Adoption Process: Squishing 9 Months into One

This family of four has some big changes coming soon.  We have been matched with a birthmom!  We received an email from our caseworker a couple of weeks ago with information about a birthmom (we will call her K) and baby due in December.  We have had a few emails sent to us about situations, but this was the first that really caught our attention.  The caseworker gave us a little information about the birthmom, the baby (full African American and sex unknown), and the cost of the adoption, and we had to decide immediately if we wanted our scrapbook shown to the birthmom.  We said yes.  The next day we found out that actually the birthmom wanted the agency to pick the couple for her since they knew their couples better than her.  That was when the caseworker let us know that if we wanted to be matched with K, we would be.  I was very nervous about this because K hadn't seen our scrapbook or talked to us.   I didn't feel like anything was official until K had seen or talked to us because she could take one look at our family and change her mind.  I felt better when later on in the day we got the email that K wanted to talk to us on the phone. 

The Monday before Halloween I answered the phone to hear, "It's a girl!"  It took me a second to realize my caseworker was calling me and then another second to remember that K had a doctor's appointment that morning and apparently found out the sex of the baby.  Hearing those words made this baby seem more real and I started getting really excited.  Dallin was also really excited since he has been saying for a year that he wants a baby sister. 

On Halloween we had a nice conversation with K.  By this point she had looked at our scrapbook and let us know she wanted to move forward with the adoption with us. 

We were first told that the due date was December 22nd.  Two months seemed like a good amount of time to get ready.  Then we were told the due date was moved up to the first week of December.  I went into a little bit of panic mode then making lists of everything that needed to be done and cleaning/organizing like crazy trying to make space in our house for a baby.

Other things on the to-do list:
Buy mini van so that we didn't need to squish three car seats on one row. (Done!)
Write lesson plans for the rest of the school year (Mostly done!)
Buy baby girl things (so excited about this task!)
And the big one that is kind of stressing me out...Get ready for Christmas!

Of course by the time Christmas comes along, Zane and I will have received the best gift ever.