Me, My Wife, and Her Boyfriend

       For the past few months, everything has been about our adoption. Whether it’s been our fundraising activities, this blog, etc., it’s all been about the addition to our family. This weekend, however, we had a new addition to our family: Ashley’s boyfriend.

      Ok, maybe I should explain this a little. First of all, I decided to surprise Ashley by taking her to the Reds-Nationals game in Cincinnati on Saturday. She likes the left fielder for the Nationals, Bryce Harper, and had mentioned before that she’d like to see a Nationals game sometime, so I surprised her with tickets to Saturday’s game. After some trouble getting there thanks to some roadwork, (come on Kentucky Dept. of Transportation! Work faster!) we finally arrived at the ballpark. Although we missed his first at bat thanks to a talkative usher, we were in our seats to see his second time at the plate. A 2-run homer later, our family added a new member. Ashley walked in as a casual fan, but by the time that ball finally landed, he was a part of our family. For the rest of the game, I heard how great Bryce Harper was. Whether it was, “My boyfriend will probably hit another homerun this time,” or “they won’t try to run on my boyfriend” when a Reds base runner stopped at third, my afternoon had become a Bryce Harper love-fest. It was pathetic.

     Despite hearing how great he was and, by association, the Nationals were, we had a lot of fun. She had fun telling me how he’s awesome and I had fun laughing at him when he struck out late in the game, all of which made me look forward to having our child. I can’t wait to take our kid to games and try to get him to take my side in these “arguments”. I’ll be trying to convince our child to be a Reds fan and (as long as Bryce Harper is playing) Ashley will be trying to convince him to be a Nationals fan. But that’s the fun stuff. Those times that you get to spend together as a family at the ballpark, or talking trash to mom on the way home; those are the kinds of things I’m looking forward to. It’s those little times that make a family a family.

    So as much as I probably should be distressed by my wife’s new, multi-millionaire boyfriend, I’m not too concerned because it makes me look forward to the fun times we’re going to have with our kid. I’m prepared for her to buy him a tiny Nationals jersey, and I’m ok with that. And I’m going to remind him that we cheer for the Reds and the Red Sox and no one else, but we’ll leave it up to our child and see what he decides. Unless of course he wants to be a Yankee fan. Then he might be moving in with grandma.

Wowzers April!

April is a great month. It's the month of opening day baseball, April Fool's, and showers that bring May flowers. It's really quite awesome. This year though, April is about more than that. We're going to be going non-stop this month in an effort to get some fundraisers finished. So no opening day baseball for us, no April Fool's pranks, and please, please, no showers (at least while we're doing things outside) because this is a work month.

We're not totally busy with adoption stuff. The first weekend in April will be busy, but nice. We're doing some family stuff which will keep us busy, but will be fun. By the time the next weekend rolls around though, it will be time to put on your game faces because we're getting down to business. We're having a yard sale pricing day at our house. We've been planning to have a yard sale as a fundraiser for a long time. Ever since we had that idea, we told people we knew who were having yard sales, "Hey, if you don't want that leftover stuff, we'll take it." While that seemed like a good idea, the yard sale items quickly overtook one bedroom in our house......then another......then a room at my sister's house.......and my mom's house. So on yardsale pricing day, it all comes out to get priced for our first yard sale at the end of the month (more on that later). We're excited to get this going so we can make some money for our adoption fund, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited to get the rest of our house back.

The next weekend, April 20, we're selling concessions at an auction near our house. We did this before and, hopefully, we learned from the mistakes we made last time. For example, we learned last time that people like to drink coffee first thing in the morning. (Who knew?!) Also, we learned that, if you're going to have food in cans, it's a good idea to bring a can opener. Despite a few mistakes, the last auction went great and we hope this one will too. Besides, I don't think we'll make the same mistakes twice. We'll make exciting new mistakes! So mark your calendars for the April 20 auction on Orhcard Rd. in Salem. We'll remind you again closer to the day, but it should be a lot of fun.

