Ducks in a row

Today we received that final piece of paper we needed.....the I-171H!! I opened the mail and honestly didn't know what it was....I DID not expect it this soon. It's only been a few weeks. So all of our ducks are in a row....now we wait on a referral. I am so axious - but trying to take it in stride and be patient. There are many families ahead of us, so I am assuming the wait will be awhile. It breaks my heart that there may be a child on the other side of the world and I may be their mommy....I am so ready to meet her and love on her. I can't wait!!! But I will, all in God's timing. I just keep repeating that to myself.
In the meantime, I have this diet to keep my mind occupied!!! I'm doing ok so far.

Change IS good.

I guess the change was good....I lost 8 pounds!!! Woo Hoo. It has not been easy but I am soooo excited.

No news on the adoption front....just waiting. Our dossier is in Ethiopia getting translated. We are now just waiting for a referral. Speaking of referral.......my friend Jennifer is "patiently" waiting for her referral. It's pretty much a done deal...just waiting for the paperwork. I am sooo happy for her and her family. The baby girl, Baby S, is SUPER cute. I can't wait to show her off, but we can't post pictures until she passes court. Now that all of this seems to be happening, Jennifer and I seriously have to figure out what we are going to do when we have to work. For those of you who may not know, Jennifer is my business partner at Pies By Inge and yes, we are both adopting from Ethiopia. We both love baking and love our jobs, but our babies come first. How can we bake and take care of our babies???? The most important thing with any adoption is the "bonding". This child has gone through so much at a young age. Issues with love, trust and abandonment are huge. We want that child to feel love, first and foremost. The "experts", whoever they are, even recommend keeping visitors and outings to a minimum at first. The child needs to know that "we" are their family. So what do we do??? We could find someone to watch the girls 3-4 days a week for 3-4 hours a day.......or cut our hours way back and maybe go in at night and bake when the hubbies are home....or bring in a pack and play and hope we have very happy babies and they will enjoy watching us bake......I guess we will just play it by ear. We still have a few months to figure it out.

Change is good.....right?

It's been a busy couple of weeks. We rushed around last week to get all of our paperwork mailed out. Now we wait for the I171-H, that allows us to bring a orphan back into the country.....and our referral for a child. We are #7 on the list for a little girl. I don't really know what that means other than we could get a referral next week, next month, or in 2,3,4 months...and on and on and on. There is just no way know. So we just wait and trust that God has that perfect little girl picked out for our family. I can't wait to see her face...I am already in love with her and I have no idea who she is yet.

This week has been a little stressful. We found out that we now may have to travel to Ethiopia TWICE. They have changed the proceedure and now want both adoptive parents to appear at the court date, that's when your child is officially adopted. Right now the proceedure is that a representative from our agency would have power of attorney to represent us at court. Then once all the visas and so forth were done, we would travel to pick up our child. There is much speculation on why they have changed this, one is a "medical" issue. There have been a few cases that the parents have traveled to pick up there child only to find out they are not as healthy as stated....I'm talking some pretty major issues. I've heard of one case where the parents left the child in the orphanage...can you imagine??? But once that child has passed court...they are no longer adoptable by another family, therefore spend the rest of their lives in the orphanage. So on one hand, it's good that we would have to travel and meet our child. We could also spend some time and visit the country and learn more about the culture. But on the other hand, that's alot of money and time away from my family and work. It would be hard to be away from my 3 kids that long. And work....what would they do without me??? :) We sure don't have another trip figured into the budget. We are guessing when this is all said and done this adoption will end up costing between $20,000 and 25,000...now add another $6,000 or so....holy cow. It's a little scary to think about. We have to believe that God will provide.

We have talked about doing some sort of fundraiser, but haven't come up with a great idea yet. So if any of you reading this have an idea, let us know!!!! I plan on having a garage sale this summer, but that won't even come close to what we need. We are also looking into "Lifesong" who will set up an adoption account for us and family and friends can donate and get a tax deduction, they also award matching grants. Which would be wonderful.

So the change has shaken things up a bit...but that's good right?

Speaking of change...I started a diet. A real diet. I went from teaching yoga and aerobics 4 times a week to being a bakery owner....not the greatest career change for my body. Honestly, the diet hasn't been too bad. I can't have any sugar. I thought it was going to be unbearable. But it's really not bad. I'm only 4 days in, but I was told the first 4-5 days were the worst. The one thing I am craving is salt. I would love to have a bowl of popcorn or chips and salsa. Those, I miss.... :( So I am trying to get myself back in shape and healthy again. I have to get in shape to keep up with a toddler again!!!!! I am only allowing myself to get on the scale once a week. I don't want to get crazy about it. So to my bloggy friends, keep me accountable. I will give my weekly updates and can hopefully report on my success!!

The waiting is over....and will soon begin again.

