Garage Sale Update

We had our garage sale this past weekend and managed to raise over $700 for our adoption fund.  Thanks so much to all the people who helped us raise this money to help bring our baby home.  We are so blessed!! 
Saturday we start our education classes in Lima and the next 4 weeks will consist of 36 hours of training/education.  We also have our first home visit with our social worker next Wednesday, so it's going to be a busy week for us.  Please keep Zach and I as well as our child in your prayers as we enter this stressful month of our homestudy.  Thanks again....you all are AMAZING!!

Visions

As I was reading my transformation journal this morning about Daniel and his dreams and visions, I can't help but envision what our family will look like when we get our baby.  I am so curious to know what God has in store for us.  We were out at dinner last night, and I couldn't help but look around at the families in the restaurant.  There was a family next to us with 2 blond haired, blue eyed children, that looked exactly like their parents.  Then there were 2 African American children with Caucasian parents.  Another family had several red-headed children that didn't resemble anyone at their table.  All these families were just that, families....despite the color of their skin or hair.  The definition of family according to dictionary.com is a social unit consisting of one or more adults together with the children they care for. 
I find myself looking at families a lot lately.  Will God bless us with a Caucasian, African American, or bi-racial child??  I can't help but wonder.  Regardless of race or hair color, I know we will love him or her with all our hearts and he or she will become part of our family.  We have faith that God will match us with our perfect child!

Self Assessment Complete

I just sent our self assessment to our social worker.  Whew...that was exhausting.  I think it ended up being 21 pages about our lives!  We start our education classes on April 3rd and have our first home visit on April 7th.  So the process is moving along.  We are having a garage sale next weekend, hoping to make some cash for the baby fund.  Our friends and family have been very gracious donating some great items for us to sell.  I placed an ad in the paper tonight, and we'll be praying for good weather and a good turnout next weekend.
We continue to thank you for all of your love and support!

Living by the Checklist!

That's going to be my philosophy until our homestudy is complete.  We had our first meeting with the director of our agency on Wednesday and walked out with a BIG stack of papers, which was a bit overwhelming, but I think we've got it under control!  We were assigned a social worker, who we met at the Adoption Fair and are very excited to work with her.  Our first step was to get registered for our required education courses, which I did on Friday, and it's checked off the list.  There are about 20 other things we have to complete, but I think I have about all of them at least started.  Our first goal is to get our self assessments done and then we can have the first of two home visits with our social worker.  We are hoping to have the whole process done by the beginning of May, but I have to remember this is not a race, and it will work out in God's time!  Please continue to pray for our child and birthmother, as well as Zach and I as we have some tough decisions to make as we continue on this journey. 

Today is the Day

Today is the day we begin our homestudy!  It seems so surreal, and yes we are both a little nervous.  Since I was about 16 I knew that at some point in my life I would adopt at least one child, and now 11 years later, we begin that process.  It's so exciting!  My heart is smiling at the thought of becoming parents. 
Blessings!!

And the Homestudy Begins

I received a call today from the director of Adoption Link.  We will be meeting with her in the office to initiate our homestudy next Wednesday March 10th.  We are so excited....I wish we could go tomorrow!!