Rileigh Nicole Page

Photo Captured by Valerie Fisher Photography

Rileigh Nicole Page
November 2, 2015

6 pounds 14 ounces 18 ¾ inches long

Dakota and I have been parents for two weeks. I cannot begin to explain the miracle it took to make that sentence true. The story of bringing Rileigh into our lives is so special to us. We know many of you have questions regarding our story and I hope we can answer most of them. Dakota and I want to show you how incredible this adoption story is, but at the same time we want to respect the privacy of Rileigh. This is her story and we want to keep some things private. With all of that said, here goes the best story in the entire world! (I might be biased!)

Now, where to begin…the only date that comes to mind is November 4, 2014. On that day, Dakota and I received the news that would change our hearts forever. Our babies that we tried so hard to know were now with God and we were broken hearted. We wanted to know them first; we wanted to be parents! Fast forward to January 2015. We attended an adoption meeting and knew instantly that God wanted us to adopt through Bethany Christian Services. We just knew! God made His plan so clear, so we started this blog and the process to build our family through adoption. This year has been incredible. We have been blessed by prayers, financial support and encouraging words more than we every thought possible. We were able to save and raise 90% of our adoption goal before we were matched! That is so amazing!

Now we will fast forward one more time. October 25, 2015. On this day I announced to my parents that we would not have a baby by Christmas this year. Shame on me for thinking I knew anything about the plan that God was laying before us! The next day Dakota and I received a text from our adoption specialist asking if we could call her. Dakota was in a meeting so we had to wait. I thought the call was regarding paperwork so I tried to be patient. Finally, Dakota was out of his meeting and we conference called in. When she said that we were matched, I almost dropped the phone. She gave us a minute to talk to each other without her on the line and that was the moment Dakota and I screamed and couldn’t believe it. We didn’t know ANY details at this point. Nothing. Just that we were matched, but we were so overjoyed.  We called back and we were shocked again because this baby was due October 28^th! Two days. Two days! Oh my goodness. Dakota left work and headed home. We talked about the details that we knew until he walked through the door. We were in shock, hugging and just standing in the kitchen. We didn’t know what to do next!

We decided to face-time our parents and surprise them. Dakota and I will never forget the shock and emotion that went into those phone calls. As I write this blog I can’t believe it was less than a month ago!

One of the details we didn’t know at this point was if we would be parents to a boy or a girl. We had previously decided on a name for each.  We were on pins and needles all night thinking that we might get a call that baby was born early. Tuesday went by and we didn’t hear anything. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday still no baby! Birthmom, who we will refer to as “K”,  was in labor from Wednesday October 28^th until Monday, November 2^nd! Please take a moment to think about that. Wow, we have an incredible birthmother for our baby! Monday, November 2, 2015 we got a call saying that baby was born and they asked us to guess if it was a girl or a boy. We both said we thought it was a girl and when they said we were right we literally ran laps around our house with the ugliest cry faces possible. Dakota and I were so thrilled!!

A short time later we were told that K asked what we wanted to name this precious little girl. (This part of the story gives me chills every time I talk about it). When we came up with names for our girl, we always thought it would be Harper. We had been set on that name for years, but about a week before our little girl was born the name Rileigh popped into our hearts. We told K that we liked the name Rileigh Nicole and she said that God confirmed her adoption plan again when she heard the name we picked. A close friend of hers referred to the baby she was carrying as Rileigh Jr when K was pregnant. She couldn’t believe that of all the names in the world Rileigh was the one we chose. Dakota and I believe that God placed that name on our hearts for a reason and we wanted K to be apart in choosing the spelling of Rileigh’s name. We love the way she chose to spell it and can’t think of a more perfect name for our girl!

