Still Waiting

We couldn't stand it anymore so Clinton called our attorney's office. Our birth mother has gone to visit her mom for her birthday. I am assuming that this means she is telling her mom about the pregnancy (it is a little hard to cover up at this point). I am actually very happy about this fact. Last week she did not want her family to know under any circumstances. I know if it were my daughter I would definitely want to be there to support her. She might be reconsidering raising the baby herself. However, I feel like she is really thinking this through and will be confident in whatever decision she makes. We were given some tips on how to ensure that the birth mothers heart and head are aligned ( the heart will always win no matter what the head says). I feel confident I will be able to tell if and when we meet her.

At least there are a couple of conversations in my head that have been put to rest ( which makes me feel better) - she has in fact received our resume and it did not get lost in the mail and our attorney is in contact with her and we will get a definite yes or no answer ( I wasn't sure how much "space" and thinking time the mother was given before she was contacted by our attorney). All in all I think this is a good thing. We should hear something either tomorrow or Wednesday. So for the time being we are still waiting.

Just Waiting

Today is a beautiful day in sunny southern Ca! Clinton and I had breakfast at our favorite restaurant in Laguna Beach with Annabelle. He then played basketball while we hung on the beach. The beach was packed and everywhere you looked this was you guessed it - babies! We then came back and went to go look at baby furniture. We are now being patient and "just waiting". This is a very nerve wracking part. A million thoughts have gone through my head. Everything from "I wonder if she has received our resume yet" and "oh I hope it didn't get lost in the mail" and " I sure hope she likes our resume" and " I know she is going to call Monday or Tuesday" and " Oh I hope she didn't lose the attorneys number" and " I wonder what she is feeling right now" and " What if she has decided that she can raise a baby and doesn't want to choose an adoption plan" AAHHH! I can tell you that this waiting part is not very fun.It is the unknown that is driving me crazy. I am just staying positive and diplomatic with the attitude " It will happen if it is meant to!" With that said, I don't think I will look at anymore "baby gear" until our file is officially open. After all, if she is interested in meeting us than there is the little issue of actually meeting her! Yikes! more butterflies! Anyway, like I said we are "just waiting". I will let you know when we hear something.

We met with the adoption attorney today

Today we met with the adoption attorney. It was a very good meeting. I got many of my questions answered. He gave us positive things to look for as well as red flags when meeting with a birth mother. We are going to proceed with the case I mentioned in the last post. The next step is that he will give her our resume and she will decide whether or not she is interested in us. If she feels comfortable and picks us ( I forgot to ask if he was going to give her any other resumes besides ours) then we will have a conversation on the phone with her and meet her for lunch or dinner. We will meet and decide if it is a match for both of us. If everyone is comfortable then we will open a file and we will proceed. If everything works out then we will talk with her and decide what our relationship will "look like". We will discuss going to her doctors appointments with her, being present at the birth, how much contact she will have after the birth, etc.... We know that anything can happen and are not getting our hopes up ,however, we are very excited about this particular birth mother! It just "feels right". If it is meant to happen then it will.

We had our first "pathways" meeting last night ( the classes our homestudy agency requires). It was definitely very interesting. I guess that LA is a little different then anywhere else. There were 3 other couples there last night. All of them had already adopted 1 child and were on their 2nd adoption. Also, I was the only woman in the room besides the social worker. We were the only heterosexual couple there! I guess you can say that the pendulum has definitely swung in the other direction. They were a group of very nice men. It was good to hear the experiences of the "old pros" for us "newbies". We found what they had to say very useful. We have 3 more meetings before we are complete with the classes.

My Nana's neck is acutally doing better. They have a cervical collar on her because they cannot do surgery due to her bad heart ( she has been in congestive heart failure for sometime now). They said it would take 3 to 4 months to heal. The only thing is now she has pneumonia. Your prayers and thoughts are still appreciated. Thanks!

Shopping for Baby!

So besides the bad news that we received about my grandmother on Sunday, Saturday was actually a great day for us. We went shopping and bought some necessities. We wanted to get the bear neccessities "just in case". We are now the proud owners of a carseat, bassinet, lots of cute clothes - for a boy or a girl, soft blankets, newborn diapers ( they are just the cutest), bottles, cloth diapers and a snugli. We also bought everything we need for bath time and diapering time. There is so much that we still need to purchase, but I feel that if we got a call at the last minute we could at least bring the baby home and survive a couple of days.

