New Profile = New Hope

I had this long, detailed post written up about us hitting the two year mark in our adoption wait, but I really just think it's all been said before.

The summary: Waiting sucks, but it will be worth it. 

The long version is more eloquently written of course. I may edit and post it in a few days. I'd rather have a positive train of thought today.

First thing first, we had our adoption profile redone by a designer! This is the paper profile (PDF available too) that goes out when a prospective birth mother calls into our agency and does intake (basically inquiring about adoption and waiting families). If she decides she wants to look at profiles, they will send her all of the portfolios of waiting families that match her search criteria (such as married, living in the southeast etc) and of course the family's openness of their profile effects whether they go to her as well.

We are in love with the new design!

The front cover...

Featuring our cats, which we think is hilarious. The colors were inspired by a poster I have at home and a pair of shoes I saw online. I'll let you use your imagination as far as whose poster inspired me (ahem, super fan alert). If you read this blog often, you already know. I just have no shame anymore.

 The inside pages...

I love how much movement it has. Our nephew is featured heavily in this. It's not like we don't know other kids, but we always forget to take pictures with them when we hang out!

Doesn't matter, because our nephew is cute as cute can be.

The back...

More cats. Shocked? No, I'm not either. I guess if someone doesn't like cats, we are not likely to be contacted by her anyway. 

We really feel that this profile is more "us". We didn't realize over two years ago that we could push to have more of what we think represents us. Our agency really tends to edit families down until they all look alike. They say to show what makes you unique, but then all of that uniqueness gets taken away in the approval process.

Can you imagine receiving 250 profiles that more or less look the same and having to choose a family out of the stack to parent your child? Sounds next to impossible to me.

In other news, we celebrated John's birthday yesterday. There was cake and burritos, some TV, some feelings of extreme love and random exclamation of how happy I am that he was ever born and put in my life. Seriously, overwhelming feelings of love. I would like to thank John's parents for his existence. He's such an awesome husband and I have no doubt that he will be even a better dad.

I'm in full swing with grad school. I 99.9% finished my second project of the semester last night. It's a great distraction from "the wait". I had many moments of wondering why I'm putting myself through more school as I was neck deep in this project, but just like adoption, in the end it will be worth it.

Our 8th wedding anniversary is October 6th! So much has happened in those 8 years. I met John when I was 21 and he was 22. I feel like we have literally become adults together. Not that at 21/22 year old people aren't adults, but it's like we grew up into more adult adults- adultier adults- in the past 14 years. We did it together.

I've also started a new list of goals. I used to have this 100 things to do in 1000 days list, but some things like travel abroad probably wouldn't happen in that time frame due to adoption. Totally fine. I made a new list with no time restriction. It is everything from finish my M.Ed. to paint the dining room to remember to wear my glasses. I'm putting five out here today, so I will hold myself accountable:

1. Blog at least once a week
2. No, seriously, remember to wear my glasses!
3. Send more snail mail
4. Take infant CPR
5. Adopt (obvs)

Ok, there it is for now. Until next time!

But For Now, We Toast

 Let's start out with the positive.

America Adopts published my guest post yesterday! With further ado, here it is!

Click Here!

Also, my Frank Turner birthday extravaganza was more than I could have ever asked for. I was right up front, singing until I was hoarse, getting slammed about like I was 22 again. After the show he came outside to hang out with us fans. What a super nice human being! Perhaps if he wasn't so nice, I could begin to ease up on my Frank Turner fandom...probably not.

He had the crowd sing happy birthday to me and got me a drink. We toasted and hugged and all was right with the world. I fan-girled a little on the inside, but i believe I played it quite cool on the outside!

Now on to the nitty gritty. Last night's sorta, kinda trauma.

Adoption, you are breaking my heart. IAC, you are breaking my heart as well.

I came home to a letter I have been dreading from our adoption agency. A letter I had only heard rumors of. It stated that we have been waiting "a somewhat longer time than the usual".

What I read: You guys are failing. You are not pretty, thin, or interesting. You are not cultured enough or well traveled enough to be appealing. You have not proven yourself worthy. Obviously, this is not true, but that's what I read.

I'm home alone and beating myself up. Is it me? Is it John? Is there some truth to the "other people's theories " that I wrote a previous post on? What happened to my being ok with hitting the "average wait time"? It is all B.S.? Possibly.

