way over to their house. 

they welcomed us in, let us play with their son, gave us instructions and more advice on cloth diapering (my new favorite topic), cooked a delicious meal for us, and sat and chatted with us for hours.  we could have gone on chatting the entire night, but we knew we had to let them to go bed sometime - after all, they have a newborn!  they blew us out of the water with their genuine caring for our situation and their generosity.  we left their home with a custom made adoption ornament, a gift bag with a plethora of burt's bees products, and some g diapers.  the abundance of amazing gifts was unbelievable, but we were even more touched by their openness and willing to connect with us on a personal level and provide support to us when we've needed it most.  they know what we've been through, what we're going through, and what to most likely expect next.  they reminded us in their Christmas card to never forget their support is here for us.

steve does amazing work for burt's bees and gifted us some amazing products!  the abundance of products will keep us out of aveda and the drug store and saving even more money for our adoption!

cathy told me about cloth diapering when we first started chatting.  i initially thought it was not something we could "handle", but cathy brought me diapers and showed me how simple they were, and really encouraged me to investigate it more.  last night she showed me about 6 different types of diapers and gave us some that she'd used up to this point.

cathy handed us a wrapped gift along with their gorgeous Christmas card.  we could not believe it when we opened the box to find a custom made adoption ornament. ( just thinking about it, makes me start to cry again.)

we just hope that what they are doing for us we can thank them enough for, and can someday do something similar for someone else who is in the "adoption pre-game" situation.  it's people like this that make you stop and realize just how life altering a simple decision can be.  it was my desire to share my foodie photos with people and our hope to find new friendships that led us to YELP which led us to the friendship with cathy and steve.  we've gained so much more than what we sought after, we just cannot be thankful enough.

request for additional info...

today we got an e-mail confirming receipt of our initial application.

wahoo!

not quite...

they also requested additional details for one of the questions we answered affirmatively.  we figured this would happen, so we're not totally devastated.  however, i was just excited to have us moving on to the next stage.  i was hoping this email with attachment was the GIANT application, but maybe we will get that shortly!

in other news - we're set all up for Christmas.  will said this was the most excited he's ever been to set up the Christmas tree, and he helped from start to finish.  (hopefully he will have that same enthusiasm when it's time to take it all down.)

our most favorite thing is our nativity scene gifted to us from will's folks a few years back.  it is made from olive wood and each piece is hand carved.  above is the sweet baby Jesus - the reason for the season!

hallelujah

we've officially begun the adoption process! 

after a year of seeking, researching, chatting, reading blogs, friending "strangers" on the internet, and submerging ourselves in God's plan - we've finally reached a milestone.  today was the day when we took or initial application to the post office.

we requested the paperwork back in july, but felt we were just not ready to decide which agency we were going with.  after further research and connections with fellow adopters who were working with Bethany Christian Services, we decided they were the agency we'd like to go with.  we're very happy with their work with the expectant parent(s) and feel like their mission is aligned with ours - to find the baby that God wants us to parent.  we know now that we needed the additional four months to get to the right spot on our journey and we can both tell you that we are SO READY to be PARENTS!

it did not take us very log to get this stage of the paperwork completed.  however, i tried to be extra diligent in requesting doctor's letters etc. for any questions that we answered affirmatively on the initial paperwork regarding our medical conditions etc.  we are hoping that the more diligent that we are initially, the faster this process will go.  only time shall tell!

we'll keep you posted with each step, but at this point we're just stoked to have gotten the first set of paperwork into the mail, and to really be in the works!

this is our packet of papers for the initial application.

this is the special padded mailer we purchased to ensure our photo and papers would arrive safely.

here we are!  right before going in the post office to get this paperwork into the hands of the mail carrier!

here we go!