Speaking of getting calls. We have made progress today. We got our classes scheduled that are necessary for a domestic adoption by our homestudy agency ( a feat in itself) and the best news is that we got a call from our adoption agency. They have another couple they are referring us to. They are 2 college students and the baby is due in May! The agency e-mailed us their picture and they are a beautiful latino / european couple! We have to find out more details tormorrow. The one thing I do know is that the adoption is a little out of our price range, so we have to see if we can make it work. We will not make any rash decisions. We will get all the details and weigh our options. If it is meant for us to have this little one then we will. I believe that God knows what he is doing and will give us the baby we are meant to have!

Here is one of our purchases from the weekend. Annabelle let me use her as a guinea pig. She resisted being put in it at first, but then loved it and did not want to get out. She enjoyed being carried around by her mama! You can see our other "kids" from around the world in the background. We help to support 20 children from around the world every month. We are constantly getting letters and pictures from them. It is a great feeling!

Sad News

My Nana fell this weekend and broke her neck. Your thoughts and prayers are appreciated. Thanks.

More follies and a little about Annabelle

Now for some more classroom follies. Today our students dressed up like their favorite character from their favorite book to help celebrate "authors week". We had students in every imaginable costume. One of my first graders ( a very girly girl 7 year old) dressed up like a princess - actually how she put it -she was dressed as the girl that is the rich snob in Junie B. Jones. Her class took a math test today. I asked the students to put their heads down to show me they were finished with their test. Riley said " well actually I can' t put my head down because I don't want to mess up my updo" ( well excuuuuse me miss priss ). I didn't know that 7 year olds even knew what an updo was or even cared for that matter.

Sometimes you are teaching and you think that your kids are listening and paying attention. All of a sudden you will see a hand go up in the air. When you call on them because you think they have a legit question, something random comes out of their mouth like - " Do you know that my dads birthday is next month" huh? ( this especially has a tendency to happen in Kindergarten and 1st grade). This happened to me yesterday. When I called on Judah he said - " Do you know that next month is my dads birthday, then comes my dogs birthday , and then my birthday!" ( why no I didn't) But when he mentioned that his dogs birthday was coming up I suddenly remembered that it was Annabelle's birthday. Out loud ( unintentionally) I said " oh my dogs birthday is today". Judah then bursts out with "Happy birthday to your dog, Happy birthday to your dog" and sings the entire song. ( this was definitely not in the lesson plans for the day)

Speaking of Annabelle - here are some interesting facts about her.

1. I found Annabelle on the internet in 1999. She turned 8 yesterday

2. I knew I wanted a Lhasa Apso and wanted her name to be Annabelle. I then found the dog to match the name.

3.Annabelle has traveled all throughout North Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Atlanta Ga, Charleston SC, Phoenix Az, Denver Colorado, Las Vegas, Utah, all through Southern Ca including San Diego, LA, and Santa Barbara.

4. She has been on 4 plane rides across the country and back. ( she is so good on the plane that the person sitting beside me usually doesn't even know I have a dog until we land and I let her poke her head out of her carrier)

5. Annabelle's signature color is purple.

6. If it weren't so weird to have my dog and my daughter with the same name, I would name my daughter Annabelle.

7. Her nicknames include Anna banana, baby belle, nanners, TBO ( the best one), and pickle.

8. When we sleep, Clinton gets 1/4 of the bed, I get 1/4 of the bed and Annabelle gets 1/2 of the bed.( don't ask me how this happens she only weighs 13 lbs)

9. Annabelle pretty much rules our house ( at least until bambino comes along!)

update

The latest update with our adoption is that we have a meeting with our attorney on Wednesday. From now on I will refer to him as Mr.D. He will explain the entire process and we we will get more details on what to expect and how everything works. To answer Betsy's question- yes he does work with single moms. There are some that are featured on his website. As far as the birth mom being able to take the child back. How my principal explained it to me ( and I could be totally wrong - but will be clear on Wednesday) is that the birth mom gives up the baby to the attorney and not directly to the adoptive parents. Mr. D then gives the baby over to the adoptive parents. After this happens I don't think the birth mom can come back to reclaim the baby. There is something technical in how it is handled that prevents this from happening. I know this because my principal adopted a baby ( not using our attorney, but someone else). She had the baby for a couple of weeks and then the birthmom came back and reclaimed the baby. To say the least she was heart broken. She then learned of Mr. D - and used his services. This is one reason why she is such a big advocate for him. Like I mentioned, I am not really sure of the details but will be educated on Wednesday. Mrs.D ( the attorney's wife) said the wait time could be anywhere between immediately to a couple of years. She did mention that if we are willing to take an "all hispanic baby" that things would probably move pretty fast. We are just sitting tight. Receiving a baby anytime in the next year would be fine with us.

We also talked to the adoption agency that we were using for the Guatemala adoption. They will keep our case open for 2 years. We can come back anytime during that time period and not have to repay the $5000.oo agency fee. That is great news! Especially since we are still interested in Guatemala once things get settled down!