The next day, Tuesday November 3, 2015 is when we met K and Rileigh for the first time. Going to the hospital was scary. We didn’t know what to say or how to act, but as soon as we walked into the hospital room God filled it with His presence. There wasn’t a single moment of awkwardness or any uncomfortable conversations. We loved K from the moment we met her and think so highly of her! She is funny, smart and very kind. We talked with K, her sister and her mother for two hours. It was so wonderful and we cherish those first moments with them. Holding Rileigh for the first time was different than I expected. I thought there would be tears flowing and I would be scared. Instead I felt a comfort so strong that I just knew instantly I was changed forever. Rileigh was the most beautiful thing we had ever seen. The instant love you have for such a little person is overwhelming. Watching Dakota hold his daughter for the first time was the BEST thing EVER. I want to relive that moment over and over. He is a natural daddy and is already so protective. My love for him has grown so much by watching him love Rileigh.

Rileigh was scheduled to go home on Thursday November 3^rd, but from the day we found out we were matched I kept bringing up how crazy awesome it would be if we brought our baby home on November 4^th. I didn’t really think it would happen because she was due on October 28^th, but it was just pressed on my heart. At this point I had never told Dakota that I prayed that God would allow us to be parents by that specific day. That had been my silent prayer between me and God for a long time. When we got the call on Wednesday morning that Rileigh was getting discharged, I could not believe it. God granted my hearts desire in such a powerful way. A day that would otherwise be filled with so much sadness was now filled with bringing home our healthy baby girl! How incredible is our God?! Our adoption verse has been Hebrews 11:1 since January and it has never been more true to us. “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” We have seen God build our faith so abundantly by granting us our deepest hope!

Our first night as a family at home was perfect. We were surprised with decorations and cute outfits for Rileigh and the next day we had family over to meet her! The past two weeks have been wonderful!

A Waiting Family

This morning I woke up, went to my Keurig and made myself some coffee. I looked over at my desk and noticed that one of my memory verses had fallen. The verse was 1 Peter 1:6  “There is wonderful joy ahead.”. This passage is about the joy that comes from our salvation and the eternity believers will spend with our loving God after the trials of this earth.  When I saw that verse it spoke to me about adoption. I know that is taking it out of contexts a little, but adoption was on my mind because we had just received the news that we are on the waiting list! Dakota and I have WONDERFUL JOY ahead of us in the form of family! We are growing our family through adoption and with that comes so much happiness.

We are excited to be on the official waiting list! Our profile book will now be shown to expectant birth parents. This is another step that involves waiting and with that comes a practice of patience!

During our wait, we ask that you keep our child, their birth-parents and Dakota and I in your prayers. 

We have specific prayers that we are lifting up:

~For God to protect the expectant birth-mother and child from any harm

~For our birth-mother to have comfort during her pregnancy and with the upcoming decisions she   will be making

~For the salvation of our child’s birth-parents if they do not know the Lord already

~For the Lord to give us patience during this process

We also wanted to keep you updated on how close we are to completing our financial goal! We hit 83% this week! 

Thank you for following along with this journey. We have the best support system!                                 

Bekah and Dakota

Nursery sneak peak ~ Fundraising update

After a month long break from the blog, we have some catching up to do! I am so sorry for not posting updates. When I last wrote a blog post I was telling you that we had completed our required training/classes and we were about to complete the profile book. We poured so many hours into this book and we think it turned out fantastic! Seeing our life in book form shows us once again that the Lord has blessed Dakota and I in so many ways. Our book is now at the adoption agency and will be shown to expectant birth mothers as soon as our home study has been approved! We have high hopes that we will be on the waiting list by next week, but we know that God has perfect timing.

This month we started to put together some items for the baby nursery. We don’t know if we will be blessed with a boy or a girl so it has to stay pretty gender neutral. We have loved dreaming about our baby in this room and although there is still a lot of work to be done, this room is our favorite! It is so fun to receive fun gifts in the mail and we have worked very hard to keep our parents from buying every baby item they come across! haha This baby is BLESSED! 

Here is a little preview of what we have done so far! Dakota built that changing table! Isn't he so talented! He is such a hard worker. 

