Adoption

We talk about adoption whenever the girls have questions.  The other day River asked again why she wasn't in my tummy.  I explained again that "My tummy is broken and so Heavenly Father had another kind woman carry you so that you could be a part of our family."  "You were both always supposed to be part of our family, you just came to us in a different way."  KG went on to explain that we all knew each other in Heaven before we came to earth and we all chose each other way back then.  Then they asked about death and he told them that we will all be together again in heaven when we die, just like before we came to earth.  I'm grateful for the understanding of God's plan.  We are an eternal family.  I have no doubt that they were always meant to my girls.  I am their Mother.  Adoption is definitely not easy.  It's hard to tell Flower she will likely never meet her sweet Birthmother.  But we remind her that a woman made a very brave decision that saved her life so she could find the family God intended her to have.  For now, she seems to have peace with that.
I'm grateful for River's birthmother and her brave choice.  I'm grateful River does get to know her.  She never has to wonder.  We have a beautiful letter that she wrote for River that we read to River.  I get chills when I read it because she also states that when she met us, she knew the baby she was carrying was meant to be ours.  She tells River how much she loves her and that's why she made the decision to place her for adoption.  Her love for River is why she gave her to the parents she knew were supposed to have her.  River will never have to wonder if she was loved. 
I'm extremely grateful for adoption and the way it's enriched our lives. 

What a roller coaster.

Here are all the photos taken of River's first day.



































I made her the little hat the night before we went in.




Here's a quick rundown of our experience.
Thursday, October 30 we got the call that a birth mother connected with our profile and wanted to meet us. We met her and her mom on Saturday, November 1. We new right at first sight in the parking lot that it was right. We later found out they agreed. Monday, November 3, we got the call that she had selected us to be the family for her child. Friday, November 7 we met again to talk about our openness plan. After that my sister threw me a baby shower for family and close friends. She and I made phone call invitations just a fews days prior, on Monday, when we found out we'd been picked. I will post a separate blog about that. Then we waited for the 19th when the mother was to be induced. We went there at 8:00 am. The day went by with no baby. Finally, after 36 hours of labor, she arrived by c-section on the 20th. Flower had been with my sister Amanda since Tuesday night. With no end in sight KG went and picked her up at 5:00. My parents were going to pick her up at 7:00 from us, and keep her over night. At 5:51 River was born so she got to be there and my parents got to see River. KG's parents also came up and then we just kept it private due to the nature of the situation. I also apologize if you attempted to call me in those 36 hours. I was just too consumed and emotionally drained to talk to anyone. There was only one person I could talk to during that time, when I needed to get away and have a break, other then KG, and I am grateful for her! :) She understood what I was going through and it would clear my head and calm me down for the next few hours. Even through her own anxiety and craziness of preparing for the wedding she made time to help out my sanity. I'm so grateful for her. Thanks Kris.
Since I had to be up early for the wedding the next day, and Flower was in the reception that night I planned to leave and sleep with Flower at my parents. At midnight both our phones were dead so I ran all the way home to get chargers and dress clothes for Flower and I. I went clear back to the hospital, in Nampa, stopping along the way to get us food. By the time I left and got to my parents, it was 2:00 am. Friday was nuts. KG spent the entire day with River. I wouldn't see her again until Saturday morning. I dropped Flower off with Grandma Laura at work and went to the temple at 10:30. I then took photos until 12:45. Then I rushed to Meridian to pick up Flower and get to the luncheon at the church, in the north end on Bogus Basin. We made it by 1:30, only a half hour late. We left there at 2:30 and went to Albertson's and Rite-Aid to get things to do Flower's hair. It was 3:15 by the time we got home. We got her dressed and got her hair all done and made it to the Country Club by 4:15. Whew! We took photos there and stayed till it was over at 9:00. I was going to go back to the hospital and trade with KG but Flower fell asleep 5 minutes after leaving the wedding and it just didn't make sense since we pass our house going to Nampa. We went home and Flower slept till 10:00 am today. We were so exhausted. Today deserves it's own post so this is enough for now.
We are so grateful she is here and in our lives!
Thank you to everyone who kept me going through text messages and phone messages throughout those 36 hours! It meant so much!

