Christmas in Pictures

Merry Christmas from our Family to Yours!!

Time Line

I want to remember what our timeline looked like, so I am going to blog it!!!

October 2012: Called to request information

November 2012: Started the paperwork and home visits

February 2013: Official License in our hands!!!!! YEAH!!!

April 2013: Call for a respite weekend and accepted

May 29, 2013: Emergency Call for a placement: WE SAID YES!!!

July 2013: Permanency Plan hearing (my first time in a courtroom----very nervous!!!)

September 2013: B's 4th birthday!!

October 2013: Permanency Plan hearing, change plan from reunification to adoption---Holy Crap!

December 2013: Christmas for THREE!!!

January 2014: Termination of Parental Rights court hearing

January 2014: Move from County Social Workers to Adoption Workers

February 2014-April 2014: Nothing much---Life goes on

May 2014: Adoption Class

July 2014:  All paperwork done, physicals done, fingerprints done, schedule adoption

August 15, 2014: IT'S ADOPTION DAY!!!!!!

Emotions

When we started this process of fostering, we never thought that things would go as quickly as they did.  We were used to things going slowly,  We tried for seven years to get pregnant..  It was failure after failure.  It was tears. It was anger.  It was painful.  It was all kinds of emotions rolled into one word: 

Infertility.  

What a painful word.  I remember this post I did on Face.book during Infertility Awareness Week:

"I have struggled with words for days. How to put into words the many thoughts in my mind? So here goes nothing:

The world of infertility is hard. Month after month, year after year of emptiness. How do we cope and continue to live when we want a child is always foremost in our minds? We have been blessed with a lovely Sweetie while doing foster care and hopefully soon she will be ours forever! While this road is not for everyone, this is the way we choose to expand our family for right now. Please know there are couples who struggle daily with the life of infertility. My advice to you is to be a ear to listen, a shoulder to cry on and have an open heart to understand what their life is. Thank you to our friends and family who supported us during the 7 years of our struggle and who continue to support us as we grow our family through foster care and adoption!!!"

We were blown away with the support that we got!!!  My favorite was my best friends comment:

"You, my friend, are stronger than you believe and have more love than you give yourself credit for. Little Miss is extremely lucky, but do not feel that you have to pretend the first 7 years did not happen. The struggle will always remain a part of who you have become. A stronger, more loving mother."

The emotional roller coaster ride has had plenty of ups and downs.  But we strongly believe in what we are doing---changing the life of one child and hopefully someday soon another one.  At the end of the day, we are thankful that every morning we wake up to this face and tuck her in at night.

Four Months ago......

......we went from this: 

to this:

Here are some of my favorite moments from the day!!

It's official!!! 

 We had the courtroom full of these amazing people!  We are incredibly blessed beyond words.  

We are now a family of three.  

We are a family.  

Family.  

Love.

In less than 12 hours.......

.......it will become official.

My heart is full.  Words can not express how extremely blessed we are.  This little girl came into our life unsure of what the future held.  Within a short period of time, she was calling us Mommy and Daddy.  The first time I heard those words, I cried.  There has been many tears; of happiness, sadness, anger, heartbreak for a numerous amount of things.  But regardless of those tears, there has been way more moments of laughter, giggles, making memories, and moments that will forever stay in our hearts.

We can't thank our family and friends enough for the love, support and encouragement that we have received.  We are so incredibly lucky to have these people in our lives.  No one has batted an eye at our decision to become foster parents, or our choice to pursue adoption as a way to start our family.  We could say thank you and we love you a million times and it still would not feel like it is enough.

To our little Tinkerbell, our little Sweetie, our little B---Thank you for letting us be your parents.  Thank you for letting us teach you, parent you, protect you, make memories with you, and giggle with you.  Most of all, thank you for letting us love you.  And thank you for loving us unconditionally with no boundaries.  We are amazed by you and will continue to love you.  Forever.

Forever, Little B, we will love you forever!!!

10

Ten days until adoption.

Ten days until adoption!

We will be in the single digits tomorrow.

Nervous: Yes.
Excited: Yes
Thrilled: Yes.
Ready to watch our family grow:  Absolutely.

It seems so long ago that we got placed with Little Sweetie and now the day is finally coming!

Ten.

Ten.

15 days.

15.
Fifteen.
1 and 5.

That is how many days until ADOPTION DAY!!

Yep, you read that right!!

We are well on our way to becoming a family of 3!!!!

We are excited beyond belief!!! We never in a million years thought that our very first placement, while doing foster care, would end in adoption.  Never.  We love Little Sweetie (yes, in 15 days, I will tell you her name!!!) and now can't imagine our life without her.  She makes us smile and laugh.  Her laugh is contagious and her smile makes my heart happy.  She captured the hearts of our family and friends and we are so thankful that they have had no reservations about loving her!  It has made the transition into our family so smooth!!

