Forgety Family: Update

I received a birthday card from one of my aunt’s back in March, who is so sweet and always sends me a card, with a comment that she misses the updates on the blog.  And I thought to myself, “Has it really been that long since I updated? I just posted last week.”

Well, it’s been more like 4 months. Whatev.

So…here is quick recap of our adoption progress over the last 4 months:

·         January 9^th:  Received our updated number of 76

·         February 16^th: Received our new number of 74

·         April 9^th: Received our new number of 67

Nothing terribly exciting but still progress none-the-less towards bringing our kiddo(s) home.  We are about to have to start the process of updating all our paperwork/fingerprints/etc.  and that thought alone makes me have a mini panic attack.  

Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

Until then we are hanging out with our two small tator tots that:

• are learning to use the big potty,
• like to give hugs straight out of the bath tub while they are still soaking wet, 
• call us "Ty-lee" and "A-don", 
• like to pray about their poop, 
• change clothes at an alarming rate, 
• throw wild-eye hissy fits because we cannot magically produce juice at any given moment in time, and on command
• and love us despite all the flaws Adam and I have.

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Forgety Family: Our First Number

By: Khylee Forgety

WE FINALLY GOT OUR NUMBER!

(Back in September, but life has been crazy with the two extras at our house,

so thanks for the grace and prayer)

This is a big step forward for our adoption process and we couldn’t be more happy to finally be at this point.  But what does it mean?

In Honduras, the process for getting a referral is a little bit different than other countries.  Everyone that is adopting from the country gets put on ONE BIG list.  We are #81 on that list to get a referral for a child.  As families lower on the list are assigned a referral than our number will drop.  It could drop one, two, or five numbers or not drop at all. 

So now we wait.  Wait for that number to get lower and lower. 

Thankfully, we have TWO little rugrats at the house keeping us busy by teaching us how to kiss boo-boos, play dress-up and horsey, fix kid friendly meals, and how to be a parent.

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A New Journey

By: Khylee

Being a mother. No one can prepare you for it.  You can read all the books required by your adoption agency, but when those little eyes are staring back at you in defiance and you hear “I don’t want to” all that knowledge flies out the window.

For those of you who don’t know, Adam and I have become foster parents to two precious kiddos.

To be honest we weren’t looking for this.  When we started the adoption process the words came out of my mouth that we would NEVER do foster care.  But, the Lord has changed both Adam and I’s heart so much over the last year that when we found out these babies needed a home, where they could be safe and loved on, without hesitation we said “yes.”

I don’t mean that in anyway to say “look at us and what we are doing.”  Far from it.  I don’t feel qualified.  We didn’t feel “ready” to be parents.  We.are.stressed.beyond.belief.  But like Scott, a friend of Adam’s said, God equips the called.  And we know we are called, and he is being faithful to give us what we need EACH day.

In the last two weeks I have learned that:

·         Shaving your legs is not a necessity.

·         How do women with children always look so pulled together and cute.  I am lucky if my outfit matches and that I haven’t already worn it that week.

·         Don’t wear a v-neck shirt/dress (or any low neck-line) while toting around a 19 month old…you will be exposed.

·         If you wear a t-shirt and underwear in the morning while getting kids ready, the painter will see you.

·         Hallelujah if dinner gets on the table.

·         Sleep…oh sweet, sweet sleep.  I need you in order to function.

·         Discipline looks completely different for an almost 3 year old and a 19 month old. 

·         Discipline=love. 

·         I need more patience.  And I need to learn how to ask for help.

·         There is nothing better than hearing at 6:45 in the morning “Ty-lee” “Oh Ty-lee”

·         Kids who have experienced hurt or loss  and are toddler age, won’t always know how to tell you what they are feeling so they will act it out, throw tantrums, refuse to eat dinner, push you away when you are trying to love on them.  We are learning how to love them through it…and it isn’t always easy.

·         It’s ok to cry. 

·         Routine. Routine. Routine.

·         Cuddling and rocking our little man are gifts from God.

·         Visit days are hard days. The kids just don’t completely understand what is going on and so they act it out in their behavior.

