Dates!

We have some dates to share with you all!

Our friends have offered for us to have our garage sale at their house. Their neighborhood is much more established than our new one and they also have a nice neighborhood sale that we are going to join in on.   So, that means our garage sale will be Thursday, June 17th and Friday, June 18th (with Saturday being a possibility). We don't have times set up quite yet, but I'll be sure to keep you all posted.

We have had a lot of response from people wanting to donate some things to the sale. We are so thrilled that so many people are able to help us out. So far we have a fair amount of clothing. If you have any other things to help us bring variety to our sale, we'd really appreciate it. Let us know if you have something large that will need to be hauled with a truck. We'll have to make arrangements with some family or friends to help us out with that.

AND.... we have our home study dates set!!!!!

May 5th and May 14th, the social worker will be coming to the house to interview us and check things out. I'm so excited!!!!! After the first meeting we will know for sure if a third is necessary, so keep your fingers crossed that we won't need to set up another date. If all goes well, and we are approved, then we will officially be WAITING FOR THE CALL in 24 days!!!!!!!!!!

I'll let you know how things go, I'm not too worried about the house, more so if they will like us or not. But I'm a worry-wort... it's what I do best :)

Lots to think about...

Yesterday and today we spent 16 hours completely immersed in adoption. It was so great, but somewhat overwhelming. Thursday we learned about the entire IOA (Infant Open Adoption) process, about dealing with grief and loss (our own and our child's), moving on from infertility, and met with a panel of families that have been through adoption before. It was wonderful just sitting in a room full of people that could relate to pretty much everything that came out of your mouth. We just understood, no questions asked.

Today we had a speaker come in and talk to us about making our profile. It was quite interesting and so much fun to think about what ours will look like when we are done with it. We talked a lot about outreach and trying to find our birth mother on our own. This is an area that I am always thinking about. I would be thrilled if we were able to find a match through someone that we know. I hope that everyone reading this blog knows that YOU can be an advocate for us. YOU can help us spread the word about our adoption plans, the more people that know, the faster this could all come together!

The second half of the day was spent on inter-racial adoption. We talked about the differences between race, culture and ethnicity. How our child will be able to find cultural identity in our family and in our community. It really gave us a TON to think about. Brian and I talked non-stop about this topic all the way home. It really struck a cord with us!

The key points that I took away from these classes were that 1) WE are the gift for the child, the child is not a gift for us, 2) the birth mother (or parents) have the same exact fears as we do, and 3) that no matter what we choose to do, adoption is going to enrich our lives in ways we didn't even know it was possible.

We are going to be in contact with our social worker this next week to set up our meetings (2-3 of them) for our home study. Once that is done, she makes a recommendation about us and if we are approved... then we are officially ready to accept a match!!!

Doubly Blessed

I don't even have words to describe how grateful I am. After reading my last post, another good friend of mine offered to do something very similar through her candle business. I was floored and am still pretty shell shocked with the amount of support we are getting. Here is what she had to say:

"Hey Kari! I just saw your blog about your friend who sells Creative Memories doing a fund-raiser for you this month, and I would LOVE to do the same thing for you with my Gold Canyon business!!! I will donate the same percentage from all my sales (Internet AND parties) through the end of May. That way if someone wants to support you, but doesn't scrapbook, they'd have another option. I just want to help you out any way I can!! I know that what goes around comes around, and you so deserve this baby!"

So here is a link to the website where you can place orders online:
www.mygc.com/mandyrtaylor

All I can say is THANK YOU SO MUCH MANDY!

I can honestly say that I have some of the greatest friends around...I am forever thankful to have you all in my life!

Our First Fundraiser!

We are so blessed! There are so many people in our corner and I don't think you all realize just how much it truly means to both of us. Most of the time I can hardly believe how many people out there want this for us, just as badly as we do ourselves. So, first of all, THANK YOU!!!

So, here is the great news! A very good friend of mine just started selling Creative Memories stuff, and has offered to have a party in our honor! We will be having an actual party on May 6th at a friends house where people can bring there stuff and work on projects, shop the catalog, hang out and have fun... you should definitely let me know if you want to come to that! It's going to be a TON of fun!

But, if you are unable to come to the party and still want to buy some stuff, or know someone else that would want to buy some stuff, you can use the information below to order online! Brian and I will be getting 20% of what she would typically be taking home... that will add up fast and will be SOOOOOO much help to us and our mounting bills for the adoption process.Any orders place now through the month of May will be applied to this fundraiser.

It is very easy to order things online following these few steps:

• Go to: www.creativememories.com
• Click on "Shop Products" to find items. 
• When you are done shopping, click on "Shopping Bag" on the top right corner of the web page to checkout. 
• Click "Continue to Checkout"
• Type "Marit Ortega, MN" in the consultant search.
• When my name and information pops up, click "Checkout" to complete your order.
• Fill in required info and submit!

 I can't even tell you how excited and overwhelmed and honored I feel about this whole thing. It literally brings tears to my eyes. Again, I can't say it enough... we are so blessed!

Thank you! Thank you! THANK YOU!

Waiting for the call...

Well, the agency contacted us and they officially have ALL of the documents they need to open our case :) YAY!!!

We are going to send in our check for the home study this week so that we can get paired with our case worker and get this show on the road. I'm so excited, thrilled, nervous, scared, and excited all over again! They say all the time that the home study is not a white glove test.... but I just feel like the house has GOT to be perfect if they are going to approve us. We are going to be working our butts off these next couple of weeks to get everything just right. Touching up paint, hanging up photos, deep cleaning EVERYTHING!

We also have our Pre-Adoption Education Classes on the 15th-16th of this month. that's less than 10 days away!

I just can't help be feel like there *COULD* be someone out there pregnant with OUR child.... it just gives me chills!

Physically Done

So I had my physical on Wednesday, which means we have every part of our initial application in and are now waiting for our social worker to contact us to start the interviewing process. I'm anxious for them to call, I want this process to keep moving along. I hate waiting!

Unfortunately, I am having a bad reaction to the tetanus vaccination I got during my physical. Basically I'm dealing with flu like symptoms, without the actual flu. I was puking and had a fever on Friday, today I don't think I have a fever but I have a really horrible headache and feel pretty tired and achy all over. I hope this resolves soon so I can enjoy the gorgeous weather and my days off.

That's all for now, I'll post more when we hear from the adoption agency!