While We Wait: August 2016 (Month #8)

Adoption related stuff:

August presented us with some frustrations... We had hoped to have our home study updated by the end of August (following our move + some forms that need updated annually no matter what) but ran into two hurdles: 1) the fire inspector told us that he can't come inspect our house until September 20th (we had submitted the request in early August); 2) Dan's CPS (child protective services) clearance form was sent to the county by our agency but somehow the results never came back, even though Bethany's form was sent at the same time and her results came back quickly.

Bummer. There's really nothing we can do about this! It's frustrating for sure. Following the advice of our agency, we resubmitted Dan's CPS form in case the first is just hopelessly lost. And thankfully our agency let us schedule our home study in-house visit with our social worker for September 7th, before the fire inspection. Usually you have to have all the paperwork and inspections done before doing that. So now we are looking at the end of September to get back in the "pool." We are very ready!! It is hard to wait and stay patient, but as a wise adoptive mom friend told us, God has our child chosen for us already. We believe that and are so eager to meet him or her.

We did update our profile book in August. This is the book that prospective birthparents will look at to get to know us a bit and see if they want to choose us to adopt their child. We were pleased with our book already but wanted to add in some pictures from our new house plus some update pictures of us. One new page we added was one with some fun, goofy pictures to show that side of our personalities! It's a challenge with a book to portray the "real you" - pictures can only go so far. We are pleased with the updated book and excited to show it to possible birthparents when that time comes! (By the way, we used Mixbook and highly recommend it for any photo book project.)

Finally, we attended one "waiting parents" meeting at our agency. This one was a little different than the usual set-up of lecture plus Q&A. The leaders gave each table a set of real-life adoption scenarios that had happened at our agency. We were told what the adoptive parents were first told: some information about the expectant mom and dad, their families, health histories, remaining questions, and so on, and then as a table we had to discuss about what information we would want to know, and how to proceed with this situation. It was really interesting! I'm pleased that we came up with many ideas that the agency staff affirmed would have been good next steps - looks like we've learned something about adoption! :) The exercise brought home in a new way how complex adoption is, how many different factors are involved, and how every single situation is so different. Holy Spirit, give us wisdom!

Other stuff we did:

We are still getting settled into our new house and new town and are loving it! We are happy that there are several adoptive families very close by. That will be a wonderful asset to have when at last we adopt.

Dan firing up the grill for the first time

Also in August we were blessed to be "witnesses" at a good friend's wedding. The couple chose to have married couples process with them into the church instead of a typical bridal party. They said they chose us because we have been an example of a good marriage to them, so we felt very honored by that!

We went to a play put on by the youth group at our new parish: "Narnia, the Musical." It was really well done! We were impressed with the talent and effort everyone had put in. It's fun now to see the same kids out of costume and say "hey, weren't you Mr. Tumnus? Weren't you a squirrel?" and see how proud they are of their roles.

Finally, we took part of a Saturday this month to do a mini-retreat together. We went to the National Lourdes Grotto in Emmitsburg, MD, about an hour away. It was such a beautiful, peaceful location on top of a hill. There was a lovely replica of the Lourdes Grotto, a charming little chapel, and a Rosary walk. It was so good to have the time set apart to go and pray together. We prayed a lot for our future child (God willing) and everyone out there who is considering adoption or part of the process in any way.

Praying for the gift of a child (let's be honest!)

In front of the pool fed by the mountain spring

We hope you had a great August, and thanks for your prayers!