Through this process I have also learned ways that people have helped that have blessed us so much (and that made me cry in gratitude).  So if you know of a family that is fostering, or has just adopted, here are some sure fire ways that you can help out:

·         TAKE THEM A MEAL.  I cannot express how much this can help a family whose dynamics have completely changed overnight.  We have had a couple of families at our church do this and it is SOO nice knowing that you don’t have to worry about it.

·         HELP THEM UNLOAD THE KIDS.  At church on Sunday, a man I know well in our church saw me pull up and helped me unload the kids out of the car and take them to their class.  I am crying as I type this for how much I appreciated this small gesture.

·         TOYS/FURNITURE/CLOTHING/ETC.  If you have extra stuff laying around the house that isn’t being used,  see if the family needs any of it.  Many times the kiddos don’t come with much so there is a lot of items that the family needs to purchase.

·         BABYSIT FOR FREE.  While you may not feel called to foster a child, this is a service you can provide that would help the mom and dad to have a night to reconnect and reenergize.

¹⁴ But I trust in You, Lord;
I say, “You are my God.” 
¹⁵ The course of my life is in Your power;

                                       -Psalm 31:14-15a

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One Step Closer

By: Khylee

 

Photo By: Courtney Folsom Photography

Well we received some awesome, stupendous, triple fist pump kinda news here in Forgety household.  Our dossier was translated and officially submitted to the INHFA committee for approval on June 8^th, 2012! 

Praise the Lord! Halleljuah!

Translation- all we are waiting on now is for this committee to approve our dossier and then we will be assigned our waitlist number!

It could be this month, it could be next month, it could be the September.  But once we are on that blessed waitlist we will finally start the “official” wait for our children.  (Yes, that’s right, we haven’t even started our 2-4 year estimated wait-time that our agency gave.)

So, please be praying this month that our documents won’t be expired,  that the committee will meet, and that we get approved and assigned a number!

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In Honduras

By: Khylee

Our dossier is in officially in HONDURAS!!!!!! Excited is an understatement for all the emotions Adam and I are feeling!

I received word from our agency this afternoon that our little stack of love has made it from the United States all the way to the Tegucigalpa, Honduras.   

So lets recap:

• May 21, 2011: Came back from vacation and decided to adopt...who does that?
• June 2011: Sent off Application #1 to Dillon
• July 2011: Sent off Application #2 to Dillon
• August 2011: Approved for Home Study
• October 2011: Finished both home study visits
• December 16, 2011: Approved by Dillon to begin Dossier
• February 02, 2012: Approval for fingerprints at the USCIS office
• February 24, 2012: Fingerprinting at the USCIS Office
• March 28, 2012: Received 171-H, our last document for our dossier
• April 12, 2012: Sent dossier to Buckner
• April 23, 2012: Dossier officially in Honduras

 So from here our dossier is in the process of translation, approval from INHFA in Honduras, and then we will be on the waitlist for our kiddos.

We still have a while before our children come home, but today we are rejoicing that we are one step closer to them! (triple fist pump....)  

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the Dossier

By: Khylee

This 6 lb beauty left our house Thursday of last week, that's right, I birthed a 6 lb paper stack!  Many of you may be wondering, what is that thing?  Well it is the beloved Dossier, the final set of paperwork that will actually be submitted to Honduras, and it has been my life for the last 5 months.  With this small stack of paperwork, we will FINALLY be on the list to begin waiting for our children. 

When we started this process in June of 2011, my goal was to have this thing submitted by January 2012.  We came up a little short of that goal, but four months later, and few thousand dollars poorer we are done, finished, finito.  Through this entire process I have learned a few things about my need to always be in control.  Courtney sent me this quote the other day:

"When our [plans] are interrupted, His are not. His plans are proceeding exactly as scheduled, moving us always (including those minutes or hours or years which seem most useless or wasted or unendurable) "toward the goal of true maturity" (Rom 12:2 JBP)." - Elisabeth Elliot

 There have been countless days that have felt wasted and useless throughout the last 10 months. But God is the author of this adoption story, not Khylee and Adam.  As much as I want it to go quicker, to be done, to know who our kids are, I also know that there is a purpose, a reason for every wait that we have encountered and every piece of paperwork that has had to be redone. We will be on the perfect spot on the wait list, so that we will get OUR kids, the ones that the Lord has chosen to become a part of our family. 