We met with a lawyer earlier this week to make sure that everything is in place.  Updated all the paperwork we needed to do.  We are ready as we will ever be!!

Ready or not, we are adopting a little girl who stole our hearts 15 months ago.  We can't wait for her to steal our last name!

The next 15 days may be the longest in our life!!!


Cara

My love hate relationship.

I have a love hate relationship with holidays.  Mainly for one reason.  And mainly for a selfish reason.

Holidays are for families.

But what if you don't have the society's take on a family (you know, the 2.5 children, white picket fence and the dog), what are you and your husband?  Are you a family?  Are you a couple?  Some couple decide not to have children.  We, as a society, have to be okay with that.  Some couples struggle for years to get pregnant and don't choose to live a childless life.  Some couples foster children who may be returned to their biological parents.  Some foster children will be placed into a forever home to be adopted.

I know that we are creating a family by adopting Little Sweetie.  I know that we making a difference in her life.  To hear her say "Happy Daddy's Day" to Jeremy this morning melted my heart.  But it also made me tear up.

For those dads who are in heaven.

For those men who want more than anything to be a dad.

For the dads who take a father role to children that are not biologically theirs.

For the moms who raise children on their own because a man didn't step up to be a father.

We love Little Sweetie and can not wait to have that paper in our hands that say she is legally ours.  She has made our family whole.  I know that my Dad in heaven is watching over us and I know that he would love her to pieces.  I am so lucky to have had my Dad for 25 years!  I wish I could have him for 25 more!!

Love you Dad!

Check, Check, and CHECK!

Checking off the boxes.

Filling out the paperwork.

Sitting in a training for two days.

Those three things have been our life the past few months.  We are getting closer and closer to finalizing the adoption.  To say that we are happy is not the truth.

We are THRILLED!   We are beyond happy!!  We have no words to explain how we are feeling.

Does it mean that we aren't scared? Nope.  We have moments of fear.  The unknowns are scary.  What unknowns could there be?

What if the adoption falls through?
What if the judge says no?
What if something shows up the day before adoption?
What do we do when B starts asking questions?  How do we answer them?
What if the answers we give her don't satisfy her need to connect to her birth family?
What if she has more needs in the future that we didn't know about at this time?

......and the list could go on.

We know through the training that we sat through the last two days that we have post adoption resources that we will have to utilize if need be.  Jeremy and I say all the time how thankful and blessed he are to have such wonderful support from friends and family.  We also know that we may have to use other support systems.  And that is okay.   We will be okay with that.

Hopefully, in my next update, I will be able to tell you the day of the adoption!  I can wait to share photos of B and the things that we have done in the last year!

Until next time.......

Three Months Later.........

What have we done in the last three months???

**The termination of Parental Rights (TPR) happened on January 15th.  The birth parents had 30 days to contest the ruling.  We waited on bated breath that February 15th would come and go with out any word.  And it did!!  The birth parents did not contest.  (insert tears of joy and fear!)

**We then met with the Special Needs Adoption Social Worker.  There is A LOT of paperwork we need to complete.  Home Studies can take a lot---how did Jeremy and I meet (online), what was our life growing up (pretty good), how do we parent (as a team, most of the time), how do we solve problems (I am always right!).  There are questionnaires to complete.  References to give.  

**We have met with the Adoption social worker three times now.  Tonight was the last night for the home study, which we are now done with.  Now all is left is a few paperwork issues (birth certificates, marriage certificates, insurance policies, etc)

**In June, we will take a two day class.  Then we are set!

**In the best news, our social worker said tonight that if everything continues to go well, we will be able to schedule the adoption for AUGUST!!!!!!!  We are beyond thrilled!  I had tears in my eyes when our SW told us that!  August!!!  That is in 4 months!!!!  FOUR!!!!  

**We will have to find a lawyer, as our county requires it in all adoption cases.  Then we go to the courthouse, pick a date and we can do the adoption.  

After tonight, it has become real.  We will really get to adopt Little Sweetie and she will be FOREVER ours!!  We can not wait to be a FOREVER FAMILY!!!

All our love,

J, C and Little Sweetie

What will 2014 hold?

What will 2014 hold for us?

That question can not be answered with certainty right now.  What I can tell you is what we hope for.

We hope for a fast court date on January 15th, 2014.  We pray that nothing will come up that we aren't expecting and that if something does we can prepare for the emotions that may be attached to it.

We hope for the birth parents making the most informed decision for their child.

We hope that we can move forward with adoption and that the process will go smoothly.

We hope that we can provide everything Little Sweetie needs in her life.

We pray for other families going through the same things as us and pray for others who have their own struggles in making a family.

We pray for friends that give us strength and love Little Sweetie.

We hope for good health throughout the year.

We thank our friends and families for the support, courage, love, shoulders to cry on, ears to listen to us for the past year and hope that it continues.

We hope for continued prayers.

2014 will be a great year!  We hope yours will be also!

C&J