Wrapping Up Frugal February

We've successfully completed our Frugal February, and, looking at the bank account, felt comfortable putting $750 into the baby's savings account as a result! (We also netted $750 from the Super Bowl Squares, so all in all, Little Laskey made BANK this month!) I was hoping for an even $1,000 from Frugal February, but neglected to take into account the fact that we had a month of double health insurance coverage. My Komen benefits kicked in February 1, and Brian's Target benefits don't end until March 31, so our insurance premium payments were higher than we normally see. 

I think I can accurately say that you learn a lot about your spending habits when you force yourself to NOT spend anything for a month. Our top 3 lessons learned include:

1. We eat out A LOT! Several times per week. This isn't a bad thing in itself, but it's certainly not conducive to saving money. I think our biggest reason for eating out is simply because we can. We're in the habit of it and, especially when we both work a long day, it's so much easier than trying to figure out dinner.

2. Meal planning has been absolutely essential to get through this month. Half the battle when we get home at night is figuring out what to cook for dinner. On the other hand, though, neither of us work well with super rigid plans for dinner pre-mapped for each day. We found a good balance of having a few options each night that could be prepped in just a few minutes. This gave us some flexibility but some structure at the same time. 

3. Keeping busy kept us from spending money. It's amazing how much more money we spend when we have nothing specific to do. We kill time by walking around Clay Terrace or something similar. If we have plans (particularly on weekends), we can save a lot of money. Even if the plans involve spending some money, it's spent more intentionally than if we just "wing it." We spent most of our free weekends painting the nursery, building furniture, and moving things from a storage unit we had rented to a garage in our complex. 

Special Bonus Lesson #4: It's easier to deal with the situation of your debit card being hacked if you know you're not spending money during a particular month. When we got a call asking us to authorize a purchase in New York for about $700, we were 1000% certain it was fraudulent!

With all that in mind, and wanting to not lose our momentum of saving for Little Laskey in March, we're going to continue the Frugal February streak into March...at least when it comes to dining out! I think we have to relax our spending rules in some areas (Brian is very excited to regain his Tuesday afternoon movie outings and we're both in dire need of haircuts!), but we plan on only going out to eat in March when we have a gift card to cover a portion of our bill. Luckily, our friends and family know us well, and we have several gift cards stocked up from Christmas presents, and one really nice one that was my going away gift from Social Health saved for a special occasion. 

Our Life in 11 Pages

We're halfway through Frugal February folks! We'll do a check-in at the end of the month and announce our plans for our own savings moving forward (Money-Saving March, perhaps?) In the meantime, we've been finding ways to keep ourselves busy at home that don't require spending money. Free movie passes were a great excuse for a freebie date night a few days ago, and the free, pre-planned dates that I gave Brian as my "something I made" Christmas gift are waiting for us to use whenever we have a night we need to get out of the house.

This week, we had a chore to do related to the adoption that took up what would have been a mindless evening watching TV. We got to read and sign our home study document! This is the paperwork compiled by the agency that will be presented to the judge to formally say that we are approved to adopt a child in the state of Indiana. It's essentially an 11-page summary of our life, based on the 45 pages of paperwork we completed, our letters of recommendation, and our total of about 24 hours interacting with the agency staff.

If you've never had a home study completed, I'm not sure I can adequately describe to you what it's like to read one written about you. The best I can do is to say that it's an incredibly surreal experience. On the one hand, you get to read quotes from your closest friends on how awesome they think you are. (Note: we didn't get to know who wrote what, but wow! We have some amazingly thoughtful and eloquent friends in Cera, Mark, Macara, Lenny, Doreen, and Marti! You all made us cry!) 

On the other hand, you see all the skeletons you and every member of your family possess, out of the closet, right there on paper for everyone to see. By everyone, of course, I mean us, the social worker, and the judge. So not everyone, but still. It's humbling on so many levels. 

Then of course, there's the legal-ese language that the document uses. Never in my life would I think to describe Brian, myself, our family, or our home the way this document describes all of us. Apparently, we are "adequately educated" about the challenges of raising a child of a heritage different than ours, we were "internally motivated as children to not disappoint our parents," and we would like to "emulate the example set forth by our own parents regarding discipline." I agree with those ideas; I'm just not sure I would have put them in quite the same words!

We ended up having more edits to make to the document than I imagine the average family makes. Most of those edits were the result of my taking a new job right in the middle of this whole process. For example, the home study document has to reflect which of us is providing insurance. We just switched to my insurance coverage through Komen, so that will need to be updated in the document. Once those changes are made, our social worker will submit the document to the judge for approval. Once it is approved, we will have officially done everything in our power in this process. The agency can start to advertise us to birth mothers, and then it's just a waiting game to be matched with the right one.

