How I've Changed

This letter came in the mail the other day, two or three years ago it would have made me freak out.  What did it say?  That they underestimated our escrow and that we owed about $1,250 more, so please detach the bottom portion and mail it in with a big fat check.  (It was worded slightly differently.)  What did I do.  I looked at it and thought, "Oh well."  That's it.  No freaking out.  It's just not worth worrying about the little things in life.  And, one more thing.  I am really, really glad we jetted off to Vegas prior to seeing this letter!  It might have made me think twice about spending money on a trip....and that vacation was worth every penny!

The Things I Worry About

This process has involved a whole lot of worry on my part.  Which is not even remotely surprising since I am a super good worrier (not to brag or anything).

Here are the things I USED to worry about, but have (pretty much) gotten over:

• Money: How will we EVER afford fertility treatments, IVF, adoption, unpaid maternity leave, etc.  It all seems to work out some how.  (Yes, Jamie, I know I should have listened to you a long time ago about this one.)  We've gotten good at saving money and have been truly blessed with support in many ways.
• Being a good mom: Maybe God isn't giving me more children because I am not a good enough mom.  I sometimes yell, let Griffin watch "too much" TV, can be too "soft" and allow him to eat candy before breakfast (not regularly, don't worry).  But, I am a good mom. 
• I am being punished: For what I don't know.  Maybe I'm really being saved from something?  And, maybe we will be very blessed (which is what I am hoping for).
• I'll never have a healthy pregnancy again: I might, I might not, but either way I will be OK.  The real bummer is that I LOVE being pregnant (OK, less and less with my more recent pregnancies because I was scared of losing our babies) and I have a super fun stash of maternity clothes. 
• What will people think if they know we did the treatments?  I'm very open about this now and we've received a great amount of unsolicited support, we're very fortunate. 

Here are the things I still worry about:

• What if we never get picked? 
• What if someone doesn't want to pick us because we have a biological child and thinks that we will love him more than our adopted child (I assure you we will love them the same!!)?
• What if we don't get picked because I work?  I fear that birthmothers will want a mother that stays home.  
• I could go on and on about weird reasons I come up with, but will stop here!  Maybe in my next post I should focus on all the reasons I think we SHOULD get picked?  Wow, that sounds "braggy" and boring.  
• What if we have a disruption (get matched/placed with a baby and the birth mother/parents have a change of heart).  Gasp. 
• Griffin's little heart getting broken again. 
• Being a nervous wreck during match meetings and crying a lot.  OK, that's probably all likely. 
• What if I get pregnant again and the adoption has to be put on hold?  I know, ironic?! 

The things I have never really worried about:

• Our adopted child being accepted as our child by our friends and family.  We have super family and friends that couldn't be any more supportive than they already are.  Thank God! 
• Loving our adopted child.  I ALREADY love that sweet little baby and have no idea if he/she has even been conceived yet! 
• Having enough cute clothing for our baby.  I'm fully committed to shop as long as it takes to make sure that kiddo is dressed in style!  Kidding!  (Kinda.)

I'm savin' up for a little baby!

The other day I was shopping with a great friend and she said, "Did you see this!?" and showed me the cutest little "piggy" bank.  It's PERFECT for us!  The other day at work it showed up on my desk, it gave me a good chuckle.  I went to move it and it had change in it.  I went into her office to tell her thank you (it truly made my day) and she told me the story behind the money inside the bank.

Her 5 year-old daughter saw the bank and asked her what it was for.  She explained that Jamie and I were adopting a baby and that adopting costs lots of money.  Her daughter left the room and came back with her piggy bank.  She told her mom that she didn't have any dollars, but she did have lots of quarters.  So, our new "baby bank" is the recipient of her quarters.  Isn't that the sweetest thing?  It completely warmed my heart.  The next time I saw my friend's daughter I gave her a big hug.  I can't wait for the day she can help me feed our new little baby.  What a sweet, thoughtful, generous girl!



 Hilarious.....

Saving Money

Over the last year and a half we've focused more on saving money--we've always been soft of frugal (and I mean sort of because we were always willing to spend money on things that we valued--like experiences, donations and gifts.)