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Thanks, thanks, many thanks!

By: Khylee

 Courtney, Matt, Adam and I would like to thank EVERYONE of you who ordered a t-shirt, bought a bracelet, ordered a calendar, or have donated just because you felt led, and prayed with us and for us.  Thank you honestly cannot begin to describe how much we appreciate your help in helping us bring our children home. We still have a few extra t-shirts in both designs if anyone you know has commented on what a rocking t-shirt you are wearing (click here to see designs).  

And because I couldn't resist, here is Adam and I with the two precious girls from His Little Feet that stayed with us for 4 days in February.    

ARE THEY BOTH NOT ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL!!!!

Tsion & Gracia- We love you both and miss your smiles, your laughs, your singing, the large amount of fruit that you eat, recording with Uncle Adam, fixing Auntie Khylee's hair, saving Tsion from the dogs and playing Just Dance! Big, big, big hugs!!!!!!

Give Auntie Brooke a big hug from us too!!!

 

 

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I'm Human....

By: Khylee

To say that I have been frustrated during the last month would be an understatement.  For the first time since we have started this process I have felt hopelessness …. We are no where closer to finishing our dossier than when I updated everyone last month.  We have almost 90% of our documents in our folder waiting to be apostiled (another level of notary done by the State Attorney General), but several BIG things are still in the process.

Let me just paint a picture for you about how this month has went:

I have read many a blog where women have divulged that they forgot an important piece of paperwork, or didn’t read something right in a set of agency instructions and had to redo an item…and my Type A self would say “I will never do that, I have got things under control.”

Oh how very wrong I was.

First, I discover that we were supposed to have our psychological evaluation completed during the home study process, BACK IN OCTOBER.  I had no idea, none, zero. I’m floating around in Lala land think we are just trucking right along making great progress. “The psychological evaluation will only take one appointment and it will be a quick process,” I said to myself. Oh how very, very wrong I was. Our agency was good to let us go ahead and continue on (I hope that means that they don’t think we are crazy) and one month later we are just now finishing it up…..

The second scenario went down something like this. Standing on the front porch I see a big white envelope hanging out of the mail and joyfully open it expecting to see a date for us to go to get our fingerprints completed and instead I am greeted with a sweet love note from the Federal Government stating our fingerprint application is not complete.  We forgot a signature. That’s right. A. SIGNATURE. How many times did I check those documents before they were mailed, oh you know, a thousand, but whatever.  I was sick to my stomach and mad at myself for wasting more precious time when our children could potentially be out there, waiting.  There goes another 2 weeks on something so small, yet so significant.

But, through it all, the Lord continues to remind and comfort me:

"The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still." Exodus 14:14

"But these things I plan won't happen right away. Slowly, steadily, surely the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled. If it seems slow, wait patiently.  For it will surely take place. It will NOT be delayed."

"...I will not forget you. See I have engraved you on the palms of my hand." Isaiah 49:15b-16a  

His timing is always  perfect, and I am learning to completely trust in this truth.

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The Beauty in the Wait

By: Khylee Forgety
 

 The question I get asked the most often right now is "So, where are you now?"  And my answer is almost always "Still waiting." 

We are waiting on our approved home study to be mailed to us, waiting for certified copies of birth certificates to come in the mail, waiting to make appointments for psychological evaluations and blood work until other paperwork comes in so we don't have too much of a time lapse and thus make other documents void. 

In the middle of November our social worker from our agency sent us the long list of items we needed to start compiling for our dossier.  Some were simple things I had expected like letters of employment, copies of important life documents like birth certificates and marriage license, copies of our passports.  Others were not so expected like having to get a psychological evaluation and get all of the documents apostiled (I will save the definition of that for another post).  At first, I will be honest the list was overwhelming.  Overwhelming to the point that for about a week my type-A self was completely paralyzed.  I didn't know which document to start collecting first and so I couldn't seem to motivate myself to do anything. 