This is a huge day for us!

More details to come!

It's Official!!!

We have been approved as an adoptive couple and as of yesterday, our profile can be viewed by birth parents. We are so excited and it feels really good that we were able to set some goals and achieve them. We started the process May 19 and our goal was to be completed with everything by the time we left on vacation. We leave Saturday! It went so smooth. Now we wait. Right now I really feel like I can wait patiently because I know that our child will find us. Now that my portion is done, there are no worries. I also want to mention how much I love our agency! They were our agency with Flower. We have a different Social Worker this time. Last time Jessica was incredible! We thought for sure we wouldn't get that lucky again. WRONG! She is just fabulous! She has been so much fun to work with and is super supportive. She has gone above an beyond! Our profile was also a big hit! It was passed around the office like crazy. I've been considering scanning it in and posting it but aside from the fact that it's 42 individual pages, it's so personal. Only a few choice people have read it. I'll think on it some more. They said that ours is very unique and not like any they've seen before. I worked really hard on it so that makes me beyond happy. She is really excited about us as a family and says we are a little more nontraditional than most of their families which she said was refreshing. (us...nontraditional??? NO!!!) :) They like to be able to provide birth parents with lots of different options and said sometimes all the profiles start to look the same. She is really optimistic for us and we are just so stinkin' excited!
Sooo, once again, if you know of someone that is considering an adoption plan for their child and think we may be someone they'd want to consider, you can send them to A New Beginning Adoption Agency. Christy is our case worker and they're phone number is 208-939-3865.
Thanks again to everyone involved and for everyone's love and support!

Adoption Training Complete.

KG and I finished the training, which started last night. It was from 9:00 to 3:00 today. We got out an hour earlier then expected. We now know everything there is to know about adoption and will be perfect parents who won't make any mistakes. Yeah right. Oh how I wish that were true!
The training was definitely better today and I felt like I walked away learning something. The strange thing for both of us is that we found ourselves associating it with Flower more then the new one. Some of the things that I learned...one was that we did so much right on how we approached Flower coming home. Even though she was 2 years old, she was a new born to us. Maybe not in how she acted, but in how we became a family. Everything changed for us just as it would a new born and we treated things accordingly. They say you should do that with any child no matter what age they are when they join your family, even a teenager. Sometimes your expectations for a child joining your family are way to high because the child is older and you have to treat it and yourselves as though it's a newborn. You need the same amount of time, away from work for example, to adjust and everything being new. Just because you get a two, three, or eight year old, doesn't mean you don't need to take maternity and paternity leave. The child shouldn't be put directly into to school or daycare, etc., just as you wouldn't do that with a 2 day old. It also reassured some of the questions we had regarding attachment to a new born rather than a two year old. We in fact do need to plan on forming that attachment just as we did with her. Mother's who give birth had 9 months of attachment. It won't just happen the moment we hold our child. And the baby might feel attached before we do. Uur attachment is just as important. There will definitely be a period of time that we don't allow anyone but us to hold our child, lots of skin to skin contact with their ear to your heart, staring into their eyes(they call it kangaroo care), not letting anyone else feed or change diapers for even longer. These are all things that can't be decided until the child is here but we already know it will be a minimum of two weeks. We also recognize that not everyone does these things and doesn't think it's necessary but these are the things that are important to us. We also learned that a new born can have just as many attachment issues as an older child and it may just come out later. No matter what age you get your child, they will question where they came from and everything that goes along with that.
I was surprised to find myself feeling emotional at the discussion of the birth parents. I just have such an overwhelming amount of respect for them and can't imagine what they must be feeling. It makes me more excited to have a relationship with them. They will be an extended part of our family. It also made me more willing to except anything they need from me to help them get through this incredibly hard time in their lives.
I learned a lot of things that I need to change in how I deal with Flower and I am so thankful for that because we can always do better. Sometimes you just need a reminder course. All in all I think it was beneficial.
Flower partied with her grandparents while we were at the training. Apparently she didn't sleep well. That seems to be a pattern there. I'm not sure why. When she slept at my mom's and my sister's she slept a little closer to normal. I'm sure it's just a change of scenery for her a it disrupts her schedule a bit. I just feel bad when I hear that she didn't fall asleep till 2:30 am! Yikes. I wouldn't be happy if she did that here. That's just not fun when you want to sleep. She had fun today though. She went to the Meridian Dairy Days. Last night she went to the parade. Today was the carnival. She got to ride on a Merry-go-round and apparently some other rides. She is going to get me some video and pictures I think so I will make a post about that then. They dropped Flower off with my parents to bring her to me. The second I saw Flower she yelled, "I HAD FUN!" Not "hi". Not "I missed you". "I HAD FUN" That's a good sign. I'm so glad that we have people here that we can trust. Grandparents are great! :)
I have to share this photo because I am so proud of Flower and well, it's just cool! Her two hardest things to get the hang of in the water were opening her eyes under water and blowing bubbles out her nose. She did them both at the same time tonight and I got it on camera! I was thrilled!