I know that the letter did not intend to make us feel inadequate, but this process has torn my self confidence down so much that I can read it again and again and only feel insulted and angry... or is it sad? I don't even know anymore.

This is not me! I am secure in myself and in John. I know we are none of those things. I know we are going to make awesome parents.

Should I only show the happy unicorns and butterflies aspects of our lives? Will that get us chosen? Will that put an end to this limbo? What is the magic spell to not be the people who wait for years and years, or even worse- never adopt? 

I.JUST.CAN'T.

Why isn't us just being who we are enough? Our unicorns and butterflies live peacefully amongst snakes and hornets. Life is a balance of good and bad and even boring.

It's just a letter. A piece of paper I knew was coming any time now. Soon to be followed by the request to begin renewing our home study, because that's cheery. Adoption is not for the weak and I am feeling quite weak.

Dear IAC, a simple "at 18 months we offer these additional services" would have sufficed. We certainly are aware of how long we are waiting. It is quite the sensitive topic.

Are we still hopeful? Always. But there are moments that don't feel so hopeful.

Today I am on a quest to get us back to that hopeful place in our hearts and our heads. 

Wrapping up with a song by Ben Marwood. Just because.

And Glen Hansard. Just because.

One Foot After The Other: Rainbamapocalypse Tuesday

First up, gotta get it out of the way...

I'm seeing Frank Turner tomorrow!! What?! Yes, I am seeing the man himself on my birthday in less than 35 hours. Try not to wee yourself in excitement. I've reached a new level of fandom. The 5+ hour drive to see someone play level of fandom. I've done the 3+ hour drive before and I believe John has done a 7+ to see a band play. Priorities.

Those dimples!

Tonight John and I are celebrating my birthday a day early, since I am going out of town without him tomorrow. I put my name in to see a band, Beans on Toast, at a house show. Looks like I got in with a +1, and it is in fact my month to say yes to everything, so looks like we are going to hit that up tonight! Assuming President Obama being in town doesn't make it impossible to get over there of course. Every time we have a president visit, the traffic is out of control! Plus rain, oh man, Atlanta traffic in the rain is ridiculous. Could end up being the Rainbamatrafficopalypse.

Edited to add POTUS motorcade. Work field trip to see it in action!

 In adoption news, America Adopts invited me to do another guest blog post for them. Look out for that coming up soon (soonish? I have no time frame to share). I really love their site! It has a wealth of information and now we have our own profile listed there as well! Linky dinky doo! They have quite a large presence on the internet as far as the adoption world goes. We feel like having our profile on their site could just be that little extra something we need to be found by someone looking to place her baby.

America Adopts profile snippet!

I was just talking to a friend we made through support group about the letter that everyone that uses our agency writes. It is a letter to prospective birth parents. You have to try to summarize who you are and what your life is about in approximately 900 words. As you can all tell from my lengthy blog posts, this is not an easy task for someone like me. I've been thinking about what I would really want to say, versus the kind of sugarcoated, glossy, picture of our lives. Of course this blog does a pretty good job of that, but I rewrite our letter in my head often.

In all honesty, what our letter should read is this:

Hello, we can't promise to be perfect parents, but we can promise to love heck out this kid and to protect him or her with all that we are as people. We love cats and music. We like delicious food and vacations. We are committed to having an open adoption.

Like, in a nutshell, that's us. Way less than 900 words. Sure we could go on about how much we love our families and how much Atlanta has to offer, but the thick of it is that we are gonna love that kid so darn much! We already do. I know that sounds weird, since we have yet to meet said kiddo, but we do.

So, I'm leaving age 34 behind in less than 24 hours. The year I thought I would finally become a mom. The year that I now know was for overcoming and forgiving the crazy things that happen in life.

Onward and upward.

A Fight Worth Fighting

I know I always say I love a good challenge, but this is intense! It is has been seventeen emotionally and psychologically challenging months since we went live with our adoption agency. Seventeen months of highs and lows and all that comes between.There are days that I love adoption with such intensity, after all it will bring our baby to us. There are days that I cannot even utter the word. I find myself calling it "the A word" or "shmershmoption" or "that thing I just can't bring myself to talk about right now".

