August

My heart is so heavy today. My longings for this child grow stronger and stronger each day. I really feel like my heart is safely resting in the hands of God knowing that He is the only one who knows the details and timing of our lives. I feel like I am resting and trusting. I am a little perplexed as to what I do with these longings? Sometimes they are excitement, sometimes they are sadness. I find myself being a little more quiet these days! They are just really strong right now. I just feel so ready- but I know that will all change when a baby is placed in my arms! I am soooo thankful this is the route we were supposed to go first. I long to be pregnant one day but my heart could not be more excited with where we are today. I walk into our room full of baby stuff and just long for him/her to be a part of our lives. I am ready for a child that runs to me as mommy and wants me to comfort them! I am ready for a child that is dying to see and be held by daddy! I can’t wait to see Steven’s heart melt when he feels that love from this child. Its so weird because when we started this process we wanted a boy so badly! I can say that I find myself longing for a beautiful little girl too! I am absolutely ok with either and would take both of I could!

The weeks are so weird now. I love Mondays! I know they are in the office and working. Its the beginning of the week and who knows what the week will hold? I just want my phone to ring! Friday’s are a little harder All in all we are doing great and getting more and more excited. This is just the strangest process with the craziest emotions! Please keep praying for our mom who is making tough decisions, for the rest of our money that we need and for our house to sell! I have been overwhelmed with all of you who have been reading this blog. I am so sorry that we don’t post more! Your comments have been so sweet and we are rejoicing and understanding all the hurts and struggles with each of you who are in the adoption process too. We are praying for you too! Thank you for reading.

Maris

I got my diaper bag in the mail today and cannot wait to use it!

Well…. we are waiting!

I talked to our social worker yesterday and she told me that she is going to start showing our profile! I think life has been a little crazy at their office. They seem really busy right now but she assured me that our profile would be shown. We are super excited and feel like it could be anyday.

This journey has been beautiful for Steven and I. We talked last night and Steven sounded so confident and ready to be a dad! I feel like my love grew for him in a different way last night. I don’t know if you have read on either of our personal blogs but we are in the midst of moving to Texas right now. Our house is up for sale, we have boxes in the garage and hopefully we will have this baby before we leave. EVERYTHING is such a huge question in our lives right now. Will this baby be a boy or a girl? Will our house sell? When do we leave? So many questions. I know this is where we are supposed to be right now. We have both taken our turns during this journey of wanting this so bad, then freaking out for a while, scared about all of the details and back to knowing that God is in total control. I too am ready. Whether it be boy or girl we are ready for August in our lives!

I cannot stop thinking about our mom here lately. I know that she is probably going through some heartache and decisions right now. I pray, as told her in her letter that we wrote to her, that she makes the right choice for her. That this is her baby and her decision. She is in my thoughts and prayers so much. My love for her and wanting to be a part of her life is so strong right now. I want so badly for her to feel God’s love during this time. I am praying so much for her. I love her the way that I already love this baby. I just want so badly to meet her. Please pray for these women today. They are making huge life decisions. They are strong and have immense love for their kids. I pray for no regrets in her life. I pray for a confident decision for her and this baby. I want her to parent first and if that is not the decision that she makes we want to be there to help her and love her and this baby.

This is a crazy process with weird emotions! I am so thankful for all of you who have been reading and keeping up with everything. We are more excited than you could ever know! Now its our time just to wait for the right mom to choose us.

Well…. we are done!

After many months (many is relative)  we have everything that our adoption agency needs from us turned in!!! Our social worker came to our house and did our last bit and now everything is in her hands. She said it would take her about a month to get our homestudy done. We should be hearing from her around the first of July to start the “official” waiting process!! We are soooooooooo excited and ready for this baby! I can’t believe everything is done and it is officially out of our hands. It feels like we crossed over the top of a huge mountain and we can see the promise land!!

It is great to have this month to sit back and relax and enjoy our time together. These could be the last couple of months we have by ourselves for a long time. I feel really good right now. Not to anxious or impatient. I am really relaxed and dreaming about this baby. Who knows if it will be a boy or a girl? We were really hoping it would be a boy in the beginning (and still) but I think we are getting a little more excited about the idea of a girl. Who knows!

