Sitting Pretty in the Midst of Adoption

It's been a while since I've updated about the adoption, so I figured now is as good of time as any! I wish I had tons and tons of secret info that I'd been hiding away for a big announcement but, well , really I haven't been updating because there's not much to say. I feel pretty frustrated when I think about it and overwhelmed if I dwell on it, so I choose the really mature option and watch Gilmore Girls reruns rather than think about adoption.

I feel like we missed out on a pretty good window back in October and November. During those two months we were seeing A LOT of cases, like between two and five a week. But we weren't ready to put our names forward yet because we were still finalizing our home study. One of the most frustrating parts is that we did complete our home study in October, but we didn't get the paperwork we needed for three and half weeks. It really seems like we got our paperwork, applied for the one situation, and then everything ground to a complete halt. We've been seeing about one to two (or less) cases a week since then, and for all intents and purposes, it's basically none because those we have seen have been so expensive... $38,000 for a stork drop last week, $55,000 for twins due later in January. In total, we've seen about five cases in the last four months that have been within out budget. I typically skim the cost analysis, see the total number and then delete the email... what in the world am I supposed to do with numbers like that?

We were told that the end of the year, with all of the holidays, is typically very slow in the adoption world. And man, that was the truth. It's now two weeks after the first of the year and we have seen a few cases come though, so maybe things will begin to speed up a bit now. It still feels like a slow time in general. It appears we missed a good time in the fall and now we'll have to wait it out. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't frustrated. Just about everyone we spoke with that used our adoption consultant was matched within five months of working with her... many brought their babies home within that time. We have also chosen to pay a little bit of extra money in order to become clients of two attorneys, one in Florida and one in Oklahoma. They were both referred to us from our adoption consultant, but we've yet to see any cases from either of them... it's just silent out there.

However, despite the lack of movement in getting matched, we're doing pretty well in other areas. Fundraising is going pretty well, for which I'm out of my mind with thankfulness. Towards the end of the year, we got a few really unexpected donations from supporters. You guys, people I haven't seen or spoken to since high school have donated. Cue sobs and uncontrollable ugly cries. We also had a really fantastic fundraiser back in November where one of Sam's patients offered to make wreaths for the front door and sell them. She donated all of her time, which was about the sweetest thing ever. And get this, we ended up getting $3,400 from that fundraiser. Be still my heart. Who would have thought?

So far, we've raised $15,927 and sold 630 puzzle pieces. That's 370 left to go. Eeeek! Speaking of the puzzle, it's done. We actually finished putting it together several weeks ago; I've just been dragging on getting the names on the back. It's a pretty tedious process, but I think it's going to look pretty cool when it's all done (I hope).

The back of the puzzle with a very measly number of names filled in.

If you add in the money that Sam and I have put in, we're at a total of $19,421. Our original goal was for this adoption to cost about $30,000. Truth be told, I'm currently hoping to stay under $35,000 as I'm seeing our expenses continue to add up, but we're not actually any closer to bringing a baby home. We were pretty close to running out of time with You Caring (it was set to expire on January 15th), but I contacted them and got an extension, so now we're set to expire on March 15th.

In other news, I made the most insane purchase of my life... a rocker. More specifically a rocker for the NURSERY. I feel like a woman possessed... who took hold of my body? Honestly, the nursery is 50% done in theory... we've picked out a crib, dresser, rocker, and bedding. I figure that amounts to at least 50%, right? Now that I sit here with an empty email inbox, and no sign of a match in sight, it feels a bit rash (understatement of the year).

When we submitted for the first baby back in November, I was really surprised by the time frame... just five days until the due date. It was a complete shock. And since then, we've seen more and more situations that have had a really quick time frame. Some where the baby is already born and others where the due date is just a day or two away. These scenarios were really not what I was expecting... I figured we'd have at least a month or more. As I began to think about the reality that things can change in the adoption world in the blink or an eye, I decided that I might at least need an idea of what I wanted to do for the nursery... a general plan so that I wasn't needing to make decisions and search for a crib in a frantic moment.

So one weekend in December, mom and I set out to go look at nursery furniture. It was quite an odd experience. At every single store the subject came up of my flat stomach. "Oh my, you're so tiny," she'd exclaim. "Getting an early start, huh?" he'd ask. Even after I said I was adopting and wanted to see pieces that wouldn't take half a year to arrive (did you know that some baby furniture is a 12-16 week order time?!?) I'd still get comments about my flat stomach. I was mostly just overwhelmed by the whole process and the 10,000 options, so the comments were really the least of my worries. I do think a T-shirt might be called for on my next trip out. I'm thinking "My stomach is washboard flat only slightly pudgy because there's no baby in this belly. We're adopting!" would work.

