Vacations

In the middle of the winter, I long for summer. Who dosen't, right?! 

Summer is one of our absolute favorite seasons. Following closely behind fall for me.

We try to be as active in the summer as we can. We LOVE go up to Bear Lake to Dave's families cabins as often as we can to play and hang out with the fam. We have a really nice beach area to lay out in or play in the sand. There are jet skis and four wheelers and a boat and floaty things to lay on the water with, and it is just a ball every time we go up! And you cannot forget to stop and get a fresh raspberry shake! 

We also like to venture into Montpelier where my Grandma and Grandpa lived before they passed away.

His family also has a time share at Snowbird, so we go there every year towards the end of summer/beginning of fall time too. There is hiking and a hot tub and swimming and just venturing all over, and they have some fun activities to do and it's a blast! We take that time to wind down and relax mostly. 

While Dave was working, I went with my family to my great uncles gorgeous house/cabin over by Park City and we played mostly all day inside and outside and on the snowmobiles, it was a BLAST!

Dave

This is the part where you get to learn a little about me. I’m a simple guy, really. I was born in Salt Lake City to two wonderful parents. I’m the eldest of six siblings. My father is an Orthopedic Surgeon who used the Air Force to pay for medical school, and as a result we moved pretty frequently. He got out of the military in 1996 and we moved back to Utah where he set up a practice and my family has been there ever since.

            I’m kind of an atypical guy. I’m not into sports or outdoorsy stuff at all. I discovered a love of books and reading early on and became a nerd. I got heavily into Star Trek and all things geeky and never once regretted it.

            I graduated from Clearfield High School in 2001. I had been active in the JROTC program there and had a blast doing so. From 2001-2003 I served as a missionary in the California, Sacramento Mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I met a lot of neat people and had some amazing experiences during those two years.

            After my return from California, I attended Weber State University in Ogden, Utah where I graduated in 2010 with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Criminal Justice. The plan was to find work with a police agency, but the economic situation at the time kept me from being able to afford attending the police academy. I found work with a Illinois-based private detective agency in 2011 and have been doing surveillance work as a Private Investigator since.

            In 2008, a friend of mine set me up with a wonderful girl named Hannah, and in June of 2009 we were married in the Salt Lake City Temple. This June will mark our fifth wedding anniversary and we couldn’t be happier together.

            So there you have it. David M. Cook in a nutshell.  

Hannah

I was born in Idaho, and I was adopted. I know and understand a lot that has to do with adoption seeing it firsthand, and how being adopted feels like and also what my parents have gone through and with my sisters adoption as well. I have always known I was adopted, and growing up (and still today) I was very proud to say "I am adopted!!" When I was little, my adoption story was my favorite bedtime story to be told to me. One of my favorite movies is Annie. Because its a story of adoption and I could "relate" not the Miss. Hannigan part of course, but the other parts. I even have curly hair. So Annie and my hair even matched-which was even cooler!! I have not found my Birth Mother yet. I hold her dear to my heart and thank her every day and pray for her. I want to find her some day and hug her and tell her thank you for giving me to wonderful parents and giving me a life she knows she couldn't give me.

I grew up all over the country. I have lived in every "I" state, Washington, and Utah twice. It was fun and quite the adventure moving all over and seeing different parts of the United States. When I was 11 we moved back to Utah where we have stayed for 12 years. Looking back, I have gone to 4 elementary schools, 2 Jr high schools (boundary changes) and 1 high school.

High school was so much fun. I miss it all the time. I miss being a social butterfly who knew everyone and Ballroom Dancing. I also was in FCCLA too. No suprise there, with all the cooking. And I also miss Orchestra! I went to a different high school just for orchestra. We were really good! We always went to State competitions and we even went to Nationals in California my Junior year. I also worked at the public pool. I loved that job!! I would go swim laps in the mornings and in the summer I would get really really tan.
After I graduated high school, I got my CNA and and worked at a hospital for 2 1/2 years where I learned a lot and how much I love the healthcare field. I also learned I apreciate CNA's and that I never want to be one again. At that time I was married and I was taking what we call "crazy pills" and I took about a year off work to cope with the side effects.

 Durring that time I went to Dental Assisting school where I discovered I love everything "dentaly". I have since tried to find a job and it's super competitive around here and the dentists really want assistants with experience.

 So as I have been looking for a DA job, I worked as a Phlebotomist for Baxter Global Services at Biolife, a local plasma center for about 10 months. I learned new skills and I found out I am pretty good at phlebotomy and my co-workers were fabulous, and I still keep in touch with some of them. I had to quit and find a job where I didnt have to be on my feet all the time because of more meds and new side effects like being dizzy and wanting to pass out and so forth.
Then I worked for the government for a few months under the ACA. I signed people up and helped people pick insurance plans. I learned a lot about insurance. It was a good experience. I now am at home working on getting IVF put together and getting this adoption ball rolling.
I do plan on going back to school to get a degree in the future, but its not in the cards at the moment.

I also have a sister who was also adopted. She is a senior in high school and is an artist and loves anything with art. She loves music and is funny and has an awesome sense of style and humor.

My mom works for a product placement company part time and is awesome at sewing and cooking. I have learned a lot from her and have lots of respect for her.

My dad works for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints as a Manager for an Employment Center and was our wards bishop when I was in the churches youth program. I admire him and his knowledge about the church and how important it is to him and how he loves to serve others.

