Finally...an Update!

It has been 2 years since we last updated you on our Foster Parenting Journey. A lot has happened in 2 years! With the 2 year anniversary of "Joey's" placement right around the corner and November being National Adoption Awareness Month we thought it would be a perfect opportunity to share what has been happening in our journey! How about we start where we left off…

“Damien” (a short-term placement) was a part of our family until January 2014. He was able to be reunified with extended family including his 3 siblings (just as the placement workers told us he would, it just took about a month longer than expected.) The night we dropped him off we also found out we were pregnant with our first biological child. I remember experiencing a mix of emotions. We were sad to say goodbye to Damien. He was such a happy, outgoing and funny kid. In our sadness, we were also surprised and excited to be pregnant. Turns out the pregnancy was not an easy one and we were not able to take any more placements. Damien was our last placement since November 2013!

In September 2014 we welcomed our first biological child Elijah (real name!) into our family. Our first birth child was an instant sibling. An instant little brother! In the midst of all these changes and happenings Joey has been constant. He was placed with us a week before Damien and he has remained a part of our family for these past 2 years! Joey went from only child (for a week) to youngest to only child to finally oldest child and he has been the most incredible big brother. It gives us unspeakable joy to announce, we will be adopting Joey into our family forever, hopefully before the end of this year! 

Another thing we experienced since we last updated is that we moved. We were living in community with Paul’s siblings and their families in the home he grew up in. This summer, that home that had been in the family 30 years needed to be sold and so we all moved into our own individual homes. There were 6 children aged 4 and under on the property and it was a difficult transition at first for Joey, but now he is thriving as truly the oldest child in our home and he still gets to see his cousins often!

We are currently looking forward to welcoming short-term placements into our home. We will be a Way Station family. This means we will have children placed with us that most likely have a relative that can take them long-term, but that relative needs a background check and home inspection first. So these placements are meant to be temporary, usually less than 30 days. (Damien’s placement is a perfect example of this.) Our capacity is 1 child of either gender, under the age of 3. We notice Joey thrives most when he is the oldest in our home and so we are making it a priority that he stays the oldest for his best interest. Way Station will be a great way to see how our boys respond to bringing another child into our home for an extended period of time. One of the nice things about Way Station is that if we need to take a short break for whatever reason the short-term placement system makes it easy to do that. We hope to be able to welcome long-term placements in the future.

The first 30 days of a placement are the hardest. And we signed up to do the first 30 days over and over and over again. We are bracing ourselves for a wild ride that will be full of adjustments, stress and inconveniences but also immeasurable rewards. We look forward to teaching our boys how to care for people in need and also help them learn and grow from grieving the loss of a beloved foster sibling. We are excited to see how these little children will grow each of us to know God and love people in a deeper and more meaningful way. These precious children will easily give us more in 30 days than we will give them.

We'll keep you posted!