I guess in the scheme of things, seventeen months isn't so long. If you add in all the time we spent getting me healthy, then infertility and then the home study, we have been waiting like-  oh I don't know 8ish years to have kids. What's another day right? (FYI another day feels like hell sometimes!)

So many good things are happening right now that it's hard to feel down about it all. I'm driving to Greensboro on my birthday to see my favorite singer Frank Turner. Frank...on my birthday. The only thing better would be hanging with our newborn on my birthday. If that isn't going to happen, then  singing my face off in the front row of a Frank Turner show will have to do. I pre-apologize to all of the people I am going to mow over to get front and center. It's probably best that I am going to the show alone. No one needs to see me in that state!

How I feel at a Frank Turner show!

How I look at a Frank Turner show (screaming internally)

Seconds before I met the man himself!

 It probably sounds really cheesy, but I don't think I would have gotten this far in the adoption wait without his music. Even though it often makes me want to throw my entire life into one backpack and take off across the world, it also has kept me motivated in my little suburban Atlanta life. Motivated to keep working for what I really want, decide who I really want to be in this life and take charge of that. I don't want to ever have any regrets or think of my life as wasted time. Raising our child to be a good human being is a life goal of mine so I, along with John, find the strength through whatever motivates us to move forward.

The two days following the Frank Turner show, I will be on a trip to Asheville with my mom. We decided this year to celebrate our same day birthday with a getaway. My mom and I have that sort of relationship where we can hang out and chat, do fun things. I fully expect to eat too much. We could both use some time away from every day life. Of course I am not so secretly thinking Asheville is close enough that I can get back to Atlanta if we have a last minute call for baby. Or some serendipitous event will happen that our baby just so happens to be born in Asheville while we are there. Then John would be hustling to get up there as fast as he can. Oh, stop it daydreams!

I really wish I could ignore those thoughts and just have fun away from home. It lingers in the back of my brain at all times. The phone rings- I see an unknown number and I get a bit of an electric shock through my chest. Ooh, this could be it! Nope, just the American Heart Association with a public service announcement or a wrong number asking for Booba. Buba? (true story, like a million times over). 

We are going to a little informal gathering of people we met through our agency support group on Saturday. It always feels good to surround yourself with like minded people. These are people who know exactly how this waiting to adopt deal feels. No one is going to offer up suggestions to find a surrogate or to adopt a baby who has been given days to live (sad, but people do send me this stuff). They all just get it. They are our peeps if you will. We meet up every so often outside of official support group and have dinner and drinks, talk about where we are in the process, and let each other know that whatever feelings we may be having are justified. Sometimes that is all it takes... knowing that your feelings are both acceptable and shared by others.

John is busy working on the Atlanta Curling Club's first bonspiel ever.  Aloha Y'all! If you are a curler and want to eat off of an entire pig, now is your chance! I'll be there volunteering as much as they need me. Or put on your best (warm!) Hawaiian gear and come down to watch. Details linked above.

In adoption news, it is almost time for us to start our home study renewal AGAIN. Ohmygod. I really was hoping it wouldn't come to this. I think we have to start most of the paperwork and fingerprints at the end of March or early April. The FBI background check takes the longest of all of the processes. We have to go to the police station, get our prints done and then snail mail them to a government agency. Then we wait an average of 8-12 weeks for the results- though I hear it is taking longer lately.

We also have to be cleared by the GBI, our doctors, a lot of state agencies, and a social worker who will come to our house for a new home visit. The only thing good about a home study renewal is that there are actual steps to take, rather than just having that uneventful waiting we normally face each day. Oh man, the stress. I am sure hoping someone contacts us before we have to go through all of this.

Maybe all of you readers could help out by sharing our information on whatever social media you use? Or mention to every face you see that this fantastic couple in Georgia are just bursting baby love from their hearts and are waiting to adopt? No, like my heart does at times feel like it could burst!

Share our Facebook page or this blog or our official adoption profile . Tell them we are committed to having an open adoption with the birth family. Letters, phone calls, visits, whatever we can work out. We are waiting to adopt a newborn in the USA. We are not approved for other countries or older children (children over 12 months).

I'm signing off as hopeful tonight. Hopeful, because we have so many people cheering us on and helping spread the word that we are waiting to adopt. I am hopeful, because perfect strangers are rooting for us. I am hopeful, because adoption is love. 
 

The Forward Crawl

I'm saying yes again. Yes to adventures, yes to just about anything. Spike is alarmed:

You are doing what?

