Okanagan Photography
Danielle and I had the pleasure of photographing Matt and Cassy’s wedding on the SS Sicamous in Penticton. It was the perfect location for their intimate wedding.
The getting ready photos, the ceremony, all the group photos and the reception were all done in and around the boat which made for a seamless day.
*Update January 31, 2017
It’s been a year and a half since I last posted! I’ve been waiting until I have hours of free time to write up our whole Nicaraguan journey down to every last detail. I don’t want to forget a thing, for my sake and the boys, but I’ve come to realize that may not happen for a while.
The main thing we want to do is give glory to God. He had this plan for Brad and I all along. He answered our prayers abundantly and gave us strength, patience and guidance in the journey. Our two boys are more amazing than we ever imagined. They are loving, they are smart, they are giving, they are adorable, they are talented. Brad and I are amazed every day that we get to have them in our lives. When I wrote my last post in May 2015 we had no idea that our little Lucas who fills up our lives with his questions, dance moves, and lust for the outdoors was turning 3, 3 days later. He wasn’t in the orphanage until 4 months later. And his baby brother Gabriel who is now a 2 year old full of energy, giggles, and passion for all things daring, was only 8 months old. In our dossier we wrote that we were hoping to be matched with two boys under 4 years old. Not many people write so specifically, or even request boys. But this was our calling. Our boys personalities fit our family so perfectly and we know they are exactly what God had planned for us. All of our years of infertility and searching are forgotten because every year, every month, every minute led to the perfect timing of being matched with our boys.
We can only imagine the struggles our boys went through the first months/years of their lives. We only have the briefest hint of their history- so we don’t know what kind of house they lived in, we don’t know what kind of love they knew, we don’t know how they received food, we don’t know how they got water…. We do know it was very minimal. The area of Nicaragua that they come from is known to be very impoverished with very little sources of clean water. They were malnourished and literally full of round worms. A couple weeks after being with us they were in the hospital a week a part being treated for Pneumonia. When they were first with us they were weak with fevers and colds and what the doctor thought was early asthma. We didn’t find out until a month later that their little bodies were so full of worms their lungs were affected and the worms were causing fevers and stealing all of their nourishment. After a very emotional (and physical) week in January 2016 of giving the boys parasite medicine the worms were gone, there were no more fevers and they started to get stronger and healthier. They could finally start to enjoy their new surroundings and new relationships.
After 10 months in Nicaragua we came home September 2016 to a beautiful new home in Canada that was ready just in time for our arrival. A new house was not something we planned, it was just a bonus that God gifted us as a perfect place to welcome the boys to life in Canada.
*Update May 24, 2015
Wowzers. Our dossier has been approved by Nicaragua already! We are still stunned since finding out last week. I was walking into Safeway as Brad texted me the news with multiple trumpet and hand clapping emoticons. I remember walking in circles around the produce section in a daze not being able to focus on why I was there. I was trying to wrap my head around what this meant, and what we’d been through to get to this point. How could we be approved already? It’s supposed to take 4-6 months! It has only been 3 weeks since our lawyer told us she was presenting our dossier to the council.
We are so thankful that our dossier even got approved lol. Our agency hasn’t done an adoption with Nicaragua and we prepared almost all of our dossier with out much insight from them. We got most of our information from a Nica adoption Facebook group and most of the people are from the States so no one could really tell us about the Canadian requirements. I was almost expecting to hear that we had forgotten something or needed to do something differently.
Having approval makes everything a little bit more real. This is really happening, it’s not just about gathering paperwork or waiting for the next requirement. We’re done. Our next step is going to Nicaragua to meet our kids. It’s finally sinking in. But,,, we still have no idea when we could get the referral, so again we throw all our expectations into the wind. It’s God’s timing, and we’re sure it will be perfect.
For no apparent reason we get to skip the long wait for approval. We’re so thankful for this miracle. Keep praying that the rest of this journey goes smoothly and that we will be meeting our kids soon!
I watched this video today, and it sums up infertility and the hope of adoption really well.
*Update April 6, 2015
How is it April already? I feel like I just did the November update last week!
At the end of December Brad and I picked up our dossier from our agency in Vancouver and drove it to the lawyer to get everything checked and stamped. Two hours later we drove it back to our agency so they could mail it to Ottawa for approval.
It took a month, but finally it arrived back in Vancouver at the beginning of February and was then sent to San Francisco to be approved by the Nicaragua consulate. Another month later and it was ready to fly to Nicaragua! We wired money to our lawyer for the translation fee and the first half of her fees.
Just last week we heard that everything has been translated and is set to go to family services tomorrow!! Wow, it’s finally there! We are so happy that these last few months have gone smoothly and it’s finally in their hands. Now we wait for Mi Familia to meet and go over the adoption applications, it could be a couple months before they get to ours. There is still a chance that we have missed something, and they could tell us our application isn’t ready yet. On the other hand, they could view our application any time and call us with a referral! We don’t really have a time line, except that it could happen now or it could happen a year from now. Either way, we are super excited to be at this point!
Tomorrow Brad and I start a Spanish class with a few friends. We know we should have started a year ago, but it’s better late than never.
