Fun Day with our Birth Parents

We invited Karlee & Devrey over for a BBQ yesterday.  We hadn't seen them in several months so it was definitely time to get together.  G was of course showered with hugs and kisses.  Here are a few pictures from last night.

J.D. was trying to make Gavin giggle since he had been so quiet all night.  He has the magic touch because he did finally giggle for us.

Saying Good night.  Gavin got to have a tubby while Karlee and Devrey were here.  It wasn't planned by definitely necessary after graham crackers and a MESSY diaper. 

J.D and I are on the Families Supporting Adoption (FSA) board for American Fork and now part of United for Adoption (UFA) board.  Next Saturday, May 11 is Birth Mother's Day and the Utah County FSA hosts a Celebrate Adoption Walk each year.  We are so glad that Kand D (hopefully depending on his work schedule) will be there with us as we celebrate adoption! 

We are having shirts printed for all of us and our parents and my sister and her family that will be with us at the walk.  I can't wait to see how they turn out!!  I will definitely post pictures when we get them done and from the walk on Saturday.

Catching Up

I have a lot of catching up to do.  For anyone that is a friend on Facebook you see plenty of pictures of our sweet little Gavin and we have a private blog that we keep updated for our family and for our birth family.  I am happy to say I am actually pretty good at keeping up that blog.  I think the longest I have gone is 2 weeks without a post.  Obviously my attention to that blog, that will be Gavin's blog, has caused this blog to get left in the dust.
It is so hard to believe that a year ago we were in the midst of filling out our adoption paperwork.  We were just getting ready to attend adoption training (that isn't even offered any longer, sadly) and anxious about what the future would hold for us and "the wait" we had ahead of us.  We were wrestling with the letter to birth parents that would become part of our adoption profile.  Oh how a year changes things.

Here are a few pictures of what we have been up to since the introduction to our amazing and strong birth family and our sweet Gavin- when we got to see him for the first time via ultrasound.

Karlee and Devrey- Gavin's birth parents at 28 weeks

Dinner at our house with Karlee and Devrey and Melissa's favorite- The Farming Game

I tried to take pictures of Karlee each week of the pregnancy from 28 weeks on but I can't remember how far along she was

Dinner at Los Hermanos in Lindon with Karlee and Devrey

We were able to go to the Brigham City temple open house with Karlee and Devrey.  It was such a fun day to spend together.

Karlee and Devrey at the Brigham City LDS Temple

Dropping off Karlee and Devrey for one of their meetings at the adoption agency.

Just weeks before we were going to meet Gavin.  Karlee was so sick during the pregnancy and those last few weeks were really hard on her.

The last pre-delivery picture I have of Karlee.  She would have been 35 weeks in this picture. 

Ultrasound...it's a BOY!!

Karlee and I continued to exchange texts through the next week and we became more and more excited and anxious as we got closer to the ultrasound on Friday, June 29.  We met Karlee, Devrey and Karlee's mom at the doctors office and went into the ultrasound.  My heart nearly leaped out of my chest as we entered the ultrasound room and she introduced us to the tech as the adoptive parents...happiness and pure joy!  It is not common for an adoptive couple to be able to be in attendance at this ultrasound or any prenatal visits for that matter.

It was so surreal being in that room at watching as the tech kept showing us different parts of the baby and stating that everything looked good.  The big question on our minds was is this baby going to be a pink or a blue variety.  The little peanut was not shy about showing us all he is definitely a BOY!   Wanna see a picture of him?

His cute profile at 21 weeks 1 day

He isn't shy- this was the second picture the tech caught!

At the end of the ultrasound the tech asked Karlee if there were any other shots she would like and she diverted to us and asked if there was anything else- no everything looked great and the whole experience was more than we could have ever hoped to experience.  Karlee and Devrey gave us the pictures and the DVD as we were walking out of the office and just asked that we give them copies of them.  **Seriously pinching myself over again**

The next week Karlee invited me to be at her prenatal visit and of course I was thrilled and happy to join her and again introduced me as the adoptive mom when the nurse and the doctor came into the room. :)  When she scheduled her next appointment she asked me to come up and make sure the date worked for me to so I could be there.  I am so honored that she has asked me to join her for these appointments.  

We are so humbled and honored that Karlee and Devrey have selected us and asked us to be this little boy's parents.  We have shared some very tender moments that are not appropriate to share in such a large forum but have confirmed this relationship is what it needs to be. We are anxiously awaiting November 1 and are over the moon for this little guy already and are so grateful for the relationship that we share with Karlee and Devrey.


Until next time...

Being Selected...it's Real

Let me just start by saying we have not been contacted by expectant parents...well not really.

