Well....

Today we met with the domestic adoption attorney. Like THE adoption attorney, who happens to live in our town. He is associated with our church and we've heard glowing reviews of his practice, so after waiting a while we finally had an appointment with him today.
Let's just say, he was a really nice man. The absolute expert in his field. I felt he was a man of integrity and knows everything there is to know about the legal aspects of what we are about to embark on. But....
We grossly underestimated what this was going to cost.
It's that old familiar feeling of coming up short. Now, Mr. Attorney, being the genuinely nice man he is gave us some options. So, we are going to have to explore those options.
I wish we could just write a check and have this guy cross every "t" and dot every "i" without any worry, but maybe this isn't the path we were meant to go down, with him at least. Either that or maybe someone who was planning on giving us some funds for Russia missed their chance and wants to pull out their checkbook and sign away....right.....
I feel as if we have completely exhausted our "adoption fairies" and we need to come up with a plan b.
I am so overwhelmed and didn't realize just how exhausted we are from the constant scrimping, saving and fundraising from Charlie's adoption. I guess I was a little foolish to think this was going to be simple.
And maybe it still can be. Please pray that once again, God would make a way for us. Pray that some of these other options pan out and we are worrying over nothing.
Now, my second wish. I wish for a personal assistant that would just take care of all this for me. Because I.AM.SO.TIRED.OF.THE.ADOPTION.PROCESS.
I am fairly certain that God didn't intend this to be so hard. 

Disturbing Ebay finds

Ok, I'm bored and purusing Ebay (never a good combo) and I found these three disturbing auctions when putting in the key word "baby". The good news is you have plenty of time to bid and very little competition.

"Male Baby Carrot" bidding starts at 99 cents

"Keep your baby floating in the tub with this baby head raft" (Also sold in Pink)

And the winner....Some (ahem..."person") in Wichita Falls, Texas is letting you name their baby girl. The middle name set as Merci and the last name is Tabor. Bidding is at 99 cents. I triple dog dare someone to bid and name her "Lordhave". 

I know I'm bias....

But is this not the cutest kid you've ever seen? We had a great time at the youth's fall retreat! It's like Charlie was born to be a youth pastor's kid- he LOVES all the attention, the busyness, the silliness, the absolute chaos that seems to follow teenagers wherever they go!
We also rode this crazy bumpy hatchback Hummer up the mountain, unfortunately I don't have any pictures of that because I was literally, holding onto him for dear life. But, oh my gosh, he had his arms in the air "like the big kids" and giggled and screamed the entire time.
We also rode the paddle boat, and for the same reasons, there aren't any pictures. :)
But we had the best time!

Hellloooo Baby Jack!

Today we met Jack via ultrasound technology. It was quite an amazing experience. I am used to seeing the little "blob in jello" ultrasound, not the "oh my gosh you can see his hair" ultrasound. The technician was banging on his "tank" trying to get him to turn around and smile for the camera and he opened his mouth and howled at her, like "Heeeeyyyy!!!! I'm sleepin' here!!!". I thought, oh boy, he is going to give Charlie a run for his money....
When his heartbeat filled the room, it brought tears to my eyes. I never thought I would experience this feeling in my lifetime. I feel blessed. I feel stressed, as in....uhhh that looks like a baby and I need to get 10 million more things ready!!! I just keep buying things to fill up the room when I should be doing things like assembling the crib in our garage and cleaning all the odds and ends out of the closet.
But, he is HEALTHY and we are so thrilled. He is right on track, and for that we thank God.
Please continue to wrap baby Jack in your prayers. This is uncharted territory for us and for his birth mom. It's amazing how different this is than an International adoption. Different joys, different worries.
So, until then, I have A LOT of work to do, cause now I've seen with my own eyes, there's a baby in there!!!

Paperwork is evil. It must be stopped.

Yesterday we called in a few favors, AGAIN. SLED checks from my old law firm, background checks from Kevin the Sheriff hero. Today, we sat in our doctor's waiting room and ask him if he would PLEASE sign the adoption form he had signed 15 times in the last year.
No kidding, I had an out of body experience tonight digging through the ol' adoption box in order to scan in income tax returns. I thought- what the heck am I doing? I honestly thought those things would stay in that box until well, the end of time.
Then, after the SLED checks and medical reports were scanned in, same thing. I had to shake my head to make sure I was still on this planet.
With the paperwork involved in Charlie's adoption, doing and re-doing and re-wording and re-scanning paperwork gives you a physical feeling under your skin and in the pit of your stomach. It's like a never ending battle. Just when you finished, they had all expired and you started over again. Unless you've been trapped in this vicious cycle, it's hard to explain the power these pieces of paper have over you. I always felt guilty if ANYTHING expired. Expired documents=the more time your baby sits in an orphanage. So, it's safe to say paperwork and I aren't really on speaking terms.
I had to keep telling myself....this document will not expire. These, if done correctly, will be done once and we'll be lucky if the ink is dry on November 18th. Our problem is reversed. But that doesn't mean that I hate paperwork any less.
BUT....THE REWARD COULDN'T BE GREATER! So, I'll make nice and tell the paperwork it's my friend. (but I'll still talk about it behind it's back) 

Home Study Part Duex

Today we had a home study. Again. Yeahhhh.....I thought you might enjoying laughing at me by reading my post from over two years ago when I was bright eyed and bushy tailed starting out on the whole adoption endeavor. I even made a little poem about it! Read "Twas the Night Before Our Home Study" HERE. 