We started saving for our IVF cycles by writing down everything we didn't do/buy, but we wanted to.  Then, we transferred that money to savings.  More quickly than I'd like to admit, we saved about $2,500.  This was just by saying no to dinners out, unnecessary clothing purchases and doing things ourselves--like taking out the dock (and others helping us with things like my Dad painting our front door). 

In the last few months we've consigned a few antiques that we didn't want anymore, skipped things we'd like to do (like get hotel rooms when heading to the Cities for events and going home for dinner rather than eating out).   I noticed that our freezer and pantry were packed--especially since my parents left for the winter and gave us all of the food they had left.  We decided to start on a "use what we have mission".  It's been fun!  We only go to the grocery store if we need an item for a recipe, and to get fresh produce.  The milkman comes once a week so we have dairy products covered that way.  We've spent very little on groceries in the last month and it's been fun to see our supply go down.  It feels good not to waste...and it's been fun coming up with meal ideas. 

It's been great to see our savings account increase and know that we are closer and closer to covering the upcoming expenses of our adoption.   It's a huge victory for us and we're blessed to have so much support from friends in family....including lots of donated items and time for our adoption garage sale that brought in $2,500! 

So what are the next fees we face?  They'll be incurred when we actually adopt, and are about $10,000.  We'll GLADLY write out that check!

Good Decisions

We've made a couple of decisions in the past two weeks that have made me feel good, like real adults or something!  :)  I planned to go with Jamie and some friends on a work trip with him to Indianapolis....I know we would have had a blast.  We always, always have a great time with the friends we were going to go with and we both love to explore new cities.  But, the flight would have been $300, plus food and whatever else we ended up doing (and we aren't exactly the type of people that spare expenses on trips).  Jamie and I have been blessed with lots of great quality time lately--including a great anniversary trip in July to the Red Wing/Maiden Rock, WI area and a wonderful week in California celebrating our good friends' wedding.  So, I decided not to go.  The money will be put to good use for our adoption and I'll be able to concentrate on Griffin.  I was torn for a while about what to do, but am so glad I decided to stay home.  We're planning a  fun, local get together with our friends soon!

The next one was on Jamie.  He had a fish house made the year we built our home.  It's been fun for him to have, but it's one more thing to deal with....you know how that goes.  Something to get a permit for, pull on and off the ice, maintain, blah, blah, blah.  And, he has a portable fish house, too.  So, he posted the fish house for sale, and it sold!  The gentleman that bought it will be happily using it on a nearby lake.  And, we'll happily add the money to our adoption fund.  (And, no worries, I am certain that in a few years down the road we'll have a spiffier fish house!) 

Funny how that works out....

Our last adoption garage sale brought in $1,000, so our grand total for our adoption garage sales was $2,500!  (Of course, this is thanks to LOTS of donations and LOTS of help from friends and family!)  Anyway, the invoice came for the next fees for our adoption...and it was for $1,000.  I love it when stuff works out like that! 

Garage Sale Day #2

The second day of our big adoption garage sale was COLD, too, but at least we saw a sneak peak of the sun every so often. Jamie was there with me most of the day and we got additional help from Kari and Mary Kaye. We had some friends stop by to visit which was really nice! The grand total from the two days was $1,219! UNBELIEVABLE! With Mary Kaye's monster cookie sale (she makes the BEST cookies and sold them at work for $2/cookie) and another donation we received, we are well over $1,300! We have a lot of people to thank for the great sale--so many people donated their items and time. We have a decent amount of things leftover, so boxed it up for a sale later this year.

It was fun to answer questions about our adoption during the sale. Lots of people asked where we are adopting from and were surprised to hear "Minnesota". Most people assumed we were adopting out of the country.

One woman commented that she serves as a guardian for pregnant women from time to time. She worked with a woman that placed her baby for adoption last week...they found the adoptive family through word of mouth. Of course, I was thrilled to meet her! She mentioned that she will be working with another woman soon, so I gave her some information about our family and our number. Before learning more about adoption through research and training, I think I would have been more aggressive and excited. But, we've learned that the right match will come along, and that you will know when that connection is there. So, I figured if it's meant to be, she'll call!