 I have done this experiment a few times over the past couple of years and it always ends up with such a higher quality of life and happiness. So, from today until the end of March, I am saying yes to everything reasonable. Unreasonable categories include stuff that will get me hurt or killed (obvs), anything to do with exoskeletons, or eating things that lived in the ocean or any body of water really.

Previous "yes" months have taken me on so many new experiences and introduced me to new things and new people. Last week I said yes to a punk show, which I hadn't in a yearish- because, work..ugh, my love of having personal space, that fear of being that old broad in the back... But, I said yes and it was fan-freakin-tastic. I had a lot of thoughts my younger self would have cringed at, but that is just part of getting older and developing a sense of self preservation. Ha. I lacked that when I was in my early/mid twenties. So, yes to more shows and yes everything else. Work and life can't get me down! No way!

Here is your chance friends and family. I can't say no unless I absolutely have to! 

We saw Againt Me! It was fun, but weird. The first time I saw them, it was just Tom and Dustin in a crusty house in Athens,GA. Dustin was playing a metal tub and Tom was on an acoustic guitar. Now it is Laura Jane Grace and no Dustin. But really, it was just as if she was playing a house show. She wasn't so separated from the audience- let people run up on stage, sing with her, general house show shenanigans. The funny part was that she acted genuinely concerned for every crowd surfer/mosh pit dare devil who fell or got banged around too much. Even paused the show to hand out random people's keys that fell out in the pit.

Copying and pasting my FB post from the morning after the show to prove how uncool I can be at age 34:

Things I thought whilst at a punk rock show last night that my younger self would be ashamed of:

- I hope we can stand far enough back to not get hurt.
- That guy looks like trouble. If anyone is going to knock me down, it will be him. Jerk.
- The girl next to me is smoking pot during the show...how rude.
- I wonder if all this bouncing about is registering on my fitbit?
- I want to take pictures, but I'm worried I might drop my new phone
- Oh no, that guy is sweating...and jumping around...what if I get random man sweat on me..
- I hope this is over by 11, I have to get up early and work tomorrow
- I don't know this song, must be from the last 5 years... playing something from 14 years ago.
- Hmmm I wore a cardigan to a punk show. so.not.punk.
- Crowd surfing is the stuff nightmares are made of
- I hope these people have had their vaccinations 

Would do again. Definitely. Whiny inner voice and all.

Laura Jane Grace is absolutely mesmerizing in person!

In other news, next month is my 35th birthday! Woot! Party like it's 2015! I really am starting to accept the fact that I am likely (barring some miracle) turning 35 childless. This was not the plan people! I was born on my mom's 28th birthday. She basically gave her birthday up to me until I was a teenager! We usually hang out and celebrate our combined birthday with some tacos or something. I feel like 35 is sort of a momentous birthday. It is sort of the last birthday you have that doesn't seem like a climb to 40...

35 is a birthday you celebrate. It's not a birthday to dwell on things you don't have. Do I wish our baby was celebrating with us? Uh, yeah... so so much. I'm just going to sit back and feel impressed at what a functional adult I have become despite my urge to only do what I want all of the time...


So, yeah. Just wanted to update real quick. Things are pretty good. John is keeping busy with curling. I am back into my old workout routines, which take up a decent amount of time. I have started my Kidney Walk team (Team Walking Beans) for the 7th year in a row. The Kidney Walk is May 30th at Turner Field if anyone is interested in joining us! Nothing passes the adoption wait time quite like distraction. I might be starting to obsess over The Hold Steady lately. Sorry, Frank Turner... you are still #1, but gotta mix it up a bit. Anyone have any additional distractions for me?

Hopelessly friggin' hopeful.

Yours Truly - Sarah

Gmork, Naps, and Curling

Subtitle: There is no rhyme or reason to this post. 

We are about 2 days short of 16 months waiting "live" with the Independent Adoption Center . Sometimes it feels like the never ending story (Well, typing that just led to a 10 minute youtubin' bonanza of Falcor videos! You can ride Falcor in Munich! ) I know what doesn't drive us absolutely insane only makes us stronger! That's the saying right? No? Well, we always have that pretty unimpressive looking Falcor "ride".

Did anyone else grow up thinking the Gmork lived in their fireplace? That is my childhood trauma. That and Return to Oz. Chills.

