Baby Steps

We’ve talked about adoption for years.  It’s just been “the plan” for quite a while, now.  But it’s always been an “in the not-too-distant-future” kind of plan.

Not “today” yet because:

• we are getting ready to move to another state
• we have a ton of debt to pay down
• we have to save up the money for the costs involved
• we can’t afford for me to stay home full-time
• and whatever else comes up that week

It’s not at all like we were putting it off.  On the contrary, in fact.  We have been ready for a really long time.  Both of us.  But I think if I’m completely honest, we’ve just been waiting for everything to align perfectly before “pulling the trigger”… and I think we are really realizing that this will probably never happen.

So we had a really good talk earlier this week and…

We are ready.

And this time, I don’t mean ready to just keep being ready.  But we’re ready to start down this path.  Ready to take our Baby Steps… steps toward bringing home our little one.

We are going to take our first step off of the path we are currently on and start really putting the work in to make this happen.

Currently, we are researching domestic adoption agencies (and actively looking for recommendations, if anyone has any!) and seeking out updated information on costs, especially since we’re still new to Texas.  And we’re also hoping to start collecting information on any/all available tax breaks, grants, adoption loans, etc. and to see what we can qualify for with our combined income and whatnot.  And we are counting people at these places, too.  Which is a huge step forward for us.

It’s really exciting.  I’m not sure why, but it feels so much more… real!  Submitting requests for adoption information packets from various organizations is quite an awesome step for us.  It doesn’t just feel like yet another thing sitting in our tomorrow basket, but it feels like we’re really on our way.  We’ll actually be answering questions and filling out applications and… really, truly getting the ball rolling. Eek!

It will definitely take time – the average wait for domestic adoption within the US is around 2 years.  And for those of you unaware, this is why I tend to look at little elephants as a kind of symbol for our little one, as the gestational period for an elephant is about 21 months.

So here we are ready and oh so eager to get this show on the road.  It may not be how we always pictured things playing out, but that’s life, right?  And if we always wait for things to be perfect before we do anything worth while, then we’ll never get there.

Please pray for us.  Please check in with us (I will be MORE than thrilled to answer questions at any time, trust me).  And if nothing else, stick around to see how everything plays out.  I can’t wait to share this journey with you guys!

~Hope