[tilly]

Hi I am from Quad City area! Great to see all these Iowa postings! We have two children thru adoption we are a transracial family. My daughter is almost three and son is 11 months. Our daughters adoption was private and our sons thru an agency that specilizes in African American adoptions. Good luck to all those that are just starting the process and for those with your babies home already congrats!
Tilly

[honorHim]

Hi....I am from Cedar Falls. I am new to this adoption forum and I'm not really sure how I came across it.....I guess it was just meant to be!!
We have done foster care for almost 15 years and we just adopted numbers 5 and 6 on Dec. 31st. I think we are probably done. With all the changes in DHS its just getting more difficult. I love taking in the children and loving them and giving them a good home but there are just too many changes.
I would love to hear from any other Iowans.

I saw your posting, you are from Cedar Falls? I live just south of Urbana. We got our son when he was 4 days old in TN back in April and just finalized everything on the 18th of December. We want to look into fostering infants with the hope of adding a girl. This was our first experience with adoption, we went the private route and it was both good and bad. I'm glad we did it and would not change it for nothing. I will say 41 is a little old to do the whole baby thing, but have enjoyed it just the same!!!!! Love being a mother and my husband is definetly going through his second childhood!!!!

[Scarlet]

Moandaa,
We are attending the information meeting for Bethany on Feb21, in Des Moines I know they are also having one in Cedar Rapids in Jan. Hubby and I are in Des Moines and just starting the process We have contacted 3 agencies. We have the informational meeting with Bethany in Feb. Hopefully the informational meeting with Catholic Charities in March. And I am waiting to hear back from Lutherian services. We are hoping to have an agency picked by April so that we can start our homestudy. We are intrested in a newborn domestic adoption.

Scarlett:

Are you open to any race? My husband and I just completed our adoption of our son on the 18th of December, this time last year we were just starting the process. We started our home study in January and completed it March 5th and got the call for our son on April 14th (he was born on the 11th)and went to get him on the 15th. If you are open to any race it makes the process go alot faster, also you must be open to either sex. We are white but our son is AA but we don't see that we just see our son. We did our home study through Lutheran Social Services but worked with Shelia Davis and Heaven Sent Adoptions. This is a networking agency that does not charge to sign up with and they bring agencies who have exhausted their pool of available adoptive parents with people who are looking to adopt. You send her copies of your profile and she sends them out to different agencies. We were very happy with her, she is a christian woman who feels a real calling for what she is doing.
Her email address is shelia@heavensentadopt.com she will be glad to send you information.

[Scarlet]

We are looking for an agency at the moment, we have talked it over and would like to have one place where we can get every thing done. We have looked at several facilitators but feel more comfortable dealing with an agency at this point. We know that certain factors will decrease our wait time and are deciding what we feel we can handle. ie. Age, race, sex, etc. We are really still in the invistigating stages. I am 38 and DH is 39. We are undergoing infertility treatment at the moment. We are also looking into adoption since some of the treatments offered have some moral and eithcal concerns for us. Thanks for the information I will tuck it away incase we need it in the future.

Laura

[dehobe]

HonorHim, We also feel that we are not liking changes at DHS. It is great to hear you just adopted too. We just adopted #8 on December 30th. That was a private adoption through Lifetime Adoption in CA. We only have 6 at home. We have considered one more child if it was the right match. Deb
Sunshine....How's the baby doing? Kami has 2 teeth and getting around a lot!

Our son is growing like a weed, he will be 9 mo old on the 11th and is in 12 and 18 mo stuff! I fear for our future food bills!!!!! He has 2 teeth on the bottom and now has 2 on top and I feel he is working on more. He started crawling last week and I don't think he will be satisfied with that for long, Dad has already been teaching him how to pull himself up! He has been a real joy, except for the lack of sleep but we are finding that we are adjusting.

Scarlet:

Shelia is not a facilatator, my husband and I had the same concerns. She is a networker and just works as a middleman in the process and cuts down on the amount of looking around you have to do. It can get kind of expensive signing on with different agencies. Good luck on the other avenue you are trying, I pray it will work for you. Catholic Charities will probably be a dead end, we looked into that ourselves and you just get added to a waiting list, that is if they are even taking names, could take you up to 7 yrs. My husband is 39 and I am 42 (41 at the time we got our son) and we have been married almost 18 yrs.

[Scarlet]

Sunshine0510
Where in IA are you? We are in Des Moines.

Scarlet:

We live about half way between Waterloo and Cedar Rapids in the little town of Urbana which is on I380.

[Scarlet]

Sunshine: Cool I kinda know where that is. lol

Just wondering if there are any others from Des Moines. I would appricate any information on agencies or other organizations you are using.

[mjbruch]

Hey fellow Iowans. My hubby and I are in the process of adopting from Russia. We make our 2nd trip on Feb 2nd to adopt our two little girls. They are sisters 6 months old and 16 months old. Is anyone else considering Russia? We are from Sumner, which is a small town about 30 miles northeast of Waterloo.

We considered Russia and some other countries but my husband was concerned with overseas travel so we decided to stay in the states. Some good friends of ours, the Ternus family, adopted 2 children from Russia 2 yrs ago. They said it can be kind of nerve racking dealing with the government over there, but they are very delighted with their daughter and son. Good luck!!!

[mjbruch]

That is very true, the government over there is nerve racking. I thought we had a lot of red tape here in the states to deal with, but it is nothing compared to Russia. I just try to remain focused on the goal and think about the girls. There is light at the end of the tunnel now. Prayer really helps me get through these tough times.