Gotcha Day

Stomper,

Has it really only been a year?

One year since we sat in front of a judge, you squirming in our arms, while he told us that you were ours officially forever?

I look at you and I see God's promise to me. His promise that I'd be a Mom. I look at you and I know that you were made specifically for us. You may not have our smile, our nose, our laugh, but God has made you so that you fit perfectly.

Strangers don't know that you are adopted, and often I too forget. Your curls remind me of your Uncle Ben. Your loud laugh is like your Bumpa's. You are ticklish like your Papa and hate ground beef like your Auntie. How is it that all these strange idiosyncrasies are yours?

I know how. God formed you in your mothers womb. When he made you he had us in mind.

When I look at you I thank God that he made you just for us.

Happy Adoption Day!

Love, Mommy

News

 I have been sitting on a piece of fantastic news. I was afraid to jinx it and so remained silent.

 Today, March 5, we officially adopted Stomper!

 I am so thankful for the huge crowd of people who came to make our special day even more special: Bumpa, Mimi, Grandma, Auntie, Auntie Teeny, Grammie Kay, Grandpa Tom, Holly the photographer, and Jessie who came to watch some kids sleep so my Mom (Grandma) could get away from work for a few hours.

The day we took him home from the hospital

Last week, so big!

When I told Stomper he was going to be a card carrying member of the family his response was: "Uh oh"

"This is a unique situation"

"Unique" only begins to describe our Adoption Story.

Yesterday we went before a judge to officially become Temporary Guardians of Stomper (for the next 6months) while we wait for all the adoption stuff to go through. The judge looked at the three of us, took off his spectacles, and said something along the lines of: "This is a unique situation, could you tell me how this all happened?"

Uhhh.

"Well my Great Aunt works at a homeless shelter...."

I told the judge as much as I knew about The Birth Mother, where she came from, where she was going, her family, where her family may be living, what her intentions were concerning the adoption. I hope I was clear enough when we were talking to him. I did my best and stuck to the facts and left our theories out.

I think he was concerned that we convinced The Birth Mother to give up her baby and that it wasn't all her idea. As far as I know, it was her idea. I'm sure other people came before us and suggested it to her, but by the time we entered the story she had already made up her mind.

I wish so much that she was around to go before the judge and say: "I want these people to love and raise my baby." I think it is easier for her though to not be around.

The worst case scenario (if the home-study isn't finished, if we are still running ads in the paper to find The Birth Parents, ect) if he is not adopted before the Temporary Guardianship is up our lawyer will file for us to become Permanent Guardians of Stomper until we can once and finally adopt him.

As always God is in control.
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Adoption Story Begins

My husband and I had a God bomb dropped on us on Friday, September 3, 2010. An aunt called and said she just met a woman who didn't want her baby. Did we want to meet her and possibly adopt the baby?

To which we answered: Yes!

Long story short we met the woman and spent several hours with her (part of it in the hospital while she went through some false labor) and she agreed to let us adopt her son.

Her due date is September 25th. Sometime between now and then we will be parents.

WOW!

Jason and I are just in utter and total shock. We didn't go looking for this, weren't expecting this, and never dreamed of adopting an infant right from the hospital. Sometimes we just look at each other and say: "We're going to be parents." with this voice of shock and awe.

We cannot wait.

The baby is a boy (his name is a secret) and from what we can tell looks healthy.

We've hired a lawyer and he's drawing up paperwork for the mother to sign when our son is born. We will take him home from the hospital. 

It is just amazing, and it's all God.

I have been taking the mother to her doctor appointments, because she has no family and no way to get to them. I wouldn't call us friends, but friendly. It's very weird for me to be this woman's friend. I feel sad for her and happy for me. At our Foster Training they had an exercise for us to do involving loss and grief and part of it was what sort of loss or grief does an adoptive parent go through. I couldn't imagine any, adopting had to be the most wonderful thing, what was there to be sad about? Now I understand. I grieve for my son, because he will never get a chance to know his birth mother and I grieve for this woman because she will never be his Mom.

Though I am a little sad, I am mostly beside myself with excitement. I am going to be a MOM!!!

Baby Hamlin

Well, it looks like Jason and I will be adopting a newborn baby boy in the next month! As soon as he's ours I'll let you know his birth store. Stay tuned for more details!

Update

A lot of people have been asking me how things are going with the Foster Parenting and so here it is.

We have completed our class work (24 hours worth) and completed our homework. I hope to pop the homework in the mail tomorrow.

We have completed our Home Study (which is incorrectly named) and the Fire Marshal has visited the house.

Left to do:

• Install two egress windows (one in each bedroom)
• Install hard wired fire alarms (four of them)
• fix the handrail 
• create a handrail
• get finger printed

If everything goes smoothly I think we should have a little one by mid-October.
The Home Study lady told us that infants are few and far between but I don't believe her. We are going to start with infants and work our way up to older kids (at least that is the plan for now).

About Adoption:
Should we take in a child/infant that becomes available for adoption we have the choice to go ahead and adopt. Or (if we decide to go this route) we can look through their book of available children and start the process that way. For now we are just going to do Fostering and see where it leads.

Changing My Mind

Wednesday after class we received in the mail two bios on two sets of brothers who are available for adoption.

My heart melted and my mind changed.

I am more than willing to adopt.

Not yet. Not until I am done with work.

Adoption Worries

We have now had two Foster Care classes.

After the first class Jason told me that he'd like to adopt. That his goal of Foster Care was to find a child to adopt. I'm on the fence.

Why am I on the fence to adopt?

I've been trying for the past few weeks to figure out what is going on inside my head.

I think I'm worried about bonding. It is likely that we could have a child in our home who is old enough to remember their birth mother. They will always and forever be comparing me to her, and wanting to be with her (no matter how horrible she was to them the Foster Care Teacher keeps telling us). I can't compete with that. I know it's not a competition of who is the better mother, but it will feel like it is.

I still have this fantasy of having my own child and what that will be like .. Jason and I have names picked out for them .. and I'm not giving up that dream just yet. I just sort of feel that saying "Yes" to adoption somehow means I'm saying "No" to having biological children. I know that anything can happen. I know that letting go of my fantasy and letting God do His will that it will all be all right.

I just can't get my heart to agree.