After quite a bit of deliberation and math, I think we've made our choices. We're not getting it yet, because hello, as all the salespeople so often pointed out, my stomach is super flat... no baby in the belly, and no baby on the horizon. But we went ahead and bit the bullet and ordered the rocker because, well, rockers/gliders are next to impossible to find that even semi-fit Sam and his 6'9 frame. But also, we got a great deal! The rocker that we LOVE is on sale for $100 off right now, and we had a 15% off coupon, AND $75 in reward points that expire this month. It seemed financially wise to go ahead and purchase rather than waste the savings opportunity, don't ya' think?

So that's where we sit... and if we don't have a baby by mid February, I'll literally be sitting in that rocker. That or the sight of it will drive me to hysterics and I'll have to cover it with a sheet... you know another really mature way of dealing with the hard stuff. Continue to hope and pray with us that the right opportunity, within our financial abilities, comes through soon!

C'mon In

So many of you have been SO incredibly sweet to ask how the house is coming. In case you missed it: WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!

Our Home (before it was our home)

And it was awesome and amazing and overwhelming. For three straight weeks all available minutes not spent working or sleeping were spent scraping popcorn ceilings and painting every surface available. After we moved in, things slowed down, but there was still SO much to do. I'm ashamed to admit that we lived for WEEKS out of boxes, I used my iPhone as a light in the bathroom to apply makeup, shave, etc... I was looking rough for far too long.

There is still a lot to do, but I hear that's the norm with home ownership... there is always a list of things needing to be fixed/updated. Regardless, I think I'm finally ready to welcome you inside.

Hello there friend, won't you please come in:

C'mon in!

Imagine with me that you, dear friend, have walked up the three well worn (read weathered and in need of repair) steps to my front porch. You, the good, dog-loving friend that you are, have knocked quietly at the door as you recognize that the doorbell is the bane of Sterling's existence. Won't you please come inside and visit our new home? Please ignore the barking: he's loud and ill-mannered, but he won't bite. He'll just sniff inappropriate places and lick any exposed skin... but we're friends, so you're okay with that sort of thing, right? We'll of course only meander through a few select rooms today as the others are not quite done (read works in progress disaster zones)

The view from the front door. One of the things I like the least about the
house is the lack of an "entry"… I hate walking directly into the living
room, but this seems to be a ranch thing, and as just about every house in
our price range was a ranch, I guess I'll learn to live with it… and like it.

The living room: I'd eventually like a sectional sofa and a tufted ottoman,
but umm, priorities are all… air conditioning units and babies first, you know?

"Dining room"- it's probably my least favorite space in the house as it
feels a bit awkward in placement, but it's functional and the table we
refinished fits just fine. I've ordered a runner for the table to bring in
some color to the space, which should brighten things up a bit!

Right side of the kitchen. The counter tops turned out great! If you look
closely you'll see some imperfections in the topcoat (which drives me
crazy!), but all in all, I'm very pleased! Total cost was about $65. The
cabinets were incredibly tedious, and again, there are imperfections, but
I love the kitchen SO much more with these than the old oak color.
(Erika- look, the moldy houseplant is still alive!!!)

The left side of the kitchen. In one of our gutsier moves, we decide to raise
one section of the cabinets in order to install a microwave over the stove.
Sam worked very hard on that part, and I'm really glad we went for it!
It clears up a lot of counter space and I like the visual interest of the
elevated cabinetry. Eventually I'd like to add some molding to the
cabinets which will really make me LOVE them!

Guest bathroom- I love how this room came together!
The only purchase was new towels, a shower curtain,
shelf supports for some old, crappy floating shelves
from college, and molding for the mirror.

This counter top is my favorite. I did slightly different
colors, and added some metallic paint… really nice! I
also love the molding around this mirror… all Sam!

Guest Bedroom- a little plain right now, but it'll perk up once we
start decorating! 

Master Bedroom- this room was a pretty bold move… dark blue accent
wall. I thought my mom was going to die when she saw it. I had faith that
it would look awesome because most of my paint colors were selected with
the help of my AMAZINGLY talented interior designer friend. I love how
it turned out. Once we get some personal touches, I think the room will
really come together. And we're saving a spot for a TV (no lectures about
TV in the bedroom)… maybe Sam's Christmas present!

