Tennessee Christmas

Clinking our mugs of cocoa across the internet - Merry Christmas from our home to yours!  Highlights include some real live mistletoe we came across in a fallen tree, and the brand-new home-hewn mantel that Matt (and I) hung this weekend.  We have two fireplaces and until yesterday, no mantels!  

Tomorrow we'll celebrate as a family of three.  Matt wrapped Bo's present up himself. :) I am hoping for no less of a reaction than the one we captured on video the other day.  We were filming a "Christmas moment" for a friend and Matt impulsively handed Bo a present...

You can imagine the reaction when he TOOK IT AWAY a minute later!  

Merry Christmas!

an adoption update

I'd like to take a minute to record some details of our adoption so that we have record of them and also because they might be helpful to someone who is contemplating adopting.  A year ago when we were thinking about taking this step, I scoured blogs to find out what the process would look like.  It was actually through a stranger's blog that I learned about the agency we decided to use.  

We started researching agencies the first week of January 2013.  After calling many and looking at cost, timeline, and other factors, we chose our agency and applied to them at the end of January.  We were accepted the beginning of February and started compiling documents for our dossier.  The dossier contains all sorts of official information and is translated sent to the host country to put us 'in line' to adopt.  The dossier process took an hour or two every day for months.  We had to order official copies of our birth certificates, marriage certificate, financial and medical information, letters from our attorney and letters of reference from friends, letters to the Ethiopian government, police report, copies of our lease, pictures of our home, and I'm sure I left something out of that list.  It was exhausting.  Every page had to be notarized by a notary who's expiration fell within a certain parameter, then everything had to be certified at the county level (of course we had things signed in two different counties) and then everything had to be state certified by the Secretary of State.  Add to that our births and marriage in separate states (and in my case, born in another country) and that all took some time to get sorted out.

We also completed a homestudy with a local agency.  A social worker met with Matt and me together and individually and visited our home.  We wrote long autobiographies and answered questions about our marriage and our parenting philosophies.  We also completed some workshops/educational forums and the social worker combined all of that information into a twelve page report detailing everything from our physical appearance to our jobs to our family history and on and on.  The homestudy was included in the dossier.  Of course the US government plays a role in this process as well, and we had to apply to be able to adopt.

May 7, 2013 at our biometrics appointment

Our fingerprinting was the last thing to complete and once we got the results from that (we are not criminals), I drove all over Tennessee getting everything stamped and sealed and photocopies (one hour in Staples copying that thing!).  Bo and I dropped our beautiful dossier into the mail on May 24th, 2013, the same day we signed for our house. 

Of course I did one little paper wrong and was treated to another round of visits to the county clerk and Secretary of State but with that paper mailed in June, everything was out of our hands.  We received word in August that we were officially starting the "wait" (as if everything up until this point was not waiting?) and were fourth in line for a boy under two years old with our agency.  In October we had moved up to second, and that's where we still sit.  The children are there but are waiting for their approval from the Ethiopian government to be officially "adoptable."  In September the US started a new process that will ultimately make things move faster but right now we are feeling the slow down as new rules go into affect.  

I had hoped and prayed to get our referral by Christmas, and so this season has been particularly challenging for me.  I felt all sorts of frustration and sadness that we are still in this season of waiting.  On the first Sunday of Advent we sang, Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus.

Come, thou long expected Jesus, 
 born to set thy people free; 
 from our fears and sins release us, 
 let us find our rest in thee.  
 Israel's strength and consolation, 
 hope of all the earth thou art; 
 dear desire of every nation, 
 joy of every longing heart.

At the last line, I thought, well, I've got that one down this year. Longing heart.  And so this may be the first time I've really experienced Advent.  I get that expectation, that need for a Messiah and a Redeemer.  I am also longing for a baby, but I'm longing for that time when this heartache is not even a memory.  I'm longing for the One who makes all sad things untrue.  When babies never have to leave their parents in the first place.  When families are untouched by poverty and disease and there is no more orphan crisis.  

Until then, God has used this grief to remind me to long for Jesus and marvel at the miracle of his birth, that the one who made us came to live among us.  

Hello? Anybody there?

A friend let me know that yesterday had been six months since my last post. YIKES. Not that I think I have readers pining away for an update... Any readers out there must've moved on to greener pastures of a more prompt blogger.  For my absence, I credit 1) moving 2) renovating 3) working 4) mothering.  The move and the renovation are done but once I surfaced from beneath piles of boxes and sawdust, real life got cruising again and blogging did not.

So for a quick recap:

JUNE

My sister lived with us this summer. It was awesome having her around! I could not have survived the summer without her!  Her presence and Bo's "summer camp" of two mornings a week at our church made it possible for me to run all over town picking out tile, lighting, paint, duct covers, curtains, hardware, appliances, and the list goes on. I'm starting to sweat just thinking back on those days.  The number of pictures like this on my phone from this summer are many and make for a very boring photo stream.