*Update Nov. 19th 2014
It seems like every step we take in this adoption process there is always a hiccup.
We finally have a contract between our Nica lawyer and our agency! We naively thought it would take about two weeks to complete, It turns out it takes a couple months. Now that we have it though, it is definitely a good thing to have. The contract states the process we can expect in Nicaragua, everything we can expect from our lawyer, and all of the fees we are supposed to pay and when. It’s good insurance to have when we are in there, and it’s good to have everyone on the same page. Thankfully, this is one more thing done.
We also assumed we would have all of our paperwork approved by Canada a couple months ago. We still have it at home here, it hasn’t even found it’s way to our agency yet! There is always another thing that needs doing before we can send it. We have recently had it checked over by our lawyer in Nicaragua and she said everything looks good to go. Then yesterday we found out from our agency that we need a psychology report as part of our dossier. This was grey area for us. Most people have said their home study and Dr’s report was sufficient enough and a psych report wasn’t needed. Anyways, I thought I would call the Psychologist recommended by our agency for having a good price. It costs $1000!?! It also takes 4-5 hours?!! We are crossing our fingers that there is some way around this. *Dec 4 Update – Our agency has notified us that our home study has been accepted with out an extra psychology report!! This is such a relief not only because of the fees but it has saved us from a few week of work and waiting!
A couple of weeks ago we had a Quilt Fundraiser. Our mom made 17 quilts that we auctioned off online. We sold all but 2 quilts and made over $2000!! We are so thankful for this money as it keeps our budget on track and relieves a lot of financial stress.
It’s also super encouraging to be supported by friends and family that we never would have been in contact with with out going “public’ :) During the quilt sale, our parents sold their house and their Realtor heard about our fundraiser and donated $1000 of his commission to our adoption. We’ve never even met him!
Thank you so much to everyone that has become part of this journey, every dollar we raise is going towards bringing two children HOME.
Although we have been biting our fingernails and wondering why things haven’t been moving faster for us here in Canada it may not have mattered much anyways. Brad and I are part of a Facebook group of people adopting from Nicaragua and we have heard there has been a slow down there for the last couple months with a change in leadership in Mi Familia. A couple people we know have waited about 4 months to get their dossier approved. Apparently things don’t really happen in December either. It’s not worth it to stress over a couple weeks or even a month. We are slowly learning not to worry about time or money.
Original post July 2014:
Thanks for stopping by! We are so excited to share that we are adopting! It’s been a journey getting to this point and the journey continues. It’s a big step for us to share publicly! We’ve had a lot of ups and downs in the last 7 years and we know things can change in an instant. To be honest, we are still fearful that this isn’t going to work. But that doesn’t change the fact that we need your prayers, love and support! We are pushing ourselves to be more open and to accept the help of our community in order to build a ‘village’ for our children to come home to.
We believe God is working in our lives and as part of our testimony we want to be open and honest through the good and the bad. We’ve been through some lows but we truly believe God has a plan for us bigger than we can understand. We feel privileged to adopt. Even though I (Lorena) have always wanted to adopt, the reality of it is that if we were able to have our own kids we wouldn’t have had the strength, finances and time to commit to it. We feel so fortunate to be on this journey and to share our small lives with a bigger purpose. We can’t wait to meet our kids and give them the love and home that every child deserves. We only wish we could adopt 100 :) Ok, maybe Brad doesn’t wish that…
We officially contacted an agency to start our adoption in December 2013. Since then we have been back and forth on where to adopt from plus getting our BC application and documents in so we could start our home study. For unknown reasons it took a few months to get started, but we finally met our social worker in April. We met with her in the evening once a week for 2 hrs. to complete our home study/education course. We just heard back from the agency yesterday (July 22nd) that we have been APPROVED by Canada! It’s so exciting for us to see things being checked off the list as it means we are getting closer to meeting our children.
It has been very hard to choose a country to adopt from. So many of them are closed to international adoption or are just processing adoptions for older and special needs children. We wanted to adopt from Central America because of its proximity to Canada and because we have traveled there and can see ourselves making trips back and making it a part of our family culture. It was also one of the fastest countries (approx. a year is what we heard from another agency) compared to the 4-6 years in Honduras, a long wait plus age restriction of 5+ in Mexico, rumors of unethical adoption in Guatemala (causing it to suspend all international adoptions), very small adoption numbers in Panama (4 in 2013), closed to adoptions in Columbia, in Costa Rica you have to live there for a year, children are age 8+….
Domestic adoption isn’t easy breezy either. You apply, get put on a list, put your profile out there and then you wait until you are chosen. We know a lot of people who have been waiting over half a year and haven’t heard anything. Then, there is a 30 day time period after the baby is born that a mother can change her mind. There are also a lot more families waiting to be called than there are children available, which is a good thing, don’t get me wrong! Just hard if you are on the waiting end…
Nicaragua hasn’t been an easy choice, our agency has never done an adoption with them and has said over and over “Are you sure you want to proceed with Nicaragua?” It hasn’t been very reassuring, but we’ve stayed strong with the help of an online group of 100+ people going through the same process or having finished an adoption through Nicaragua. Still, we’ve had a couple moments over the last few months wondering if we’re making the right decision.
