Dave took me to court.

More specifically, he drove us to court.  We had our first court date for Isaac today, and we now have it officially on court documents that he is moving in with us, and we are officially considered his pre-adoptive home (which is what we will be until the adoption is finalized).

I was completely nervous on the way down there.  Since I didn't know what to expect, I kept finding things to be worried about (will the judge think we're slobs if she sees the drop of coffee I spilled on my pants?).

Then, I worried about whether I look too young.  It's been within the last year or so that I have answered the door, to have someone ask, "Is your mom home?" (not the most flattering question...), so I wondered if the judge would think I looked to young to be a responsible parent.

I don't normally ask Dave "trapping" questions, at least not on purpose. However, on the way there today, I asked Dave, "Do I look old?"  With the wisdom of someone who has 5 years of marriage under his belt, he replied, "You look like a very responsible adult in their mid-twenties.   He managed to lay my fears to rest and yet tell me I look young all at once....what a guy!

Anyway, we are SO excited!  Signing the pre-adoptive agreement was, by far, the most fun I've had filling out paperwork, among all the thousands of documents we've gone through.  I considered asking the judge for an autographed copy of the agreement to frame, but I thought that would be considered inappropriate in an official courtroom.

We really like the judge on his case, though.  In fact, every person we have met who has been professionally involved with him has really been easy to work with, and I've been so thankful to have such pleasant, capable people involved.  The judge even had us pick out a beanie baby to give to Isaac, and also gave us a kid's toothbrush and toothpaste kit, because she said she really values good dental health.  Definitely more personable than I was expecting, and it was really nice to have met them, and have a better idea of what to expect next time we have a court date.

Today is a good day!  And, just think, tomorrow is FRIDAY, so we'll get to see him soon!( though it still doesn't feel quite soon enough).  Can't wait!

Paperwork - but the kind I LOVE!

WE GOT OUR LICENSE IN THE MAIL!

That is the first time I have EVER written a sentence all in caps on the interweb.  That's how excited I am.

We were told we were approved before, but now we have proof.

The good state of Iowa has officially declared us fit to parent.  Hooray!

Also, I think it's the first time we've received adoption paperwork in the mail that hasn't required more form-filling on our part.  (Hooray again!)

It's a good day.

We got the Stamp of APPROVAL!

We were notified that our homestudy has been APPROVED!  We are so excited.  Thrilled, really!

We knew there would be obstacles to overcome in our homestudy, and are so thankful that God allowed it to be approved the first time through. We're so excited! Our paperwork still has to be processed (seems like there's always a reason to wait for something!), but it's officially approved.  This also means there will be a break in the deluge of paperwork we've been doing.  Woo hoo!

Once we get our actual license in the mail, then we can start working towards finding a match. Since we stated that we are not currently interested in having foster children, but only children who are cleared for adoption, it could still take awhile. Or it might not.  Hard to say! As a planner, that's not what I want to hear, but as believers in Christ, we're still trusting that God has everything in His control.  We know He will work everything for our good, as well as the good of our future children - and also for His glory, and we are resting in His promises.

We would really appreciate continued prayers through the matching process. With any phone call we get, we can ask questions, and say yes or no to individual cases. We anticipate this being a time where we ask God for much wisdom and discernment, and would appreciate prayers along those lines.

Hard to believe we made it this far through the process!  We have desired kids for so long, and it finally feels like they could be just around the corner.  We can hardly wait to meet them!

We Graduated!

It's official, we graduated from our PS-MAPP classes, and got the certificate in the mail to prove it!

This doesn't mean that our homestudy is approved or that we're licensed, but we're hoping to hear back on that in the next few weeks.  Woo- hoo - one more step completed!

Last Home Study done! (and an unexpected game of 20 questions)

I spent most of the morning cleaning up the residue from the fire yesterday.  Despite the fact that the coffee Dave brought me yesterday was regular and not decaf, I just didn't have the energy to deep clean the whole kitchen last night, so we cleaned up the really bad parts of it, and saved the rest till this morning (although we did go to Wal-mart to replace the fire extinguisher, just in case it came up.  Which it didn't).

Turned out it wasn't anymore fun this morning that it had looked last night.

But, since we had our last home-study visit today, I was pretty sure we should get the residue from the fire extinguisher cleaned up.  I didn't think that a kitchen covered in post-fire messiness would really make us look like the safe, responsible type.  So, I gritted my teeth and tackled the oven.

