Interviews, interviews, and more interviews …

In our last blog update we briefly mentioned that we had our “Couple Interview” scheduled.

That interview took place on Tuesday, January 2nd at the Bethany Christian Services (BCS) Offices. We met with Carrie, who oversees the domestic adoption section of BCS. We have worked fairly closely with Carrie over the past few months and will continue to work with her throughout the remainder of the adoption process.

The Couple Interview started at 4:00pm on that Tuesday and ended a little before 6:00pm that evening. During those near two hours we spent a lot of time talking about our married lives. This started with our “how we met” story. As most of you know, I absolutely love getting to share the story of how Kayla and I met. The time passed fairly quickly and none of the questions seemed odd, strange, or difficult to answer. For the most part Carrie was simply getting to know us better and trying to get a feel for how we acted together as a couple.

That night ended on a very good note for two reasons. One, we were able to schedule our Individual Interviews (which I suppose means we did well enough on the Couple Interview that we weren’t disqualified from adopting!) and two, we went and ate at Olive Garden (and got to use a gift card to boot!). Olive Garden was not nearly as good as Grandma’s home cooking, but it was pretty stinking good none-the-less.

We scheduled our Individual Interviews for Monday the 26th. Anyone peaking at a calendar will quickly realize that this blog is therefore being written AFTER the fact. Yes indeed, we have now finished our Individual Interviews and managed to survive the ordeal.

Before the interview I had grand visions of bright white lights, bamboo sticks for under my fingernails, and perhaps a waterboarding table. I can happily report that none of those interrogation methods were utilized. Instead, they went with a more simplistic approach of electric shock therapy and a polygraph test. Okay, I am kidding … I think.

The Individual Interviews went well. They lasted about an hour and a half each (mind from 2:30-4pm and Kayla’s from 4-5:15ish) and primarily focused on our childhoods and young lives. It was fun telling of some of my favorite childhood memories and reliving events from being a kid, teenager, and adult.

The night once again ended on a great note. After Kayla’s interview we were able to schedule our Home Inspection (more on that in a moment) and ate dinner at Cheddar’s Cafe. Once again, I suppose our answers did not raise too many red flags for BCS to schedule our home inspection.

Speaking of the home inspection … It is scheduled for Friday, February 6th at 3:30pm. This is when Carrie will come out to our house and evaluate and ensure that it is safe for a baby to be placed here. From the discussions we have had with Carrie (and with others who have undergone home studies) this should be a fairly easy and even low stress. They will be checking that we have a fire extinguisher, working toilets, no hazardous wiring, working smoke detectors etc.

It was quite a relief to learn that they were not going to be scrutinizing every portion of our home. We were even told that we could have dirty dishes and unfolded laundry around without fear of problems. Of course, we all know that will not happen. Kayla and I are already planning a “house cleaning party” to ensure that even every baseboard is properly clean!

So, as you can see, there has been a lot of progress in the last two weeks. All of our interviews are completed. All of our references have received their letters and are filling them out. Our home study is less than two weeks away. Once the home study is done (and the reference letters are turned back in) then Carrie will write up a report packet for approval (or denial). That report takes about 30 days to process but once it is processed (and ideally approved) we will officially be a WAITING FAMILY!

So, please pray that our home inspection goes well, that our reference letters are turned in quickly, and that our Inspection Report is processed quickly and approved.

It is entirely possible that by the middle or end of March we could be simply awaiting placement! This means that the remainder of our funds might be needed sometime in the near future. Because of that, we are going to be launching our next (and possibly last!) fundraiser very soon! Check back soon for info on that!