Frugal February

So we've done a lot of fundraisers in the past year. We did #BeardforBaby, Santa Letters, and are currently in the middle of a Super Bowl Squares fundraiser. (By the way, if you're interested in purchasing squares and a chance to win up to $1,000, be sure to check out https://www.superbowlsquares.org/6z65s. Enter username "username" and password "password" to pick your squares. Also, the more people who play, the bigger the winnings, so please share the link with any friends who may be looking for some squares!)

We've also squirreled away our tax refunds, bonuses and raises, and some money from each paycheck over the last 14 months. Right now, we are only about $5,000 from the total amount we will need to fund the adoption. So, in addition to the Super Bowl Squares fundraiser, we would like to introduce you all to our personal contribution to our savings for the next month:

Frugal February. I got the idea from a Pinterest link called "No Spend November" which was designed to help people save for Christmas shopping.  We've agreed to spend  no money in February outside of necessities (you know, like rent, gas for our cars, etc.). We decided to keep our produce delivery every other week and that buying milk was acceptable, but we plan on making meals with what we have in the house. Other than that, though, no spending.  No dining out, no movies (good thing I organized 10 free date nights as per of Brian's Christmas gift!), no shopping for new clothes, nothing.

We aren't big spenders normally, but we usually don't think twice about going out to eat if we've both had a long day at work, or grabbing a nice sweater at Target if it's on sale, that kind of thing. It's going to be a challenging month; wish us luck!

February...

As the month of February approaches, Stephanie and I sat down and thought about what could we potentially do for our next fundraiser to help bring Little Laskey home.

We have seen a great idea called "Adopt a Block" where you have grid of boxes labeled 1-100 and each person picks a square and donates that amount of money. However, after talking, we both decided that you all have been INCREDIBLY generous so far with your support of our previous fundraisers and we wanted to switch things up a bit.

Well...being the quick thinker that I am, I decided to take the idea of "Adopt a Box", combine it with the time of year, the hype of PowerBall, and make things a little more fun. 

Introducing, "Little Laskey's Super Bowl Squares"! These are just like other Super Bowl squares but with a minor twist. Instead of doing payouts each quarter, or each half, we will do one payout at the end of the game. 50% of the pot will go to the winner, and 50% will stay with us to help bring Little Laskey home. If we fill out grid, that means $1000 to each!

The nice part is there is no paper to fill out! Everything is digital! 

To play, simply visit www.superbowlsquares.org/6z65s and when prompted for a username/password, enter username/password (secure right?). This will allow you to pick the number of squares you'd like.

The score numbers will be filled in 1 hour before the game (unless we haven't sold out, then they will be filled out at kickoff). 

Payment can be made to Stephanie or myself, or online through our GoFundMe www.gofundme.com/LittleLaskey and must be received 1 hour prior to kick off, or your squares will be removed. If you pay online, please put the number of squares you are buying in the comments section.

We really want to see this extend past our spheres, so please share this with all of your friends and family and help get the word out.

Thank you so much for your support and good luck!

Brian

Losing Control

Anytime a family welcomes a child into their home, whether that's through adoption, foster care, assisted reproduction, the "old fashioned way," or any other way that may exist, that family gives up a certain level of control over their lives. Midnight feedings, loss of sleep, planning a sitter before a night out, the list goes on and on. We knew all of this, we anticipated all of this going into this process. Quite frankly, we can't WAIT for all of this! We are so ready to open our home to our child and give up all the control that comes with having a new baby in the house. (The dogs are less sure about giving up control than Brian and I are, but we're working on it...)

I think to a certain extent, we had even come to terms with giving up control of various aspects of our "pregnancy." We will get matched when the right birth mother sees our profile book. We have no idea when that will be. We have no idea how far along into her pregnancy she will be when she firsts learns of us. We may get 8-9 months to cultivate a relationship with her, or we may meet her several hours after the baby is born, when we are signing papers in the hospital. We have little to no control over the timing of this whole process.

We also have very little control over her health and wellness during her pregnancy. This idea took us a little longer to come to terms with. Having a background in science and health, I know how I would take care of my body, and our child's, if I were pregnant. We would be able to control (as much as anyone can, anyway) our prenatal care, ideal birth plan, prenatal checks, etc. When we made the decision to adopt, one thing that we really had to think very carefully about was the level of care that our birth mother will receive during her pregnancy. We needed to be open to certain levels of smoking, drinking, and recreational drug use during her pregnancy. We needed to be open to caring for a child whose birth mother may have not seen a doctor until she showed up at the hospital in labor. One of the most grueling exercises during our home study paperwork was filling in a sort of check list of various medical conditions that our child could have. Which on the list were things we were willing to deal with, and which were "deal breakers" for us? It felt so slimy to do that, as in the back of my head, all I could think was that any parent has to give up control of their child's life, and if we were having this baby, we wouldn't be able to control for these various medical conditions, so why would we get to select this now?

