Busy life

So it has been a crazy few months. I (Joel) took a new position effective Feb 1. This move would relocate us from Hernando, MS to Lubbock, TX. Lubbock is home for me, so it was a great opportunity to be closer to our family. We found a private school for Luke that specialized in dyslexia and enrolled him in the middle of March. He has excelled. About the same time, Lisa decided it would be easier to keep our house in MS clean if she was in Texas, so the whole family moved in with my parents. We were looking for houses and praying that our house in MS would sell soon. We looked at a lot of houses, but never found one we really liked. Lisa enrolled Will and Noah in the school that I graduated from (along with my dad and granddad) and they love it. We had decided to rent a house in the country and wait to buy or eventually build.

On Monday, April 23 at about 10 a.m., Lisa got a call that we had been selected by a birth mom. The only info they gave us was that she was due in a couple of weeks, they asked if we would be available at 3:30 for them to present us the situation and that they doubted we would turn it down. I was freaking out with anticipation. At 3:30, the ladies at Christian Homes and Family Services (which is an awesome organization if you are interested in adoption) called. They presented the birth mom's family and medical history, discussed her first and current pregnancy, and told us she was due May 15. They then presented information about the birth father, his family and medical history. They asked us if we had any questions, which we had a few basic ones. At the end, they asked if we had any more questions, of course, we wanted to know the gender. They all giggled and asked if we really wanted to know, YES, they said it was a baby GIRL!!!!!!

So we had to wait until Tuesday to confirm we wanted to go ahead with the match and meet the birth mom. We scheduled to meet her at 2 p.m. in Abilene (about a 3 hr drive from Lubbock). As I drove to work on Wednesday, Lisa called and said her mom had found the perfect house for us. I looked it up online and agreed. The only problem was, I had to pick my boss up at the airport at 11 and I would be busy with him until we left for Abilene on Friday. Luckily, our realtor got us in at 10 and it didn't take long to realize that this was the house. We made an offer that afternoon, they counter offered on Thursday morning and we came to an agreement that afternoon. We are excited to be closing on our new house June 15!

So we made the drive on Friday, making small talk. I am typically the calm, level-headed one, but I was as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs. We got to the office early and had to wait 15 years (ok, maybe it was 15 minutes) until we could start our meeting. The social worker explained to us how the meeting would work and that our birth mom is very shy and quiet. When she came in, it was an awkward moment. How do you have a conversation with someone about them giving you their child? She is a beautiful girl. She is about 5'1", with long, brown hair and brown eyes, fair skinned and probably only weighs 130 lb at 9 mo pregnant! She talked about why she wanted to place the baby for adoption, about her family and the amount of contact she wants to have. She told us that she had narrowed her selection down to two families, one with no children and then us. She said that she liked the idea that her daughter would have 3 brothers to protect and spoil her. Man, did she have our boys nailed! We talked about why we wanted to adopt, about our families and just us in general. They then brought in her 10 mo old daughter, who is precious and we played with her for about an hour. We (along with the birth mom) were then given until Monday to confirm the match. We didn't need it, but those are the rules.

On Sunday night, an enormous storm came through town and our new house got hit with baseball size hail, insurance should pay for it, but it is just another thing on our list. Lisa called to confirmed that we wanted to move along with the match, but only got voicemail. After no return call, she called again on Monday afternoon and got voicemail again. Tuesday comes, she calls again, voicemail. I am now starting to worry. Luckily, the case worker calls about noon and says we are good to go and that the birth mom is now dilated to 3 cm.

So now we are just waiting. After the baby is born, we have to wait 48 hrs before the mom can terminate her rights. We then have to wait for TX and MS to approve our paperwork (can take 10 days). We will then head to MS since that is where our home study is current. After meeting with our case worker there (Lauren Johnson of Senatobia, also awesome to work with) we can transfer the paperwork to Texas. So we will see all of our MS friends sometime in May!!!

Oh, and one last thing, everyone said girls are more expensive than boys, and now I know that, I can't believe all the pink stuff I have had to look over the last week and the cost of it all.

Joel