July Update

We've just gotten home from a 10 day trip to Kevin's family's cabin.  Someone please remind me 10 days in too long to spend in our camper the next time we plan a trip like that.  I apparently had temporary amnesia, we did this 2 summers ago, but not last year, so I guess I forgot!  We did have fun spending time with our family in Akeley...Eli loves his cousins!!!  We were at the campground in town for a couple days, which was great, but all in all, a lot of work and not much rest.  I did get a couple of skates in, and a couple of walks, but this darn weather makes it hard to exercise outside!!!  Kevin was able to do lots of riding on his new ATV, which he loves, so that was good for him.

We had been waiting to hear news about a possible baby for the last couple weeks.  A young woman, who was due at the end of August was looking at profiles.  She was only a "5" on a scale of 1-10 (1 being least certain, 10 being completely decided) about if she wanted to place the baby for adoption or parent.  She took profiles home about 2 weeks ago, and wanted to hang onto them and keep looking at them.  She also wanted to talk with a mother who had placed her baby for adoption and an adoptive family to help her make her decision.  We got an email from our social worker yesterday that she has decided to parent.  It is a disappointing email to get, but at the same time, I am in no way angry or upset with the birth mom.  How could I be mad that someone has decided they will be able to parent their own, sweet, precious baby.  I will be praying that this woman has the support & resources that she needs to care for her baby.

So, we're back to waiting.  It has been almost a year since we applied to our agency, and only 7 months since our home study has been finished.  The "average" wait at our agency is about 18 months, so we're doing ok.  We haven't had an update this month on how many birth mom's are in counseling at the agency, but will probably hear about that next week.  From last month's report, there are several more possibilities in the next few months. Keep praying for us and the birth parents!!

Thanks for checking in!

Crazy Week

So, it's been a crazy week here with the adoption. We were aware last week that a birth mother would be looking at our profile on Monday, but then Friday we heard of another who would be looking at profiles Tuesday.  Then, on Monday, we got a call about a 3rd birth mother looking at profiles.  All 3 babies were boys.  We, of course, were thrilled.  We haven't had any showings of our profile book since December.  I was trying to stay calm, and did a pretty good job. Unfortunately, we found out yesterday and today that all 3 birth mothers went with other families.

We feel sad, but know of several more birth mothers currently in counseling with the social workers at our agency, so while it's disappointing, we have more possibilities coming up.  We really are doing okay, and plan on enjoying our summer with Eli.  (Hopefully his last as an only child!!)

Please keep praying!  We trust God will bring a baby to our family!  Thanks for your thoughts and prayers and checking in with us on the blog!

May Update

So, things are getting exciting around here!  After not much action the last couple months, things are picking up at our agency.  We need to keep most of the details private, but we would love prayer for our adoption.  There are several clients at the agency making decisions in the coming months, and that means that some of them will be looking at our profile.  We are very excited, but still cautious.  It is hard to keep that balance, but we are doing well.

Kevin is done with school, Eli has one more week, we've celebrated all of our birthdays and have travelled a little.  Summer is going to be busy with weekends away, sports and Vacation Bible Schools for Eli and lots of outdoor plans!  I'm doing my first 5k tomorrow morning.  I've lost almost 35 lbs (34.5 as of yesterday) and am feeling really great!  I have plans to keep active and keep losing more!!!

Thanks for reading and checking in on us. Again, all of your prayers would be so appreciated!
Have a great start to summer!!!!!

Spring Update

Well, it's been a while since I've posted so I thought I'd fill you in on what's going on, or really, not going on.  There is nothing really to report.  We've had monthly updates from our social worker a couple of times since I last posted.  In March, the news wasn't great, our agency really didn't have any clients or possible clients.  Our most recent update from mid-April was a bit better, there are 7 women either having decided to place their babies or are in decision making counseling right now, due dates ranging from June to November. None of these are ready to choose an adoptive family, but we're praying that one of these could be our match!  There are currently 12 families (including us) who are waiting to adopt at our agency.

We're doing ok with the process...Kevin has 3 classes left (last class May 16th) so he is really excited to be done! My diet & exercise have been going really well, I'm down a little more than 28 pounds & have been exercising most days. I'm feeling really good.  Eli is done with hockey & is on to baseball...he's playing on a coach-pitch team and is loving it! All in all, we're staying busy & enjoying spring...we're so thankful that we have Eli, it really makes the process a lot easier to stay focused on him.  Colten (my great-nephe, who I do daycare for) is also such a blessing.  He is such a sweet, happy baby, I love having him here.

We'd appreciate your prayers about this, and also, if you ever know anyone considering adoption for their baby, we'd love to be connected.  This is often how adoptions happen.

Have a great spring!!!

Update

It's been a while since I've posted and I've gotten questions on our adoption progress.  At this point, nothing has been happening.  I would think we'll be getting a monthly update from our social worker soon, and our last one pretty much said that not much was happening at the offices.  2 of the 5 offices of our agency didn't have any "decision making clients." (Birth families)

We are doing okay with this...as always, we are keeping busy.  Kevin's work has gotten super crazy and he is in his final weeks of school.  He will be done with classes in mid May, which we are all really looking forward to!!!  He has done so well with all of his classes and has learned a lot that is helping him in his job.  (His degree will be a BA in Organizational Leadership.) 

