I haven't posted in awhile!  Here's a quick update....Our homestudy was completed last month.  It all went very smoothly.  We were reccomended for up to two children, either gender, any race, ages 0-10.  We are currently waiting to get all the required signatures on it.  It's been signed by the supervisor, but still has to be signed by the lady who completed the homestudy.  At this point, I have no idea when we will get our copy and when we will be able to start sending it out.  I'm finding myself consistently frustrated with the delay.  I keep looking the photolistings and asking myself, "Are you my child?"  It reminds me of that children's book where the little duck (I think it's a duck) gets lost and keeps asking every animal it sees, "Are you my mommy?"
I promise to post more when something actually happens!

Home Study Interviews are Completed!

Today was our last interview for our homestudy!  It was done very quickly by a wonderful lady who assisted in teaching our MAPP classes.  By Monday, she will email us a copy to proof read.  The Saturday after Thanksgiving we will give her all our additional paperwork and references, and we should have a completed home study by Christmas! 
It was so nice to read all the kind things our references wrote about us!  I'm so glad we chose who we did to write on our behalf!  Their sweet words meant a lot to us in this process.
We learned some more on what to expect when trying to be matched with a child.  Some was disheartening.  The fact that we have no parenting experience may make us lose out to other families.  All I can think is "Would you deny me a biological child because I have not yet parented?"  Of course not!  So I'm scared that this may be a mark against us, but I'm hoping that being from an adoptive family, having a professional knowledge of services available to special needs children, and all our other good qualities will win out!  We plan to submit pictures and other things along with our homestudy in hopes of standing out and helping the caseworkers put a faces to our names!

Mission Accomplished!

MAPP classes are officially over!  Our last class was Saturday.  We have our certificate of completion...

Being awarded our certificate

We had several families come and talk to us about fostering and adopting.  One family was adopting a teenager I was familiar with through my work.  I boo-hooed through her entire story.  I am so happy she has found a loving forever family!  And I was so proud of how far she has come since she was last in our office.  That is one spectacular girl who is going places in life!

I was somewhat discouraged by one of the families.  They set out to adopt and went a year without a match, despite sending out home studies to several states.  They are now fostering, and were turned down for an adoption of one foster child because the child was a different race than them.  Instead, the child was matched with a family of his own race.  Now, I suppose I understand this in theory.  But the fact that the child was already in their home should matter!  Long story short, I am having another episode of doubt with the process.  I am scared that it will not work out, and we will simply spend six to twelve months waiting for a child that isn't out there.  We are still going to do our home study (if they ever figure out who CAN do it).  Hopefully it gets done quickly so we can get this ball rolling!

I'm trying to stay positive, but I am thinking we better have a plan C and D ready in case this doesn't work. 

Yesterday was a very busy day!  We were fingerprinted, did tons of MAPP homework, finished our family profile, bought pretty stationary to write our letters to a prospective adoptive child and their birth parent, wrote those letters, bought a scrapbook, and gathered pictures for the book.  I'm waiting for Tim's mom to send me a few pics of his family to put in there.  We have to finish a bit of homework tonight as well.

I made copies of our profile and letters today.  I know things "get lost" sometimes, and I don't want to have to complete that mess again!  We attend our last MAPP class on Saturday.  This one should be good because they will have some children who have been through the system talk to us.

I'm waiting to hear who will be doing our homestudy, since Children's Home Society might not be able to.  I better know before I leave that MAPP class on Saturday!

The Hardest Thing So Far

I am currently trying to write letters to our prospective adoptive child and their birth parent.  This is one hard task!  I want to make the child feel like the home being offered to them is one filled with love.  It's hard to put this in words a young child can understand (without sounding like a crazy lady).  How do you explain that you already love this child who you've never met and know nothing about?

And writing to their birth parent....GEEZ!  That's a tough one assuming that our future child will be a child in foster care, which means they were removed from their biological family for good reason.  All I can do is let the parent know that we will love their child like they are our own.  I tried to explain that we will always allow their child to love them too.

Anyway, this has been a hard job, and I think I deserve a bowl of ice cream now as a reward!  :)

Progress Update

We are now 2/3 of the way done with MAPP!  This Saturday is our final class.  We are almost done with our family profile.  This weekend, I worked hard on the profile, drew a floor plan of our house, and created a photo collage of the house, myself and Tim, and Church (our kitty).  We still have to do our homework from last week.  It will be difficult finding the time this week since Tim has midnight openings and inventories....but we'll get it done!

After speaking with our MAPP teacher this past weekend, I learned that they may have to call someone in from Panama City to do our homestudy.  I work for the agency that would normally do the homestudy, so they may have to call on someone from another division to avaoid a conflict of interest.  It's also possible that our second MAPP teacher can contract out through her agency to do it though.  We will see!  As long as someone is able to do it, I don't care!

I'm feeling sort of guilty that we are just going to try to adopt a child or sibling group whose parental rights are already terminated.  Most of our classmates are willing to foster as well...but I really don't know if my heart is up for that!  I feel like Tim and I have to look out for ourselves during this process and do what is good for us.  Otherwise, we aren't going to be able to do any good for the kids placed in our home anyway.  I'm trying to stay hopeful that things will work out just how they are meant to and we will find the child or children that are meant to belong with us no matter which route we take!

Back to School

So we attended our first MAPP class last Saturday and have been working on our homework this week.  I feel like I have gone back to school with all the homework we have.  I'm such a dork that I actually kind of like it, though!  We are working on the homework and family profile.  It's a lot of thought and effort, but it will be worth it!

Our first day of class

Future Mama working for her baby!

Tim putting thought into our work

We are scheduled to be fingerprinted next week.  We are getting our cat's vaccinations updated as well.  We have started to research cribs and other needed items.  The process is rolling!

We are still up in the air as to whether we would like to foster or just pursue adoption of a child or sibling group whose parental rights are already terminated.  I'm sure our hearts will lead us to decide exactly what is meant to be.  We have decided that we are up for a single child or sibling group of two.  We are open to any race and gender.

We have two more MAPP classes left, then comes homestudy and licensing and the waiting game!

Our anniversary is next week as well.  We usually go to Tennessee, but due to MAPP we are staying home.  I will miss the fall leaves, but this is so worth it!  Maybe next time we go, we'll have a kiddo or two in tow!