JULY: 

We had many sweet summertime moments with cousins:

and friends!

But the rest of the time was spent picking out paint colors and working on our house.  We had a contractor and many helping hands for the big stuff but for the little stuff- like trying to improve our dingy floors - we tried to tackle ourselves.  (Hello, Rejuvanate!  What a great product!)

At the end of July we packed up our rental house and stacked the boxes into a couple "finished" rooms of the new house.  

AUGUST

Our house was still very unfinished so we spent a week at my brother and sister-in-laws' home while they were on vacation, and then we went on vacation, hoping and praying that the house would be livable when we returned!

This was our backyard when we left:

Ugh!! But six days in the Carolinas was a great way to avoid the construction!  We spent a couple days with my grandparents in Dataw Island, SC, and a couple days with the Riches in Wilmington.  

 

When we got home, things were better ... but still unfinished.  I think for a week Bo and I walked to Starbucks every morning for breakfast because it seemed easier than scraping up food home.  The fridge was in the living room and guys showed up around 8:30 every day to bang around (oh that nail gun!) so we spent as much time out of our home as possible.  They were stressful days and at that point I could not see a light at the end of the tunnel.  I was convinced we'd live in sawdust forever.  One Saturday morning Matt's parents had Bo because we were going to a wedding in Ohio and Matt and I were so pumped to sleep in ... until the contractor was knocking on our door at 8 am!  Ha! Our sweet contractor was such a part of daily life for months.  Bo really loves Mr. Richard.

Bo started "school" the last day of August.  He goes two mornings a week to Mother's Day Out and we LOVE his little school!  The teachers and kids are precious and we live close enough to walk.  Walking takes 45 minutes instead of 10, but it's a chance to slow down for a minute and talk with Bo about life (and pinecones).

SEPTEMBER

At some point in September our house was functionally finished.  I hope to do some before and after pictures but this photo of Bo picking dirt off the kitchen floor for his dump truck (eek!) gives a little preview and is a story itself - we had to have the floors painted and then repainted a month later and with no-walking-for-48-hours that was no small task (with a dog and 2 year old).  Thankfully Matt's parents took us in for the weekend. 

Matt and I had two consecutive weekends away - one in Lexington for a wedding and Chicago for a work conference (and I managed to see 2 besties in the suburbs!) - so my mom came out for the week to stay with Bo.  My dad and brother also made it up for the weekend so we had a great little family day!  Such a treat when we are far-flung.

 Cubs vs Braves

 OCTOBER

Autumn is beautiful in Nashville and it turns out our house has many deciduous trees.  And we are now well stocked with lawn equipment.  Getting the yard to look like this probably took Matt all day:

And then the next weekend, after a big storm, it looked like this again:

Matt did most of the work for a while and I raked piles and dragged leaves to the curb, until one day I  realized that he would not have time to get the leaves up before the leaf truck came the next day.  So I somehow got the riding mower started, hooked it up to the leaf hopper, and did the yard myself!  I had a real "girl power" moment when a mom ran by with her jogging stroller and I was cruising around on the John Deere.  (Somehow driving a tractor is a highlight of October?  I guess it is a good sign that we were getting back to normal life again!) (P.S. I can also rev up the leaf blower by myself.) 

I was able to meet up with two great friends in Richmond, Virginia, for the weekend... wow, it was SUCH a treat! I just miss my friends and love them dearly.

 And of course, Halloween, and I made this costume after the one we ordered didn't fit my little guy:

NOVEMBER

We had a much more normal month in November! Time outside playing "Star Wars"

and going for walks and bike rides.  

We had Thanksgiving in Oklahoma which included many special moments - like riding on a real freight train, coordinated by my dad who pulled some strings with a work contact. 

It also included some not-special times, like Bo's first ear infection, but if you're going to be sick, Coco and Poppy's is the place to be! 

DECEMBER

We are loving some "Christmas Season," as Bo calls it.  He had his first little "concert" where he clapped his hands like a boss.  Next year I'm advocating for a place in the front row so I can see my little angel more clearly! 

So that is a really quick recap on the second half of 2013.  Maybe now that I've broken the ice I can get back to writing a little bit more!  I hope to get some pictures up of our work on the house and an adoption update (short story: still no news).  And just in case I don't get back up here before 2014 - Merry Christmas! 

how did we get here?

As I sit to write this, my home looks different than it did a few months ago.  On the surface, you might not notice anything out of the ordinary, a contained clutter of trucks and cars and photos and furniture that make up this rental house I've tried to make a home.  But a closer look reveals a stack of photocopied birth certificates on the desk, a workbook, a couple books on attachment underlined and dog-eared.  If you were to get more personal and poke around a bit more, you'd find a necklace in a dish on my dresser with an initial 'B' and a charm of Africa; within our file cabinets you'd find numerous new-but-worn files neatly labeled 'dossier in process,' 'dossier completed,' 'IFS application,' and 'homestudy.'  Sit down with us for a while, and you'd see that while we look to be a family of three, our hearts are full of the desire to be a family of four.