Yesterday I was running errands and while standing in line at Walmart got a call from our caseworker, Hayley.  I knew something was up when her name popped up on my phone because our paperwork is final and has been for 3 weeks.  We did find out last week that our profile has been viewed four times already by registered expectant parents (YIPPEE).  She told us that is rare and usually couple goes for months without anyone clicking on their profile.  Anyway, back to yesterday... she asked me if it was a good time to talk and I told her sure I was just in line at Walmart but I could chat. (Note to self- don't do that again- ever!!) She told me about an adoption situation with twin girls that were born premature, the adoption that had been set up had fallen through for some reason and they were looking quickly for another couple that would accept twins and children with disabilities.  WHAT??!!  We needed to discuss it and let her know in the next 30 minutes.. DOUBLE what??!! All of the adoptive couples would then be sent to the birth parents and they would decide who they wanted to meet  and wanted to meet that night (it was 2:26pm when I got the call) and it was at least a 2 hour drive to get to them.  Needless to say that is A LOT to take in a few minutes.

I really needed to sit down somewhere but the checkout line at Walmart isn't exactly a good place for that.
I REALLY needed J.D. with me right then so I could talk to him about it and see his eyes and feel his arms around me to tell me any decision we made would be the right one.

I checked out, I'm sure the checker thought I was crazy because my response was so slow as I tried to wrap my mind around the call I had just received and the email with a little bit more information I received from Hayley. As I was walking out of the store after paying for a cart full of groceries I almost left them in the store and walked out to my car.  I was a little bit worried about my ability to get myself home because my mind wasn't exactly on what was immediately around me.  Luckily talking to J.D. and my sister on the phone got me home.

J.D. and I agreed that we would both say a prayer and regroup in a few minutes after I got home and discuss how we felt we needed to proceed with this situation.  When we talked we decided that this wasn't the right situation for us and more importantly these were not our children.  We have heard many, many times that when it is your child you will know and in this situation these special little angels were not ours.

I made the call to Hayley to let her know that this wasn't the right situation for us.  I started to cry as I was talking to her.  She said many times there are feelings of guilt (yep sure did have that) and there is no reason to feel guilty.  She reminded me that our goal isn't to have just any baby but to find our baby- also true.  I told her and later as I talked to J.D. that my greater concern were the "what if's". What if these were our babies and we said no- even though we both felt that these weren't our babies.  What if this is the only time we are contacted?

After J.D. got home we were able to talk more about it and of course I cried some more.  It was a real wake up call for us that we may be selected in this way and this may have been prep for us for the future.  Adoption is a wonderful and challenging thing.  We are blessed in so many ways and although these twin girls were not our babies we may be a little bit better prepared now for the future and how we will possibly be contacted by expectant parents.

Until next time...

Adoption Phase 3 Complete

This is my favorite picture. I can't wait to have a little to pull in a wagon!
These are a few of our pictures that we had taken for our adoption profile. We love how they turned out! Thanks to Kristen at Shadtree Photography for capturing exactly what we were looking for.

Just this morning I finished and submitted our letter to expectant parents for our adoption paperwork. We just have our home study left to do and we will be approved and expectant parents can look at our profile and hopefully want to know more about us...and place their baby in our home.
I never anticipated writing a letter would take so much time but it is hard to express everything you want to and tell someone you have never met....ever how great you and your spouse are.
I had to keep reminding myself that this really is in the Lord's hands and He has a plan for us and our baby and our birth parents and only He can make it all come together like it is supposed to and no matter what we say in our letter He is the one in charge.
So grateful to be done with that part and ready for the home study to be done so we can be approved. I am waiting to order pass along cards with our information on them until we get approved and need to get our adoption blog started and finished. Still plenty to do. We are enjoying going to the LDSFS chat nights and learning more about adoption and others adoption stories.

Until next time...

Ah Ha Moments

Last night at work there was a baby that started showing signs of drug withdraw. This little one was not one of my patients but she was just so sweet and tiny I couldn't help but want to hold her and give her a little bit of extra love. I don't know the entire circumstance of her family but the small portion I do know was so disappointing. It is heartbreaking the suffering this little infant has had to endure already because of choices she did not make. It is repulsive the lack of care that this mother appeared to have for this child that she helped create. With these things though I had an ah-ha moment that shook me to my very core and brought me to tears...this little infant so sweet, pure and spirit fresh from heaven taught me a valuable lesson. This is not about her mother (or father) or any other person-- it is about this small little person and her enormous spirit. This is her story and only Heavenly Father knows why this spirit and the body to carry it have to endure these earthly trials.

We have been told in meetings with LDSFS that the journey with adoption isn't about the birth parents or the adoptive parents and what they want/need but about the child and what they need and/or is best for them. I heard it, I thought I understood it before but this tiny infant taught me what that really meant last night. I promised this baby as a rocked her last night that I would pray for her...and I will.

Until next time...

