Random Friday Thoughts

I have really enjoyed this summer, mostly because I have been outside running a lot. I have been not wanting cold weather to come. I end up feeling cooped up by the end of winter every year, but this week I have had the fall itch. Fall is my FAVORITE season. I love the temperature, the trees, the holidays, the cloths. Everything! I have been thinking about Halloween a lot this week too and I think I may throw a party this year. :)

Kyle starts school on Monday. He has been working so much this summer that it might feel like a break to go back to school. His only comment about it right now is that he is tired. Poor guy.

I have really been loving my job lately. I just got a promotion to Training Coordinator of the center. Training has been my favorite part of my job thus far so this job is perfect for me!

Tomorrow I run my very first half marathon. I can't believe it is real. I started running over a year ago with my friend Dara and we couldn't run a mile without stopping. Now we are running at least three on easy days and we have done up to twelve on long runs without stopping. It is crazy what our bodies can do if you work for it. The other day I told someone that I was a runner and it just felt so wrong coming out of my mouth haha. I will post pictures!

We have had all of our paperwork in for quite some time now and we are getting really anxious to get our profile up and be officially approved. It is crazy to think that we can adopt at any time once we are approved! I hope our time is soon!

FSA regional conference 2012

Saturday was the regional families supporting adoption conference. It was actually the whole weekend, but I was only able to attend some of Saturday. Kyle couldn't come so I had my mom come (she is always so supportive and is fun to be with).

 The first class was about nurturing relationships made from adoption. It was co-taught by a adoptive mom and a birth mom. The next class was my favorite. It was all about managing the stress of being the "perfect parent". She was very educated and such a good teacher and on top of that she is an adoptive mom. She talked about how parenting is already overwhelming when you have societies expectations looming over you, but on top of that you have a birth family that may have expectations as well. She said that we need to realize that our children will just be who they are and we need to let them be. Just because you adopted them does not make you any better of a parent or more prepared than others. Anyway I can't even sum up how much I learned from her class.

Last there was a keynote address by Megan Johnson. Visit her website to learn more about her. She had an accident that caused her to become a wheelchair bound for the rest of her life. She is a speaker who motivates people with her positive attitude about life. She was so funny and inspiring. She talked about how sometimes we have this vision for how our life will turn out and almost always it turns out different than we dreamed, it's even better. 

Things I learned: I don't need to be so consumed with being perfect (the perfect mom, wife, employee, friend) I just need to do the best I can do with what I have.

I am so grateful for how different my life is than I always dreamed it would be. I absolutely LOVE my life and the experiences I have been through have made me the person I am today! I would never trade that in!

I learned more about open adoption and how much your family can grow from it.

I learned that adoptive parents that still mourn their infertility are more likely to raise adopted children that have issues with poor self esteem and identity problems.

The most awesome part of our adoption journey so far is that there are so many opportunities in the adoption community to learn and get educated about not only adoption, but for life. There should be conferences like these just for parenting or life in general! 

My poor me moment

In the adoption process I have made it a goal to not focus on infertility being the reason for us adopting. Although I know that it is the road that lead us to adoption I feel like adoption is not our second choice it is just another step towards starting out family. With this mind set infertility does not just disappear. I am sometimes reminded that I can't make a baby come (biological or through adoption) when I want it to come. I have no say  in the situation. All I know is that we have faith that if we are proactive about it our family will grow soon!

This weekend I had a moment that I was not proud of. Another goal of mine is to stay positive and not get jealous of others when I hear their good news of pregnancy and adoption. I feel like everything happens for a reason and I should not make a special moment for them about me and my trials. I should not need special treatment. This weekend  someone that I love announced their pregnancy in front of a large group in a really fun way. I was shocked and instantly started crying. I grabbed my husband and hurried away so that I could pull myself together before anyone noticed. In that moment I had thoughts like.... Why does it happen so fast for some people, this isn't fair, we have to try so hard and have gone through so much, why me. Kyle was great at letting me get those feelings out and being on my side while I had my pity party. As soon as I stopped crying I was totally embarrassed that I had done that. I just did what I promised myself I wouldn't. I made an awesome moment for someone else completely about me. As we went back to the party it was obvious that a few people knew I had been upset and I know they were trying to make me feel better. I appreciate their love and understanding. As we were leaving I talked to the momma to be and told her that I was sorry and that I am so excited for her family and her little one. She is so great so of course she was very nice to me about it and I hope she knows that I really am happy for her.

I guess this moment proved to me that I am not immune to feelings of infertility and longing for a baby. I have been saying (and it is true) that adoption has given me so much hope for our future and I have such a good feeling about it. I love that we can be proactive in finding a child. I just need to focus on what we CAN do instead of what is happening for other people.

Zoo Keeper

This summer Kyle has been working part time at the Willow Park Zoo. I love that his position title is zoo keeper! It is a very small zoo with mostly birds located in a park close to our house.  He has had a lot of fun and has learned some fun things. He even gets to pick up the huge python!

Adoption interviews... CHECK!

Today we met with our case worker for our individual and couple interviews. I was a little nervous, but it was very chill. Sara is great and she made us feel very comfortable. Usually at this point the case worker lets you know what you need to differently, but she said that she was very impressed with everything and no changes are needed! PHEW! So now there are a few minor things to finish online and then next week she is coming to do our home visit. After the home study visit she will compile all of our information from forms and from online and create what they call the home study. Once she is done she turns that in to her boss to be approved. This could take a month or less. It is beyond exciting that we will be approved so soon and especially now that we are finished with our part. Sara mentioned that it was awesome how fast we have gotten things done... haha guess I was stressing about that for nothing.
When we were done we took a silly picture because we were so excited!

Adoption update!

So it has been a while since I have given an update about our status. Well let's just start by saying that this summer has been crazy busy, mostly because of all the awesome plans we have had, but non the less super busy. I feel like we have every moment of the day planned out and not enough of those moments have been working on our paperwork. I have been kind of on a roller coaster of emotions this week mostly about feeling really bad about not being finished with our paperwork yet. I feel like I wouldn't want my future child to think we just took our time getting approved. And what if we missed our opportunity, maybe we felt urgency because there was a situation that we needed to hurry for. Also on the flip side we are actually very close to approval now. We just turned in all of our documents (finally... it took forever to get our stinkin birth certificates). We had a surprise new eight pages full of questions to fill out that we are finishing tonight as well as polishing up our profile to be perfect. We are meeting with our case worker Sara on Thursday to complete our interviews and hopefully she will tell us we are ready for the home study.
It is crazy to think that we are potentially going to be approved within the next few weeks. That means that at anytime we could get a call about a baby.... Yeah just got goosebumps! I feel like I am pretty prepared for whatever time frame this process will take, but I can't help but be anxious.
So now you all know how it is going! When we finally get approved we will be sending out pass along cards with our info so you all can spread the word for us :).  

The 4th was awesome this year!! We were a little bummed that we couldn't spend it with our family for the traditional 4th breakfast, but our day was so much fun!

We spent the afternoon at Bear lake just chilin on the beach.

Here we are after breaking for lunch.

When we got home we had a BBQ with our best friends Dara and Brian and their kids. The food was delish and we had a great time! Thanks for inviting us guys!

 

We ended the night with a fireworks show. We brought a few little fountains and Brian got a big aerial. Poor Aylan was so afraid of the fireworks.

We are so grateful for America and the freedoms that we have because of it. 

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!