I think we've come around to all of this loss of control. We've had many difficult discussions over the past few months about structuring work around a fall-in-your-lap placement, we've talked about dealing with recreational drug use during pregnancy, and we've discussed the potential for advanced medical care for our child. Just when we thought we had it all figured out, when we though we were controlling as much of the process as possible, life threw us another curveball.

I think many people know that I've accepted a new job and will be starting on Monday. I'm leaving Social Health Association after an amazing three years to work at Susan G. Komen of Central Indiana as their Mission Director. I'm excited for new challenges, but it's been an emotional few weeks transitioning out of an agency that I've grown to love so much.

In most families, when one person is looking at a new job, they may seek advice from their partner, their families, maybe a mentor or two. Throughout the application and interview process with Komen, I did all of those things. Brian and I had many serious conversations about what this change would mean for us as a couple and for our family moving forward. My parents weighed in with their thoughts, and I sought advice from a mentor of mine. When I received the offer from Komen, however, my first call wasn't to my husband, my parents, or my mentor. My first call was to our adoption social worker. I wanted to know how a change in career would impact our home study approval process. It was amazing to me how automatic this was for me to do; I didn't even think twice about clearing this decision with someone who I've only known for about 3 months and who, outside the realm of our adoption, has nothing to do with the decisions we make as a couple. 

But that's the thing, isn't it? Our entire lives right now are INSIDE the realm of the adoption. That means that not only did we give up control of the timing of our child's birth, the prenatal care and substance use of our child's biological mother, and the medical issues that our child could face (not to mention the possibility that we may never know what hereditary risk factors may exist for our child), we also gave up some level of control over our own decision making. It's all part of the process, but it's one of those things I never would have imagined before we began this journey.

Looking Back, Looking Forward

Happy (slightly belated) New Year, everyone! It's hard to believe that just over a year ago, we told you all that we'd begun the adventure to build our family through adoption. What a year it's been! We hit a low point a few days before Christmas this year, thinking about how long it's been, and feeling like we had made very little progress. We lamented, "It's been a year and we aren't even being advertised to birth mothers yet!"  Upon further reflection, however, we realized how far we've come in such a short period of time. So, this post will serve as a sort of recap of our adoption journey through 2015, with a little taste of what 2016 may have in store for us.

In November of 2014, we decided to begin the adoption journey. We had both been thinking privately about how right it felt to grow our family this way, but we had not discussed it with one another. Our nephews came to visit for my birthday, and watching Brian interact with them (frosting sugar cookies to look like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) was really what cemented the idea in my mind that it was time to have the discussion. The kids were leaving the next day, so we had planned a dinner out for my birthday after they left. We hugged our sister and brother-in-law goodbye, gave both the kids kisses and promises to see them soon, and left each other with a "there's something I want to talk about at dinner tonight" before heading to work. Over dinner, we talked at length about both of our hopes for our family, and we decided that we were both ready to begin this process.

In late November and early December 2014, we began meeting with adoption agencies. We had decided that we were not going to announce the news to anyone until we found an agency we were comfortable with, one that we knew would someday unite us with our child. We went on several agency interviews (you can review that process in our "Tale of Three Agencies" post), and found one agency that we were comfortable with. It was time to move forward and begin telling people of our plans! We told our families over Christmas. We had ornaments personalized for each of our parents and my grandmother. The ornaments had two snowmen holding a baby snowman. We had someone write "We're Adopting!" on the ornaments, and gave them as gifts. I think my grandma, Nana, had the best response to opening her ornament. Nana was 87 last Christmas, and as she was opening the ornament, I casually asked if she would be able to read what it said without her glasses. She assured me she was fine. Once she got it open, she looked at it and proudly read "We're Adorable!" I assured her that yes, we are adorable, but that wasn't what the ornament said, and she should read it again. 

Once our families knew, it was time to tell the rest of the world. We announced to all of you via Facebook, Twitter, and this blog on New Year's Day 2015. We were overwhelmed by the incredible support, encouragement, and congratulations that you all offered. We truly believe we have the best support system in our family, friends, and coworkers.