Master Bathroom: I have big dreams for this room, but
in the mean time, I love the way this came together. I
think this might be my favorite paint color… very serene!

I think the colors came together really well in the master
bath… I love the creams, browns, and blues. And the
frame Sam built for the mirror really adds a nice touch!

Thank you so much for coming, and for being such a polite house guest! Thanks for not looking under the beds or in the closets! Now if you'd like, just for fun, we can take a look back and see where we started:

Kitchen on closing day

The plastic was to protect the floors/carpet from the
raining plaster that fell like globs of mud.

The aftermath of scraping popcorn ceilings

Master Bathroom before

The counter had a bad spot on it that the previous owner had tried to
patch… you'd never know it now. Plus the mirror looks a bazillion
times better now.

Guest Bathroom before… as you might guess, it was
always our intention to paint this room.

Side note: I'm super sorry that I disappeared following an "I'm depressed" announcement. Apparently saying that you battle depression and then dropping off your blog for a few weeks causes concern: lesson learned. I'm here: alive and well enough. So sorry if I scared anyone, and thanks for checking in!

The Room

Over the last few years, I've read as fellow bloggers lamented the pain of the unused bedroom. I thought I understood... I mean it's not like I had a nursery or kid room to decorate either, I thought I understood the pain... I was wrong. The unused bedroom is haunting.*

We went house hunting for the second time with our realtor (and friend) the day after the negative beta from the FET. It was pretty fortunate timing really. For one, I was forced to get up and get out of bed on a day I would have chosen to eat my weight in Ben & Jerry's. Secondly, the recent failure of the FET reminded me that our family will most likely cost thousands upon thousands of dollars; we need margin in our budget. If that first beta had been a good strong number, I can see how I might have argued for stretching breaking the "do not cross line". But as the reminder of our infertility was fresh in my mind, I was looking for under budget... top priority. 

I write all of that to say, I didn't go into this house with images of a nursery in my head. Sure, I'm always hoping we'll bring a baby home, but I wasn't imagining kids playing in the front yard the day we picked our house. Rather, I was looking for a home that we liked, that fulfilled at least half of our wish list (we are big dreamers), and that a social worker wouldn't run away screaming from a home study in the future. But there's something about the permanence of owning your own home that makes the room call to you. Maybe it has nothing to do with who owns the property... I think it's probably all about knowing that we will live in that house for years. We've never really had that before. We've been married for four years and this is our fifth move, things were never permanent enough to imagine a nursery. I mean, obviously if we had had a baby at any of the previous places, we would have created a room for the baby, but none of those places had a room for the baby. There's a difference. Now, there's the master, the guest bedroom, and THE room. 

I jokingly asked Sam which room would be the nursery... You know, we wouldn't want to set up a guest room only to get pregnant and be forced to move it all around (the horror). He gave a rational explanation that had nothing to do with a nursery and everything to do with the guest bedroom... again, not thinking about nurseries at all. But now that we've said it, now that the rooms have names, the room haunts me. I can't walk in without thinking about it: this would be his/her room. My child has laid claim to a room in a house I've only slept in for five nights, and he/she hasn't even been conceived.

I did something I haven't done in years... I logged on to Pinterest and looked at my Board O' Nursery Dreams. Ughhhh... the pain, the horror. I have absolutely no idea where this need came from, but I just had to check... I think it was the picking of paint colors. If I learned anything from my mom growing up, it's that paint colors have to blend from one room to the next (she was a bit ridiculous in her zealousness).... I think I just wanted to imagine the blend. The sad news is that nursery bedding changes on the fly... I don't think one single piece of carefully chosen bedding is still available today. Pottery Barn's designers do not await the infertile woman, no, no, they have to change it so that each. and. every. kid. in the house of six under the age of seven can have a different crib/quilt/sheet/blankie/shower-towel-wrap-thing. By the time a child fills that room, today's trends will be old news, and everything I pinned circa 2011 will be history. And that's okay... Lord knows the designers do a fabulous job of making me need ALL. THE. THINGS. If I feel this way when I don't even have a baby, I'm pretty sure I'll be able to find something I like enough to create a nursery, I mean, if I'm forced to.

I don't really know what to do with the room. My heart wants to keep it 100% empty... a way of saying this is yours, we're waiting for you, come fill this space. My head says that's too sad and miserable. And dumb... why not use the space for now? If and when there actually is a small human to fill that room, we can move things around again, right? No shame in saying while we're waiting we're going to use what is ours. I can't decide.

