Our first care package

Last week we sent our first care package to Grant!  They only allow you to send what will fit in three ONE-gallon size ziploc bags, so space was limited.  Below is a picture of some of the stuff we sent.  I also threw in a couple more small toys that Auden doesn't play with anymore that aren't pictured.  Cody and I slept with the blanket for almost two weeks to get our smell on it, ha.  We had a great time with the recordable storybook "Under the Same Moon."  For the dedication page we did our best to say a couple Korean phrases that we learned..."Hello," "I love you," and "thank you" (to his foster mommy).  I'm sure Grant's foster family is going to get a big kick out of it...hopefully it sounded remotely close to what it was suppose to! 
 

Countdown has begun!

Our "wait to travel" has begun!  Our agency received our acceptance packet on November 7th, so that is our official start date of waiting.  Although our baby boy can't be with us physically yet, I wanted something that could be with me during this long wait to go get him.  I had this necklace made (gotta love Etsy!) which says "LOVE" in Korean on the front and his name on the back.  It helps to know he is close in my mind and heart despite the thousands of miles that separate us right now.  Since I have been wearing the necklace whenever I carry Auden around he naturally holds onto to it, it's so cute.  He knows it says "love" and is quite infatuated with it.  We can't wait to tell him about his little brother one day...but not yet, it is too soon...14-18 months is hard for us to comprehend, let alone a 2 year old:-) 

IT'S A BOY!!!!!!

It feels like a dream when I say-we have another son!!!  He is on the other side of the world right now, but he will be ours and we will be his forever family!!!!

Many of you are probably very confused right now since the last thing you knew is that we were pursuing domestic adoption, so let me take a step back to explain. 

After our last failed match with a domestic birth mother, Cody and I were pretty disappointed (and stressed) with how things were going.  I was spending so much time, energy and emotion speaking to these potential birth moms that called us and we just ended up getting hurt in the end.  I know that if we continued we would have eventually been successful but our heart just wasn’t in the domestic process any longer. 

That is when we suddenly found out that if we switched from the Korea girl line (which never moves) to the Korea boy line we would move to #1 on the list (since we have been waiting 15 months) and we would likely be matched within two weeks!  It didn’t take us much time at all to know this is definitely what we wanted!  After all, Cody and I already decided we would be happy with either gender when we embarked on the domestic adoption journey (since usually you can’t choose), so why were we spinning our wheels with domestic  when we could have a baby boy from the program our hearts called us to in the first place two years ago? 

Even though wait times and travel times have gotten longer since we began this journey, there is still so much to love about the Korea program.  The children get top of the line medical care in Seoul and live with loving foster families until you are able to get your child.  Since unwed mothers typically live in special homes during their pregnancy you have the opportunity to get extensive background information about the child’s birth family, which is very rare in the world of international adoption. 

So, now onto the fun stuff!!!

This week we received a referral for a beautiful baby boy!!!  He is now six months old as he was born on April 20, 2012.  He is a super healthy little guy and this was confirmed by our pediatrician and an international adoption doctor that reviewed his file for us this week.  We officially accepted the match today and are in the process of putting our acceptance packet together to be sent to Korea! 

We have more information about his birth mother and birth father than we ever imagined!  We even have heights, weights, occupations and even childhood histories for both parents….such a blessing for our baby boy!  Please understand we will not be sharing this information with anyone as this is his story to tell one day if he so chooses. 

But I would love to share stuff about our little cutie!!

-At 6 months, he weighs 16lbs, all his stats are 50^th percentile

- He sleeps 10 hours at night, with three one hour naps during the day

- He poops 2-3 times a day (hehe) and loves taking a bath

- Speech and Response: "He makes eye contact and babbles a lot and

laughs out.  He moves his limbs vigorously and turns over.  He

controls his head and sits for a while when placed in a sitting

position.  He bares weight on his feet and bounces when placed in a

standing position.  He grabs object within his reach and brings it to

mouth.  He stares at and plays with his hands.  He brings his hand to

mouth to suck.  He turns head in the direction of sound.  He tracks a

moving object at the angle of 180 degrees.  He responds to a feeding

bottle.  He talks a lot during play.  As he spends most of the time

with his foster mother during the day, he gets happy to see other

foster family members coming home in the evening (two school age boys

and father)."