Now, for your reading pleasure I have composed a "this is our fourth home study for pete's sake" haiku. (I am even too lazy for a poem)

"Shove it in the closet

Quickly, quickly, she'll be here at 6

When will this be over?"

First Home Study

Fourth Home Study

EARTHQUAKE!

On Tuesday, August 23rd Charlie and I were enjoying a leisurely vacation nap at the beach when I was roused from my sleep by a strange shaking sensation. At first I though Charlie was kicking the bed. I looked over at him and he was sound asleep.
I closed my eyes again. The shaking got worse. I looked over at him. His eyes opened too with a look on his face, like "Why is Mama shaking the bed?" Then I thought, maybe it's the washing machine I turned on before naptime. Nope. IT WAS AN EARTHQUAKE! Not something I had ever experienced! Now this wasn't a huge one mind you, but enough to wake me from my slumber and get my attention. The funny thing was, that earthquake wasn't the last time that my world was rocked that day. God sent two earthquakes our way that day.
Later that night, a message came through from a person I hadn't spoken to over a year. A person that I always thought fondly of, a good person, a sweet person. A person pregnant with a baby that she couldn't keep. And then those words you can never imagine hearing-would you and Chad consider adopting the baby?
In case you missed our August 31st post (SOS) the next three weeks were a roller coaster of thoughts, emotions, and prayer. I had a hard time blogging because this baby consumed every waking thought in my tiny little mind. We questioned God's timing. We questioned our sanity.
After fighting for Charlie for over two years, this baby just drops into our laps. At that point, in less 12 weeks this little boy will make his grand debut. With Charlie we filled out paperwork, paperwork, paperwork and then when it expired filled it out again. Fingerprinting, fundraising, homestudies, doctor exams, chest x-rays, blood work, certificates of home ownership, tax returns, the list goes on and on. And now this. A simple question, a not so simple answer. It still seems too good to be true. It's like God knew that another adoption nightmare might just send me over the edge. He gently nudged us and said "take this baby, I'll make this one easy on you...."
So here we go. In 64 DAYS, Baby Jack will make his grand debut and take up residence in our arms. It's funny, he's already found a place in our hearts. Less fighting to get him home has not made me love him any less. It's funny how fiercely we can love someone whom we have never met, never dreamed of and didn't even know existed till the day the earth shook twice.
It's funny how little baby clothes are. It's funny how many brands of bottles are in the store (it's even funnier to see the look on my husbands face while trying to decide which bottles to register for....) It's funny the way Charlie wakes up every morning and says "Baby yet?"  It's funny how God blesses our socks off when we are least expecting it. It's funny how we "plan" our lives and obviously God finds humor in that too. It's when we cross our last "t" and dot our last "i" that He shakes the earth under our feet to get our attention.
So ready or not, we will double our family size in less a year. We are buying tiny things and cleaning out closets.
Thank you so much for your Charlie prayers, now we need Jack prayers. Pray that he is healthy. Pray for his birth mom, I can't imagine what she will go through in the next two months. Pray that she will remain strong and brave. Pray that our path through this adoption will be smooth- I am scared to death considering our less than illustrious track record when it comes to smooth adoptions....Pray for my sweet husband and for big brother Charlie too. We just need some intense, solidified prays in the next two months. You had two years to pray for us last time, so this should be short and sweet, but much appreciated!

And the answer is....

Meet my son, Baby Huey.

In January, Charlie was in the 5th percentile for his height. Now.....drum roll please......
HE'S IN THE 75TH!
Holy moly!
Now, his weight has never been an issue, he's held steady in the 90th percentile his entire little life, but we are so thrilled about his height!
Over 5 inches in seven months ain't too shabby.
Welcome to America, land of healthy food, plenty of yard space, and sunshine! Turns out kids really do grow exactly like weeds.

What brought this discovery to light (other than my arm feels like it's breaking off when I carry him for longer that 2 minutes) was getting ready last night to go to a friend's house.

It was a little cool outside, so I decided to put him in jeans. Jeans that swallowed him up last winter, size 3T. Well, now said jeans are jean capri's. I mean, you could see the top of his socks. Then I tried on a pair of his size 9 slide on shoes. Nope. His toes were crammed into the ends of them. Next, the fruit loop shirt, size 4T. BELLY SHIRT. He looked like he was going to an 80's rock concert (minus the Bon Jovi hair).

So today, we got out the scale and the measuring tape. Yup. He is officially Baby Huey. 

Techy

Trying this from my new phone! Pretending to be all techy...at this rate I could type a paragraph in 25 minutes. Still haven't reached a decision...Thanks for all your advice, but can't you just tell me yes or no?