We met another woman that was about my age and was adopted. She said her birth mother tried to locate her, but she didn't have any interest in meeting her birth mother. After all, she had a mom and a dad, and that's all she needed. It was interesting to hear her perspective.

It was a very encouraging day, and we're $1,219 closer to covering our adoption costs (about $22,000-$25,000)!

Gulp.

Got the bill for the blood tests I had taken to determine if I have an autoimmune disease which could have lead to the loss of our baby boy. $2,616.60. Gulp. I'm praying that the bill is for all 11 tests--it's hard to tell. I'm trying to remind myself that we needed to have the testing done to determine if anything was wrong, and that if I didn't have it done, I would always wonder. But, I can't help but think that $2,616.60 would have paid for a nice Caribbean vacation. With lots of delicious blended drinks.

On the agenda tonight is movie time for Griffin while Jamie and I are on separate computers working on completing our online adoption training. We each have 8 hours of training to complete before Thursday (when we have our adoption class). Yikes.

It's going to be a long week, but a productive one.

Progress.

I was having a hard time on Monday morning. I was feeling like we had too much to do before April 21 (our adoption training day). We need to finish our paperwork, complete 8 hours of online training, get fingerprinted and gather more "junk" and price it to make sure the adoption garage sale is a success. To top it off, I was
visiting with a friend that gets ready at the Y the same time I do. I told her about our adoption garage sale and she inquired about the cost of adoption. I casually mentioned that it would probably cost between $22,000-$25,000. Her face said it all, she had complete sticker shock. She repeated, "I can't believe it costs that much." That stuck in my head. Really, I can't believe it costs that much either. Sigh. So. Much. Money. I know it will be SO worth it. But, it feels so unfair. We've worked so hard in school and our careers to get to where we are. Living paycheck to paycheck was a thing of the past. Then, we couldn't have babies like other people. The easy way. The normal way. The natural way. And, we love babies. We have so much love to give. So, after time, the money didn't bother me. It's just money. We can make more, right? What would I rather have, a lifetime of joy or a finished basement and fun trips? A lifetime of joy, thank you very much! But, on Monday it all bothered me. I wanted a pity party! I married my true love...and, our fairy tale came to a screeching halt when we tried to pursue the next dream....to grow our family. So, I had a mini pity party on the way to work. And, I pity partied a bit at work.

Then I got an email from a friend/co-worker/someone that really understands and offers me lots of encouragement and support. She commented that she read this blog and she was impressed that we were making so much progress so quickly. Really, we were? I didn't seem like it. My baby bump is gone, we aren't approved for adoption yet and there are SO many LONG and UNPREDICTABLE steps between approval and holding our baby in our arms. But, you know what, she is right! Three months ago we lost our baby, and here we are 3 months later still putting one foot in front of the other-- and still on the journey. We haven't given up. We ARE making progress. Wow, did that one email turn all of my thoughts around. Thank you!!

And, it gets even better. She said she'd love to contribute to our "junk to blessing" garage sale, but she gave away her "junk" to another garage sale that was raising funds for a great cause last fall. So, instead she sent a check to our friend that is hosting the garage sale at her home. 100% thoughtful, but also 100% unexpected and unnecessary--which I told her. She told me that she wanted to contribute. Want. It's so great to have people that want to help. Again, we are blessed.

My day and thoughts completely turned around with one two paragraph email. We are making progress and we are not alone. We have people in our lives that really, truly care. And, they show it. Wow. We are so, so fortunate.

Much Needed Help!

When we had our most recent miscarriage, a friend told me I had to keep trying and couldn't give up--and she said she'd do whatever she could to help me. Well, here is proof!
Mary Kaye and Helen have been an amazing help with our adoption garage sale. We priced things together for 3 hours on Sunday, and then they priced for 3 more hours without me! We got together on Monday night and priced for a few more hours and are getting together again on Wednesday. I'd be lost without them!
Totes and bags have been showing up from others and, more is on the way! It's so encouraging. We are so blessed to have such supportive and generous friends and family.
I have help lined up for the day of the garage sale, too. It's going to be a fun day!