- The social worker states that he is "a cute and clever 5 month old

baby boy. He looks up at people and laughs out if he is called by his

name.  His social response is good.  He has developed good feeding,

sleeping, and bowel habits: his motor skill development is

age-appropriate."

And last but not least…..we are naming him Grant but keeping his Korean name as his middle name.  So his name will be Grant JoonHyeok.   Very eclectic with our last name, eh?  His birth mother named him so we wanted to honor her by keeping it in his name.  “Joon” means “hero” and “Hyeok” means “sincere” in Korean. 

 It still feels like we are dreaming.  We are so excited to become a family of four, even if it is “in spirit” until we are able to travel to Korea to go get him.  Auden and Grant will be a tad over 2 years apart in age which will be perfect.  Perfect for playing together and of course perfect for fighting with each other like brothers do!

So now we have to exercise more patience than humanly possible and wait 14-16 months to go to Korea to go get him.  This may sound horrific to some but Cody and I have always known about this travel wait, so we have been mentally prepared for it (it was the wait to get matched we were not prepared for, ha).  We will get updates and pictures every two months and be able to send him care packages as well.  In the meantime, we can rest assure that his foster mommy is taking good care of him. 

Thank you to all our friends and family for all your support since we first started this journey just about two years ago!  It’s amazing what a rollercoaster ride it has been and we are so lucky that we’ve had so many cheerleaders along the way.   It is easy to see now that every day and every bump in the road was meant to be, as it lead us to our little Grant.  Please continue to keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we begin our wait to when we can finally hold our baby boy in our arms.

Continue to check our blog for updates about our little guy as we receive them!  The agency discourages posting his pictures on public websites so we may have to stick to emailed pictures until we get to Korea:-) 

Match #2 = Failed

Last Friday we received another call from a birth mother that began another rollercoaster ride until it came to a screeching halt last night.  The first conversation went really well, she said she wanted to proceed with us and sent us ultrasound pictures and pictures of herself right after hanging up the phone.  Our conversations continued to go well and we thought we got through all the “tough” questions and were on the same page.  We set up arrangements to go to Grand Rapids, Michigan to go meet her.  Our attorney advises you do this as soon as possible to “lock down” the relationship (especially since she was only 16 weeks).  Yesterday morning flights were booked, hotel reservations and an ultrasound appointment were made.  We finally allowed ourselves to get excited. 

Then came an email late in the afternoon.  She said she had consulted with an attorney and found out she was within her rights to ask for living expenses- rent, food, bills to be paid for the next five months until she delivers in March.  We repeated that we were happy to pay for everything adoption and pregnancy related (all legal fees, counseling fees) including generous post-partum support…but we cannot pay for living expenses for the next five months for her and her three year old.  We explained that if a prospective birth mother is asking for this, it is hard for us to know she is in it “for the right reasons” and won’t change her mind after the baby is born.  She then told us she would be looking for another couple.   

And that was that. 

Thank goodness we found this out before we went to Grand Rapids and were even more invested, financially and emotionally.  The really sad part is there are desperate childless couples that get taken advantage of all the time by women like her.  There is nothing easy about this process. 

Match #1= Failed

Well, we knew this domestic process wasn't going to be easy...I guess we were just hoping we were one of the lucky ones where it was easy.  Unfortunately, the match with the couple in Texas pretty much feel apart this week due to some information we learned that proved to be a deal breaker for both parties.  We were pretty sad it didn't work out but that just means it wasn't meant to be our baby.  Our baby is still out there.  We are learning more and more about the right questions to ask these birth mothers as they call, so at least we feel better prepared now that we have a couple of calls under our belt. 

