Happy Mother's Day!

Today is Mother's Day and I would like to thank my Mom for putting up with me and Cliff. I happen to believe you done a great job in raising us and I also believe that it probably wasn't always an easy job! However I think I was your 'good' child. At least I never tried to tie-dye my jeans on your brand new carpet! No I'll never let him live that one down! How could I? That's just hilarious! I will always remember our trips to Disney World at Christmas and to the beach during the summer. We always looked forward to those. I can remember counting down the days until each occasion. Those are our memories as a family we'll always have! I'm soo glad that you and Daddy gave us those memories. I pray that we can do as well with our little girl so that she will always remember the good times with us. I hope nothing happens to us for a long time but as we learned you just never know when our time will come. Unfortunately I also have December 26, 1997 bookmarked in my brain as if it were yesterday. What 16 year old who lost their Daddy suddenly wouldn't? The important thing is that you picked up and got us all through those hard times as well!! We have lots of wonderful memories of him and you together with us as a family. That is what's important in life! Thanks MAMA for putting up with me being extremely picky and downright hard to handle at times! Chad calls this being high maintenance. I just pray that I can be as good of a mother to our little girl as you have been to me!

6 year Anniversary......

together and still going strong! We had a nice weekend together. We spent the day fishing out on the lake and then went out for dinner together at Enricos. They have the best Italian food EVER! I never thought I'd find any Italian I enjoy any better than Olive Garden but Enricos put them to shame. The restaurant was located beside the lake. We had a little table close to the window where we were able to see the sun as it started to set. We finished dinner and headed back to the lake to finish watching the sunset. Absolutely beautiful! This has been a fun but crazy year. For more than three years we tried to start our family and God told us no. We now in a matter of months have started the adoption process, completed lots of paperwork, have been matched, and are awaiting the arrival of our little girl. WOW! God works in amazing ways! In a couple of months we may find out why God hasn't answered our prayer before now. LOL! Just kidding! We've never expected parenting to be a breeze or to be all fun but do expect her to be the BEST gift ever! We know that this year will probably be just as wild and crazy if not more. Hang on with us and enjoy the ride!

First call went well!

We believe the first call with Renay went relatively well. Once we were all on the same line Sandy introduced everyone and then she let us take it from there. I began the conversation on a light note with a few 'get to know you' questions. We found out that she's a cat person, likes vanilla better than chocolate, her favorite movie is A Walk to Remember, and she enjoys watching American Idol and Deal or No Deal. Sounds exactly like me other than the whole cat thing. That's one topic I'll have to disagree with her on. LOL! She had a really sweet and shy voice. We asked a couple medical/health questions that she was able to answer for us. Renay hasn't hardly been sick at all but she has been more tired than usual. She wanted to make sure that we knew the baby was a girl. I was curious as to how sure they were that it was a girl and she let me know they are VERY sure! Renay told us that she wasn't shy at all during the ultrasound. She also let us know that ultrasound pictures should be on the way to us before long because she took her copies to CVS to have us a copy made. She wants to keep the originals so that she will have a copy. She has handmade a blanket to give the baby at the hospital and has started a baby book for us. She has noted things like her first kick and when she found out the baby was a girl. We wanted to make sure she understood that we are willing to communicate as often as she'd like. The more we hear from her the better I think we will fell. I feel like if she gets to know us a little then maybe it will help her at placement in not feeling we are total strangers. We let her know how awesome she is and how grateful and honored we are to have the chance to be parents to her baby!

Can you say NERVOUS?

One more day and we get to speak to Renay! It's extremely exciting but also makes me very nervous. I have all of these questions in my mind. Will she like us? What will she think of us? Will we fit her expectations? Will one of us ask something that will offend her? Will we ask all of the questions we would like to know? I'll stop now because I probably could go on and on. Our call will be at 5:00 our time so we are asking that everyone say a prayer for us. I have NO doubt that once the conversation gets started good that it will take off. My nerves play on how to start the conversation and get her engaged. I will update everyone afterwards! God please guide and be with us!!

It's a GIRL!!!!

We found out today at 12:05 that we are having a baby girl! We couldn't be more excited and now we can head to the stores for even more fun. I have my heart set on a pink glider rocker that's dark wood but I haven't been able to locate one as of yet but I haven't gave up. All I've found is white wood with pink. I'm not sure that it would match our cherry furniture in the nursery very well. Now we have to decide on a name. We've discussed this topic some and have a few possibilities but nothing set in stone. Evon we can hardly wait to see her in that bonnet you've been saving! We look forward to the weeks ahead filled with planning and nervousness!! Oh soo exciting!

We are going to get to talk with Renay....

Next Friday the 4rth at 4:00!! Oh man! I’m nervous but soo excited! What do you say to someone who is going to give you the gift of a family? There are no words to describe how grateful we are and will always be towards her. We are currently preparing a list of questions to send over to our coordinator of things we’d like to know about the birth family. Renay will do the same so that our coordinator can share our questions with her and her questions with us ahead of time. I think this will be a valuable tool to help calm everyone’s nerves to a degree. Sandy, our birthmom coordinator, tells us that she’s very excited to meet us and that we’ll just love her. I don’t see how we couldn’t!

Tune back in on Tuesday the 1st for the verdict! Pink or Blue?

Fast forward a month!!!

