Atkinson Family Addition

Bursting Seams As we continue to prepare to grow our family, we have also been preparing our home. We had been working on a basement remodel, painting, and touching up several projects around our house and planned to get them all finished before our family and friends held a baby shower for us. Which was ambitious. We spent many late nights hanging crown molding on 100 year old plaster walls (not easy), touching up with caulk, and painting. If I never have to fill in another nail hole, I won’t be disappointed. After some late nights, and long weekends, we got nearly every project complete and our house clean and free of drywall/plaster/etc. Dust! Finally. Major victory for my anxiety. The completion of projects also meant that we could finally get our basement space back! Travis has space for woodworking, I have space for painting and polying, and our very patient renters can get to their storage space again. The weight of these tasks on our to-do lists has been lifted! On Sund...

We Made It! Forgive us, it has been quite awhile since our last update….again. After several months of reading through paperwork, completing forms, then re-completing forms after Travis’ job change, we were finally able to COMPLETE our Master File! When we got the email saying that our file was complete it was a mix of relief but also excited anticipation to have reached another milestone on our journey. After completion, we scheduled our home visit with our wonderful Social Worker! We anxiously anticipated the visit and spent some time cleaning, organizing, and mentally preparing for the unknown….It was a BREEZE! We each had a 1:1 interview, followed by a house tour, and then we were done. Our puppy Cash could tell we were anxious so he curled up on our laps for each of our interviews. Home Study: Complete. As we reached this milestone, I found myself really struggling. Struggling with wanting to “nest” and prepare for our future child; yet at the same time wanting to guar...

Autobiographies   After meeting with our wonderful Social Worker a few weeks ago, we were given our next "assignment": writing our autobiographies for our Home Study Assessment. The autobiography consists of eight solid pages of questions that guide us to reflect on our past, think about our future, and prepare ourselves to be parents. It's been an enlightening process so far: we are getting to better know ourselves and what has made us who we are, each other and how our lives fit and work together, and who we hope and want to be as parents after we are matched with a child. We will also be writing about our support system. Here are a few of the questions: Describe your current and future support systems and other available supports in the community (family, friends, church, counselor, club, support groups, therapists) List 3 support people and what each of those is willing to do to help. Please be specific. Who might be a barrier to your adoption? No...