Paperwork, Home visits and Training...Oh My
This week is my Spring Break, which was overly needed. I tend to go full speed and then get to a point where I just hit a wall and last week was my wall. So I am extremely grateful for this week. I am also grateful because last Friday, we got our adoption paperwork and checklist of things to do, so now I have the week to work on things! Here is my Spring Break to do list, in no specific order:
Get the house ready for our home visits. Most of this involves A LOT of painting! The most important rooms right now are half bath, living room and future nursery. Thankfully my mother-in-law Sandy came over this week and we knocked a lot of this out in one day.
Paperwork. Our social worker called to introduce herself this week (Yay!). She also emailed me a list of questions that we will be going over during our first home visit. Chris and I each need to answer them on our own, email our answers to her and be prepared to talk with her about them during our visit. The questions range on everything from our personal history to questions about attitudes/beliefs, stress management and parenting. I feel like answering these questions is going to be a lesson in reflection. In addition to the questions for our home visit, we also have a packet of items to begin filling out. Letters of reference, employer references, financial statements, a drinking water statement and a pet immunization form, among others. I have heard that there is a lot of paperwork...and as we are getting started, I can see that this is true...but is it weird that with every item I check off, I get that much more excited?!
Appointments. We have quite a few appointments to schedule for the agency. Each of us needs an updated health physical, updated BCI/FBI background checks, and a fire inspection of our home.
Training. We must complete 12 hours of training at the agency's facility. Thankfully, they offer the training in a weekend to get it all complete. They only offer the training every 3 months, so we were really happy to be able to get in this month. I am not sure what to expect from the training, so can't comment on it much, but I will definitely fill everyone in once we have completed it.
So, there you have it, my Spring Break in a nutshell. Not the most exotic, but might be the most exciting one I can remember in a long time because it is bringing us one step closer to our dream of having a family.
