Weekend away!

After having the situation with the prospective birth family, I was having a hard time moving on. We had had a super busy summer as well and hadn't gotten the chance to spend a lot of time together. At the end of May, my mom broke her leg which required two surgeries and she needed a lot of help--and because I don't have a paying job (I'm a house wife and help out here and there as people need it) I was able to help my mom out. I believe most of June was spent being at the hospital with my mom or at my parent's house helping my mom. July was getting ready and having our successful garage sale--but that also meant we didn't get to go away for our anniversary. Last year we were lucky enough to spend almost a week at my grandparent's beach house that they own. We loved the fact that we got to get away and it was free!! So we were hoping to make it an annual thing. However, now that Mark has a newer job aka no vacation time (well, he started back in April) and we have a lot of adoption stuff--it just wasn't feasible to make it happen this year. But we still wanted to get away...So we decided to go to Seattle!!! He was able to just flex some of his time so we were able take off Friday morning and come back on Sunday without using any vacation--YES!! Here are some pictures of our trip :)

Here we are at Kerry Park
On the roof top of Hard Rock Cafe

We rode this bad boy!!

Here we are in our hotel room with the Space Needle behind us

We had a total blast! We got to meet up with some friends that are also adopting through Bethany for Friday night dinner, then Saturday and Sunday it was just us and our schedule. We got to go down to Pike Place and eat some delicous mac & cheese, wandered around City Target, ate dinner at Hard Rock Cafe, we rode The Great Wheel (it's a ferris wheel on a pier), took a 'Ride the Duck' tour, went to Kerry Park, went up the Space Needle at night, just hung out and enjoyed spending time with each other! It was such a blessing to get away and not talk about adopton. We refrained from uttering that word (other than on Friday night with our friends) until we were back on the road on Sunday. On Sunday we stopped by the outlet mall on the way home and bought a super cute onesie that says, "I Love Daddy" and can be used for either gender. It's the first onesie I was able to get that wasn't a specific gender and mentioned 'daddy'.

I was sad for the weekend to end and wish that I could spend more time with my man. He is a very hard worker at his jobso during the week we don't get to spend much time with each other and the weekends have been jam packed with other stuff...so times where it's just us and life isn't getting in our way are priceless and I treasure them.

The very next weekend (last weekend) we had a great Friday night with some of our good friends. We decided that we had another free Saturday since it was a long weekend and so we wanted to leave town again. This time it was to Cannon Beach!! I have a favorite pizza place--it's called Pizza a' Fetta...and it's delicious!!!!! We usually go there when we go to my grandparent's beach house-but we haven't made it to the beach house in a year, so I was missing my yummy pizza. We had joked about going to the beach just for the pizza...but after joking about it for over 9 months we made it a reality! Thankfully the weather cooperated with us so we went into Seaside and played at the arcades and miniture golf and then got to stick our feet into the ocean. We then drove over to Cannon Beach and ate pizza--then drove home. It was a fun date day. I am not sure how I got so lucky--a weekend get away and then a date day all within a week of each other?!?! Oh how my soul needed that!

My love tank is filled up and I feel refreshed! I am ready to tackle life with a new attitude. I am thankful for my husband to spoil me in such amazing ways!!!! So now we are back on track of just waiting for our time to become parents--whenever God sees it fit! :)

Adoption Update

We are alive and well! We have been staying busy this summer with house cleaning, yard work, nursery preparation and getting to spend time with our family and friends.

I am sure you guys are all interested in is our adoption progress! There isn't a whole lot to tell (sort of). We are coming up on being on the waiting list for 2 months. And let me tell you--it's been a LONG two months of waiting. I am learning the art of patience and learning the art of staying busy to keep my mind off of all the waiting. Thankfully we HAVE had our book shown to several prospective birth families so the waiting hasn't been for "nothing" but waiting is HARD!!! There was one prospective birth family that made it hard. We got a phone call from our social worker saying a woman (prospective birth mom) was in labor--and for a variety of reasons was thinking of adoption for this baby. She gave birth on a Wednesday. Her and her significant other had already named this baby--so we had a name, weight/height, all of the baby's stats, etc. I knew that we were at least one family of two that our profile books were being shown...but I let myself get attached. I got things ready--we washed clothes, packed a diaper bag and did all other things baby related. I tried hard not to let my heart hope that this could be it but at the same time I couldn't help it. It's a fine balance and I'm not sure I've learned it yet. Thursday came and went and we hadn't heard anything about the family or baby. Friday came and I emailed our social worker asking for an update. Our social worker let us know that the family would like more time with the baby and would like to think more on their options. I completely get that this is their baby and until the papers are signed (if ever) that it is their baby until that moment. However, I started to view this as our child--even though we weren't anywhere close to that moment. So we had one of the longest weekends ever!! I didn't sleep much or eat much as I just wanted to know either way. I wanted to know if these parents were going to choose to parent or choose a different path for their little baby that had a name that I knew. We waited all day on Monday as well and finally got word on Tuesday that the family decided to parent. I was C.R.U.S.H.E.D!! In my HEAD, I knew that it could go either way and that the birth family had every right to make that decision. In my HEART, I wanted this to be it. I wanted this baby to be ours. I still pray for this little baby and for her parents. I pray that God is with them as they enter a new phase of parenthood and that things are going well for them. But I didn't know it would be hard for me to let go of this little baby that I hadn't met, let alone seen a picture of. I just knew her name...and kept picturing what she looked like. I felt like I had "lost" her. So I gave myself a week to grieve this little life that wasn't going to be in our life and then needed to just move on. I know that we will be okay and that this baby wasn't meant to be ours. We are on a journey of a life time and this experience has helped us grow in our adoption journey and as a couple. We are stronger than we thought we were and know we can do the same situation again if it does happen again with another family.

We are looking forward to the future and cannot wait to hope, pray and be blessed with Baby Bretl--we know he or she is out there for us!! So please continue to pray along with us as we continue on this crazy journey of adoption :) I will be hopefully posting two more blog posts this week--one on our trip to Seattle and another one yet to be decided. :)