Finally, at the end of the month we'll be having our long-awaited yard sale in Orleans. Almost anything you need, we'll be selling. I'd list what we have, but it's probably easier to list what we don't have....puppies. I'm pretty sure anyway that we aren't selling puppies of any kind. Although if our dogs misbehave on pricing day, I can't guarantee you they won't get a pricetag stuck on them. The yard sale will be Friday and Saturday the 26th and 27th in Orleans (we'll have the address for you later) and will be a part of Orleans town wide yard sale day, so if we don't have what you need, someone probably will. But come check with us first, please. We'd appreciate it.

So, other than that, it should be a relaxing month. I'm not complaining though, it's all going to be worth it in the end. As exhausting as it will get, we're excited about all of the action going on this month. The more work we do toward our adoption, the more excited we get. It's going to be a fun few weeks. If you can join us for any of the events or want to help us with pricing, auction food, or working the yardsale, let us know. Regardless though, make plans to come see us on some of those days. We're going to have a lot of fun and look forward to sharing that time with all of you.

 

::Reminder Note::

Don't forget we are also having "Can My Yard Night" on May 10th! So keep saving those cans so you can litter our yard with them!

Loose Screw

     I found a screw loose on a cabinet door the other day. Normally that’s no big deal, but around our house lately, this is a huge deal. This week we made some progress in that we finally got our paperwork sent off to our agency. This was a huge deal for us because after all of the time and effort spent trying to gather information and filling out forms, we were finally finished with this part. The celebration was short-lived though because we realized what came next. Our home study. Nothing has made us more paranoid than this home study mostly because we don’t know what to expect. I mean, are they just going to talk to us and look around the house a little bit? Or are they going through all our drawers and checking the fat content of items in our refrigerator? At this point, I wouldn’t be shocked if our case worker said she needed to get in the crawlspace under the house and start looking for termite damage.

      For the record, our house is fine. I mean, we’re not living in a mansion or anything, but everything seems normal, I suppose. But this home study has me worried beyond belief. Every time I see something that isn’t perfect, every time a door handle jiggles a little too much, a light flickers, or I see a loose screw, I automatically assume that we’re going to fail our home study and never get our kid. (And I’m sure some of you were already thinking I’ve had a few screws loose for years. I get it.)

     In reality, it will probably all be ok. The lady we’re working with from the adoption agency is great and I’m sure she’s not expecting perfection. After all, if they’re only letting perfect people have kids, then we’re all in trouble. I’m sure that all the worrying will be for nothing and that our home study will be fine. Until it’s finished though, we’ll have a few more weeks of being paranoid about everything. So consider this your warning, if you happen to come by our house in the next few weeks, compliment us on how great everything is. If not, be prepared for us to put you to work.

Blegh, Homework

     I have to be honest, I’m worried about this whole adoption thing. Not that I’m concerned about us having a kid or anything. That’s the great part. The part that worries me is what happens a few years from now. School. It scares me to death.

     Now, for the record, I finished elementary school, high school, and college. Graduated from them all and did pretty well, I guess, but that stuff was easy. When my kid goes to school, he’s going to be bringing home homework. And inevitably he’s going to have something he needs help with and who will he go to? One of us. My only hope is that I can find some excuse to leave the room and make Ashley help him. And I don’t care how flimsy of an excuse I can find, if I don’t know the answer, I’m getting out of there. Taking out the trash, walking the dog, moving to Canada…nothing is off the table.

    That seems like an odd thing to worry about, I’m sure, but I just did my first book report in over a decade and it nearly made my head explode. As a part of our adoption paperwork, we had to read a book and fill out a short questionnaire giving our thoughts on the book. Easy enough, right? Wrong. It was awful! I mean, we read the book, we discussed, and did everything the way we were supposed to, but when it came time to write about our thoughts on the book….nothing. Drawing a total blank. I mean, seriously, we make children do this at school?! What’s the matter with these teachers?! This is torture! Maybe it’s just because the last time I finished a book report, Bill Clinton was president, but it was almost painful. I’m fully expecting our agency to think that we paid some 4^th grader to write it for us.