And how can I forget Daisy. Our family dog. She is spunky and has so much attitude. LOVE YOU DAIS!!!

Infertility

About three months after we were married, we decided it was time to start a family. Every month around "that time" we would hold our breath and say a prayer. After a year of all negatives and starting to feel a little lost and starting the emotional roller coaster, we went to the doctor who put me on Provera and Metformin. After another year of no success, I went to see another doctor to get another opinion because they were just giving me medication and we wanted to move forward.
When we want something, we stick with it and work hard for it.
So a friend recomended this next doctor. In our first visit, he did more for us and gave us a TON more information than my old doctor had that whole year. YAY!! He drew some blood and did some other tests and the results came back that I have PCOS and there looked to be some issues with my uterus. So from there he recomeded we try Clomid. Oh. My. Gosh. We don't like that stuff at our house. The side effects were crazy. I got sooo HOT I would have the windows open, and this was in the middle of winter. I could see faces in rocks and other objects, and nothing sounded good to eat, and the list goes on and on. But anyway, that medication didn't work either.THEN after he did everything he could think of he decided to send me to a infertility specialist.
So last January we started seeing my current doctor, and he wanted me to try Femara, Letrozal and Metformin. That was a way better med cocktail than Clomid on its own any day. He then would check with an ultrasound to see how my cysts were doing every visit. With PCOS, the cysts that grow on your ovaries can either shrink or get really big. Luckily mine are very small if not gone.  I also have an issue with ovulating as well. We found out that I had never ovulated.
 So we scheduled an HSG test (its more of a procedure, really) at the hospital where they were able to unblock one of my fallopian tubes, but the other one, as hard as he tried to push the dye through, wouldn't unblock. So now I am able to ovulate half the time. But the way your ovaries are set up it doesn't switch back and forth every other month. So we really don't know when I ovulate unless I test for it. I also have some scar tissue from an infection I had. (I promise I am clean, everyone gets an infection at least once in their life) I have a spot of something on the outside of my unblocked tube that makes it hard for things to come in and out. We've also been trying IUIs and I'm looking at yet another doctor that I've heard is really successful with IVF.

Now with Mr. Dave... some of his "little guys" are slow and misshapen, so the doctor perscribed him a supplement that helps with that.
I so wish I had his issue. He gets it so easy.

So basically, it is REALLY hard for us to have kids and we REALLY want a family. It is so important to us, and this is one big reason why we are looking at adoption.

Meet the Cooks!

Hi there!
We, as indicated above, are the Cooks, Dave and Hannah. Hannah had this awesome idea to start an adoption blog, because that's what we want to do, so here we are and here is our story! We've been married for 4 and a half years, having been married in the Salt Lake City LDS temple in June of 2009. We're a rare blind-date success story. A mutual friend had asked Dave to accompany her to rescue Hannah from a really, really bad date. Seriously, no bueno. Not long after, Dave asked Hannah out and the rest, as they say, is history.

 Dave is 31 years old. He was born in Salt Lake City, but moved all over the country with his family before settling in Utah as a teenager. After serving a mission in Sacramento, California he graduated from Weber State Univerity with a Bachelor's Degree in Criminal Justice, and has been working as a Private Investigator for the last two and a half years. He's preparing to return to school to work on a Master's Degree in Psychology and from there go on to earn a doctorate. He's kind of a huge nerd. Dave is a hard core Trekker and enjoys science fiction and fantasy novels, as well as the occasional video game.

Hannah is 23 and was adopted from Boise, Idaho when she was less than a day old. She also moved around a lot as a child before also settling in Utah. She has worked as a CNA, a phlebotomist, and helped people sign up for the ACA. Hannah really enjoys cooking and is amazing at it. Seriously, she has become something of a legend in Dave's family. Upon learning that she had been asked to bring the same type of dish as Hannah to Thanksgiving dinner one of Dave's aunts was heard to lament, "I brought the same thing as Hannah? Now no one is going to eat mine!" She was wrong of course. Hers did get eaten. The fact that it was only after Hannah's dish had all been eaten was probably just a coincidence.
Hannah received a Kitchenaid stand mixer for Christmas and oh my gosh you guys. Its like she took happiness and sunshine and turned them into food. Hannah also ennjoys yoga and is really into Essetial Oils, playing her violin, and finding projects on Pintrest. When Dave is away for work, she likes hanging out with her BFF Chelsee.

We like to play board games with each other and snuggle up to watch movies. For the past couple of years, we've enjoyed going to see a local improv comedy troupe on Friday nights. In the summer, we like to spend time with Dave's family at Bear Lake and go boating and ride jet skis.

Long story short- we're awesome. We have been trying to start a family for over four years with no success. When we learned that we were dealing with infertility, we began trying everything we could think of to get pregnant to no avail. Now, we're hoping to adopt. Hannah was adopted herself, along with her younger sister, and has always wanted to welcome an adopted child or children into our hearts and home. Dave has family members who were adopted and has also seen firsthand the blessings and miracles adoption can bring.
That's the purpose of this blog. We're trying to find a birth mother who is willing to give us that greatest of gifts: a child. If you're a birth mother who has found this, we hope that as you follow this blog and get to know us you'll consider placing your little one with us. We're open to an open adoption, and are willing to help meet your needs.
You can contact us at davidandhannahadopt@gmail.com.