I received good news today. Mike from ICM called to tell me our approval letter for our home study showed up today!!! He offered to mail it to me, but I told him no way, I would send Darren to St. Joe to get it. So off Darren went to pick it up. I met him in Champaign to get the approval letter and have him sign a few papers. Rushed back to Monticello, made copies, got our dossier cover letter notarized, mailed the home study and approval letter to USCIS in Chicago. Whew. My heart was racing. Came back home to organize all the paperwork to take to Springfield for the State Seal. Well, bless my husband, he came home to say he would take the papers to Springfield today!!! I love him. He totally knows that things like that make me so happy. I don't want flowers or candy, clean the bathrooms or do the dishes and I am a happy camper. Anyway, I got all the papers together, wrote Darren detailed notes on what to do, poor guy, and out the door he went. I am shaking right now. I told him if he lost that dossier I would seriously hurt him, I mean it. That is precious cargo. If Darren has time, he is even going to Express Mail our dossier to the Assistant Stork today. Assistant Stork is a wonderful husband and wife team out of Virginia, that run a courier service for people who are adopting. They hand deliver your dossier to the State Department and the Embassy of Ethiopia. There is a fee but is is sooooo worth it. They will then send it on to our Agency in Florida. Once our agency has authenticated dossier in hand, we will officially go on the referral list. YEA!!! Hopefully, a week or so. Then.......the waiting begins again. I'm afraid that wait will be much harder than this wait for the home study. But at least we are on to the next step.
I have to confess, I was having a bad week last week. I wanted that home study so badly. So I calmed my frustration by going shopping.....I bought the cutest diaper bag. Darren just shook his head. He said, "we don't even have a baby yet, why buy a diaper bag?" Both Hannah and I replied at the same time "because it's cute!!!!"

And it is isn't it??? :)
So I've had a good day on the adoption front. Thank you all for your kind words and support. We so appreciate it.
I've done some moving around of rooms. The boys are now in Owen's room in bunk beds. We repainted and got new bedding for the boys. They think it's really cool. Once it's all put together I will post some pictures. Then on to decorating the baby's room..... I can't wait!!!! There's that word again.....wait.

Waiting waiting and more waiting.....

We are STILL waiting on our home study approval from DCFS. Got news today that we were next in line for approval....does that mean today? tomorrow? next week?
I spoke with our agency rep last week and she says she now has 9 families waiting for baby girls. I was so bummed. She said she really didn't know how long a referral would take....2 months.....6 months. We don't officially get on the referral list until our authenticated dossier is in their hands. So who knows how many families will get theirs in before us. Yikes.
So right now I am asking for prayers. Prayers for fast paperwork and to get this done in God's time. I know he has a plan for us...it's just so hard to see right now.

Oh, the weather outside is frightful.........

What a crazy couple of days. We have been slammed by snow here in Central Illinois. Tuesday we had a snow day at school. Darren and I did go out and the roads weren't too bad. We were scheduled to be in Indianapolis on Wed (today) at 10am or 9 am Illinois time, for our biometric fingerprints. I was freaking out we would miss our appointment. Our original plan was to get up early, send the kids to school, drive over and come right back. Well, at the last minute we decided to drive over on Tuesday night and spend the night. What to do with the kids and dog???? Will we have snow day on Wednesday? What to do-what to do????? I made some fast and furious phone calls, I wanted out of here before dark. We decided to bring the boys with us and take the chance that they would have a snow day, which they did. Hannah went to her friend Shannon's house for the night. My friend Kirstin, took care of Truman and I got on line and did Priceline to find a hotel room. Got one right down town for over $100 off regular price. Oh how I love the "Negotiator" :) For those of you thinking.."Why didn't they just reschedule?" Well, you don't. This process is crazy. You don't make an appointment to get your fingerprints done. A piece of paper comes to you in the mail and it tells you where and when to be there for fingerprinting. And there is no contact phone number for the office you are going to...believe me, I tried. So we figured we better just go.....

Roads were a bit hairy on the way over but we made it. Boys went swimming, I sat in the room and caught up on emails. Sue at our agency emailed me to ask if we would be interested in a boy AND a girl......two.......I think my heart may have skipped a beat when I read that. The thought is a bit scary. Of course, the planner in me goes straight to "where will I put another two kids???" I am planning on moving Luke and Owen into Owen's room in bunk beds and move our "girl" into Luke's room. Where would I put another little boy??? I guess we would have to finish out the loft. Money grows on trees right? The little boy Sue is referring to is on the waiting list, he's 1 1/2 and super cute. But I am guessing he will have a family by the time we are paper ready. But you never know.....
Anyway, we made our appointment. Very uneventful....except the boys thought it was cool that they got scanned and searched going into the room. Owen said, "just like at the airport!" We were one of two families there to get prints. So we were in and out in no time. It was only 9:30am our time, so we hated to head home. We drove around and decided to head out towards Keystone. I ended up going into Babies R Us while the guys went to Borders. If I only knew the age of our child.....soooo many cute things. I already told Jennifer that once we get our referrals we are taking a road trip back over. We ended up eating lunch then driving home. Roads were fine. The kids probably should have had school today......
I did buy something the other day for our "girl". I am really trying to be good and not go crazy. But I saw this and I just had to have it. It's a hutch for her room. It's huge, but will be sooo cute with baskets in it filled with tiny little socks, hats and bows.
Darren just shook his head......I have no idea how we are actually going to get it into her room....Looks like I will be making dinner for my good friend Ian again....he is our favorite "mover". Here's a picture of the hutch. Now that I have this, the planner in me is going crazy again....how will I decorate???? Do I need a crib or a toddler bed???? Oh, how I wish I knew........

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It is real.......

It hit me last night that this adoption process is real. So far it's been all paperwork and headaches. Yesterday, I received great news that our friends, Todd and Amy, who are also adopting from Ethiopia-passed court in ET-first time through-Amazing!! Which means the kids are officially part of their family. It's real. Now they just wait for the kids to get visas and passports and then they will travel to pick them up. I am so overwhelmed with joy for them. They also have had their complications with "paperwork". But now they are a family of 6. Wow. Check out Amy's blog to see their new son and daughter. So beautiful. There is a link to the blog on the lower right side of my page. Click on Blessed Beyond Measure to see their story.
They are the first family in our "group" to get through the process. So, it does happen. I have a much better outlook on this whole process now. :)
So go read their blog, enjoy and probably cry :)