     I’m sure we’re overreacting. I’m sure they’ll read it and think it was all ok, but either way, it’s got me worried. I think I can help our kid through addition and subtraction, but after that I’m in trouble. I guess this is something all parents have to deal with though, because once you stop doing some of that school work you get out of practice quick! Until we get our child home though, we’ll try to make sure we’re academically fit to raise a child. Just in case we’re not though, Ashley’s mom is a 3^rd grade teacher. It’s always good to have a built-in backup plan.

Adam's Fault

      Ok, so we messed up. Correction, I messed up. Not Ashley, just me. Totally my fault....although I'm still trying to shift the blame to her a little bit. We've done this blog since September and we've been posting things on here every Monday without fail...until this week. Christmas Eve? No problem, we wrote a blog. New Year's Eve? Please! We got that covered! But somehow this week, we got derailed. What huge event could have taken us off track this week? Adoption paperwork. It totally killed our Monday evening and by the time we looked up, it was time to go to bed. Sorry.
      On the bright side, we're almost done with the paperwork we have to do to get our home study started. We're hoping to get everything finished and sent in by the end of the week and then get ready for our home study. Although this is just the beginning of the process, we're pretty excited about getting this part done. Every step we take is a step closer to getting finished. 
       We're also excited about the progress we've made with our adoption fund. Between money we've saved and our fundraisers and donations, we have enough to cover our home study costs and a good percentage of the next round of fees that we'll have to pay. We're not all the way there yet, but the progress is great and we have a lot of you to thank for that. Your donations and support have been amazing and we can't thank you all enough.
      I was fortunate enough to be asked to speak at Orleans First Baptist Church the last 2 Sundays. We enjoy seeing everyone there and they've all been very supportive of our adoption process, as well as our fundraisers. At the end of the service, they unexpectedly gave us an envelope with an incredible donation to our adoption fund. (If anyone from the church is reading this, thank you all so much.) It wasn't something we expected, but maybe we should have. It seems like we've been blessed with support from unexpected places at unexpected times throughout this process. We know that God has guided us through this, but things like this are further affirmation that He is in control.
     Again, I'm sorry we didn't get the blog up on Monday. We'll try to get back to normal next week and hopefully we'll have some more news to share. Until then though, thanks for all you've done and for all you continue to do. We'll see you next Monday...unless Ashley screws it up again.

It's so TINY!!

       This week I discovered a new hobby. The bad part is, I think it will eventually drive me crazy. Earlier this week I found myself wandering through NBA.com. One of my favorite former Hoosiers, D.J. White, was signed by the Boston Celtics last week, so I started reading the Celtics website for information about the signing. The website had a link to the Celtics online store, so I thought, “Hey, let’s see if they’re selling D.J.’s jersey.” At the time, I thought, this would take 30 seconds, then I can get back to doing other things. Then it happened. On the Celtics site they had jerseys that could be personalized, like all the other team’s sites have, but at the bottom of the screen I noticed a little, tiny, infant Celtics jersey. That was it. I was hooked. First I decided I’d make a Celtics jersey with #33 (for Larry Bird) that said “Brown” on the back. It was awesome! Then I thought I should wander over to the Pacers team site and see what those would look like. A white Pacers jersey with “Brown #40” on the back was first. But after you do a white one, you have to do a gold one. Then, after you’ve done a gold one and a white one, it’s only reasonable to see what one looks like in blue, right? Right? Anybody?

    I’d like to say that I didn’t make tiny personalized jerseys of every former IU player also. Again, I’d like to say that…but I can’t. Baby jerseys of Eric Gordon, Alan Henderson, D.J. White, and (the greatest of all time!) Calbert Cheaney were all on the screen before I was done. I even went ahead and tried a few different teams for Cody Zeller and Victor Oladipo (just in case). Finally, I convinced myself that I needed to stop. I figured that it was a nice way to kill 10 minutes or so, but I was done. The bad part is that 10 minutes I wasted actually lasted closer to 45.