Adoption- Step 1

JD and I went to Provo to the LDS Family Services adoption orientation meeting last Wednesday only to find out that we can't work with that office because we live in Pleasant Grove. We then went to the meeting at the American Fork office on Friday. I'm kind of glad we were able to attend both meetings because while the information was basically the same, the way it was presented and what they spent time focusing on was different at each office.
This morning I drove over the orientation paperwork to the office in American Fork- so that means our journey with adoption has "officially" started. They will now send a letter to our bishop for his recommendation, we will then be assigned a caseworker and after they receive the letter back from the bishop we will have what is called an intake interview with the caseworker and get the next batch of paperwork to complete. There are quite a few things that we need to get done or gathered prior to this next batch of paperwork being turned in. Birth certificates, marriage certificate, fingerprints for background checks, family pictures, a new blog set up to be shared with birth families (and really anyone else that would like to take a peek at it).
We also need to start writing our letter to birth families that will introduce us to them- no pressure to want that to be just right. The one thing I keep remembering is that birth mothers/families aren't looking for perfection we just need to be who we are and the Lord will take care of the rest.
Since this entry has taken me almost two weeks to write we have since met with Bishop Lawyer (we have been so blessed to have wonderful bishops since we have been married) to go over questions that he needed some extra information from us to complete. He was going to mail the letter back to LDS Family Services (LDSFS) yesterday, so I can only assume we should be hearing back from LDSFS this week sometime.
We still haven't started the birth family letter but I have some rough drafts running through mind- let's just say my focus isn't always on school but very often on the things we need to do to finish our paperwork in record time and then be prepared to welcome a child or children into our home. We have started cleaning out the third bedroom in our townhouse and cleaning out extra junk, errr I mean treasures, that are collecting dust around the house. It feels good to get rid of some of this stuff.
This morning I ordered the birth certificates and marriage certificate that we will need to turn in with our next set of paperwork. Next, doctor appointments for both us for a checkup and completing the next batch of paperwork we are given at our intake appointment. We are also hoping to be able to attend the Adoption Training in October that is a requirement of LDSFS but it all hinges on our intake interview. This is quite a journey and we are so excited to be adding to our family through adoption

Work, School and Adoption

I started school again last Wednesday. It is going to be a fantastic semester! I am taking Anatomy and Physiology. Before you comment that I'm crazy for taking these two classes together- I already know! It is going to be a lot of hard work, let there be no mistake about it but I have great professors and my sister and I are taking the classes "together". By together I mean she is also taking the classes at the same school (Salt Lake Community College) but from different professors so we will be able to bounce ideas off each other and study together- at least a little bit.

JD continues to stay busy at work and with the freelance jobs that he works on from home. He is such a hard worker and I appreciate him so much. He is such a wonderful provider and support to me. He is constantly studying new programming languages that will help add depth to his skills and make him more marketable. He plans on returning to school eventually and getting his Master's degree in Computer Science. He likes the program at BYU so it's a good thing we live in Utah County- at it appears we will be for awhile. As of now, it will probably not happen until I am done with my nursing degree or until he finds a job that has tuition reimbursement to help pay for the cost.

And finally...we are thrilled and anxious to be meeting with LDS Family Services on September 7 for an adoption orientation meeting. That's right we are going to adopt. We aren't sure what to expect except that we will get the paperwork to start filling it out. It can take up to a year and more to have a child placed but we are looking forward to the road ahead and the experiences we will have and the opportunity to meet birth mothers and welcoming a baby into our home.

I have the unique opportunity to occasionally take care of birth mothers placing their babies for adoption at the hospital and it never short of extraordinary seeing the love those women have for their babies and what a sacrifice they are making to give those children a better life. I am so grateful that adoption is an option for us and that we will be starting the process soon. So with all of that said we would appreciate your prayers and letting anyone you may know that we want to add to our family through adoption.



Until next time...

Moving On and the path ahead

I got the call from Dr. F's office this afternoon we didn't have success with our third IUI. I have had good reason to believe that would be the result. I have been weepy since my body started telling me we weren't going to be pregnant on Saturday night at work. We decided that this would be the last treatment we were going to do- at least for awhile when I had the lengthy high dose injections and hyperstim issues during this round. We need a break from the emotional roller coaster of fertility treatments.
This has not been an easy journey individually or as a couple. I am so grateful for the good man that I am lucky enough to call my husband and eternal companion. We know that Heavenly Father has a plan for us and we will be blessed with children...eventually but most likely not in the way we once expected. We need some time to take a break from all of this and then our plan is to meet with LDS Family Services and begin the process of adoption. We know there are little ones that are supposed to join our family and hope and pray for a miracle...or two. We cannot express enough gratitude for the prayers and support that we have received from our family and friends. We love you all!

Until next time...