Unfortunately, Easy-off is a slightly mis-leading name for the oven cleaner stuff.  It was not easy, nor is it all completely off the oven.  I also inhaled copious amounts of the cleaning chemicals during the process, which I did not enjoy. And at the end of it all, my house smelled like a cleaning supply warehouse.  Not exactly inviting.  So, I did what any normal slightly obsessive person would do:  I opened the windows, turned on fans, then baked brownies to cover the last of the chemical smells.  Worked like a charm.  Plus, now we have brownies to eat.  

Actually, back when Dave and I were dating, sometimes I would put cookies in the oven about 20 minutes before he would arrive to pick me up so that I could feed him warm cookies and the house would smell nice.  They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, but I also think it's through his nose.  You know, good smells are attractive and such. 

But back to the homestudy. It all went well!  Well, except for one part.  I had been making coffee for every visit, just in case she was interested.  Today I found out that she hates even the smell of coffee.  Oops.  Lucky for us I don't think any points were deducted for all the coffee smells she's had to endure.

During one part of the study, she asked if there were any "other" things we thought she should know.  She said it with sort of a questioning look on her face, so I wasn't sure what to say.  Then, she reminded us that back in class #6, we were told about a question that DHS cannot ask us, but if we want them to know the answer, then we are free to tell them.  That sparked a memory, and I knew there was something that I had wanted to mention, but I couldn't figure out what.  So, I asked if we could play 20 questions.  She said yes. 

That was question one.

     Question 2:  "Does it have to do with religion?"

     "No."

     Question 3: "Does it have to do with race?"

     "Yes."

Then, I just said the first thing that popped into my mind (always a bad idea):

     "Do you need us to tell you we're white?"

     :::head in hands. "Um, no." 

(I guess that's pretty obvious when you look at our pale complexions...)

     "OH!  We are able to tell you at this point if we have any racial preferences 

       in the kids we'll adopt!"

     "Yes!"

     "Oh, we'll take any race."  

And thus ended our game of 20 questions.  

To be clear, she definitely stayed within the rules of not asking.  Mostly it turned into a game because I had that nagging feeling that there was something that we should say, and I pursued the subject.

Our social worker said she's working on our study next week, because we had all our paperwork done first.  Score!  She even showed it to us on her planner, which just warmed my heart. And, she said that the reference letters she received from my doctors answered her questions concerning my cancer history.  In the end, it's not her that approves the case study, she just creates the case study and gives a recommendation, but she seemed very optimistic.  So, if all goes well, we should be hearing back sometime in February.  

Hooray!

School's out for the year! (for us anyway)

We went to our 10th PS-MAPP class last night, and have now completed 30 hours of training!  So now we basically know it all. Totally kidding!  We now know enough to know we definitely need to keep learning more (fortunately for us, there's mandatory training required each year to keep your license...and more paperwork as well!).

It was fun going to our last class.  I'll definitely miss the people we've met, although we'll keep in touch with some of them via email and such.  We had quite a group - there were a few people you could count on to lighten any heavy topic, and so many people with good insight. We really learned a lot.    

As much as we enjoyed the class, however, it will be really nice to not be making weekly trips to Ames on snowy roads, and to have our Monday nights back (of course, we get our Monday nights back just as Monday Night Football comes to a close!).

We celebrated being done with classes by getting chocolate ice cream on the way home.  Even though it was 5 degrees outside.  And it was amazing.

From here, we have one more home study visit to complete, then we wait for our homestudy to get written up and go to DHS, and hope and pray we get accepted!

:::::Fingers Crossed::::.. The Paperwork is done! (We think. We hope. We pray.)

Well, I just emailed our social worker what we believe is the last of our paperwork.  I sincerely hope it is.  For two reasons, really:
1) I want to be done with it.  I believe that part is obvious.
2) If our social worker has to chase down paperwork, references, etc, then our homestudy gets pushed back further, because she doesn't start writing it up until she has ALL of the paperwork (understandably!  That would be frustrating otherwise).

So, I'm waiting to hear back on whether we have everything turned in, and whether she has gotten all the references she needs turned in.  Hence the fingers being crossed!

If you all could cross your fingers (and perhaps pray, since that would actually do more good anyway) with us, that would be just wonderful.

I've mentioned this before, but please also be praying with us that our homestudy gets approved the first time through.  With cancer on my "record,"  there's a chance that could cause a bit of a delay. So please pray that it goes through with no problems whatsoever!

Want to see our Family Map?

We are ALMOST done filling out paperwork for our homestudy.  Actually, I had thought we were completely done, but then, I found another 2 pages of worksheets that we were supposed to have already done that had gotten tucked behind other stuff.  Sigh.