After a week of immobilization, some encouragement from fellow adoptive mothers and word from our agency that we could officially begin the dossier process we dove in headfirst.  Needless to say for the last month and half Adam and I been consumed in completing mounds of paperwork so that we can finally be on our agency's waitlist. Happy dance, happy dance, happy dance!!!

Last week while reading for advent I came across this sentence and scripture:

"Sometimes God has his people wait long so our gratitude becomes deeper and wider." Anne Voskamp

"But these things I plan won't happen right away.  Slowly, steadily, surely the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled.  If it seems slow wait patiently.  For it will surely take place. It will not be delayed." Habakkuk 2:3

For a waiting momma's heart these words are giving me encouragement that I didn't even know I needed. I am clinging right now to each word, to each promise that this verse holds during this long season Adam and I are in of waiting for our children to come home! 

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What We Want You to Know: Christmas

By: Courtney and Khylee

As Christmas time approaches our minds are full of grocery lists, last minute gifts, and travel plans. Ten trips to Wal-Mart THIS week (We wish we were kidding!). We both feel like we have been going non-stop trying to wrap up all the odds and ends and prepare for family Christmases. While editing photos today I (Courtney) listened to some sermons online and WOW did the Lord speak to me. WHAT are we bustling around with all this busy body work for? We fill our lives full of meaningless activities, stuff and outside pressures to the point of busting at the seams. Yet, somehow instead of expectantly waiting and anticipating the birth of our Savior, we end up missing Him altogether.

“Whenever Christmas begins to burden, it’s a sign that I’ve taken on something of the
world and not of Christ.”- Anne Voskamp

Like most families that are thinking about how they want to raise their children, the subject of Christmas is something that we have REALLY begun to talk about this holiday season.  Both of our families want to start meaningful traditions that point only to Christ, not our own selfish desires. We want to teach our children the story of Christ during this season, the story of how God began the process of adopting us as HIS children, the story of the fall of humanity, our need for a Savior, and his merciful redemption.

“Maybe that’s always the only choice we have to make every Christmas: feed our own fickle wishes or feed the real hunger of Christ?”- Anne Voskamp

We want to teach our children during this season how to be the hands and feet of Christ, how to love “the least of these” as we are commanded in Matthew 25.  For us, it only makes sense to celebrate this time asking Jesus what we can give him for his birthday.  So, we are starting new traditions this year with both of our families that don’t involve a man in a red suit but rather point us into marveling and worshipping our Savior.

“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:14

I (Courtney) heard a sermon that said - "You may know the Christmas story and not know the Savior.”  In this busy season what is on your heart? Buying another gift? Stress? Disappointment? Unfulfillment with all the stuff, but not knowing why? Or truly celebrating the birth of the Savior of the world.  If you do not know Jesus Christ and do not have a personal relationship with Him, you can. Embrace the unexplainable hope that only comes from Him.  That is the reason he came from heaven, was for you and me.

So we encourage you to see Christmas with new eyes. Go to your local youth shelter and donate your time or money. Give to a family that might not be getting any presents this year. Pay someone's gas bill. Pay for the person behind you in line for the drive-thru. Take a cause on as a family. There are a MILLION ways you can make a difference in someone’s life and in return you will find more fulfillment than any present can give you because “When we give to Christ in the hungry, He satisfies our own hunger pangs” Anne Voskamp!

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Don't miss it

By: Khylee 

 

January of this year was a big month in my life. I didn’t realize it at the time, but looking back I see it was a time of learning, growth, and challenge.

To say that I am obsessed with reading other people’s blogs would be an understatement- fashion , home improvement and, food blogs…I had to get google reader just to keep up with them all.  In January, I stumbled upon ADOPTION blogs and I was like kid in a candy store.  I saw families that looked like the family I had always envisioned (one with multiple different skin tones, hair textures, and eye shapes) with parents that looked completely different. Rusty, the pastor at my church, brought up James 1:27 one Sunday that month and for the FIRST time I saw in the bible “Religion that God our father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans.”  I had grown up in church my entire life and missed this verse!  How could have I missed this verse?  There it was, not only was my heart crying, ADOPT, but now I was reading God’s word and it was saying just that.