We are adopting.

How did we get here?  A hundred little stepping stones.  The Riches' adoption of Hope that started in while we were in Kenya.  Taking pictures for our friends' profile book in Long Island to share with birth mothers.  Numerous conversations that ended in "someday." A hand raised and Matt sliding across the pew to accept a Show Hope packet, signing up on the spot to sponsor adopting families.  Watching our friends travel to China to pick up their daughter.  An expectation that we would be expecting - but we weren't.  Reading Jen Hatmaker's book "7" over Christmas break and a twelve- hour car ride where Matt and I talked about how we could point our life towards less stuff and more Jesus.  We made a decision to volunteer with World Relief Nashville to befriend a refugee family, which is a whole different story - and Matt said, "Let's look into adopting."

And so we did.  And now we are planning for another little boy - this one from Ethiopia.  We started in February with applying to our agency, getting accepted, and starting the homestudy process.  I spent a couple months gathering paperwork, we were fingerprinted by the government, got approval from immigration to adopt, and have sent our dossier to our agency.  That is a two-sentence synopsis of six months of process that I will probably detail soon.  We hope our dossier will be on the lawyer's desk in Ethiopia sometime in July, at which point we will officially start waiting for our referral - to be matched with a child, whom we anticipate will be a boy under two.

The road is long and winding and we can't really see what's on the other side of the hills.  I don't know how long this trip will take or what curves lie ahead.  I do know that God wrote Africa on our hearts long ago, that we fell in love on the dusty roads of Kenya.  How fitting of Him to bring us a child from Africa, too. 

Homeowners!

Well, last Friday was a one of those monumental days in our family history.  Our house hunting days are over!  After an hour of signing papers, we were handed keys to our new home.  

Now, out of the three keys they gave us, only one actually works... But I feel like that's kind of how it goes for us.  We bought a house we won't be moving into for a couple more months, but boy do we have plans.

Our sweet realtor has unlocked quite a few homes for us and had to break the news two different times that "the one" was no longer available for our purchase.  And as the market has changed around here and homes started selling in days after they were listed, she's had to tell us homes were off the market before we could even see them.  

Such was the case for a house that popped up in a great spot but was under contract before we could peek inside.  The location was so appealing to us that we drove by it at least twice to gaze forlornly at the "under contract" sign in the yard.  When this house popped back up online I thought for sure it was a mistake and texted Angela to see what was going on.  A few texts later she confirmed that the deal had fallen through with the first seller and it was indeed available again! Unfortunately, all of this went down as we were driving to Matt's parents' house for the weekend.  We were over halfway there when we made the decision to turn around and drive back home to look at the house. Being a Saturday, we knew there would be other buyers out and we didn't want to risk it.  During the drive back, we were so nervous and excited.  I commented that this was "Just like a movie!" And Matt corrected that it was like aborning movie where the characters sat in the car the whole time. Angela met us there 90 minutes later, on her birthday.  Moose was in the car and Bo had just spent 3 hours driving nowhere, which were not ideal house looking conditions.  

But we liked what we saw and could envision what the house could become. 

We got back in the car and pointed West again, back to Murray!  We signed an offer on that drive (oh, technology!).  And a few (stressful) weeks later, here we are! 

We love the street of older homes and being walking distance to both downtown Franklin and a local park.  We love the stone exterior and mature trees.

We can envision the trees and bushes trimmed up, new shutters, trim painted white. 

Inside the home has the quirks of a 1940's cottage that will hopefully translate to "character." There are two living areas- this one will be our family room/play room.

Those doorways above lead to a small kitchen that we will hopefully be expanding.

Below is the wood-paneled wonder of a living room. You can bet the first thing I did was take down those heavy curtains!  We might be able to knock down some walls but we will certainly be brightening up the room with some paint. 

Outside the house has a large carport, which is typically not my favorite but it does the trick and I really don't mind it.  The garden is overgrown but we've identified some great plants- hydrangea, peonies, and lavender among them. It's a wild jungle now but give us a year.

This little garage is homely but the perfect dimensions for Matt's work needs. Of course we've got plans for cutesing that up someday.

The yard is a big wild dream.  I never thought we'd have this much space.  Of course now that it's ours  the reality of caring for it sinks in! But there is a spot for a garden and anything else we could dream up. 

Possibly a zipline.

Bo has been at grandparent camp in Oklahoma this week.  I miss him terribly but the timing was great.  We shopped appliance sales, hit up the hardware store, and have spent hours at the new house.  We are waiting on approval from the city before our contractor can start the big demo but we can plink around a bit ourselves.  I've tried to rescue the magnolia from death by vine strangling: 

And Matt's been framing out a storage space in the garage.

So it's scary and a bit stressful as we step into this but after months of looking, we know what we want!  It is surreal to actually own a house.