I also unfortunately had to break ties with the birth mom of the twins.  Like I suspected, she couldn't call me for a couple days because she was in the hospital.  Her heart wasn't doing good and they wanted to monitor the babies.  This confirmed for us that it is just too high risk of a situation for us to enter into.  She needs parents that will be ready when these babies are born probably less than 30 weeks and I had to tell her we are just not the right people.  We just can't go through the NICU for weeks and weeks again. 

So, that is it for now.  Back to the drawing board.  Hopefully we will get more phone calls soon. 

cautiously announcing...we are MATCHED!

Wow, everything is happening so fast!  First of all, the birth mom of the twins never called on Tuesday with her ultrasound appt. date like she was suppose to.  I called her twice the beginning of the week and she did not answer.  Definitely a blessing in disguise because on Wednesday afternoon, we had two potential birth parents contact us!  I say "parents" and not "moms" because one was actually a birthfather, which is extremely rare.  He explained to us that he and his wife (just got married last week) were 34 weeks pregnant and wished to make an adoption plan for their child.  They are only 20 years old and currently attending college as well as working full-time in Texas.  They believe they are not in a position to care for a baby right now and believe an adoption plan is best.  I couldn't believe how mature he sounded for only 20 years old, it was obvious he was a very responsible young man.  I asked him why he liked our profile and he said because of all the profiles he and his wife looked at it, we looked like we really had fun being together and they could feel the love within our family by what we wrote and our pictures.  That made my heart melt.  Since his wife wasn't home from work yet (because of the time difference) we made arrangements to talk to her later.  Yesterday, I got the chance to talk to her for over an hour.  We had an amazing conversation and she is just as sweet as her husband.  Although I need to get her to stop calling me "mam" because it makes me feel so old:-)

She said their families are supportive of an adoption plan and assured me several times they are 100% confident in their decision.  Since she is so far along in her pregnancy, they said they are comfortable just video conferencing through Skype a couple times before it's delivery time.  She is receiving great pre-natal care and we are awaiting her recent ultrasound pics via email.  We decided we were all comfortable with a semi-open relationship where we would provide them with an email update once every 6 months with pictures.  She also offered to find out the baby's gender at her next appointment in 2 weeks so we can prepare accordingly!

They gave us the go ahead to contact our attorney to start the necessary paperwork and arrangements and we couldn't be more excited!  The situation seems so wonderful and we are pinching ourselves right now.  They said they feel so lucky to have found us and we feel so lucky that they chose us!

Thoughts and prayers please that the process goes smoothly from here on out!  Our due date is October 15th!!

Check back for more updates.

PS- Although this probably goes without saying, we ask that our friends and family refrain from writing anything on Facebook.  This is a process with many steps and while we pray they go smoothly there is a chance they may not.  We do not wish our addition to the family be made "public" until the state revocation period is over, which is 13 days after the baby is born in the state of Texas.  Thank you for respecting this in advance:-) 

We got....A CALL

On Friday afternoon, exactly 2 weeks after we put our profile up on parentprofiles.com we received our first call from a birth mother.  It was good timing since I got an early dismissal from work for the holiday weekend and didn't have to pick up Auden for another 1.5 hours from school.  Little did I know I would be talking to this birth mom for the entire 1.5 hours. 

One of the first words out of her mouth was...."you need to know- it's  identical twins."  My heart skipped a beat as the practical side of my brain tried to calm down since this was starting to sound like a scam, after all, most adoptive parents dream is to have twins so they don't have to go through the adoption process again.  But she continued to tell me her life story, I couldn't believe how open she was.  The adoption attorney said this is how it would be with real birth moms- they would be open books.  So, I listened to her and asked a question every so often.  As with most birth moms, she has had a rough life.  She is my age has been through more than I could ever dream of.  However, she has a decent job as an LPN and is very concerned about the health of these babies.  She even said she would want us to be infant CPR certified before we left the hospital with them (which we already are from Auden's NICU time). 