    I’m not sure why I got so engrossed in making baby basketball jerseys. I mean, sure, they were probably some of the cutest things I’ve ever seen, but why was I obsessing over them like that? I guess it’s because it got our child’s picture in my head. I mean, I could imagine taking him to basketball games and seeing people say, “Is that baby wearing a Steve Alford jersey? That’s awesome!” (Ok, maybe some people won’t care, but I’m sure it will turn the heads of a few IU fans.)

    Anytime things like this happen and I picture our child, I get more and more excited. I see kid’s stuff in a store or online and I think about whether we’d get something like that for our kid. We have conversations all the time about things we will or won’t do with our child. Everything from what he’ll wear to what we’ll watch on TV with him. And that’s why the little jerseys will drive me crazy. The waiting is hard enough, but the more I have to picture my child (and he’s a really cute kid, at least in my head), the more I think about having to wait. It’s brutal, but we don’t have any other choice. In the meantime, we’re trying to remember that we need to be patient and this will all work out not in our time, but in God’s time. It’s all in His hands, we can only hold up our end of things and let Him take care of the things we can’t.

     Patience is one of those things that’s easier said than done, but we’re working on it. By the end of this thing we’ll either lose our minds or be the most patient people you’ll ever meet. And maybe that’s God’s plan all along, to help us become more patient before we bring our child home. I suppose it is good practice. In the meantime, I think I’ll head over to nfl.com and see what kind of infant Colts jerseys we can buy. Obviously the whole patient thing hasn’t kicked in yet.

"Our willingness to wait reveals the value we place on the object we're waiting for."

 

    

Getting Our Soup On

I think I owe all of you an apology. I read through the last 2 blog posts and thought that, in retrospect, they seemed kind of negative. Sorry about that. Fortunately, we’re full of great news this week, so that should make up for it a little.

We had our soup supper on Saturday night at Westview Christian Church and everything was great. We ended up with around 100 people there and raised enough money to really help with our adoption costs. Combined with our savings and other fundraising projects we’ve done, we’re off to a really great start.

The entire evening was outstanding. We were pleased to have Warren and Brian from Calvary Christian Church (www.calvarychristian.net) with us all evening. Warren is an outstanding musician and performed several great songs for us, and Brian shared with us some very moving and inspirational words on adoption. We’re so fortunate to have great people like them who were willing to sacrifice their time to share their talents with us. We can’t thank you enough.

As great at things went, the day wasn’t without a few hiccups. There was, of course, Ashley’s insistence that only 5 or 6 people would show up and that we’d be left eating leftover soup for weeks. When the first wave of people started coming in though, we were hit with the more frightening thought of, “What if we run out of soup?” In the end though, the amount of food ended up being just fine. There were also the things we forgot at home. Fortunately, one of us was thinking ahead and made sure the car had plenty of gas to make the trip back to Salem to get what we needed. Although I didn’t plan on making 2 trips back to the house to get things we forgot, we still had plenty of gas so that wasn’t too much of a problem.

And sure, there were things that disappointed us a little. There were people who we expected to be there who didn’t show up. And as much as you know that things like that are going to happen, it never ceases to disappoint you just a little. Those small disappointments were quickly brushed away though by the overwhelming kindness of the people who came. For every person we expected to see and didn’t, there were more who we were pleasantly surprised to see. From people we haven’t seen in years to people we barely knew, they all came to support our efforts. It’s honestly so overwhelming to me that it’s hard to write about how much that means. We owe you all a debt that we can never repay. Thank you so much.

But there was one thing more than any other that disarmed any of the small disappointments or stresses that occurred in setting up this event. That was that this weekend made us feel like our child was closer to home. With every small progression in our adoption journey, whether it’s finishing some paperwork or adding to our savings, our child feels a little closer. We know he’s out there waiting for us and the work we put in this weekend was a big step toward getting him home. We know there will be many more steps and, sometimes, there will be setbacks. But celebrating the progress makes us feel like our child just got a little closer to home. Thank you all for helping our family take this step.