Mommy got killed.

This morning I decided to go on a walk with Flower. It seems things have been so busy that we haven't been able to take a walk in the mid morning for quite some time. It felt so nice to get out with her. I did want to have some exercise value so I decided to put her in the stroller instead of letting her walk, that way I could go a bit faster. We did our same route, walking up the hill and going along the ditch. This time we went farther down, until it ended at Hillcrest shopping center. We then turned around and back tracked until we got to Curtis and then I decided to go up that hill. It's not a big hill but pushing a stroller up made all the difference. It was a good work out. I was using muscles in my hips I haven't felt in a long time. And with the heat, I thought I was going to die. We made our way through the neighborhood, down Cole Rd. and back home. We were gone for two hours, I have two blisters on each foot, and sunburned shoulders and neck. I started getting severe ankle pain about an hour in but not much I can do about that. It will be nice to get a brace so that I can wear tennis shoes. Right now I can't because it puts too much pressure on it and hurts it worse. Walking for two hours in flip flops probably wasn't the smartest choice. It felt good to walk and be outside with Flower and that's really all I care about it. We went straight to the clubhouse and soaked our feet in the pool for about 15 minutes and cooled off. When KG woke up I was telling him about our adventure and said, "it about killed me" and right after that Flower pipes in so matter of fact, "mommy got killed." It was funny. After all that, I decided I needed a good soak in the tub. It's been a long time since I've taken an afternoon soak. It was lovely.
When I went to work I didn't feel like I accomplished what I wanted to because I got stuck dealing with a douche bag tenant that is moving out. It was a phone conversation that lasted 35 minutes and took everything in me to keep my cool. I lost it a tiny bit at one point but that got his attention and then he pretty much kissed my ass up one side and down the other and finally took responsibility and did what needed to be done. It was just such a waste of my time. Oh well, not much I can do about that. Then of course he, and two other people show up at the same time. Doesn't it always work out that way?
I had to leave a few minutes early because KG and I had a date night at the adoption agency. We had a three hour training from 6:00 to 9:00. I learned a little bit but couldn't help feeling like it was a tiny bit of a waste of time. So much of it just seems to be common sense to me. And the fact that we have to go for 7 hours tomorrow might have something to do with my bad attitude. Oh well, I'm trying to make the best of it. Flower is spending the night at KG's parents since we were at the training till 9:00 and have to be there at 9:00 in the morning. They have some fun activities planned with her so she was excited to hang out with them. We went to dinner at Texas Roadhouse after the training and enjoyed just being together. Now we are about to watch the Bucket List and enjoy each other's company.
Hope your weekend is off to a good start.

We're doing it again.