This morning we received a call from our new birthmom coordinator, Sandy. I had prayed for some answers to our questions. We were having a little trouble getting some of our questions answered. The other coordinator we were assigned to in the beginning always had excuses but we thought they were good excuses! (had a birthmom deliver, had scheduled appointment, sick all weekend, etc.) That is until we got our new coordinator today. All our questions were answered and we received LOTS of updates!! We found out she had a Dr's appointment scheduled for this afternoon at 1:00!!! She answered the questions that I had been asking for about a week and then told me she would call me with an update after her appointment.

She called me back around 4:30 this afternoon and our baby will be born a month earlier! She is farther along in her pregnancy than they originally thought. We are now 21 weeks along instead of 17!! WOW! This is going fast! She informed her OB today that she wants to deliver on the OB wing of the hospital and after the baby is born she would like to be moved to another part of the hospital. She has requested to be moved so that we can have her room and begin bonding with our baby! This woman is AWESOME!!! Our birthmom also requested for ultrasound pictures to be sent to us and for us to be involved in the pregnany. She wants us to get all updates on the baby's health. The baby had a heart rate of 147 today and was very healthy. The birthmom was previously considered high risk but after her appointment today everything was great and he said there was no need in keeping her on high risk. The BIG ultrasound appointment is Tuesday, May 1st!! Next week we may know pink or blue! (If the baby cooperates!)

Triple Digits........

on our counter deserves a post! Our birthmom is 100 days pregnant today (16 weeks 2 days) . I have gotten to speak to our birthmom coordinator over the phone this week. Her name is Carrie and she appears to be very supportive to both us and the birthmom. She is completely open to answering or obtaining answers to all of our questions. She is very confident that we will receive ultrasound pictures of our little one! YAY! Currently we are in the process of our birthmom being switched from her regular doctor to an OB. We are awaiting the news of her first OB appointment. Hopefully we will have an appointment scheduled in the next two to three weeks. I'm ready to head to the stores for some retail therapy!! Carrie is also working to schedule a conference call with us and the birthmom. She encourages both sides as she feels it helps both parties calm their fears. Everything seems to be progressing smoothly at this point!

Breaking the news on Easter.......

was lots of fun! We were matched just in time to celebrate over Easter and we wanted to do more than just blurt it over Sunday lunch. We've waited a LONG time to become parents! We decided to use plastic Easter eggs with confetti and these different phrases:

Spring has sprung a new addition!
Unloading this fall! Hope you're ready to change diapers!
Extra egg hunter on the way!
Get those arms ready!
Aren't you eggcited!
Easter bunny is dressing up as a stork this year!
Pitter Patter Pitter Patter! It's not the easter bunny you hear!
A new flower is blooming!
We have eggcellent news!
Hope the Easter bunny brings eggstra diapers!
We are adding an extra rotten egg to the bunch!
God has delivered instead of the Easter bunny!

Under each phrase we also typed baby due October 1st. I think a few people had to read it twice before they really understood what was happening! It was GREAT!!! Granny told us it was the best Easter present she could have gotten. Then she went on to tell us we couldn't name the baby after her but we had to raise him/her to please ourselves and that we couldn't please everyone. Then my Mom went on to tell us what we could name the baby. Oh and Chad's mom is thinking it will be a boy! These next couple months are going to seem like eternity!!

We're Matched! We're Matched! We're Matched!

Chad and I talked Tuesday night about the adoption and different situations and circumstances that we would accept. We decided that whatever child God brought before us was meant to be ours! On Wendesday morning, April 4th, I sent a simple email to all of the agencies in which we had been submitted to let them know that our information should be updated to include our new budget, etc. Approximately 30 minutes afterwards my cell phone rings. It's a long distance number that I don't recognize and I hesitate to even answer since I was at work. I decide to just go ahead and see what the person wanted. It was Karen with Adoption Advantage! (One of the agencies that we applied with.) She told me that they had a situation that she thought we may be interested in and asked if I could talk. I shut my office door and told her to proceed. Before calling me she had called Chad's cell phone and he immediately referred her over to me. LOL! She went into detail and it seemed that almost everything was just perfect in EVERY way!! I wanted to shout that we would accept the baby! I knew this was not the appropriate thing to do. I let her know that we were very interested and that I would need to give Chad all the details so that we could make a decision. I told her that I would call her back with a decision. She let me know that since we hadn't paid any of our adoption costs we were on a list with other potential adoptive parents. This meant it was open to more families than just us and whomever contacted her back first would become the parents to this baby. This made me VERY nervous!!!! We knew that we had a decision to make but we also knew that we had to take some time to think about every aspect. That afternoon Chad called me back at work and let me know that he was DEFINATELY interested in proceeding with the adoption. I frantically dial Karen to ask if the baby is still available for adoption............................I can't tell you yet! I had to leave a message because she was out of the office. The next twenty minutes was the longest twenty minutes of our life!! She returns my call and tells me that she still HASN"T found a family that would accept this baby. YAY!!!!!! I let her know that we were ready to proceed with the adoption. She emailed me the adoption contract for us to look over that night and asked for us to fax it back the next morning signed. She also said if there was any changes we wished to ask for they would be open to our request. I forwarded the contract on to our consultant and she let us know that it sounded like a really well rounded adoption situation. There was a few small things she let us know that we may want addressed or corrected. I called her back and she was open to the changes we requested.

The birthmom is VERY healthy. She is receiving prenatal care and the father is willing to sign his rights over to us as well. She has consumed NO drugs, NO alcohol, and NO cigerrettes! She has requested for me to be in the delivery room and for me to take the baby after delivery. She has also requested for it to be a closed adoption with no pictures or letters mailed to her. I will refrain from posting the state where the birthmother resides at this point but we will have to fly when the time comes.

WE HAVE A BABY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!