Life as Foster Parent

Baby E had trouble sleeping last night, so Holly stayed up to try and comfort her while I tried to sleep. When I awoke this morning, I found Holly and E. lying fast asleep on the floor in the baby room. E. was wrapped in her blanket and Holly was wrapped in her sleeping bag. I tried to get the camera before they woke up, but our meowing cats spoiled the moment before I could snap the shot.

When we signed up to be Foster Parents we knew it was going to be emotional, but you never really know anything until you have experienced it first hand. Well, we got our first dose of Foster Parenting today at 2:00 when DHS (Department of Human Services) called and said that the judge ordered DHS to return E. to her family. We had a doctors appointment scheduled for her at 2:30, so E's case worker met us at the clinic to pick her up. We fed her a bottle, gave her kisses, prayed for her and said our good byes. It is amazing how much love you can feel for a baby only after 24 hours.

Baby E.

God brought Baby E. into our lives today. She is a very sweet and beautiful baby and we feel very blessed to have her in our home. Because our blog is public, we will have to keep things pretty generic, but we look forward to sharing our foster parenting journey with you.

Finally Foster Parents

Yesterday we officially became certified as foster parents. We were made aware of this in two very real ways: we received a certificate in the mail, and we received a phone call from our caseworker asking us if we would be willing to take two little brothers (ages 1 and 7) who had been taken from their home that day due to extremely unsanitary living conditions. Robert received the call and left me a message while I was teaching. We waited for the next few hours to hear if we would really be bringing these two little boys into our home. At about 5:00 Robert received another phone call letting him know that a grandma had been found in a nearby county and had been approved to take the boys. So the call yesterday was a bit of a false alarm, but it was also a very real indicator that we may be welcoming children into our home at any moment. Please pray for the little boys who were removed from their home yesterday. And also, that God would help us prepare ourselves for the first child / children that we welcome into our home.