Home Study Underway! August 28, 2007

Hello everyone! We booked all of our homestudy visits today with our social worker. I spoke with her on the phone and she sounds amazing. She is getting all our visits done very quickly and will send our paperwork in as soon as we have completed our education seminar. The timeline for this is much faster than CAFAC had thought, so we are very excited.

One interesting thing I learned today from her is that a few years ago the parents didn’t have to fill out the massive thirty essay questionaire. The social worker used to be responsible to get all of that information during the visits. Wow. What a responsibility for them! Now it must be so much easier to read all of it ahead, have some knowledge going in, and be able to ask clarifying questions and really get to know the couple in a more relaxed setting.

Our first meeting will be during the second week of school already. We’ll be done by the end of September! It took quite a bit of schedule arranging and some finesse on my part (ask me later) to make these meetings work, but they are on the calendar now and we hope that all goes well and they can happen as scheduled.

Good news August 21, 2007

Dave and I have been following the adoption of a little Ethiopian girl by a family in our church. Their paperwork was in Ethiopia and they were awaiting their referral for over ten months (very long compared to many people). Well, they got their referral this week! An adorable little girl who they hope to bring home soon. We were privillaged to see pictures of her and, boy is she a cutie! After such a long wait we are very happy for Lisa and Bill and their kids. Congrats!

Adoption update! August 21, 2007

Hey everyone! It’s been a bit of a break as we had a family wedding and holidays. I didn’t think I’d have an adoption update so soon, but we had two e-mails in our box today! What are the chances?

The first was from our social worker who has received our papers, read them, and is in the process of doing her preliminary write-up. She only received the packet on Friday, so we’re super impressed with her already!! She sounds very nice and we should have our four appointments booked with her soon.

The second e-mail was from CAFAC, letting us know that almost all our paperwork was in! The medical forms were sent from our clinic and arrived safely. Now we are awaiting two referrals from family friends. (Two are done, thank you very much!) I’m hoping that with a bit of arm twisting we can get those in this week so that we don’t slow things down! Other than that, CAFAC gave us the impression that things were moving along at a good clip!

baby clothes August 10, 2007

My sister Marsha came to town yesterday (she lives in B.C.) and brought me a double stroller, a whole rubbermaid tub of infant clothes and some toys her kids had outgrown. It was so much fun today to sort through some of the clothes. It’s still a long time until we will need them, but I have room to store them until they are needed. I’ve always given all my kids clothes away to friends and family, and it’s nice to be on the recieving end!

While I was looking for a planter in the shed last week, I found that we still had a little trike, a pool, and a cute riding tractor with a trailer. I had been so sure I had gotten rid of all our little kids stuff, so it was a fun surprise to find them! They will all be put to good use once again.

Update August 9, 2007

Dave had his medical today and we managed to get our bloodwork done. Not without some excitement, but I’ll let Dave tell you about that on his own. All of our paperwork got dropped at the mail this morning with shouts of horray from the kids! It sure was a thick envelope!

The lab work should be done next week sometime and then sent on to CAFAC. Hopefully the last of the refferal letters will be sent in this week and then we’ve done everything we’ve been asked to do.

Paperwork is done!!!!! August 8, 2007

We just finished printing all our paperwork! Tomorrow morning I’m off to mail it to CAFAC. I can’t tell you how good it felt to see those pages coming off the printer! We’ll finish our medicals tomorrow and get the last of the blood work done. Then we wait for our social worker to contact us and help us get the dossier together. The first milestone is done!

testing and waiting August 8, 2007

Today is an in between day. Both Dave and I have now had our TB testing and are protecting the little penned circle on our arms. Tomorrow they check them at the clinic and we will be cleared!

One medical done! August 7, 2007

I just came from the Doctor and my medical is done. It wasn’t as bad as I had envisioned. The TB test is just a little shot which they check in two days. The rest is mostly bloodwork which I will do with Dave on Thursday. It feels really great to have one more “to do” checked off the list!

Now we just need to finish our paperwork. I said yesterday that we were done. Well I read Dave’s today and he left out a section.! I’m sure not on purpose , but we’ll need to finish that tonight.

Adoption update August 6, 2007

Today Dave and I are finishing all our paperwork to send in to CAFAC. It has taken a little longer than we (o.k. I) had hoped, but we will be done in a few hours! For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of filling out those questionnaires, it is refreshingly grueling. Refreshing because Dave and I have had an amazing time bonding over reviewing so much of our lives. Grueling, because they really don’t leave any question unasked and there is a lot of detail.

Even before we began the questions we had to send in an application to CAFAC. That was perhaps the hardest part. We knew we wanted to bring home two children. What age? What sex? What sorts of medical issues? On and on the list went. We stopped at one point and really struggled with it, knowing every check mark would eliminate the chance of some children being adopted into our family. We finally decided that there were some things we really wanted, and some we would leave open. We all (our kids included) really wanted to have another girl. But what about the second one? We left it open. It will be a surprise! We did a lot of reading and finally felt good about requesting children under the age of three. That was so hard!! What about the cute four year olds that we see on other adoption blogs? That simple request eliminated them. It felt like we were ordering from a catalogue. That’s not how you’re supposed to get a baby! We know why we had to do it, but it didn’t make it easier. Health issues were another concern. We finally did what we thought we could handle and left it at that.

So now we’re off to our Doctor this week to get our medical clearance. All the paperwork should be in the mail on Thursday afternoon! Then we wait for our appointment with our social worker.

Some days I get frustrated, knowing that this process is going to take a very long time. Other days I’m so excited we have started the journey and don’t really care that it will take two years. (I have so much I want to get done before they come home!) Often I forget and just live our normal life, and then someone will say or do something and I will instantly be thousands of miles away.

A friend asked me the other day if it was weird thinking that our children might be born already, living a world away. Yes, yes, and yes! Mostly I find myself thinking of their parents. I can’t imagine having to give my children up, or the circumstances that would lead to that decision. I pray for them every time I think of them.

chocolate bunnies August 6, 2007

Our journey to adoption has been longer than I had anticipated. Along the way there were many cheerleaders who would encourage us and let us know that the timing would be right “some day”. My grandmother was one of my greatest cheerers. She knew my heart was in Africa, wanting to bring babies home to Canada. Unfortunately she passed away last June, before we started our paper work. Before she died she told me that someday she would see my chocolate bunnies. “Chocolate bunnies” was the term she always used to refer to the children I wanted to bring home from Ethiopia. It was a term of endearment for her. She had traveled to Africa with my grandpa when I was very young and her stories fueled my desire to someday go there myself.

I find myself getting teary, wishing that she were here to see that we have in fact started our official paperwork. We have begun the long awaited process and have applied to bring home two siblings from Ethiopia. In every way the timing seems so right, except that she will not be here to greet them with a kiss when we finally bring them home.