Later that same day I found a new adoption blog (Waiting on a Word) and the scripture at the top was Isaiah 1:17 “…take up the cause of the fatherless”.   There it was again, in the scripture, the call to take care of the orphan.  I excitedly showed Adam these verses…and he looked at me like I was crazy woman.  “Did you know these were in there”… I said. ” “Well, yeah, didn’t you?”  “No, I had no idea the word specifically said that we are to take care of the orphan.”  HOW COULD I HAVE MISSED IT?

That is one my fears that the adoption process has made me stop and begin to recognize in my life…that I will somehow miss it.  That I will get so wrapped up in myself, my desires, my middle-class privileged life style, my possessions, my religion, my traditions, on being comfortable---that I will miss out on hurting people, that I will miss out on something better than “stuff”, that I will miss out on watching God perform miracles, that I will miss out on getting to be a part of something bigger, that I will miss the life-changing power of the gospel.

But isn’t that what the enemy wants? In John 10:10 it says he has come “only to steal, kill and destroy.”  And so he goes about making sure that children in our state, our country, around the world don’t have a family that can bring about love, healing, safety and protection, that children are trafficked and forced to become labor or sex slaves, that some children in foster care are prescribed 10+ medications because “they are acting out” [goodness, if anyone of us had been ripped out of our home and everything we knew we might just have a few behavior problems ourselves. 20/20 aired a special on this very issue: click here for the video], and the list goes on, and on.   He goes about causing Christian people who have the ability to care for the orphan to stay so wrapped up in their life, to become apathetic to the meaning of the word orphan, to become comfortable with the status quo, to make excuse after excuse and believe lie after lie that.we.miss.it. 

So this Christmas season, lets remember the birth of Jesus- our savior who makes us right again before God, who made it so that WE can be adopted into the family of God, who came so that we can have life---LET US NOT MISS IT.   

(For a challenging and inspiring read on how to make Christmas more meaningful and Christ-Focused read this blog post from Jen Hatmaker entitled “The Christmas Conundrum”)

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Last Call for T-Shirts

By: Courtney and Khylee

We are taking last minute orders for our adoption t-shirts! 

Our goal is to sale 50 shirts per family and we are only half way there! 

We need your help to sale 25 per family by THIS Friday! Facebook us, or send us an e-mail at ourwelcomehomejourney@gmail.com to place your order!

 

T-SHIRTS SOLD: 57/STILL NEEDED: 25

T-SHIRTS SOLD: 54/STILL NEEDED: 25

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"Our Journey"- Part 3: Where are we now?

By: Khylee Forgety

The adoption process has a lot of different steps that Adam and I had no idea existed before we started.  There is a ton of paperwork to complete, copies to make, doctors visits to go to, parenting education to attend, and a lot of new vocabulary to learn. Some of you may be familiar with the process, but for those of who you aren't this post is for you.  Here is a time line of how it all works: 