I have our baby bed, mattress, stroller/car seat, pack n play, bouncer and some other really great gifts! I LOVE all of them! I love looking at them and can’t wait to put a baby in each of them! We love all of you for the support, love, gifts and prayers you have given to us. This is really becoming a reality and we can’t wait to share this journey with you all. My heart is in love with adoption. I am in love with becoming a mom!!

Its getting closer

I am in baby world! I know Steven is getting tired of hearing about all this! We just registered at Babies R Us a couple weeks ago and that had to be some of the most fun I have had in a long time. This is really happening. Its real. This is the route that we have chosen to take before pregnancy and it could never feel more right. I am in love with the baby that God has for us before we ever see him/her. I am just so in love! I wish my body reflected how I feel. I honestly feel about 8.5 months pregnant. I am really hoping that in the next couple of months we could have a baby! We are so so excited!

This morning at church we talked about being adopted into God’s family and I just couldn’t help but cry knowing we have such a beautiful picture of adoption by the way God loves us. There are many adoptions that have not gone well. I learned this when we first started this process. There are many heartaches and tears shed both ways over these precious kids. I wish they could all be perfect and that these decisions were easier for all parties involved. I want so badly for ours to be healing and for us to be able to love on our first mom and invite her to be a part of our family if she wants that. I think about these mom’s all the time. Their love, sacrifice, heartache and what incredible women they are. My main concern is that she makes the right decision for herself and that she is not pressured from anybody else either way. I want her to do what she thinks is right for her. This is what I pray for most.

We sat next to our friends Eric and Mandy who just adopted baby Cohen. Their blog is: http://mandyandericmoore.blogspot.com. They have had a beautiful journey and its amazing to see how incredible Cohen’s birthmom is and the beautiful love she has for her son. We went through our adoption training together and I love how you can see desire and love all over people’s faces and to see the results of hours of paperwork, working hard to raise money, hours of training and hours of waiting turn out. To see that precious baby and know that they were able to give this incredible women a second option is all just really overwhelming.

We will keep you updated. Steven has his individual interview this week and I have mine next week. After that all we have left is for them to come to our house and approve us to adopt and we are done! We are hoping and praying for all of this to be done by June 1st. Its pretty scary how close we are. Please pray for all of the mom’s that are in this situation. Please pray that God would provide the money that we have left to get. Please pray that we can have all of this done before Steven leaves for the summer! Love you all so much, thanks for reading and keeping up with the Bush’s!

There is something missing

I am feeling very different lately. I think I am getting a little freaked out at how close we are getting in this adoption. The agency has been sending out reference letters and everybody is telling me that they have gotten them and are sending them back in already. We have our marital counseling in the morning. Things are just working like a well oiled machine right now and I can only think that God is moving. I feel like His hands are all in this and He is moving this very quickly.

Since the day we got married, its always been just Steven and I. We have loved our precious time together! That time won’t stop just because we are adding to the family. He is such an amazing man and I find something to fall deeper in love with inside of him everyday. There is something missing though. Its like the Grinch- I feel like our hearts are growing! I can tell that we are both longing for this child. I am just starting to feel like there is something missing from us. The other day (I work at a hospital) I walked to the newborn nursery and just stood there looking through the windows at the babies. It was quiet in the hall and I just wanted to watch their little bodies and how they moved, cried, yawned and slept. It just made me feel closer.

I hear people say occasionally, “What if that baby is placed with you and you don’t feel close to that child because they haven’t grown in you and you have never seen them before.” I am NOT trying to be cheesy but since last August when God called us to move forward with this adoption I feel as if this child has been growing inside of me. Its in a different way but I have been bonding with the fact that we want to have a child ever since. I am ready. I am ready to love on any child that God places with us for the amount of time that they are with us. Even if that mom changes her mind we will love that child for however long we have them. My heart genuinely feels 8 months pregnant!

I love being an option for girls/women who get themselves into a situation that maybe they didn’t intend to get into. I am so thankful that there are positive options. Not all adoptions are healthy but I am determined to make this a healthy adoption! I really want this child’s mom to be a part of our lives if she chooses to do so. Ultimately I want to show Jesus in this entire situation. He loves. He provides. He nurtures. He heals. He has brought us as Gentiles into His family and made us sons and daughters. My heart overflows for women who are pregnant and are overwhelmed. First and best option is always to parent! If she chooses not to we would love to be a loving option for her. I just think about her all the time. Please pray for these women/girls today. Some of them are faced with very hard decisions.

