First Meeting of Home Study

Yesterday we had our first meeting with our case worker for our Home Study.  I can not even begin to describe how nervous we were.  We felt the need to prove we are a normal family even though we are far from normal.  I am not sure we want to be "normal."  In my opinion, we are a loving happy family but we don't have all the answers.  We will give it our best shot, do the research, put in the time and energy but I can promise that we will make mistakes.  We were afraid this would count against us but the meeting went well. A lot of paperwork to sign, questions to answer and items to add to the "To Do List." We were given a number of books to read, classes to attend, and tasks to complete.  Overwhelmed- yes! Excited- YES!!  Progress- YAY!!!

I come from a large family... That is a little bit of an understatement.  I am one of fifteen.  I can honestly say that I am not looking to have a family that size but my best friend in the entire world is my little sister.  I have no idea where I would be without her.  That is one of the main motivations behind our adoption.  I struggle with the thought of not being able to provide my son with the opportunity to have a relationship like the one I cherish with my sister.  I understand that the relationship my son will develop with his siblings may or may not be as great as the one I have with my sister but I am determined to at least provide the opportunity.  I love Kolby with all my heart and want to give him the world- I think that is typical of any parent. :)

We think we may see a flicker of light at the end of this tunnel...

As many of you know, we began our adoption journey when our son was only 6 months old. He is currently coming up on his fourth birthday in June. The point of this blog is to help us document our experience.  I am hoping to find blogging as an outlet for my thoughts, joys and frustrations. If you become a follower- Great!! If this ends up being a venue for me to rant and rave- EVEN BETTER J Our goal is to documenting a period of my life that has brought so many sleepless nights, tears, and unbelievable heartaches but in the end I believe it will be one of the best experience of my life.
Since we began this process we have gotten declined applications one after another:

• Kolby is too young
• Jason and you are too young
• You don't own your house
• You are both self employed
• You need a higher net worth

So in the last few years a lot has changed. All three of us are older :), we bought a house, I work full time as a Training Coordinator, Jason works full time farming and we sold our Espresso Shop and now have a higher net worth.  We got final approval from our adoption agency for the Bulgaria program.  We start our home study this week and head to Boise at the end of January for some education classes. Finally feeling like we see a dim flicker of light at the end of the tunnel....