1. Application: involves a lot of the paperwork.  You fill out an application all about you and your spouse, you get copies of birth certificates, marriage license, social security cards, you ask people to complete a reference for you, etc. This also ensures that you meet the criteria for the country program you are applying to (i.e. you have been married the required number of years, so many divorces, if you are single)
2. Home-study: If your application is approved by the agency then the agency completes the home study which consists of two visits with a social worker.  The two visits are to assess the home and to get to know the couple or family. In the "home assessment" the social worker looks for things like smoke detectors and a fire extinguisher, not if you have any dust on your dining room table.  He or she also talks to you about things you put in your autobiography (something that is a part of the application).  The social worker who completes the home study has a vital role in the process as they approve the home for a certain number of children, age range, etc. (usually the decision is based upon what the couple has  expressed to the worker). 
3. Dossier: is a collection of certified or notarized copies of documents such as birth certificates, marriage licenses, etc., the home study, pictures of your house- that are submitted to the country where you are desiring to adopt. Every country has a different process of what documentation they require.
4. Wait list: once the dossier is submitted to the country, the family gets put onto their agencies wait list. The agency gives you a time-line for how long they anticipate you to wait for a referral: 8 months, 24 months, 4 years... This is probably one of the hardest parts of the journey because there is a lot of unknown: when will you get the phone call, how long will you have to wait? what if it is longer than what they said?, what if is shorter?, will I be able to take off work at a moments notice?, how much will flights cost? and the list could go on...
5. Referral: This is the blissful moment when someone from the agency calls you to tell you there is a child or children that matches what you specified you were willing to accept.  Often times families get to see a picture of the child, medical information, the child's history (if known).  The family can choose to accept or decline the referral based upon this information.  
6. Trip 1: If the family accepts the referral than plans are made to the take the first trip to the country (not all countries require two trips, but both Ghana and Honduras do).  On this trip the family gets to meet the child, visit where the child lives, and begin the legal process of adopting him or her. Often this trip takes between 7-10 days.
7. Trip 2:  Then the family comes home.  Again, this is probably one of the hardest things to do is to leave your child for 3-5 months while the paperwork gets done.  The family then returns for the second trip.  For the Folsoms' their second trip will be another 7-10 days, for the Forgetys' the trip will last anywhere from 3-6 weeks.  On the first trip the parents only make trips to the orphanage to visit the kiddo, on this trip that precious little girl or boy gets to stay with you at your hotel and the actual parenting process begins.  During this time the child legally becomes a part of your family so that when they step onto U.S. soil they are U.S. citizens.
8. U.S. Court: Even though the adoption is legal, our agency recommends that you finalize the adoption here in the United States.  

I caution you though to remember that while I laid the process out pretty black and white, how it can play out in reality can look different for every family.  Bureaucracy can slow paperwork down, a judge can discover one error in the paperwork and require it to be resubmitted, or the court can close for a season or decide to stop all adoptions from a particular region in a country.   

So there you have it friends!  I hope that you all found this educational. Adam and I are currently are waiting for our adoption agency to approve our home study and we hope to have our dossier completed by January. 

For the rest of the Forgetys' story, click on the links below:
Part one: Why are we adopting?
Part two: Getting started 

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"Our Journey" Part 2: Getting Started

By Khylee

International or a domestic adoption?

How old of a child?

Boy or girl?

One child, or a sibling group?

If international, what country?

What agency is reputable?

How do we know when to start?

These are just a few of the questions that we have wrestled with.   And…I know these are just a few of the ones that many of you want us to answer. 

Honduras, 2004

In January of this year, I began to feel a pull towards the Central America country Honduras. It was one of the countries listed on several of the agencies I had been researching and the Lord would bring Honduras up when I was watching the news, reading an article, talking with friends, watching gangland-that’s right Adam is a big fan of the show, I watch from behind the covers. It was also a country that holds precious memories for me. In 2004, during my freshmen year in college I had the opportunity to travel there for a mission trip to work with boys at an orphanage/school.  It was only 6 days but it was a life-changing six days as those boys showed me love and held me when I cried and I didn't want to come home.

…but then my heart would say things like “the wait is too long, 2-4 years is ridiculous to wait for a child”, “you aren’t guaranteed a baby and a toddler will come with too many issues.”  So, I began to research a little more on Ethiopia and domestic private adoptions because the wait isn’t as long, and you can get a referral for a child that is under a year old, problem solved, right? 

Wrong.

What a selfish, selfish human being I am.  I am embarrassed to even admit I thought that, but that was the state of my heart.   I was only attracted to Ethiopia and private adoption, so MY needs would be met, so that I could become a mother on my terms.   

In May of 2011, Adam and I took a vacation to Mexico.  Every night we would go down to a street called 5^th avenue that was filled with all sorts of touristy things to buy, places to eat, and live music. Among all the “stuff” though, we saw young children without shoes picking up cans, digging through the trash to find things they could make money off of, and selling bracelets.  One night, Adam looked at me and said “Khylee-I think we need to adopt from Honduras, I don’t care how long the wait is.” 