We will keep you updated with where things are going. Hopefully we can be “waiting officially” within the next month. That is the goal.

gracious givers & how i am to be an example for my son

maris & i have been super blessed through this entire adoption process. so many of you have sacrificially given to us & our adoption. we are forever thankful for your prayers & support, and we couldn’t have gotten this far without you guys. from donations, to photography, to people buying t-shirts, to friends helping us with a garage sale…we are amazed at how much you have helped us out. i wanted to say thanks from the bottom of our hearts for this support.

it’s getting closer to the time where we will be waiting to be chosen. it’s real real close, and we can’t wait. i can’t wait to be a dad…even though it scares the crap out of me at times. i’m ready to have that little guy crawling around here…i’m ready to see maris be the awesome mom that she dreams of being…i hope i’m ready to show him how to live life chasing his dreams, loving God & loving people, living day to day as if it were his last.

i want my kid to know that i support him in his dreams. if it doesn’t include college…then so be it. if he wants to be a missionary in africa…then so be it. i want him to live life without any regrets. i want him to live a life that is spent serving others…loving others…and doing whatever he can to fight the injustices of this world. i hope he lives a life opposite of the things mother culture teaches about chasing the American dream…of what she teaches about consumerism…of how she teaches that our worth is found in material posessions, wealth, & power. to find worth in Christ & in turn serving others is my hope for August.

before i can hope these things for him…i have to be willing to live the same way. i pray that God continues to refine me, give me vision, & a passion to see this world change…not just for the sake of change & the Kingdom…but for the sake of me being an inspiration to my children. i can’t expect him to chase his dreams…if i am not willing to do the same.

psych testing, missing paperwork, health insurance, & t-shirts

we are one more step closer. we took our psych evaluation test this past friday, and we have another meeting with the psychiatrist to see if we’re sane. i’m a little worried. haha…those test always freak me out. it makes you realize how your brain works, and how messed up you really are. i know everything will turn out fine…those test just make me nervous.

we sent in our paperwork, and then realized they were missing a few pieces. i’ve scanned and emailed them today. i’m still waiting on 2007 tax returns, and we’ll be done with the paperwork. i also need to talk to our insurance company about getting coverage for august. any of you adoptive parents have advice for talking to them? what questions i need to ask? what kind of coverage?

we recently ordered some more 2xl adopting august shirts. we had run out of them, but now they’re back in stock. we have every size available now.  if you’d like a shirt please let us know. the links above will order the shirts through paypal. every little bit helps. we’re a little less than halfway on the funds that we need. so that’s exciting. i’m also still doing photography for our adoption. if you or someone you know needs photos please email me & let me know. it’s been an awesome way for us to make money for this adoption.

thanks for all of the prayers & support.

our adoption paperwork is in the mail

today is the day that we have officially sent off all of our paperwork for our adoption! it means that we are moving one step closer to bringing August home. we can’t tell you how excited we are about this. i finished up this afternoon around 1pm with collecting all of our stuff. I went to Kinkos and made copies, and then proceeded to the Post Office. They should receive the envelope by tomorrow. We still have a couple of more things to do before we are in the waiting process. We have our home visit, psychological testing, and our profile. then we will be put on the list! it seems like we still have alot, but after getting that small book of paperwork finished this stuff looks easy.

thanks again for all of your prayers & support. please continue to pray for us as we have these last steps to complete. pray for everything to work out with Maris’ job so that she can have the time off required to get our counseling done. pray for provision. we are almost half way there with our funds, and we still have a ways to go. i know the money will be there…but i’d be lying to you if said i didn’t worry about it at all. pray for the mother of this child & all of the things she is going through. pray for a safe pregnancy. pray for us as we try to keep focused & moving forward with what we have left to do.

you guys are the best! thanks for being a part of this journey.

How cute is this?

friends & their august shirts

here are the henry’s showing off their adopting august shirts.