Merry Christmas from our home to yours

Making an IMPACT

Several weeks ago, we attended an orientation class with the DCFS. It was sort of an intro to the foster care and adoption process. We went on to enroll in the IMPACT classes. If you want to adopt or foster from DCFS in our state, one of the many credentials you need to have is a certificate stating that you attended an completed the impact classes. Monday before Thanksgiving, was our last class!

What does this mean? Can we adopt or foster? How does this impact our family building?

Short answer: No, we can't currently foster or adopt through DCFS. We still need to have a huge laundry list of items completed. Good news is that once all is said and done we will be able to adopt or foster from DCFS in the future, once the rest of our paper work is completed.

We aren't sure what this means for our family building efforts. We are waiting to talk with our social worker and plan to evaluate it on a case by case basis. This like most things we do, will probably happen in a spontaneous windstorm of glorious chaos.

Why we chose adoption

The word Adoption means different things to different people.  
To some it means tragedy. To others it means love. To my mother in law it means becoming part of a family. To my niece it means gaining a father. To us it simply means family.

Shortly after getting married we began talking about starting a family. We knew that we wanted to become parents and adoption was always something we considered. Our plan was to have a biological child first, since at the time I had a dream of experiencing pregnancy. Then we would eventually adopt to expand our family.

It has been several years since we started working on "our plan" for a baby. Many changes have occurred to both the plan, each of us, and our marriage. Our journey to become parents hasn't been an easy one, but we have learned many important lessons along the way. We have never been more committed to each other or our family as we are currently.

Adoption: where we are...where we have been.

The Past:
We were made aware of a birth-mom who needed to place due to her personal choices landing her in some legal trouble. The unique situation meant that we had no contact with her personally. The situation wasn't what I expected our adoption experience would be like.  She didn't know us and we didn't know her.  I was very cautious in the beginning. I tried not to hope. The funny thing about hope, is that she is a tricky tricky bitch. Just when you think that you are holding strong she finds her way beneath your skin and invades your body. She penetrates your heart and gets comfy. All the while you think you are NOT HOPING you are really hoping at your core. I bought clothes for a tiny human. I bought a pack n play (did you know that they cost almost as much as an ipad?!?) I knit some more baby things. I told a few friends. I waited for a baby boy to be born...

The Present:
A few weeks ago we found out that the birth-mom chose a different family. My heart has been heavy ever since. I can't seem to shake the feeling of loss. Part of me thinks it is utterly ridiculous for me to have feelings of grief. I never really had anything to begin with. It is not a constant pain, but more of an ache that suddenly comes upon me when I find myself in certain situations. I have to remind myself that it will happen. We will become parents. I just have to have patience and wait. Unfortunately, I have never been really great at waiting.

The Future:
We will become parents...

Trying to turn the dream of a baby, a family into a reality.

1 in six couples find themselves infertile every year. That was us 7 years ago. In the beginning you find yourself numb with grief and paralyzed by emotions.

I always thought about adoption and becoming a mom through domestic adoption seemed like a good fit. Domestic infant adoption fees range from 20-40 thousand dollars. How were we ever going to afford to become parents and expand our family?

How could I help make our family a reality? I have always been a "thinker" and a "doer". So I started thinking and I started doing. You can't wait for miracles to happen you have to help them along.

I started sewing and knitting baby items for friends who wanted to be able to gift handmade items to their family and friends. The next logical stop in my mind was to open an etsy shop (you can find the link on the right sidebar). 100% of the money I make off of each item goes directly towards our adoption fund.

I also decided to start this blog to chronicle our story and experiences. So here we are...