Anyway,  one of the items I turned in today was our Family Map.  It was, by far, the easiest of the paperwork we've had to complete.  And so, I'll present it to you for your viewing pleasure:

Aren't we cute?  Just two little circles. The grey circle is so big because we have lots of room in our family for more mini-circles (kids, in case you were wondering), and the double lines going between us is because we like each other a lot.  All done according to the code set forth in the "How to draw a Family Map" worksheet.

Unfortunately, Yarbo was not able to be on our Family Map, but he was on our EcoMap, so he was at least partially represented.

We're still waiting to see if we can go to class tonight - it's supposed to be our LAST ONE!  But, it's also snowing out there like crazy, so they might have to postpone it for weather.  So, I'm going to go fold laundry until I hear whether we have class (I'm hoping they let us know very soon).

Home Study Meeting #2 & a Medicinal Mishap

We had our home study meeting this morning, #2 of 3, so we're 2/3 of the way there (I know, my math skills are awesome).   We had the house pretty well picked up, nice Christmas music playing in the background, had given Yarbo benedryl, since he sometimes gets hyper with new people, and had put him away in his kennel (we weren't sure up front whether he would need to be out with us or not, thus the benedryl, which had been ok'd by our vet).

So, we sat at the table with our social worker, answering lots and lots of intensely personal questions, and all the while Yarbo was howling, whining, squealing, and literally bouncing off the walls upstairs.  Now, I know that I said he sometimes gets hyper, but that's usually when he's with new people, not when he's upstairs.  Since I have piano students coming in and out all the time, he's very used to people being in the house.  He just gets excited when he actually sees them.  So, for the life of us, we couldn't figure out what all the ruckus was about, and it was annoying, but also a little concerning as well.

So, we wrapped up the visit, scheduled our last visit, and after the worker left, went upstairs to get Yarbo, who should have been somewhat sleepy, like he was the last time we gave him benedryl.  He exploded out of the kennel and tore all over the house, running around like crazy, which was a bit.....unexpected.

Rewind a moment to last night, when we were running errands after our class and trying to pick up the benedryl.  We were supposed to get the children's kind, and give him half of one of those.  We looked at 4 places, and the only children's benedryl we could find was liquid, or those little strips of medicine you put on your tongue, and I wasn't sure that we could get Yarbo to take that.  So, at the 4th store, we finally just got regular benedryl, after seeing that the active ingredient was the same and all.

However, after his behavior this morning, we went back and read the rest of the small print on the back label.  It warns: "May cause excitability in small children."  Apparently the children's benedryl must be formulated differently, and not just a smaller dose.

Sigh.

At least all the cups were clean that we used (and yes, I did plan them again.  I couldn't help it.) and everything else went smoothly (except for the part where Dave tried to help the worker spell Saskatchewan by lifting up his outer shirt to show her his t-shirt underneath - that was slightly awkward/funny.  She decided to just leave it as "Canada.").

And, of course, we got to turn in another stack of paperwork.  But the bonus - we didn't get any more new paperwork to fill out from this meeting.  Score!

So, all in all, it went well, and next time, we will be sure to use only the children's benedryl on Yarbo, even if it means using the strips.

Ridiculous Amounts of Superfluous Measurements

I bet you'll never guess what we got to do tonight.  Once I tell you, I'm sure you'll wish you had spent your evening the same way.

We measured every inch of our house, and drew a floor plan.  Took forever.

"Why," you may ask? 

Simple.  Because we'd like to be parents.  

In order to have the chance to be parents, one of the 953 pieces of paperwork required is a complete floor plan of our house, including interesting tidbits such as how far above the ground our windows are, spaces between said windows, and extra bonuses such as the size of dressers.  Yes, the size of our dressers.  I don't even feel like mentioning to them at this point that the dresser currently in our guest room is not the same one we plan to use for our future kids.  It just doesn't make sense to us to buy the furniture for the rooms until we know who and how many we're buying it for.  Nevertheless, we dutifully measured our dressers.

Sometimes, it just seems....well....like there are ridiculous amounts of superfluous paperwork required that don't really make sense (in case you don't know this about me, the more irritated I get about something, the more I use big words).  I get that they need to know we don't live in a shack filled with carbon monoxide, or that we won't be making them sleep on the floor or feeding them nothing but crackers and candy, but isn't that what the home visit is for?   

So much of the questions and profiles we have to fill out seem....intrusive, to say the least, but I understand those a little bit better.  They're trying to make the best possible match between us and our future kids.   Still a bit much sometimes, but I understand it a little more.  Tonight's activity was just....frustrating.

