Our Adoption Story: We Meet Natalie

We planned a special trip to Utah to meet Natalie.  We were so excited to meet her in person.  But OH SO nervous.  I thought it was really cute that Natalie told us later that night that she had been nervous too!  Probably a lot of the same kind of thoughts were running through all our heads. 

We planned to meet at the LDS family services office.  Once we arrived, we were greeted by Natalie’s caseworker.  We talked with her for a minute before she left to go get Natalie.  Cue the heart attack.  I really was dying.  What if I said the wrong thing?  What if we were different in person than she had expected?

Then, there she was.  Our sweet Natalie.  One of the first things I noticed about her was how beautiful she was.  She seriously is the most gorgeous girl (who had the most petite little baby bump even though she was like seven months pregnant for Pete's sakes).  And she has this goodness about her.  She is so genuine and just has this light in her eyes.  A person can’t possibly say too many good things about Natalie for my taste.  We adore her. 

We had a really good visit.  Natalie’s aunt and uncle were there too.  They are such awesome people.  Very fun to be around.  They had adopted two children themselves, so it was so neat to hear their perspective from the adoptive parent side as well as the birth relative side. 

It was amazing to finally be able to speak in person.  We talked about baby names and what we wanted in an open adoption. 

My favorite part of the evening was when Natalie let us feel the baby kick.  It was seriously the most precious thing of my life, feeling him bounce around in there.  I totally fell in love with that little jumping bean.  It was so kind of Natalie to let us experience that.  It was so special.  We talked about it the whole car ride home.

It was hard to believe that we would get to meet the little guy in person in just a few months…