I have been dieting and exercising and have thankfully lost 17 lbs in the last 6 weeks.  It feels good to be making some progress in this area, where I always struggle.  I hadn't been looking for a new diet to try, but while at Costco, came across a book, called "The Simple Diet."  It really is simple!  3 meal replacement shakes (like Slimfast) 2 frozen entrees, (Lean Cuisine, etc) and then at least 5 fruits and veggies per day.  There is a 2nd phase and then a long term phase that adds other foods back in.  Exercise is always the key to losing weight and I just hate getting started.  Once I am doing it, I can keep it up, so thankfully I've gotten back into it.  I have been using our elliptical, doing some weights, Just Dance 2, and now, thanks to this crazy warm weather, run/walking outside.  I'll be able to inline skate and bike now too!  

Eli is as high energy and busy as ever.  He played hockey this winter and totally loves it!  We signed him up for a short spring league that goes until the beginning of April.  He'll be playing baseball this spring and them some other camps (Lacrosse, basketball and tennis) this summer.  He is definitely his father's child with his LOVE of all sports!!!!!!!  He just can't get enough! 

We're praying that we get a call soon about a baby.  Please pray with us that our agency has more clients coming in for counseling about their pregnancies and that one of them chooses our family.  Enjoy this beautiful weather and have a wonderful spring!  Thanks for reading!

February Update

So not much has gone on with the adoption lately. We had our profile shown to one birth family last week, but they chose another family.

We got an update from our social worker today and there are a couple of birth moms thinking about placing their babies over the next few months, but 2 offices don't have any birth parents considering adoption, so that limits our chances for the time being.

Things have been really busy here at our house...Kevin is in the last fee months of school and it is really a lot of work. His job is going really well, but it is sometimes overwhelming.

Eli has been really enjoying hockey and is doing well in school despite not loving it. He'd rather be playing than at school, but comes home happy very day!

I'm getting started on a new diet and exercise plan...I'm feeling good and committed right now. I am praying I can stick with it! I've got a pretty big goal-to get to my target BMI, which means I need to lose 55 pounds. Yikes!!!

Thanks for reading, I'll post again if we here any news!

Happy New Year!

Hope everyone had a great Christmas and New Year.  We were busy, traveling to Duluth for some skiing/snowboarding and water park fun the week before Christmas.  Then we were home for Christmas with the Ecklunds on Christmas Eve, at our house Christmas Day with Kev's parents, then up to Akeley to celebrate our sweet God Son, Noah's 5th birthday on New Year's Eve.  We celebrated Christmas with the Kramers on January 2nd, so we really stretched out the party! We had lots of fun, but it's going to take me a while to get this house back in order!

On the adoption front, we are now an active "waiting family" with our agency.  We got a call on Dec. 16th that our Home Study had been approved, so that next Monday the 19th, we went into the waiting pool.

I'll try to explain what happens now...when a birth mother (sometimes the birth father/birth grandparents) goes to our agency, they fill out some general health & social history.  She has her own social worker who she will meet with several times (hopefully-this is the ideal, but it depends on how far along in her pregnancy she is-sometimes it may just be 1 or 2 meetings.) and during that time she answers questions regarding what type of communication/openness she would like, if she has preferences about siblings, if the mom stays home, if the family is Christian, etc.  This info, along with due date, sex of the baby, any birth father info, and the health and social history are compiled into a form called a Request For Summary.  RSF.
When she is ready to look at Adoptive Family Profile books,  her social worker contacts the adoptive parent social workers to see if there are families matching her criteria.  If we match, our social worker contacts us, and sends us the RSF.  We receive it by email and are given a certain amount of time to look it over and decide if we want this birth mother to see our book.  We are able to call our social worker to talk about question/concerns.  Some reasons we may decline to be shown would be a known medical problem, drug and alcohol use, or a known special need the baby would have.
If we say yes, the birth mother has a meeting with her social worker where she is shown profiles.  She usually looks at more than one.  If she thinks we'd be a good match, our social worker will contact us to set up a face to face meeting.  (With both social workers present.)

So, that is where we are...we actually received one RSF on the first day we were active, but had to decline.  Our social worker made a small mistake and forgot the one thing that we are not open to as far as ethnicity.  Native American children who are placed for adoption have to go through one extra step, which is a Termination of Parental Rights meeting with the tribe they are from.  It can be unpredictable and we feel like it is one extra set of "what ifs" that we want to avoid.  In the case of the RSF we turned down, both parents identified as Caucasian, but the mother had a small amount of Native American heritage. Even though she doesn't consider herself Native American, the tribe would have the final say in where her baby is placed. It was so exciting to get the RSF, but we knew we had to say no and stick with our original decision.

We really don't have any idea how long this will all take, but we're praying that God has a baby chosen for us, and that he will help orchestrate a smooth, problem free adoption.  And of course, I pray that it happens quickly, but we all know that God has his own timeline!  :)  I'll try not to rush him!

Happy New Year!!!