The situation is not perfect, far from it.  There is so much to consider and Cody and I's brains have been hurting this weekend just thinking about it.  First of all, even though we have always wanted three children- can we handle twins?  can we afford twins?   Secondly, this is a very high risk pregnancy and we are mostly likely looking at NICU time again.  This woman already has twins (fraternal) from a previous marriage that came at 34.5 weeks.  They put in a cerclage (stitched cervix up) a few weeks ago but they are in no way full proof from keeping her from going early.  So, Cody and I are trying to wrap our heads around logistically how we can deal with twins in a NICU near Boston while we have Auden.  It seems impossible for more than 2-3 weeks.  We decided it was best to be 100% honest with her and explain this.  I spoke to her for a long time again on Saturday and she seems to still want to pursue a relationship with us and is interested in meeting us.  She even mentioned perhaps coming to VA to have the babies so they are at our NICU.  This sounds great in a perfect world but usually there is not enough notice to travel such a distance before delivery, let alone with preemies.  Now, whether or not we bring her down her around week 30 and put her up in a hotel until she goes into delivery is another matter that we could consider. 

She is 20 weeks pregnant right now, her due date is Feb 9th.  If she goes at 34 weeks, everyone's goal, that puts us around the 3rd week of December.  So, Christmas in the NICU is a strong possibility. 

So, when we talked again yesterday she agreed to us coming to Massachusetts for her ultrasound in 3 weeks.  It is a two hour long ultrasound to confirm the babies hearts are okay since the birth mom herself has a heart defect.  It is very nice to know that she is being monitored so closely with high risk doctors.  Many times birth mothers have no prenatal care whatsoever.  She even said that we if wanted to know the babies gender we could find out as long as she has her headphones in and can't hear (she really doesn't want to know anything about the babies other than they are healthy). 

So, that is where we are right now.  Proceeding cautiously, trying to figure out if this is a good match.  I'm trying very hard not to get too emotionally invested in the situation despite having spoken to this woman for hours and hours the last three days.  Because after all, the chances of the first birth mom that calls you actually working out is very slim.  And this is high risk pregnancy situation that we may not even be able to handle.  Or the birth mother could find another couple that is comfortable with micro-preemies and a long NICU stay that she thinks is a better fit than us.  Honestly, anything could happen at this point. 

Thoughts and prayers for this birth mom are appreciated, she is literally putting her life on the line carrying these babies due to her heart condition.  And thoughts and prayers for these babies that they can stay in as long as possible, regardless of whether we get to be their mommy and daddy. 

Auden Update- 2.5 years old

Last week Auden had a half birthday, which gives me an excuse to update the blog with all the fun stuff he is doing lately!  He is such a little boy now, he will tell us what he thinks about everything and is definitely testing his boundaries like toddlers do.  He is eating great which is such a pleasure for Cody and I after all we have been through.  His favorite things right now include puzzles, jumping on our neighbor's trampoline and putting his head underwater at the pool, see pictures below:-)  We transitioned his crib to the "toddler bed" last month which went smoother than we could have ever imagined.  He doesn't seem to fully realize or care that he can get out of bed now when we are not in the room.  He will still lay in bed and play with his stuffed animals until we come into his room in the morning, which is quite funny.  We are having a great summer riding around in our new jeep, Auden loves wearing his shades with the top down.  He is at such a fun age right now, we love watching him explore and discover new things every day! 

                                                        Swimming under water at our swim club

                                                         Jumping on our neighbor's trampoline

Auden being chased by our adorable neighbor

 Our home made slip n' slide

                                                   New toddler bed

                                                  Cody refurbished his childhood rocking horse for Auden

                                                       Crusing in the new jeep

                                  Some professional pics we got done for our domestic adoption website 

                                 

Here We Go- Switching Gears!