Here is a little preview of what we have done so far!

Our fundraising meter is at 81%! If you have any fundraising ideas we would love to hear them!

Please continue to pray for patience with this process. There are days when it feels like eveyrthing is working out perfectly and there are days when it feels like we will never be on that waiting list! We need patience! Please also join us in praying for our child and his or her birth parents. We pray for their safety and comfort during this time. We know that God is using them in BIG ways and we want them to get their strength from the Lord. 

Great is Thy Faithfulness

~We praise God for His faithfulness to provide continually for us~

Dakota and I want to thank everyone that purchased a fundraising t-shirt! We really appreciate all the support and cannot wait until they come in! You should receive your shirt by June 8^th! Also, we are so incredibly blessed that we not only met our goal of selling 50 shirts, but y’all helped us pass another goal by purchasing 8 more shirts! Thank you from the bottom of our hearts! We feel so loved by you.

Before we post every week we fill out our fundraising meter to see where we are financially and this week we are just shocked. I guess we didn’t realize what was happening before us, but here it is! We are 75% to our goal! Can you believe that in six months God has used family, friends and strangers to help us get to $18,950?! What a HUGE act of God. He is so good! Thank you to everybody who has helped us financially, we could not do this without you! 

We can’t forget to thank everybody who has prayed for us during this process. There have been many wonderful and exciting moments so far, but there are also times when our hearts ache and we just don’t understand certain situations. We know that with the prayers that you are lifting up for us, we are able to keep moving forward with thankful hearts. Your prayers are something we desire more than anything else. We know that God has opened these doors for us to adopt, but it is so wonderful to know that you are speaking to God on our behalf. We are so ready to meet this precious child that God has planned for us, but we have to be patient. Please pray for patience and more patience as we wait!

This week Dakota and I took our baby basics class and learned how to take care of a newborn baby! Last weekend Dakota was officially CPR certified! We are nearly complete with our book and we are eagerly waiting to be on that waiting list! 

Fundraising Friday/T-shirt Reminder

This week was such a joyful week for Dakota and I. We felt encouraged and motivated to keep moving forward after our last home study visit. We have about 6 weeks until we are an official waiting family! I have never been more excited to wait for something!
Our baby basics class is scheduled for the end of the month and we are really looking forward to learning everything we can about taking care of an infant. We are also working hard to finish our profile book. For those of you who do not know what an adoption profile book is, we have a 20 page picture book to tell the story of us. We are able to write a letter to the birth parents and show them things about ourselves, our families and our interests. It is really fun to make! It is a great way to really show the dynamic of who we are, how we would like to raise a family and our faith.

Don’t forget to to purchase a t-shirt! Click here for the website. We are can’t wait to see you in them! The t-shirt sale is only open until May 23 ^rd, so only one more week to order! 

With our t-shirt sales we have moved up to 65% on the fundraising meter! We are so thankful to everyone who has supported us financially, spiritually and with encouraging words!

Family Is More Than Blood (t-shirt fundraiser)

Our t-shirt fundraiser begins today! We are so excited about this fundraiser! My wonderful friend, Irene, used her talents to design these t-shirts. We can’t thank you enough for all of your hard work, Irene! Dakota and I appreciate it very much. Our official adoption shirts are available in five colors for adults and three colors for kids.

Available in adult sizes

Available in adult sizes

Available in youth and adult sizes

Available in youth and adult sizes

Available in youth and adult sizes

Click here if you are interested in purchasing a one of a kind Page family adoption t-shirt! The sale will last until March 23 and the t-shirts should ship out on June 8^th. We can’t wait to see you in one of them!

Our fundraising meter stayed at the 70% mark and we can’t wait to see what happens with this fundraiser! Thank you so much for all of you support. We love you all! 

Thankful

This week has been wonderfully exhausting! We are so thankful to have so many of you along our journey and praying for us daily. Prayer is something we need during this long and emotional journey! 