So sidetracked.

I feel like we are in an adoption wait "happy place". This can change day to day, moment to moment, but overall- I think we are dealing quite well. Those thoughts of "why not us yet?" or "why must we be stuck in this land of limbo?!" pop into my head and pop right back out these days. There is no real answer, so I am just going with the flow. I avoid message boards and support group Facebook pages these days, because I feel reading about things gone wrong only make a negative impact on how I handle this process. Believe me, I am aware of what all can happen, so it's not like I am turning a blind eye, just protecting myself a little.

We are keeping busy as usual. We went to the Pajama Curl bonspiel in Charlotte, NC over the past weekend. I was reminded that me going to anything that resembles a 72 hour party is a bit of a joke. I needed naps... multiple. I found that retreating to the hotel to watch a marathon of Law and Order SVU, was replenishing enough to make it through some of night two! John has a much higher energy level than I do and just kept going and going.

Since the theme was Pajama Curl, we saw more adult onesie pajamas in one place than anyone wants or needs to see in life. Grown men in onesies.... hmmm. Still unsure of that one.

I have pictures!  Iphone quality, but pictures none the less.

That is John. Batman.

Some pj's were exceptionally awesome.

No, really. It was a real TMNT!

All of the teams that the Atlanta Curling Club sent. So many onesies. 

Over all we had a good time. Good friends, good food- seriously, they fed us a TON of food. Charlotte still has Qdoba! Delish.

Coming up for adoption wait distraction we have Valentine's Day, John's sister's birthday (which is on Valentine's day! Kinda cool!), and my birthday is in March - the big 3-5! I keep telling people I will be 36, I have no idea why. Brainz not working. I am thinking maybe an evening out with friends... friends, you in? How does one party 35 year old style? Does it involve naps? I love naps. Another year, another nap. Better get to napping before baby comes! 

Well, this turned into a nap themed post. Guess we all know how I am feeling today. Luckily, I have a hot coffee and a nice slow day at working coming up. 

We are hopeful that this is our year. We are hopeful that someone who wants to place her baby with loving adoptive parents reads our blog and thinks we are pretty cool rather than the huge nerds we actually are (nerdy is in right? Oh good!). We are hopeful that you all will share our blog, our official profile , our open adoption Facebook page and our open adoption Instagram , where we are participating in the #hopingtoadopt60days get to know us challenge.

I leave you with our very own little luck dragon, Moe. #sunspotsforlife

Those Happy Little Moments

There are a lot of really happy and exciting moments in the adoption wait. Last night as I was trying to sleep, i realized that I never really share that sort of thing on the blog.

These are my favorite "adoption wait" moments:

When you find that perfect onesie by chance and add it to your stash of perfect onesies.

When you have flashes of what it will be like meeting your baby for the first time.

When your email is loading and you imagine an email from an expectant mother will pop up saying "let's get to know each other better!"

When a strange number shows up on your phone and for a split second you imagine it being THE CALL

Tiny sock collecting... TINY SOCKS!

Sitting around talking about baby names. Laughing at each other over most of them and then that hmmm moment... put it on the list! 

When you mention it to near perfect strangers and they have an adoption story. Thank you Starbucks drive thru lady... you have no idea how much that made me smile.

Imagining playing Santa Claus and sneaking gifts under the tree late at night.

Imagining that new Christmas stocking hanging on the mantle. Then imagining filling it with tiny toys, chocolate reindeer and the requisite socks and undies.

Designing the nursery. Making it soothing and calm and absolutely perfect.

A work in progress of course!

Having a mini movie play in your head about how you will announce to friends and family that baby is here! You know, just in case they don't hear you beaming from the hospital.

When your friends ask how it is all going and you can say "sure it is hard, but we are making it."

When you are hanging out with your friends and they start giving your recommendations on baby stuff. It makes it SO REAL.

Developing a stash of baby supplies! WE ARE SO READY.

Having our almost 3 year old nephew finally decide he wants us to have a baby more than a horse. True story.

The amazing friendships you make with other people in the adoption community. Trying not to scream YOU GET ME! YOU REALLY REALLY GET ME!

Picturing your spouse snuggling a baby, calming a screaming baby or even getting pooped on. Dreamy! Amiright?!

Dreaming of finally putting Yoda hat on baby instead of Waffles the cat.