While not set in stone, we are hoping to adopt two children at once (between the ages of 0-4). Once we receive a referral, the fun begins :) Nicaragua is unique in that one of their requirements is for a ‘fostering’ period. What that means is that once referred, we will live in Nicaragua with our kids for 4-6 months while the paperwork is completed and goes through the court system. While this probably sounds crazy to some of you, there are many benefits to this – one of which is a chance to really bond with the child one on one before bringing him/her/them back to Canada to meet all of you! We aren’t sure on the logistics of this just yet (work/housing). We do have a connection with a couple in Managua (capital city of Nica) who have a house for families going through this exact process. They rent rooms out of their large house for anyone going through the fostering period.
Our trip to Nicaragua in 2011, before we knew we were adopting
We’ve been trying for 7 years to build our own family. You could say we have been on a roller coaster of emotions :) However, we know we are still meant to have a family because through all of these emotional tests Brad and I have loved each other unconditionally, and every day we are still so excited for life’s adventures and can’t wait to share them with our kids.
It started with the usual questions, and doctors’ visits, and ultrasounds, then a Hysterosalpingogram. Waiting for results. The discovery of endometriosis, an infertility specialist appointment in Vancouver where I learned I had a large cyst on my left ovary. Then, surgery in Langley by a different doctor for the endometriosis, a painful recovery, an emotional breakdown when I found out the Dr. wasn’t able to do anything because of the cyst (that was attached to my bowels) which he should have known about beforehand. (The Dr. hadn’t read the specialists report prior to the surgery which would have told him what he discovered during the surgery).
Next, naturopath visits in White Rock for surgery recovery and stress/depression?
More trips to the Vancouver infertility specialist Dr. Cheung. Ultrasounds, another hysterosalpingogram, 6 months later another surgery but with Dr. Cheung instead, and an unbearable three week recovery.
Healing and waiting for full recovery for half a year. Ultrasounds. Thinking I was healed, I felt like “it” should happen every month and then was very let down every month.
A year later back to the specialist in Vancouver to discuss IVF. A couple months go by. Deciding on whether to try IVF and which clinic. Finally deciding. Going to the Vancouver IVF clinic for our first appointment where they tell us it’s not possible, there aren’t enough follicles to even attempt IVF. Another emotional breakdown because this was news to us. We had finally decided to try IVF only to learn that even that couldn’t help us.
Back to Dr. Cheung who moved from Vancouver Women’s to his own IVF clinic called Grace. He was willing to try enhancing my cycle with drugs so that there would be a larger number of follicles. A month of injecting myself with drugs through a needle in my stomach. Ultrasounds in Vancouver a couple times a week. Finally time to withdraw the eggs. The procedure goes surprisingly well and we get 8, even after the other clinic said there wasn’t hope of any. We’re hopeful, but the next day we find out they aren’t fertilizing. We decide to wait a few more days. Then we get the shocking phone call saying that they didn’t fertilize. All the time, finances, and hope. For nothing.
It took us a while to decide what to do next. At first we wanted to try again but realized after some time that we probably weren’t the best candidates.
After a year of praying, waiting and deciding Brad and I finally started the adoption process. It wasn’t an easy decision. We had a plan of how things were supposed to go in our life and when they didn’t work out that way it took us some time to process. But, we knew we still wanted a family.
A whole other part of the story is the emotional side. Besides all of the Dr.’s visits, trips down-town, surgeries, research and decisions, we’ve had to deal with our emotions. Even writing these words bring me to tears. Sometimes the weight of it all pours out.
For me, it’s obviously hard that I can’t have kids like most women. Like every girl, I grew up thinking and talking about having kids as a given. It’s been really hard seeing all of my friends go through the stages of marriage, pregnancy and family. It’s been hard being in love with my nephews and nieces and not having my own kids grow up with them. But, even harder than all of that is not being able to give Brad what he grew up anticipating. I love him so much that I want him to have everything he deserves, and I’m the one taking it away. Brad has obviously had his own struggles though out it all, but he has always encouraged me and has never blamed me. There is nothing more he could have done to support me than how he showed his love to me throughout everything.
When I was in high school I remember praying a very real prayer that God would break my life so that I would know him better and be a better witness for him. I prayed this more than once and I can specifically remember where I was standing when I prayed this 17 years ago. I obviously didn’t know what I was asking for. Unfortunately I also didn’t realize this would affect my future husband. I guess I should have mentioned it to Brad before we got married?!
We have been hurt, and we still cry about the past but we couldn’t be more excited for the future. We know God’s vision for our lives surpasses our understanding. And we hope that we continue to grow in our faith and trust. We truly are thankful that we have been pushed past our boundaries and we pray that we continue to find our strength in God and follow His will.
Congratulations on your graduation girls! This was such a great idea to end your high school years with. I know these pictures will be so important as you go your different ways throughout the years.
Such a cute family! These pictures were taken way back in September at Powell Beach. Don’t ask me why I haven’t posted them sooner?! This year went by so fast, I seriously can’t believe it’s summer again.
Elle & Dee 