With Paper In Hand

Day 5 approved and waiting for our baby through the miracle of adoption

We were so excited to get our approval letter! Here we are showing it proudly. Now with paper in hand we are ready to be very proactive in our "finding" process.

May I Have Your Attention Please!!!

Day 1 approved and waiting for our baby through the miracle of adoption

MALONE AND I ARE APPROVED TO ADOPT!!! We heard from our caseworker today and we are now official! Check out our profile at:

https://beta.itsaboutlove.org/ial/profiles/22213586/ourMessage.jsf

We are so excited to be in the "finding" phase. That means the real work begins and we need all of your help. We would love to send you our pass-along cards and fliers so that if you come upon any potential birth mother you can share our information with her. You can also just give them out to all of your friends and family so that if they hear about a potential birth mother they can share our information. Anyhow, that's kind of just the short version, and I'd love to share more information with you. Just email me your mailing address to our adoption email which is: maloneandbrittanyadopt@gmail.com. Be sure to also include how many pass along cards and fliers you want me to send!

We have lots of other ways you can help us, more information will be coming about that. Most importantly, we want to ask all of you to pray with us that we will be connected with our birth mother quickly, whether you are a member of our religion or not. If you are a member of our religion, we would love it if you would also consider adding our names to your temple prayer roll and fasting with us the first Sunday in March.

No news...

Several people have asked if we've heard anything yet. Unfortunately the answer to that question is a BIG FAT NO. Sorry guys, I know you're all waiting on pins and needles like we are, but unfortunately we just can't force a brick wall to move. BUT, our case worker does go into the office tomorrow and so we're hoping tomorrow will be the day we get officially approved and put on the website. So here's crossing my fingers (and toes) that things work out the way I want them to. Check back tomorrow and see if we have any more info, and cross some of those fingers (and toes) for us!

I HATE red tape

So all yesterday I was anxiously waiting to hear from our case worker because I know she goes in on Wednesdays. She said that she was going to try and get all the required signatures at their staff meeting. So I probably checked the email ten THOUSAND times waiting to see if I would hear from her. At 5:30 I still hadn't heard from her and I had to go pick hubby up from work. I was irritable and ornery and when Malone asked why I said, "Because I really wanted to hear from Charity today and I didn't." What was his response? HmmmmmMMMMM????? He said, "Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you that Charity called me."

You have to be FREAKIN' kidding me! Charity had called him and he forgot to call me and let me know. Man I could have avoided a whole day of anxiety. She just called to ask him a couple of questions about our file. Apparently the director wouldn't sign off on things until she cleared things up. (Double checking on our insurance and Doctor's reports.) Malone answered her questions and then hung up with her. Did he BOTHER to ask her if she knew when we could expect our approval notice? Of course not! Seriously... sometimes I wonder about that boy. (Don't worry, I still love him. :) But I think we're going to change our primary contact number from his cell to mine. )

So this morning Malone called the office. Of course, Charity wasn't in but the secretary was able to deliver the irritating news. Because the director didn't want to sign off on things until those questions were cleared up we are now going to have to wait ANOTHER WEEK! Mr. Director won't come in to the office again until next week at which point I am desperately hoping things will be perfectly clear for him to sign off on. Don't get me wrong, I'm really glad they're thorough when it comes to approving adoptive couples. And I understand they are super busy especially Mr. Director because he supervises two agencies. But this is just so important to me it's easy to forget it's not life and death to everybody else as well.

So... if we do get approved in a week, it will have been almost 8 months just to get approved to adopt. Does that seem like a little ridiculous to anyone else? Here's hoping we get chosen MUCH quicker than that.

Birthdays and More Waiting

Malone and I recently celebrated our birthdays. I'm 23 and hubs is 26. We're feeling old! Malone made me dinner, and gave me my favorite candy and Wii Fit! He spoils me. I'm so loving the game! Even if it tells me I'm old and "unbalanced." (This is referring to my coordination, not my mental stability! :P) I treated Malone to dinner at A&W and gave him Ticket to Ride Europe, Madagascar 2, new shoes, and his favorite candy. We also threw ourselves a big birthday bash and a bunch of our family and friends showed up! Thanks guys, it was crazy but fun!

On the adoption front, we are still waiting... and waiting... and waiting... Seriously, we haven't really had a problem with impatience through this whole process. But this is the most frustrated we've been. All that's holding our approval back is waiting on a signature. This is three weeks of waiting that we haven't been shown to potential birth mothers because of a little signature. Argh... I know we can't force things to go any faster, but now that we're so close we're just wanting it to happen NOW! I almost feel an urgency in the pit of my stomach. I'm really trying to be patient. But it is super hard. Our caseworker said she's hoping to have it done by the end of this week. Hopefully she pulls through for us! She's been really great so far, so we can only hope this trend will continue. Then we'll be off like a shot getting the word out! Do any of you have suggestions for how to endure this?

Superbowl PARTY!!!

My nephew was having his own Superbowl Party while us big kids watched the game. He was watching Veggie Tales on that laptop! I have to say, he's pretty freakin' adorable.
Check out our cute football shaped homemade oreos! My sister made them, but I gave her the idea for the shape. I'm the QB in our kitchen!
Just us. Like Malone's goatee? I think it's hot.
Check out our spread!!!
All of us... we were just a bit anxious to dig in to the food. This was about 15 min. before go time!

No, we are not football freaks. But, we do enjoy the occasional game here and there. Same goes for baseball, hockey, basketball, etc... Really the only sports events we get too crazy about are the Olympics and WORLD CUP SOCCER! (I can't wait!)

Anyhow, every year we throw a Superbowl Party. This year we kept it fairly quiet without a ton of people. We just had a couple of my brothers, their families, my little sister, and her man. No biggie. But we did have a TON of food. Seriously, I swear we could have fed all the Cards players as well as the Steelers. To say we overdid it a little is an understatement. But I guess that's kind of mandatory for the Superbowl. After all, we're Americans! ;) Anyhow, here are some pics.

P.S. I was sad that the Cards lost.

It's official now...

Today Malone and I were released from the nursery. (For those of you who aren't members of our church, we voluntarily serve in different aspects such as taking care of the very young children. AKA nursery.) It sucks because last week was the first week we had almost ALL of our kids at church and NONE of them cried. And let me tell you, that is a major accomplishment for six kids under the age of 2. The kids are all really getting to know us and feel excited about nursery. Of course, right when you really start to get comfortable and love the job you're doing, that's the time the Bishop (our church leader) asks us to do something different. Anyhow, I'm really going to miss spending Sunday with all of those kids. We've really fallen in love with all of them.

But now I get to try something different. The Bishop asked me to be the Literacy Specialist. Of course, I said yes and I'm excited for something new. I'm ready to get started, but I'm missing one important piece of the puzzle. What in the heck is a Literacy Specialist?

Truly inspiring

Birth mothers are so inspiring. I happened upon this woman's story (check it out at http://sethadamsmith.blogspot.com/2009/01/adoption-and-abortion.html), and I knew I had to share it with all of you. One of the most surprising blessings I've received from the adoption process so far is how much love I feel for these young women who willingly choose to place their children for adoption. Most of you know how emotional I can get. Well, I'm pretty much a mess every night when I kneel down and pray for the woman who will make our lives more complete. I can only imagine what she may be experiencing right now. I get downright worried for her. Anyway, we all have something to learn from these women. Check out this story, and others you can find on beta.itaboutlove.org.