Many thanks..

This year has been less than stellar for Jeff and I. But with Thanksgiving day tomorrow I wanted to say how thankful and blessed I am for the life I was given. I am thankful for my husband, my friends and my family. Despite infertility, I'm thankful for my health and know that I can conquer this disease. I'm thankful to be on our adoption path and know that God will bless us with a child. I'm thankful for all the support and love that everyone has given us and know that this support and love has made us stronger!

From our family to yours may you have a blessed Thanksgiving!

Love,
Jeff and Jennifer

Updates

Sorry for the delayed update. Busy with work and more work! :) 

Wednesday Jeff and I had our home study visit. I frantically spent the morning cleaning our house (even though we had it cleaned professionally the week before). I wanted to ensure that everything was in place and "perfect" for our social worker. Since this was the first time we were meeting, I wanted her to have the best "first" impression of us. We sat in our kitchen and talked about our application, what we are comfortable with, what led us to where we are and we went into further detail about our biographical statements. That was the hardest thing about the visit. It was almost like therapy having to explain your childhood etc. We survived! An hour and a half later we were wrapping up and she asked us to see where the baby would sleep. Besides the kitchen and the foyer that is the only room she saw. Oh well, at least I have a really really clean house! From here it will be about 2 to 3 weeks for her to write her report. As of now we know we have not been presented to any birth mothers, but she indicated we are still early in the process. She indicated that the process shouldn't be too horribly long (though that is easy for her to say...she's not the one waiting!)

Through the advice of our agency we were told to "search" for potential birth mothers or situations to speed up the process. The internet is a helpful tool, but you have to be weary of potential scammers. Last week we did find a situation of a baby that was to be born this week in Las Vegas. We contacted the agency and through our conversation with her decided that we would be presented. However, after continue discussion between Jeff and I we decided that this situation wasn't the best situation to take a risk on. We declined to be presented. It's amazing how close we were to having a baby, but know in our hearts that there more risks that could potentially lead to issues down the road. 

In the meantime, we are looking at other Florida agencies and national agencies pricing their programs and potentially will sign with an additional entity to get us exposed to more birth mothers. I continue to look on line and have added myself to newsletters with respected agencies in the industry for "hard to place" situations. 

We also have made progress in Baby K's room! We decided on the furniture and placed it on lay-way this week. This gives us time to pay it off and gives us the opportunity to have it delivered when needed vs having it in the room for months waiting for baby. :) 

Thank you again to everyone for their continued support, encouragement and love. It means the world to us and our future child. :)

From our house to yours we wish you a healthy and happy Thanksgiving! We are so thankful and blessed to have you all apart of our lives!

Love,

Jeff and Jennifer

Baby on the brain!

**Update** Home study has been rescheduled for November 16th. Will update next week once completed. On the bright side, we had our house cleaned yesterday and it looks great! Lets hope it stays that way! :)

This week we are scheduled for our home study! I'm so excited and nervous and hope that everything goes well. Just hoping for that phone call soon with good news of a match! All I can think about is baby stuff. Jeff and I went and looked at baby furniture and I think we found what we would like for the nursery. We've started our registry and have bought some small clothing (gender neutral) items. Some might say that it's too early, but we are expectant parents just like a pregnant couple would be. So why not start planning and purchasing! I know deep in my heart that this won't be a long process so why not be prepared. It makes me happy to have baby things around! :)

I'll update after our home study!

Love,
Jen