Good things are coming everyone. We may not know a specific day or even month or year, but good things are coming. Our adoption agency's holiday party is on Tuesday, so we are really looking forward to hanging out with our adoption friends and possibly making some more.

This weekend our nephew Henry turns 3. Three years of watching him grow and develop his amazing little personality. He has perfect comedic timing and endless energy. He and I once had a 20  minute conversation about how peanuts are made into peanut butter. It ended with him saying "and peanuts make cookies crunchy". Words to live by, little man. We love this kid more than we can say in words.

Newborn Henry:                                                                                  Almost 3!

Happy Birthday Henry Huggybear!

If You've Got My Back I'll Go On

I really don't have an organized train of thought for this post, I just really need to write to get some feelings out. I struggled with whether I should say anything at all about recent adoption developments, but it just helps so much to get it all out there. We've had a loss. A pretty major one. Without being too specific, we were talking to a potential birth mother for about three weeks and it ended abruptly. Abruptly and in a really sad way. It's just so hard to go from thinking of names, travel arrangements, holidays, birthdays to absolutely nothing. I'm not putting this out there to get sympathy, I just need it off of my chest. Right now I am still carrying it around with me and I am sure John is too to some extent. I let my brain go there even when my guard was up. I am hopeful that this post will help me let it go. Taking a deep inhale now, letting out an even longer exhale.

So yeah, there it is. We must move forward, we must stay strong, we must stay hopeful. Our adoption coordinator (who is just so awesome, by the way) reminded me that it is okay to mourn this as our loss. She said it is okay to miss speaking with the potential birth mother, no matter if it was all real or not, because we got close so fast, building a bond that generally seemed rooted in truth and mutual respect. No matter what the whole story is, there is a feeling of loss there too.

You know, I do feel better writing it all out. To our friends and family who didn't know, I apologize, but we knew the risks of things not working out and wanted to spare many people from that heartbreak. Adoption is love, but adoption is also hard as hell for all involved. It will be worth it in the end. IT WILL. It has to be or no one would ever do it.

We are back to waiting and waiting for something to happen. October we will go on the last minute hospital list, upping our chances for a last minute placement. We have necessities for baby in case we have to grab a bag and go. It is 5k season, so I am back at trying to be in shape for those, which is great for getting my mind off of this huge loss. I have one race in October and two in November so far. I tried and failed miserably at curling (FYI: lunges in yoga and lunges on ice are not the same AT ALL). Mad props to John for being strong enough for that craziness. I on the other hand, sweat in a way I can only describe as "fountain-esque" and three days later can still hardly use my legs. More on that when I complete my challenges requested on Facebook in exchange for sharing our adoption stuff. So close to finishing the last challenge, but I have needed extra time due to distractions (see first paragraph for distraction).

Something funny is this week's soundtrack. Since our loss started Friday night and we had to buck up and celebrate birthdays Saturday and Sunday (John and his mom are a day and some sorta years apart- happy birthday John and Susan! More on John's birthday in a bit.) reality didn't start setting in until Monday. Monday I felt only the need to listen to music that screamed at me or cussed at me or took me to a place I could feel what I needed to feel. Tuesday I couldn't help but listen to music that took me to dark places- solemn, lovesick and hopeless songs. Wednesday was starting to get a little more upbeat- with hope in the melodies and rebellion in the lyrics. Today, I allowed full on shuffle, not cutting out the happy tunes or feeling bitter and sad at those bouncy, feel good songs that are usually saved for a sunny day off. What I learned? I can read my own moods, even when I am not in touch with them, based on what is playing in my headphones. Good to know, self.

Geez, this post is going on forever. I canna help it (Outlander fans? Anyone? Canna? Didna?). Some happy as heck things... I baked a cake from scratch for John's birthday. It was dark chocolate with dark chocolate icing and too rich to just sit and eat. Lesson learned. Next time I will go more fudge that dark chocolate. We had lunch at Big Chow Grill, compliments of my parents. We loafed around on the couch despite plans for activities, mostly due to being so full we couldn't move. We listened to records on the living room floor and stuffed some more food in after a while. All in all, I think he had a good birthday. Next up is out 7th wedding anniversary on October 6th. I am sure we will eat more foods that we shouldn't and do something out in Atlanta or something. It is TBD. Seven years married and 13 years together! Go us!