And I knew in that moment- I knew that Adam was right, I knew that the Lord had our children in that country, I knew I needed to wait, to wait as long as it took, and to open my heart to a wider age range.    The Lord had already intimately connected my heart to this country and he spoke through Adam to help wake me up to the boundaries and rules I was setting up for how this adoption-thing was supposed to go. 


It wasn’t a coincidence that I had learned to speak Spanish in college or that I already traveled to Honduras once in college on a mission trip and fell in love with a group of orphaned boys.  The Lord had purposefully placed in my heart a love for this community of people.

Mi mono "my monkey" was my nick name for this little guy.  

So we both came home from our vacation, with a firm grasp that it was time- Time to begin this new, exciting, scary, unpredictable journey… 


(For Part One of our story: "Why we are adopting" click here)

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"Our Journey" Part 1: Why do you want to adopt?

By Khylee

High school, for me, is a time in life I am glad is over. I had absolutely NO sense of personal style (I shopped at GAP kids) and my hair was a short frizz ball. Don’t judge, my friends-the CHI had not yet been purchased. 

I do know one thing though that was very certain during this time: I wanted to adopt.

 Call me crazy, but I used to tell my friends I wanted a child from somewhere in Asia, India, Africa and Latin America.   And this desire to have a family full of diversity has not changed.

Fast forward to January of 2011, 2 ½ years after Adam and I had been married.  I had been looking at tons of different adoption agencies. We had already had several LONG discussions on adopting our children versus having them biologically. On January 12^th, with adoption heavy on my heart, I prayed that God would make it as crystal clear to Adam as it was to me and that it would he would become 100% on board. 

Over the course of the next 4 months the Lord was faithful to answer that prayer.  It wasn’t that Adam was opposed, he did WANT to adopt.  It was just that He needed the Lord to give him some confirmation to move in this direction.  And the Lord did just that: through the stories of two men, lots of prayer, and a gut wrenching reality check Adam was ready. 

So, for those of you who are wondering, adoption is not our back-up plan, not our plan B. As far as we know we have no issues of infertility that would prevent us from having biological children. 

What we do know is this: 

• The Lord has made it clear that we are to adopt our children
• We are to fight for, protect, love, and be parents for at least a few of the MILLIONS of children out there that are without a mother and father
• That the road ahead is full of uncertainty, long waits, first-hand experiences with injustice, heart-ache and yet will bring unspeakable joy  

"Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless..." Isaiah 1:17

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Two Families, One Call

Welcome to all our family and friends!  We couldn’t be more excited to be sharing our journey of adoption with each and every one of you.  This blog will feature not one but two couples- Matt & Courtney and Adam & Khylee- two separate families who have felt one call to ADOPT. We want to share with you our stories of how we each got here, the journeys we take to bringing our children home (each and every one of them), and the challenges we will encounter as adoptive parents.  

Why the name? After much discussion among us all, we decided the name Our Welcome Home Journey best encompassed our vision, our calling.  In Matthew 18:5 it says “And whoever welcomes a little child like this in my name welcomes me.”  Adoption is just that-saying welcome to our family-we don’t care where you came from, the color of your skin, or that you come with a whole lot of baggage (which don’t we all?).  We love you, we’ve been praying for you, and we WANT you forever in our family!   We cannot wait to hold our arms open to our babies and say welcome home.

More importantly, however, adoption is a picture of redemption. God has adopted EVERY one of us who accepted Him into HIS family (Ephesians 1:5). “Welcome home my child,” he says to us when we take those initial first steps to believe Him, when we return after being away for months, when we think we done something so awful that He won’t forgive us, or when we replace his love in our life with other things.      

Over the course of the next several weeks we will share our stories. In our personal journeys we have been faced with issues that are HARD and that have caused us to look at our lives, our faith, and to examine if what we say we believe is what we really live.  Expect to be challenged, expect to feel uncomfortable as we honestly share our hearts of how God brought us to this place.  Welcome to "Our Welcome Home Journey."

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