We went on one more agency interview in February of 2015. This was ultimately the agency we decided to work with, and we couldn't be happier with how things have gone with them over the past few months. We didn't activate with them right away, since we knew that we didn't want to begin the process until we were financially able to complete it. Neither of us wanted to incur debt through this process. So, we spent the first half of 2015 raising money to pay for the first round of expenses that come with adoption: agency fees, home study fees, advertising fees, etc. Throughout 2015, we cut back financially to throw as much money as we could into our adoption savings as possible. We also fundraised, and through many people's very generous support, eventually had enough stashed away to pay the first round of fees, totaling about $10,000.  My favorite fundraiser during that time was the beard that Brian grew. I couldn't decide how I felt about our friends during that one: so many of you gave so generously, for which I am forever grateful. On the other hand, I can't help but think that at least a few of you took a small amount of pleasure in seeing just how much we HATED that beard and HATED that we needed to keep it around day after day!

In August of 2015, we had enough money set aside to make it through the first round of fees, so we emailed the agency to see what our next steps would be. Things started happening very quickly from that point. We attended our (13 hour!) home study class in mid-September. We spent two weekends filling out the mountain of paperwork that comes along with a home study. We had our home study visit in early October, and got a draft of the profile book that the agency will use to advertise us to birth mothers in mid-October. All of this was happening as we spent a week in Washington, D.C. to celebrate my little brother getting married and a week in Las Vegas to celebrate Brian's 30th birthday. Fall 2015 was a very busy time in our home!  Our home study was approved by the agency committee and their licensing agent in November 2015, and is ready to be sent to the judge after we make a few revisions to it.

We anticipate the judge receiving our home study draft in early February 2016. Once he or she approves it and we have the full placement fee in our savings (another $10,000) we can begin being advertised to birth mothers. We are well on our way to that next funding goal, thanks to very frugal living over the last few months and another successful fundraiser. I sold letters from Santa to children in November and December 2015. That fundraiser was so much fun for me to do, as I had the opportunity to get a peek into so many wonderful people's lives. Over 40 letters went to 5 states and 2 countries, with recipients ranging in age from 6 months to 60+ years. We are trying to time the approval of our home study with our having that final fee in our account. We have one more fundraiser planned for January 2016: football squares for the Super Bowl. Be on the lookout from Brian about how to get involved! Then, in February, we're going on a spending hiatus. We're nicknaming our final push "Frugal February," and other than paying our bills and filling our cars with gas, we plan on spending no other money during the month. The idea spawned from a "No Spend November" challenge that I saw on Pinterest, intended to help people save for holiday shopping without incurring debt. 

With any luck, our profile book will begin to be shown to potential birth mothers sometime in March or early April 2016. From there, our agency's goal is to have us placed with a child within 12 months. Their average is 9 months. We are praying that, by this time next year, one of us will be updating this blog with reflections of how busy 2016 was, while the other rocks our baby to sleep.

Home Study Update

Hello friends!

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! We had a great day. My in-laws were in town, and despite  a minor turkey mix-up, Brian did an awesome job cooking a big, traditional Thanksgiving dinner.

We always have much to be thankful for, but this year, we had something extra to give thanks for. We got word that our homestudy had passed through the agency and their licensing agent! This means we are one step closer to being officially "paper pregnant." Once we approve the draft of the homestudy, our agency will pass it along to the judge for final approval. At that point, we are offically just waiting.

Once the judge approves our homestudy, the agency can begin showing our profile book to potential birth mothers. They strongly recommend, however, that we have our full placement fee in our savings account before they start showing our biography. This is so that we know that we can cover that final amount (due 2 weeks before she is due, or immediately in the case of a fall-in-your-lap adoption) without going into debt. While this makes sense to us, it's tough to feel like we're legally approved but waiting without being "advertised." 

So, while we wait, we'll keep busy. Through a very generous boss and board of directors, I have some unexpected time off work around Christmas, which I'll mostly be spending writing adoption grants, hoping to get some funding that way. I'm also writing personalized letters from Santa for kids that parents, grandparents, and others can order as a Christmas gift (see an example below). Be sure to order one today here. Better yet, order tomorrow (Monday) and take advantage of my Cyber Monday deal...$4 per letter or 2 for $7 (discounted from $5/letter). I'm also hosting a booth at a local craft fair on Saturday to display the letters and hopefully collect some more orders.

Big thanks go out to Kristi, Cera, Cassy, Kim, and Erin who have already ordered letters for their little ones! Additional thanks go out to all of our faithful blog readers, and all of our family and friends who have been so wonderful and supportive through this whole process. We took a huge step forward by having this homestudy approved, and are excited to keep working to keep the process moving!