Thank you so much for reading our blog and for being a part of our adoption story. I am so happy that this child will have you as an aunt, uncle, grandparent, cousin or friend. We are all so blessed by your prayers and encouraging words.

The fundraising this week has blown our minds. Our hearts are overjoyed with the amount of

financial help we have received through all of you. As you can see from our fundraising meter, we have officially hit the 64% mark. Can you believe that we are only $9,000 dollars away from our goal? It is a true blessing and we are so thankful!!

We are working on a t-shirt fundraiser.Hopefully it will be ready by next Friday!

Our last home-study is already marked on our calendars for the second week of May. Thank you for helping us be able to go through this process so quickly. We realize that without your help we would not be at this point! Many of you have asked what else we need to do in order to be on the waiting list. We have our last home-study, a baby-basics class and a doctor appointment! After our last home-study it will typically take about 6 weeks to be approved to go on the waiting list…so we are looking at the end of June! Our goal date was June 30^th and it looks like with your help and God’s provision we will be able to make our goal! Praise the Lord! We cannot WAIT to WAIT for our baby. 

Fundraising Friday Update!

This blog post is long overdue! I am sorry about the long delay in posting, but here it goes.

We had another amazing, successful fundraiser! My sweet Aunt April hosted a benefit garage sale for our adoption. We are so thankful for the love that she, Gretchen and Jenny put into this event. They were able to receive donations from so many people and as you can see from the pictures below, there was a great selection! We are so grateful for the hours of work they put into this.

The amount of hard work and time that goes into these events show how loving of a family this baby is going to be place into. We are so excited about the blessings God has given us through our family and friends. God showed us how he can provide again at the end of the day when we heard the amount that the garage sale added to our adoption fund….it is another unbelievable day in this journey. Drum-roll……..The grand total raised is $1,125!!! 

Isn't that amazing? We are so overwhelmed with the fundraising for our adoption. It has been a true miracle to see the amount that has been raised to help bring home Baby Page. 

Thank you so much for you hard work Aunt April, Gretchen and Jenny!
We love you and appreciate everything you did for us.

Next on the the list to update you on…our Home study!

Last Monday, Dakota and I had our first home study with our case worker, Kari. We had a great time meeting with her and quickly felt like we were making a new friend. We talked about our families, things that we enjoy doing together, our lifestyle and what our expectations are in regards to semi-open adoption. It was relaxed and way easier than we imagined! We also had our home inspected. Before our home study we were given a list of things that would need to be completed before the inspection. After making sure everything was done, I was still nervous! I cleaned out closets, drawers and made sure everything was in exactly the “right” place. Of course, non of that mattered! J They didn't go around with a white glove inspected our home, but they did check for necessities like a fire extinguisher and smoke detectors…just the normal things to keep children safe! Overall, we loved having Kari in our home and we are looking forward to our next home study on the 29^th of April!

We have officially hit the 53% mark! Praise the Lord!! It is so encouraging to be at the half way point. J

Training/Exciting News

Adoption training was a wonderful way to cram as much information as possible into your head in two days! It was intense, emotional and completely overwhelming in the best way possible. I have a strong desire to pass on information we learned in our classes, but I don’t want to overwhelm you! I will write periodically about different subjects and prayerfully we can all learn together about how wonderful it is to adopt.

Here we are about to leave for training!

Just to give an idea of what we learned last weekend here is a brief description of our experience.

