Rooted in Trefoil to Rooted in Sand

Well, it's 6:45pm on Thursday and I'm feeling mighty accomplished! Just applied for our homestudy through Illini Christian Ministries. Such great people!!! When I was on my search for a Hague Accredited homestudy agency, ICM kept popping up. I read pretty much everything on their website and started correspondence with Dayna, who's their Adoption Specialist. She truly eased my fears, answered all my questions, and provided tons of support - and we weren't even her clients yet!!! So ICM and the Schmidts are going head first into this adoption together, and I couldn't be more excited!!! One step closer to Baby Schmidt!!!! Thankfully, ICM has a 6 month waiting list for home studies...so we probably won't begin ours until Nov/Dec of this year. If we're lucky, we'll get a tax season behind us to assist with the costs. Tyler and I have a lot of paperwork upon us though. Fingerprinting, adoption education, getting certified copies of things.....just a lot a...

As most of you know, adoption is expensive. It is mostly this way, due to the scrutiny of the countries on who is adopting. Its a lot of time and paperwork. We could do this all on our own, but that would take 5 to 6 years just to save and we just don't have that kind of time. We're still hoping we will win the PowerBall. ;-) I was reading one of my favorite bloggers, and she was explaining that it's important to give friends and family the opportunity to be a part of the process in a meaningful way. Too often Tyler and I allow our pride to get in our way and exclude others because we insist on "doing it all by ourselves". Truth is, unless you have $45k sitting in your bank account, you can not do it alone. We have to open up and allow ourselves to be vulnerable. Every blessing that is given, multiplies the love of God to others. Just as you are willing to spread God’s love to others, be more accepting of his love through those that wish to bless you. "...

Lately, I've been working on collecting paperwork to apply to the Indian govt. for OCI in lieu of PIO and renunciation. Basically the PIO/OCI is a visa that can be used for travel and it states that I'm of Indian heritage which would allow us to adopt a "healthy" baby that is younger than a year old. Let's note that Tyler and I are open to any child up to the age of five who may or may not have minor/correctable needs....this visa tho IF approved will just give us a wider net. While I was home I was able to find my Indian passport, and was just so cool to see in person. I've made several scans of it, but like my current passport it too has to leave my possession for processing by the Indian Embassy. It's so hard to let go of two major important pieces of information...one that is a part of my beginning, my adoption story, my history, and the other that is current. I know that the embassy is familiar with handling important documents, but still I have an...

Tyler and I got so much accomplished this past weekend. He's finished painting the "baby's" room and it looks awesome!!! (no, as of right now there is no baby Schmidt on the way; please continue to pray for us) I took two pano pictures one with the lights on and the other off. I love the colors we picked!!! Toasty Gray and Mountain Mint; both by Behr. Our whole house is Behr paint haha. With the lights on Altho, I do love the room with the lights on,....I am over the moon with the natural light flowing in. It just seems so peaceful and calming. I look forward to cradling our baby in this room. It'll be such a joy when God blesses us. At least I know the following accents will go great! Gray, Navy, Coral, Yellow, and Gold. In natural light We did have a funny moment, I was taking a pano and Tyler moved. He looks like a hobbit. haha. It was a good laugh!! After a long day of cleaning, organizing, and painting, we treated ourselves to dinner at Ale...