We've started the adoption process. This time is so much different then last! We were not ready for another child even two months ago and wondered if we'd ever want more. Then I started having dreams about *gasp* babies. Ever since we had Flower, we were kind of over wanting a baby, because we saw that having a baby wasn't the only option. Our favorite age has always been 18 months to 3 years. That still remains true so why not start at the age you love? Well that's apparently not what someone else has planned for us. I approached KG and told him we should start thinking about it. He looked like a dear in head lights. I would wait and bring it up ever few days with updates on dreams or thoughts after praying. We thought a lot about getting pregnant but that just didn't feel right. We always thought we'd go back to China, and maybe we will, but that's not what's supposed to happen now. We are feeling most lead toward domestic infant but are open to a toddler as well. This scares the crap out of both of us! We never thought we'd go with domestic because it's so uncertain. With international you are guaranteed a child in a certain time line. You are also guaranteed a cost. There is NO guarantees with domestic. You have no idea when and if you'll be chosen. And then what if the birth mother changes her mind. That's like having a miscarriage. There are also no guarantees with the cost because each agency had different costs and we just don't know where our little one might be waiting for us. There is also the potential of birth complications which you are responsible for the cost of. There is so much uncertainty! We're terrified. But if that's where our child is, we'll do what it takes. Amongst all the fear we are super excited!
We printed off all the paper work the weekend of the 17th and sat down Monday, the 19th, and completed most of it. We finished what we hadn't completed on the 27th and we met with our social worker yesterday, the 28th! She was SHOCKED that we had it all done. She thought she was coming over to bring us the paper work and walk us through it. No. Once we decide we're ready for something, we don't waste anytime. The process of when we started for Flower was meeting with our social worker in February, done with all the paper work a month later, waiting for state and government approval, getting her referral in July and bringing her home in February. One year exactly. But everything on our end was done in a month and our social worker was amazed. We don't mess around! We have our fingerprints scheduled for the 9th of June, our doctor appointments on the 17th, our next(and final) meeting with our social worker on June 18th for our interviews and our mandatory training on the 20th and 21st of June. She is going to have our homestudy done by then so she just has to add our training certificate to it and then we can be viewed! :) I am going to work on our profile, which I am the most nervous about, this weekend and complete it by the following weekend. I'm so excited.
We are being a little more, or should a say A LOT more open about this one and letting everyone know at the beginning of the process. With Flower no one had clue that we were adopting, other then those we'd asked to be references, until after we had her referral in August. But with domestic, you really should network for yourself. I've had friends who have adopted a child that they found out about because it was someones sister, friend, cousin or distant relative or someone they met from the blogging world. So please keep us in mind if you know of a birth mother that is considering adoption for her baby. Flower will make the best big sister! :) When our homestudy is complete we will have more information for you to give a potential birthmother if you know one, but for now you are welcome to send them to our blog so they can get to know us. www.zflowerz.blogspot.com
Thank you so much to everyone that is already being a huge help to us through this. Your love and support is what makes us who we are. It gives us the confidence to move forward in expanding our family.
Love,
KG, Ang and Flower :)

1 year Post Placement Interview and the Kilt

Today we had our 1 year PPI with our adoption agency. A PPI is required after you've been home for 6 months and at 1 year. She was impressed with Miss Thing and said she is progressing nicely and obviously attached to us. The lady brought her 8 year old daughter with her so Flower was being a little poopfart not wanting the girl to touch ANYTHING! They did eventually venture off to Flower's room and surprisingly got along better. This little girl was actually adopted from Bulgaria 2 years ago so it was fun to hear about her progress! When they brought her home she was mentally at an 10 month old level. She also wearing size 2T clothing. Can you imagine that for a 6 year old? She has progressed leaps and bounds! We had a nice visit with them and all is well.
Here are a few photos of the outfit Flower wore to church yesterday. My mom bought this kilt in Scotland about 11 years ago. She gave it to my first niece who handed it down to her sister who then handed it down to her cousin who has now handed it down to Flower who will eventually hand it down to Flower's cousin. It's so fun to think that each of my mom's granddaughters had worn it. She bought it because of our Scottish heritage.
Don't you just love the 'cheesy smile' stage?!
Here she is giving KG the 'stink eye' because he otld her to quit being cheesy. :)
Thanks for the kilt mom!