Dakota and I were so nervous pulling into the parking lot of our training! Meeting new people and knowing how important the information is, was a lot of pressure. Once we were in the classroom we realized again how perfect this adoption agency is for us. These people are so lovable!. We truly enjoyed listening to them talk and talk and talk and talk about adoption! J They had so many fantastic things to say. One of the first things Dakota did was eat…he was nervous. Eating made him calm, therefore, that boy ate for two days! Donuts, chips, cookies, barbecue, even peppermints went straight to his plate. He couldn't stop! It was completely adorable in a strange way. I just love how his heart is all in! We received a HUGE notebook filled with information and places to take notes.  My coping mechanism was taking notes. I have no idea what most of my notes say, but it kept me calm and focused. J

Have you ever wondered about the history of adoption? How about what it feels like to be a birth parent? Did you know there are right and wrong terms in regards to adoption? These are just a few examples of things we reviewed. We also went over subjects like grief/loss, the legal process, trans-racial adoption and what it will be like once our child is home. I am so excited to dive further into these subjects at a later time and just share our hearts with you. The very best part of this weekend was listening to the panels of people who have gone before us. On Saturday we had a couple share there story (which was so similar to Dakota and my story that we were both in tears).  It was so touching to see a couple that is now a family of four. Another best part of the weekend was meeting birth-mothers. We met four amazing birth moms who shared with us the struggles they went through and how adoption influenced their lives forever. Meeting them and learning there story has completely changed me. These woman are courageous and make the hardest decision of their lives out of selflessness and courage. We also had a panel of adoptive parents. They gave words of wisdom and challenged us to keep moving forward. Adoption is a roller coaster filled with twists and turns that we don’t share with everybody. It can be hard, but the reward at the end is priceless. We are so looking forward to the day God fulfills our hope for children. 

Here is some BIG NEWS-

On April 1, our adoption case worker contacted us and scheduled our first home study! Whoa. This just go so real! We are over the moon ready, excited and nervous to begin that process. When we thought about our home study process back in January, we NEVER imagined on April 13, 2015 we would be meeting for our first home study visit. We prayed to get everything complete by June 30, but the Lord is moving things in His perfect time. We are so grateful. We laugh because after the home study begins the dreaded wait period will be here….so we are really just racing to begin waiting. J

Fundraising update- We are now at the 46% mark on the fundraising meter! Yay! It is so encouraging to watch it grow and know that God is working miracles! 

Fundraising Friday

Our adoption training begins today! We are thrilled to be one step closer to embracing our child. 

During the next two days we will learn more about infant adoption and meet families that are on this journey also. We can’t wait to make new friends and learn more about adoption.

Last weekend we were able to go to a family picnic with our adoption agency. God sent us to a wonderful agency and we are overjoyed to work with them! It was such a great atmosphere filled with Christian families built by adoption. It was a beautiful sight seeing how much love these families have for one another. Maybe next year we will have a baby to bring to the picnic!

Fundraising Friday is here again! This week we stayed at 43%. We are so thankful to be at this mark because we are able to do our classes and set up our home studies without worrying where the money will come from. God is a great provider and we thank you all for being a part of our journey.

Don’t forget to go click here to place a bid for the painting my father-in-law painted as an adoption fundraiser! 

Brothers of Different Mothers

Brothers of Different Mothers

This awesome painting will be auctioned off to help with the funding of our adoption process. My father-in-law painted this with his grand-baby on his mind. We love how artistic he is and the time he put into this painting. 

The title is Brothers of Different Mothers, isn't that so creative?  Click here if you are interested in the auction of this painting!

This is an 8x6 oil painting with a starting bid of $1. 

*Thank you Popee!

Fundraising Friday

This week I came across a verse that keeps coming back to my mind. "So be truly glad there is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while." 1 Peter 1:6. The wonderful joy ahead keeps my feet moving and my heart on track. The thought of meeting our child gives me unbelievable joy and makes me truly glad to be on our journey. Everybody has trials and painful times in their lives, but knowing that there is always wonderful joy in front of us is so comforting. I want to choose joy and be truly glad.

I missed the blog post last Friday, but I have a lot to share with you today! After writing about our huge blessing at the garage sale, we knew that we were SO CLOSE to getting the financial support to be on the waiting list. God’s timing is perfect and we are thrilled with what He has provided for us. After the fundraiser Dakota and I had sweet friends give us a huge surprise. It was around 11:30 that night and I couldn't sleep from all the excitement earlier in the day. I checked my email and immediately woke Dakota up to tell him that we officially were at the mark to go on the waiting list!!! God has used so many wonderful friends and family members to help bring our precious baby to us! We almost can’t believe it! We are so close to being on the waiting list now!

