Lewis Plain and Simple

After my last post I got a lot of questions, so I thought I would answer some of the popular ones.

1. What can we do to help? Honestly, praying for us would be number one.  Number two, would be to keep your ears open about any possible adoption opportunities.

2. Are you interested in using a surrogate?  Right now the answer is no.  When we discussed other ways to bring a baby in to the world, this came up but I did not get excited about it like I did adoption.  I am not saying we would never go this route, but it is not something that I want to venture in to right now.

3. Have you considered embryo adoption? Until many people brought this up, I had never even heard of it.  I did some reading about it and my answer would match the one about surrogacy. I am so glad you brought this up though because it was an option I did not even know was out there!

4. Why am I just now hearing about this? Well the simple answer is that Brady and I are really private people.  We are not ashamed of this journey.  I have to admit part of it was that I did not want people looking at me with "sad eyes" or constantly asking me if I was pregnant yet. We had family and a couple of friends that knew and we felt that was enough.  Initially it was our lawyer that encouraged us to go public in order to find a baby faster.  Also, another friend in the middle of the adoption journey told me it could be therapeutic.....so there you go!

5. Why are you giving up so quickly? I re-read my last blog and I did not see where I mentioned giving up.  We do not feel like we are giving up.  One has to remember that I gave you the short story through fertility treatments because no one wants to sit through over 3 years worth of appointments, drugs and disappointments. Our decision to adopt gave me a new sense of hope that I had lost in the last 3-4 years. I am pretty sure I have read a million blogs and books and articles about adoption.  It gave me something to look forward to when those tests came back negative each month.  Our story is just beginning. And when our story ends with a beautiful baby in our arms, we will give Him all the glory.    

Hopefully, I answered a lot of questions.  If not, ask away and it will give me something to blog about :)

Hi Everyone!

It has been a long time since I have blogged.  I started this post on July 29th.  I had it all finished and I was just waiting for Brady to get home from Italy to proofread it.  Well before he got home some things happened and this post became irrelevant. Now, 4 months later, I am ready to publish this story.

The post was a detailed story on our journey to become parents.  I am going to give the highlights and not very specific details because it is a long story that has a lot of heartache in it.  We started fertility treatments in 2010.  After a year of drugs and lots of doctor appointments, I got pregnant.  I miscarried at 10 weeks. After taking a few months off to grieve and let my body heal, we started trying again.  After 7 months, I was pregnant again...only to have another miscarriage.  After that miscarriage, we did some genetic testing.  Nothing serious came back, except for my blood clots faster than it should.  We were told what we would have to do carry a healthy pregnancy. We started up fertility treatments once again.

During this time we felt like we needed to pursue other avenues.  We took a class to become foster parents.  We finished the class but never got licensed.  I had many fears about doing this...the main one being that foster care is supposed to be a temporary home for children while their family gets the help needed and heals.  I was not sure my heart could take getting attached to another child only for them to leave my home.

Private adoption seemed like it would be a great option for us.  We talked to a few of our friends that have adopted.  From there we submitted our paperwork to an agency and two adoption lawyers on July 30th.

Remember I said I started this blog post on July 29th?  Well this is where our world turned a little chaotic.  On July 30th I dropped Brady off at the airport so he could go to Italy for work.  I then delivered our adoption paperwork to the designated offices. On July 31st the adoption agency called and told me that a birth mom saw our profile and wanted to talk to us over the phone.  I talked to her on the 31st.  Brady returned on August 3rd and birth mom signed adoption agreement with us on August 5th.  Birth mom was due on August 18th.  Friends and family rushed to help us get everything we needed done in less than 2 weeks notice. On August 16th I had a phone call with our social worker and birth mom.  She talked about being tired and ready to give birth.  She had a doctors appointment on the 19th and they were going to schedule an induction at that point.  Her appointment was at 11:00 in the morning so I clung to my phone knowing she would be calling soon.  No call came.  I then started calling our social worker and lawyer with no success.  It was not until the next day that I was able to talk to our lawyer.  He said the sentence I had been fearing for the past 24 hours, "She has changed her mind". Once again we had lost another baby.

So here we are almost 4 months later. The purpose of our first post was to get the news out that we wanted to adopt and ask for your prayers as we go through this journey and second if you know anyone that is pregnant and considering adoption to send them our way!

The garden is finally starting to produce:

Here are my numbers for the end of June! It is getting hot so I expect the okra and tomatoes to take off any day now!

Well summer time is here so maybe it means I will spend a little more time on my blog!

Also it means.......GARDEN TIME!

So here is the annual list of things that I am growing....hopefully each week I will update the totals and maybe even get a picture!

How to organize plastic bags....put them in a coffee can.  I spray painted the can and added sparkly letters to make it pretty. I also put a slit in the lid so I could pull the bags out without opening the lid.

Also, if the can gets full I know it I have too many and I donate those.  I got a lot of cabinet space back by doing this! 

The "best" picture of the dogs

Duke with reindeer antlers and Duchess wearing a scarf.

I have a death grip on Duchess and Duke is trying to eat Brady's face!

Picture of the human family members..

Our favorite picture!

Why only one dog?  Duke was growling at Duchess so she ran off!

One last human only picture!

Back in May I attempted to make my own vanilla.  It had to sit for 3 months, so I had to wait to test it.  In October I finally tested it while making Vanilla Pumpkin Pie.  On a scale of 1to 10, I would rate it a 6.5!  I definitely got what I paid for.  I will use both batches and then decide if I want to make more.

*Also, no pictures because I forgot to take any!