Meanwhile, if you come by our happy home, I'll be more that excited to show off the master bedroom, and hopefully I'll get that guest bedroom put together soon, but that other one, the one with the door closed... don't ask. It's either filled with storage (boring) or it's empty. Either way, it's a time capsule of sorts... the Lord willing, we'll unseal it some day.

*I completely recognize that my haunting is much less severe than others... my room is empty, which is far less painful than an actual nursery, created for a particular someone, but remains empty. That is a pain  I still can't imagine. My heart breaks for you if you have one of those rooms.

Have Mercy

I'm still here, in body at least. I lost my mind somewhere along the line with this house renovation. I use the term "renovation" lightly as we're not actually removing or installing anything.... same floors, same walls, same cabinets. It's really more accurate to describe it as a facelift, buy boy oh boy, do I have new appreciation for people who actually renovate. This is A LOT of work!

When we purchased the house, we had very limited things we thought needed to be changed. Most notable were a bubble gum pink bathroom and a very violet spare bedroom. Other than that, we thought the house was pretty cute. The one major project that we knew right off the bat that we simply had to tackle was the popcorn ceiling. I abhor the stuff. Sam watched YouTube videos for days about removing the vile mess, and once he felt like he was a professional, we tackled it. It was 20 times worse than I imagined. It was disgusting, back-breaking, tedious work and I've literally been thinking evil thoughts towards whomever invented that mess. Ughhh. I could kill him.

We thought that the ceilings would be the worst project of all by far, and really the only "project" so to speak because painting two small rooms doesn't seem like much of a project. But projects seem to have a way of multiplying. When we arrived at the home after closing, we discovered that the previous home owner was very fond of hanging things via anchors. You don't really notice how many things people hang on the walls until there are GIANT holes all over the walls. And obviously, when you don't know the paint color, and you have FOURTEEN holes to patch in one corner of a bedroom, it becomes apparent that you will be repainting that room. Slowly but surely, we have come to one reason or another why Every. Single. Room. need to be repainted. I kid you not, we are done with seven of the eight rooms… soooo close, yet so, so far.

In addition, I didn't really like the cabinets… I decided to paint them, which led to buying new nobs, spray painting the hinges, and painting the countertops. Yep, you read that right. Yesterday I had big plans for relaxing by the pool for at least an hour, instead we spent multiple hours fixing a project that went disastrously wrong.

What the finished product should have looked like.

And what it actually looked like.

The first photo there is the finished product after painting and sealing. The second one, however, is the remnants of the paint, primer, and sealant when things go horribly, horribly wrong. We used this miracle product that was supposed to be the equivalent to 50 coats of polyurethane in one application. Apparently, it's a testy chemistry concoction, and I was never all that good at chemistry.  When the science experiment goes wrong, it goes very, very wrong. We woke up Monday morning to two sections of counter that were beautiful: nice and hard, but one section was a sticky, goopy mess. We immediately tuned to Google and discovered that if it's not dry is 6-8 hours, it never, ever, will be. We tried removing just the top layer of goop, but alas, no success. Eventually we scraped the whole thing down to the laminate so that I could start all over. Lucky for both my husband and mom (who graciously spent 5 days working with me), I handled it like a champ. I did not cry, which was really saying something as we've been working 14-16 hour days for weeks now. Sleep deprivation and catastrophic delays do not typically result in my best side.

Speaking of catastrophes: our AC unit died. Mmm, hm. Dead, like dead, dead. Two weeks after purchasing the house, the repair man pronounced it dead, may it rest in peace. Truthfully, we knew that the unit was old, as in, original to the house. We were warned that it didn't have much life left. We were hoping to get through Summer, inefficient or not, and maybe through Winter too. No such luck. Winter I could maybe handle, but not Summer, have mercy, but no. I was simply not made to sweat. You'll be impressed to know that I did not cry upon hearing this news either. It is what it is. The saddest part isn't the cost, but rather the delay to Project Bring Home Baby. But what can you do? My big girl panties are firmly in place... on we march.

We've got 74 hours until we have to be out of the rental. At this point, I'll be happy when we have a working bathroom with a light, toilet, and sink all in one place. Hopefully that will come sooner rather than later and I can post some photos of our work. In the mean time, think of me, and when you do, imagine me with unwashed hair (thank you, dry shampoo), paint in my hair, on my legs, under my nails, and a nice sweaty sheen as I scrub, sand, and paint in a house without air conditioning.