After our last blog post we had many of you congratulate us for being on the waiting list, but I need to clarify that we are not on the waiting list just yet. Financially we have hit our mark. Before we can add our names to the list, we have a few things to do. Our first task it to attend our two day adoption training classes next weekend. We cannot wait to learn as much information as possible and pass it on to you! Our pre study documents are finished, but we need to wait for background checks and a few other items to be cleared.  We recently learned that we both need to be CPR and First Aid certified. I am a preschool teacher so I have my certifications, but Dakota needs to attend the classes before our home study can be scheduled. We also have a mandatory infant training class to take together. As you can see, we still have a lot of work ahead of us just to get our home study started! We are looking forward to checking these off our list and getting closer to meeting our precious baby! The next two months will be busy busy busy! The last step before being added to the waiting list is possibly the hardest thing we will have to do in this journey (other than waiting!). We need to make a book that will show our child's birth mother a glimpse of Dakota and myself. It will include a letter to her and pages that show our personalities, families and lifestyle. That is a lot of pressure. We are already praying about what to include in our book that will show our child's birth family that we are their baby's forever family. Please continue to pray for us as we keep moving forward with this adoption! 

It is amazing that less than two months ago Dakota and I shared this blog with our friends and family to let them know about the journey we were taking. We absolutely cannot believe that we are at the 43% mark on our fundraising meter! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!! We want you all to know how much we appreciate you praying for us and continually asking us about our adoption. It is our favorite subject! Our family is being built by adoption and we love when you ask us about it. We also want to thank you for every donation. The amount of  people who have given to our adoption fund touches our hearts and we are constantly reminded of how many people love this baby. Every penny is one cent closer to reaching our child!

Full of Joy-A Sold Out Event

                                                                     Hebrews 11:1

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” 

This is a verse our pastor used in a sermon in the weeks leading up to our first adoption meeting. It is something that has been an encouragement and a constant source of focus during our journey. I love this verse. Dakota loves this verse. It exemplifies the emotion of adoption to us. This weekend we had this verse lived out in our lives. Our first big fundraiser was a huge success. Dakota and I had faith that God would provide for us to adopt our child. We hoped for this journey to be meaningful and to bring Him glory. The things that God has done in our lives and around us, in just over a month, have complete humbled us and encouraged our faith.

There is one constant thing that adoption keeps doing for me. It has allowed my faith to grow in many ways. I am okay with the fact that I may not have biological children. My desires for growing our family are not “controlling” my thoughts anymore. I am okay that adoption will take time and we are just going to enjoy this journey. Basically, I am okay with giving all my hopes, fears and desires to our Heavenly Father because He takes care of me. 

Here we are setting up bright and early! Almost 7 am 

These pictures show the donations we received for the benefit garage sale. What you see the pictures above is very misleading. I promise we were packed to the brim! My parents could not walk in their garage, kitchen, dining room or living room without having a donation at the center of their attention! J What a blessing!! (Thanks again Mom and Dad!) There were eleven tables completely filled with household items. Hundreds of clothing articles, shoes, jewelry and toys were donated. Furniture, collectibles, antiques…you name it, everything had a place at this sale.  Do you want to know what we had at 2 pm on Saturday? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! We sold out with about 15 minutes to spare. God gave us something we hoped for, but we had no idea it was even possible.

Our fundraiser goal for this event was $1000. We prayed we could meet our goal, but there was a little speculation. I am happy to report that we didn't make our goal….WE DOUBLED IT!! Our total for the day was $2,050.00. Praise the Lord for giving us the evidence of things not scene.

As of today we are at the 38% mark on our fundraising goal. We are only $1,162 away from being financially able to go on the waiting list. We believe God will provide and we thank you for being a part of our journey. We feel so blessed.

