Our Adoption Story

Kelly's Korner is doing a show us your adoption day, and I had to share our story. These pictures are a few of our beautiful girl. They are in the wrong order but you get the drift!

Our family in 2010

My beautiful Miracle

She has always loved her brother. They are best friends.

Her first visit to our house. She was a daddy's girl right away!

Josh and I were married in August of 2006. I had already informed him that I wanted to adopt when we were older, and he agreed. I started my job at The Meyer Center for Special Children soon after our marriage and loved everything about it. The buses would load through my room at the end of the day and I always noticed this cute, skinny, little bit of nothing who had the most precious smile in the world. One day, I finally asked about her. "What is her diagnosis? She is so cute." Her teacher quickly replied that she had a small developmental delay due to drug exposure at birth. "Do you want to adopt her?" she asked me flippantly.





I rushed home from school that day with a thought in my head. I called Josh and told him that we had to adopt this little girl. He only half believed me but agreed anyway. He loves kids too and what was the harm in making the wife happy? He thought it would never happen.





I called the local DSS office right away. I asked around and got lots of information about LaMiracle and how the adoption process would work. I was in love and knew that that little girl would be coming to live with us someday. Josh and I sat down and talked about it very seriously. We knew we were young and recently married, but we could go through the process and see how far we made it. Neither of us felt we would get approved, but we knew we wanted to try. Before anything, Josh wanted to come by and at least meet her.





He was waiting for me in the lobby when a therapist came in from outside with a little girl she had been doing physical therapy with. The little girl saw Josh and ran to give him the biggest hug. The little girl was Miracle. Josh was a goner! He remembers that hug to this day!



We were about half way through the process, and everything was looking pretty positive. We had a few last inspections to get through, but we started to get pretty excited. I found out I was pregnant in Feb. of 2007. We were excited but worried that this might effect DSS' decision of whether or not to let us adopt our girl? We were not worried though. It was looking like we would get Miracle (if approved) around June or July and the baby was not due until the end of October.



In May we found out that the bedroom windows in our rental house were too small. We put the adoption process on a "quick" hold so that we could buy a house. We knew it might not be the smartest thing to do financially at the time, but we needed a place if we wanted LaMiracle.



At this point the adoption process really started to drag on. We had to get all new inspections for the new house. Some of our home study had to be redone. I was getting more and more pregnant.



I went into labor with our son on October 14th 2007. He was born on the 15th. We were instantly in love but continued our plan to get LaMiracle.



She was placed with us on November 2, 2007. She was scared to death of our pets, but she loved her new room. She adjusted so well. I think she new we loved her. We ended up taking a trip to MI for a funeral only 2 wks after her placement. I was so worried for her little heart. She would be meeting a ton of family and would be so overwhelmed. NOPE. "Hi, I'm Miracle." she proudly introduced herself. She was already a part of our family and could not be shaken.



The actually adoption day was in June of 2008. I had the worst case of strep throat ever. Aunt Melanie and Aunt Christy ended up having to keep the kids the night before and meet us at the courthouse. I was on pins and needles but everything went fine. We went home that day knowing that she would be our little girl forever.

The memories with her will already last forever. I will never forget the day she realized that her skin was brown and ours was white or the day she asked in older lady in McDonald's what color she was... I love her attitude toward life and the sweet way she looks at things. She is our girl!