We've already given our social worker a complete tour of the house - is it really necessary to provide the inches of space between the door to our room and the door to our closet? 

At any rate, at the end of this public rant to the Internet, I will get back to our binder to complete more paperwork because whether I like it or not, these are hoops we are assigned to get to the end goal: parenthood.  And for that goal, I would measure every house in Des Moines. 

First night of Adoption class!

We went to our first PSMAPP (can't remember what that stands for, but it's for foster parenting/adoption licensing) class last night!  It was....long. Very long.  Three hours in a hard chair sitting at an awkward angle that produced a pain in my neck. But, the class was good even so, because we got a lot of information, and have a better idea of the things we'll be learning along the way.

As a side note, we got to the building and didn't see anyone on our way in (there are several entrances and the class size is small, so this isn't too unusual), but our stomach dropped to our toes when we saw on the whiteboard: PSMAPP Classes, room 302, 5:30pm.  May I mention that we arrived at 6pm, which was when we thought it started.  We frantically raced through the building, concerned that we would have missed too much of the class (and meeting #1 is imperative to pass the course, no make-up's allowed!).  As it turned out, they reserve the room at 5:30 so that it is free by 6pm.  It took a good 10 minutes for my heart rate to return to normal, but it all ended well.

They gave us our coursework for the class - it is thicker than many of my college textbooks.  And, if you miss a class, even if your spouse goes, you have to fill out a BOOK.  I'm not exaggerating - it is literally a book, I saw one because some poor woman in our class is going to have to miss next week.  Whew.  We will have to miss one, and I'm already not looking forward to The Book.

We also have homework, which I knew we would, but not only is there weekly homework, there are long-term due dates as well (for example we got a huge set of paperwork last night that isn't due till week 3, but we also have homework to do this week).   Seriously, this should count as college credits.  I don't know what I would do with extra random college credits, but I still think we should get them.

We met the people who will be in our class for the next ten weeks.  I think it will be a great group, and I have a feeling we'll learn a lot from their insight, in addition to all our materials.

All in all, it was a bit of an overwhelming night, but we're still just very excited to be moving forward in this process!

We're in!!!

We are very excited, because we got some wonderful news!  WE MADE IT into the next adoption classes, and they begin on November 8th!  Thanks God!

We were told our background checks could take up to two weeks from when they received our fingerprints.  We got our finger prints done and mailed last Thursday, so they probably received them Friday, and we got the call yesterday!

Our classes go from 6-9pm every Monday for 10 weeks, which caused a bit of a problem since I teach till 6pm, and the classes we made it into are about 45 minutes away.  However, I have some of the best piano students/parents ever, and they have so graciously agreed to reschedule during those weeks, so we've already ironed out the scheduling conflicts, and we are good to go! 

Today, we got a little postcard in the mail, with a reminder of our class time, dates, location, etc. (as if I'd forget!).  Then, I read the fine print: "You will receive a detailed letter confirming [a lot of things] a few weeks prior to your training."  I'm already looking forward to the "detailed" letter (translation: 50 more pages of paperwork?).

We're excited!

17 forms turned in, 953 to go.....

Well, we went to our first adoption meeting this past week, and it was....overwhelming.  We learned a lot about what we'll be learning, if that makes sense.  We got to turn in the first set of forms, which included our official adoption application!  Next, we have to take 10 weeks of classes, do a home-study, complete oodles and oodles of paperwork, get licensed, then kids can get placed with us (that's the short version).   The next set of classes starts in early November, but it's on a first-come, first-serve basis.  If we don't get into those classes, we have to wait until January or possibly February. :(

In order to get into the November classes, we have to pass our background checks (fingers crossed......j/k!).  In order to get the background checks processed, we had to send in our fingerprints.  To get fingerprints done, we had to go to the police station, where they took us back to the prisoner-place with the cells and such, which was really creepy.  It was the same room where they take all the people who have done bad things and do mug shots and everything.  It was fairly intimidating to me, so I don't think that I would make a very good criminal, if for no other reason than I'd be afraid of jail.  But, we got our fingerprints done, and sent in, so now we wait to see how fast our background checks go through to see which class we get into!

I'm already getting the feeling that we'll be doing a lot of the "hurry up and wait" thing, which isn't my strong suit, but I believe God will use it to build patience in me, so you can pray for that. 

In the meantime, we're so excited to be finally taking actual steps towards adoption.  We nervous and excited, slightly intimidated, yet eagerly anticipating meeting the children that God has for us!!