The prep course...

We arrive early and report to the bustling front desk of the County Council building. The receptionist exclaims particularly loudly "Are you here for the Adoption Prep Course?" Every eye in the foyer turns to look at us with a look I am so familiar with by now. A kind of curiousness with a sprinkling of pity.

The room is all set up with large tables piled high with paperwork and much to my delight,  a plate of biscuits in the centre. Slowly more people start to arrive and we realise how lucky we are. Being locals and living so close, we know the area and sneaky car parking pretty well and are by far the most relaxed of all the people there. We spend the next 4 days of the prep course getting to know these prospective adopters really well as most of our time is spent doing case studies in groups and then presenting our findings and discussions to the class. It dawns on me how lucky I am to have absolutely no fear of standing up in a room full of people and speaking. So many of the group really had to face their worst fears by doing this and I commend them for that. Bit like asking me to stop eating cake really....

The content of the course is intense and covers a child's brain development, medical issues, trauma and attachment disorders, child therapy,  the adoption process incl. legal matters and we have numerous guest speakers all who have invaluable information and experiences to share.

We are such a complex mix of prospective adopters and on the last day I glance round the room and wonder how many of these people will we continue to stay in contact with. There's a lesbian couple, a couple of single adopters, and a number of older couples who already have children. There is one couple who we immediately 'click' with and for blogging purposes they will now be referred to as the Fraig's.They have the same silly sense of humour as us ( I will admit, there's something hugeley comforting when people laugh with you rather than at you!) They too have dogs and I can see us being a huge support for one another.
There is another couple who specifically want to adopt a disabled child. I have the most immense amount of respect for them. Let's call her Mrs. Rainbow. She makes me laugh when she says it's 'no biggy as they already have 2 children and the youngest (a teenager) is disabled and they are already familiar with that circle of life and she just wants to give another child a better life.' Phew! This makes me realise that we really need to think about what sort of child we would like to adopt. In all honesty, I am not sure we are ready for a disabled child. Does that make me a bad person? Mrs Rainbow assures me it doesn't.

We leave on the last day with our mountain of paperwork and feeling a little giddy with excitement. They quickly bring us back to reality when they announce it takes 8 weeks for them to allocate us a social worker for our home study. 8 whole weeks...I will admit, I am dissapointed. I am so ready for this but I guess we are just going to have to wait. I while away the weekends baking and we go away for a few camping weekends. While we sit around the campfire telling ghost stories and gazing up at the big night sky, I simply cannot wait to take our little ones(s) camping with us. Baking wise, I have a few cakes to make for friends, my favourite being a vintage rose cake for a 70th. I spend hours making this....I mean its not like I don't have the time on my hands.

Campfire mallows

Vintage Rose Cake