I can’t help but to laugh as I write this.  Boy, how much has changed since I first started this blog in the beginning of 2011!  Let’s see, we chose Korea because it was a stable and predictable program over the last four decades.  But as soon as we got approved everything started to change and slow down drastically.  We said we didn’t want to pursue domestic because we didn’t want a newborn.  Lately, Cody and I find ourselves getting super excited at the thought of a little baby in the house.  We believed domestic adoption was not right for us because we weren’t comfortable with a birth mother in the picture.  Now I love the idea of our future child knowing where they came from and being able to ask their birth mom questions one day.  

We are now days away from starting to advertise for domestic adoption.  To contradict ourselves once more, we decided to completely go for it and advertise nationally with the website www.parentprofiles.com.  We feared we could be spinning our wheels advertising locally for months without any leads, whereas this site is extremely popular and will get tons of views every day.  This week, we have been working hard to write a good “Dear Birthmother Letter” that is seen on the site, as well as fun photographs that give a peak into our lives.  Today we got our “baby phone,” also known as a cheap cell without a contract that we can add minutes to whenever.  This is how any interested birth moms are going to reach us.  Of course we need to be prepared for scammers calling; we have been educating ourselves regarding how to identify a scam vs. regular birth mom. 

It’s funny, the unpredictable nature of domestic that once scared us has actually become exciting.  After we go "live" on the website, every day we wake up could be the day we speak to a birth mom that wants to make an adoption plan with us.  Of course, being in our new house makes timing so much less important now thankfully.  We could even be ready tomorrow if we need to be to bring home a baby!  Let’s hope we can give Auden a little more notice than that though, ha.

Who knows what is going to happen with this but for now it feels good to be doing something while waiting in the Korea line.  I’m thankful it has been so easy to get started with domestic with very little additional paperwork on our end.   I could have never ever predicted that this is where we would be right now but I love that our hearts and minds are completely open.  It’s amazing how life works, maybe we were meant to wait in the Korea line for the past year because it wasn’t time for us to meet our child yet?  We are looking forward to see what the next few months have in store for us! 

Adoption Update- Unexpected Good News!

July 1^st will mark one year from the day we got our home study approved and officially got on the wait list to be matched with a Korean baby girl.  Since we haven’t been matched yet, it means that we had to update many clearances and documents with the agency (you know, since we haven't been busy enough).  We also had to meet with our social worker again because she had to check out our new house.  I have to admit, doing the paperwork was not easy since Cody and I are losing hope with the program.  It is hard not to wonder if we are doing it all for nothing.  The current news in the program is that a bunch of referrals (children to be matched with) are suppose to come in late July and start coming regularly thereafter, but that is what they told us in May and nothing happened.  So we are definitely not holding our breathe any longer.  At this rate, I think it will be a miracle if we are matched by the end of the year. 

Our plan was to give the Korean program until the end of the year and then pull out so we could pursue domestic if the referrals still weren’t coming in.  At our meeting with the social worker this week, I planned on asking if we could at least have them write our domestic home study so we didn’t have to start all the paperwork over with another agency.  I wasn’t sure they could do this because our agency doesn’t have a domestic program on the East Coast, only in their Mid-West office.

Good news #1- it turns out they can write a domestic home study for us (for a fee of course) and it requires NO more additional paperwork/clearances because the requirements for international surpass domestic.  So, we’ve done everything already, it is just a matter of the social worker writing it up!  No more paperwork for Courtney = awesome news!

Good news #2- I was under the impression that we could not pursue domestic until we pulled out of the Korea program because we signed papers saying we would not actively try to get pregnant or actively try to adopt a baby through other means.  However, thanks to Cody’s prodding, that is not the case at all!  They just don’t want you to sign with another agency.  We are absolutely allowed to pursue private domestic adoption on our own (with the attorney we met with) while still waiting on the Korea girl list!  They only make you get off the Korea girl list after a child has been placed in your home and the birth parents rights have been terminated!  So, we can pursue both at the same time!