Cake!

And a Frank Turner song, because I'm feelin' it. Today's mood, we are gonna make through this and come out on the other side better than ever. If Ever I Stray:

May the Force Be With You!

Waffles sporting the Yoda baby hat

I mean, really, is a blog post needed after that picture?  I am pretty sure that sums it all up...

One of my best friends and former roommate Katie knitted our future baby a Yoda hat.  Seriously, she oozes talent.  She has a pastry degree, is artistic, is a wonderful mom to her son Xander, and now she knits.  Being the childless woman that I am, I did what any other sane person would do and stuck it on my cat.  I had to test it out right?  In the picture above, Waffles was frozen in fear or in some sort of stunned state of paralysis.  For about five minutes after, we were enemies.  Luckily, Waffles is our least intelligent cat and promptly forgot all about it.  This means I slept with 10 lbs of cat on my face again last night.

But wait!  It doesn't stop there!  She also knitted me a hat.  A grumpy cat hat.  Brace yourselves.

Nice image quality Sarah...

Um, so awesome!  Sorry for the grainy photo, I used the reverse facing camera on my phone so I could tell if I was getting the ears in the picture.  One of the best parts of these gifts is that I came home to them on my doorstep.  I love getting snail mail and packages for real.  I don't love that Katie moved to Philadelphia, but I do love that she mails things.  I was having a really hard week, really down on that old familiar stagnant adoption process feeling I often talk about.  This absolutely changed my attitude.  Who can feel down when they have friends that will do this for them?  Here is another look at the Yoda hat, sans cat.

Speaking of friends... My sister in law Heather and I had a very successful combined birthday party last Saturday.  We both made a bunch of fancy snacks, stocked up on beverages and invited some of our favorite people.  I believe we had close to 20 people at the house!  That is pretty good for a house party.  I got to show off the nursery progress to those who were into that.  I got to hold our friend Vicky's new baby Connor, good lord he is so cute!  I believe he is around 4 months old.  Nothing but roly poly baby chunk and smiles.  Love it.

Heather and I had a little too much fun with the Publix cake ordering catalog and ended up with this:

Hang in there!

Thanks for the picture Stephen!  It is a cat with a ball of yarn, apparently Heather's dream cake for years.  We got the bakery to add "Hang in there" for added confusion.  Our friends appreciate our sense of humor, so it wasn't too weird when the cake came out.  Anyway, the party was a lot of fun.  We got to hang out with people we hadn't seen in a while and I got to mark "have any party at the house" of my master to-do list.  It was literally on the ongoing list I keep for life experiences.

The adoption is going.  Just going.  On March 23, which is Sunday, we will have been active with our agency for 6 months.  Again, way under the average wait time, but it still doesn't feel great.  You can always convince yourself that you are way cooler than other people and will be chosen quickly, but the truth is that there is no rhyme or reason to being chosen by a birth mother.  Being cool or young or whatever doesn't always have anything to do with it.  After reading about how some birth mothers picked their child's adoptive parents, it can be anything from hair color to location to it coming down to a gut feeling.  It will happen, we just have to be patient.

We did have a woman (I guess, it was online so could have been a man) attempt to start trying to scam us.  Well, I don't know all of the facts and she very well may have been pregnant, but her story wasn't adding up.  The timeline was all off and she said she was already talking to a family that may not "stick".  In the end, it didn't feel genuine.  Even if she was pregnant (again timeline didn't add up on this though) another couple thought she was working with them and it felt really wrong.  The things she said contained so many of the red flags we are taught to look out for, well, because there are a lot of people who are out to scam waiting adoptive families.  Mind blowing right?  They will scam you for money or for attention.  Like this process isn't difficult enough already, you have to be on high alert for scammers?  Awesome.

So, what is coming up?  Just home study renewal stuff.  Our physicals expire in April, as do the cats vaccinations.  In May a ton of stuff expires, so that should be fun.  I signed up for the Run for Your Life, Donate Life 5K, which is April 26th.  It benefits organ donation awareness.  The kidney walk is May 31st.  We are going to Wilmington, NC in June for a curling event with the Atlanta Curling Club... assuming we don't have baby by then.  I would be willing to skip the trip for that!

It's almost time for work to start, so until next time- we are EVER HOPEFUL and excited that this adoption will happen soon!