We also want to thank our parents for working so hard in the fundraiser. It was a family run event and for that we are grateful. We cherish the times we get to spend with our parents and we cannot wait to make these wonderful people grandparents!! 

And of course we cannot forget to thank Auntie Katie, who will undoubtedly spoil and love on her niece or nephew! We love you Katie!

Garage Sale

We are moving along at a great pace! Two months ago we attended our first information class with our adoption agency and today we are ALMOST at the 30% mark on our fundraising meter!! God is working His hand in our adoption and the evidence is undeniable.

Tomorrow my parents will be hosting an adoption garage sale. We received so many wonderful donations for this yard sale! If you are looking for something to do between 7am-2pm tomorrow (March 7th) stop by and check it out! If you know of anybody in the area who enjoys a great sale please let them know. 

Thank you again for all of your support! 

Love,

Dakota and Bekah

Questions and Answers

Q & A

We realize that many of you have questions in regards to our adoption and we would love to answer them. At the beginning of our journey we had a lot of questions and it was overwhelming.  We have decided to start blogging some Q&A posts to inform you more about the adoption process. If you have any specific questions please leave a comment at the bottom of this post, on facebook, or just ask us whenever you see us! There will be some things about our specific journey that we have to keep private due to the nature of adoption, but we will be able to answer most questions. We hope that these Q&A posts will give insight to adopting. Below are just a few initial questions we are asked frequently.

This is a picture from last June of us spending time in the mountains. There have been many mountains to climb during this adoption journey, but it has been beautiful. I think this picture is a great representation of where we are now! 

Will you be adopting from the U.S. or over seas?

We are doing domestic adoption.  Dakota and I put prayer into our decision of what agency to use and where to adopt our child from. Our decision was to adopt from an agency that works with children from Florida. I know there are many parents that feel called to adopt from over seas or from different states and we think that is wonderful!  Dakota and I want to adopt a newborn, and it is more difficult to adopt a newborn overseas due to various country requirements and wait times.  Also, costs can be increased with overseas adoptions due to multiple visits. We felt that God pointed us to adopt locally, but we also know there are children desperate for homes everywhere. 

Will you have a closed, open or semi-open adoption plan?

Here is a brief explanation of the three options

CLOSED-In a closed adoption there is no contact, history or information about the birth parents. There is no desire to communicate. This was a very common form of adoption until about a decade ago.

OPEN- This would be an adoption where there is open communication between the birth parents and the adoptive parents. There is an exchange of addresses, phone numbers and easy access to each other. 

SEMI-OPEN- Adoptions that are semi-open are typically done through an agency. Direct communication is not typical, but letters and photos can be exchanged with the help of an adoption agency. Also, the adoptive parents have a chance to meet with the birth mother with an social worker present. 

This was a hard decision for us. There are pros and cons to everything.  Our family will always be out of the norm and we realize that is actually a beautiful thing! We decided that the benefit of a semi-open adoption would fit our desires for our child. Although our first choice is semi-open adaption,  our agency will contact us in regards to other options as well. I know many of you are thinking that it is crazy to consider semi-open adoption. We feel that our journey to parenthood is a shared one. With our great joy, there is great sorrow in our baby's birth family. Our lives will forever be linked. Do we plan to have them over for play dates or holidays? Who knows. We will seek to keep a relationship through pictures and letters through our adoption agency. Our child will one day have questions that Dakota and I cannot answer, but our prayer is that they will have the option to ask his or her birth family.

Can you pick a girl or boy?

The paperwork we fill out does allow us to choose a boy or a girl.  We personally will not be choosing one over the other. We want a baby, and we know that God has a perfect plan for us!

How will the birth parents decide to place their child with you?