We were in shock.  Our social worker is writing up our domestic home study as we speak.  We can essentially begin looking for a birth mother as soon as we get our approval next week!  However, with domestic you have to be ready for a baby at any point.  Yes, it could take 2 years but it could also take 2 weeks.  So, it is in our best interest to not start advertising until we are ready for a baby.  I’m not sure we are quite there just yet as I am still on the mend from orthopedic surgery, we are still getting the new house in order and getting Auden adjusted to his new school.  So, we will spend the next few months working on a website for birth moms to view and figuring out our advertising tactics.  We are going to start local- advertise on bulletin boards at community centers, colleges, hospitals, doctor’s offices as well as run ads in newspapers.  We don’t want to expand to websites like www.parentprofiles.com yet (even though they have the best success rate) because it would be too hard for us to hop on a plane and go meet a birth mom across the country on a moment’s notice.  We may get to that point, but for now, since we are remaining on the Korea list, we just think it makes sense to advertise locally first. 

There is a big piece of me that still wants Korea to work out so badly.  But right now it feels right to have other options.  I trust that there is a plan for us and whatever is meant to be, will be.  

Home Sweet Home

We have been working hard getting settled in our new home!  Things are getting back to normal this week: Auden started his new school today, I start back at work tomorrow after being out on medical leave, and all three of us are living under one roof with no grandparents in sight, ha:-)  The house still needs a lot of furniture, as you can tell, but things are coming along.  We ordered new family room furniture since our sectional doesn't work with the space, so I will post more pictures later once that furniture comes in.  Cody and I made a deal that we will find our dining room table before Thanksgiving (we want to take our time looking), so for now Auden is one lucky boy and has half of the downstairs as his own personal gymnasium. 

Enjoy some more before and after pictures!

                                                         BEFORE: eat in kitchen area

                                                      AFTER: eat in kitchen area

BEFORE: family room

AFTER: family room

BEFORE: dining room and formal living room

AFTER: dining room and formal living room

(still needs lots of furniture and new light fixture)

BEFORE: formal living room

AFTER: formal living room

The formal living room will be Auden's play room until he is old enough to play down basement by himself:-)

AFTER: foyer

                                                                   BEFORE: Foyer

                                                                     AFTER: Foyer

BEFORE: foyer/upstairs hallway

AFTER: foyer/upstairs hallway

BEFORE: master bedroom

AFTER: master bedroom

BEFORE: master bedroom

AFTER: master bedroom

BEFORE: Auden's room

AFTER: Auden's room

                                                              BEFORE: guest room

AFTER: guest room

                                                              BEFORE: guest room

AFTER: guest room

                                                                  BEFORE: my office
      

AFTER: my office

                                                             BEFORE: Child #2 room

AFTER: Child #2 room

                                                              BEFORE: laundry room

AFTER: laundry room

And here are some deck pictures, future plan is get some comfy deck furniture to have something like a living room outside:-)                                                                                                                

Not pictured yet: kitchen and bathrooms which have only been painted and will be updated in next few years.  We also have an awesome finished updated basement with bar and bathroom, but currently still covered in boxes:-)  

The Big Reveal!

I am more than happy to report that the work is finished on our new house!  Since we are busy unpacking and getting settled, below are pictures of just the exterior.  It surpassed all of our expectations and we are in love with our new home!  All that is left for the outside is landscaping and that will be done shortly.  Enjoy the photos!

                                   BEFORE                                 

                                                                                                                                                      

AFTER

As you can see, nothing was left untouched.  New roof, windows, siding, shutters, gutters, trim, light fixtures, garage door and front door.  What makes the biggest impact are the new dormers on the second floor windows.  We were wavering on whether we should do them because of the cost but in the end it was more than worth it, we are thrilled with how they turned out!  Big shout out to Cody who worked tirelessly on getting the dormer design just perfect on top of everything else that he did! 

Here are some more BEFORE pictures:

                                                     

Here are some more AFTER pictures:

Stayed tuned for before and after pictures of the inside of the house!