After we are placed on the waiting list, the birth parents will come to our agency and speak with an adviser. They will be counseled to make sure adoption is what they truly think is best for them. Dakota and I will make a book that is “addressed” to the birth mom and she will see a glimpse of our lives. We will say how we met, talk about our families/friends and write a letter to her. The book will be filled with pictures that will give her an indication of what our lives are like. She will look at our book along with others to make her decision. She will then decide to meet with us or decide right there that we will be the family for her child. Typically after the books are narrowed down, the birth mother will want to meet with the prospective family. If that is the case we will have a face to face meeting with her and an adviser and get to know each other.

How long does this process typically take?

We have been told that 18 months is a typical wait time, but sometimes the wait is much shorter.  There have been multiple occasions where the wait time is less than 3 months.  Our goal is to be on the waiting list by June 30, 2015.  Obviously we pray that it is a quick process, but we know that our baby is worth waiting for.

FUNDRAISING FRIDAY REPORT

We are now at the 20.9% mark! Thank you for donating to our family. 

Twenty

Another fundraising Friday post is up! Showing our weekly progress has been such an exciting thing for Dakota and I to do. We have treasured seeing how God is working in our adoption story! 

20% down. 20%!!!! Can you believe how wonderful that is? We are so grateful and just in awe of the support we have received. It felt like a difficult thing to ask for help in the very beginning of our journey. Looking back at the stressful discussions we had about finances, I see that my pride almost made us miss an opportunity to witness God working through our friends and family. Adopting has given light to a few weaknesses I have, but pride was definitely the first to come up to surface. I worried what people would think when we first discussed how we would afford adding to our family. I couldn't stop the anxiety that came from my pride. I was overlooking the fact that there is a child out there who will have a Christian home and be loved so dearly for his or her entire life. I am so thankful that God walked with me even during my doubtful and proud moments. He is so good and always there to pick me up. My faith is growing though this adventure.

I don’t know many adoptive parents, but I would be surprised if this next statement were not true of them all. Adoption changes you. In the best and most bizarre ways. Dakota and I have thought of things we would NEVER put to thought if our lives were “normal”. There is so much good that comes from adoption. We want to thank you all for being a part of our journey and giving support. You are changing our lives and we will forever be grateful to have you as a piece of our puzzle.

Don’t forget to save the date for our adoption garage sale on March 7, 2015. It will be a great day and we look forward to seeing some friendly faces! 

Fundraising Friday/Guest Post

This week we received some good news in regards to the order of steps in our adoption. We were given our checklist in January and we knew it would be difficult to complete everything quickly. If you notice in our adoption timeline it says that we need to pay for the application, then the pre-study documents and after that we would go to our training classes. After speaking with our adoption agency they informed us that there are only four training classes this year. March, June, September and December are the only months they hold the two day training classes! March was out of our reach finacially and Dakota has some obligations in June so that would mean waiting until September just to complete step 4 in our long adoption process. Yikes! Praise the Lord that Dakota is level headed because I was very concerned! Dakota suggested that we just ask if we can take the classes in March and turn the pre-study paperwork in when we are able able to afford it. Our agency said that we could switch the steps and there would be no problem. So we are signed up for the March training classes and are working diligently to fill out our pre study documents.

Fundraising Friday Update- We are so grateful to say we have 16% donated to our adoption fund! It is such a blessing to see our family and friends love our baby before it is even here. We cannot wait to have a sweet face that everyone can see and feel the huge impact they are making in our family’s life!

Today we also have a guest blogger…my parents!

Dear Friends and Family,

On Saturday, March 7th, 2015 we will be hosting a benefit garage sale for our daughter and son-in-law (Bekah & Dakota) at our home. All proceeds will go directly to their adoption fund “adding pages”. 

If you have anything around your home that you would like to get rid of we would greatly appreciate the donation. If you need assistance we will be glad to work out a time to come pickup any items. No item is to small or to large as we are trusting that this benefit will bless this adoption process no matter how little or much we make financially.

I believe you will find their story a blessing and testimony of their Christian Faith.

Once, again thanks in advance for any donation you can make and please keep them in your prayers.

Sincerely,

Danny & Pamela