The placements of Little Man and Peanut.

Well, this post is coming late. But we've been so busy as a family of five now I keep forgetting to update the blog. I want to keep this going though so I have a running record of our foster care journey.

October 14, 2013.

Josh and I were laying in bed. He was asleep and I was flipping through my Parent's magazine. I came across a little coupon for a Carseat Canopy, FREE, just pay shipping. So I did. Then they sent me a coupon for a free sling, just pay shipping. So I did.

After I was done ordering it, I took a picture of the ad to share on Instagram with the #fostercarecrew about how I'd just ordered them and didn't know if I would ever get to use them (not knowing if we'd get a placement that young). And before I could hit "post" my phone rang.

10:15pm. I smacked Josh as I answered the phone to a number I didn't recognize. This was our conversation.

PC (placement coordinator): Mrs. Holly?
Me: Yes. This is her.
PC: Hi, this is Br****, the placement coordinator for FIT.
Me: Yes, ma'am.
PC: We have a possible placement. Two kids. One would come tonight. 2.5 year old anglo boy. His brother was born today. Taken for (classified)....
*she continues talking*
Me: Yes. We will take them
PC: No behaviors as far as we know. And we aren't sure when the baby will be released.
Me: Okay...when can the bring the older one.
*PC still trying to give me info about the boys*
Me: How long until they are here to drop of the older one?

Then we worked out the details.

11:45pm We see a car pull up. Josh didn't even wait for them to bring him inside. As soon as Josh got to the car, Little Man (which is what we call him for online postings) reached straight for him. When they got inside, he reached for me.

He went straight to the playroom and played while we signed all the paperwork. He was just so curious. He didn't speak much. Mostly babble that you couldn't understand if you had tried. And he screamed. A lot.

2:30am...he finally passed out on the couch after many failed attempts to get him down other places/ways.

October 15th, 2013.

We were up bright and early to take Rylie to school. After dropping her off we headed to a couple different stores gathering clothes, shoes, and his favorite foods. And he screamed. A lot. It was like that was his only way to communicate. Put him in the carseat. Scream. Take him out. Scream. Make him sit in a cart. Scream. Hold him. Scream. When he wasn't screaming though, he was giving me the biggest hugs, and the most beautiful smiles.

I picked Rylie up from school at 2:30 and we headed home. At 4:00 I got a phone call from our agency.

They were releasing Peanut from the hospital, and they wanted to drop him off at our house before 6:00pm.

Wait? Released already. I couldn't believe it. But we went with it. That's what we do best around here. We roll with the punches and we just make things work. So I went ahead and pulled all our newborn boy stuff out. Set up the swing. Before I even had everything put away the case worker pulled up. Josh wasn't even home from work yet. So we sat and chatted while I snuggled the most beautiful 36 hour old baby boy I'd ever seen.

Life has been crazy, but I'm happy to report that both boys are adjusting wonderfully.

Peanut is growing like a weed and sleeps through the night (for the most part), and Little Man has an ever growing vocabulary, his speech is improving daily, and he screams very seldom to attempt obtaining what he's wanting.

I'm a momtog.

I've had a lot of people ask me what a "momtog" is. So, here I am, explaining.

I'm a mom of one sweet, beautiful little girl who I adore and love with more pieces of my being than I ever thought was humanly possible.  She's pretty amazing, if I do say so myself.
I could seriously write for days about how awesome I think my kid is, but I'll spare you. ;)

I am also a photographer. I own a studio in our downtown. It's a charming little building in which I share the space with a dear friend who owns a children's boutique. In the photography world the word photographer is often shortened to photog.

Do you get where I'm going with this? I'm a mom. And a photog. Making me a momtog.

I kinda really love my job.
Both of them.

So since every post is better with pictures. Here are some phone shots of me and my daughter at dinner the other night after her dance class. ;) (And if you want to check out some better pictures that I've taken head on over to my website!) :)

"We are all clear..."

I just got the call from our agency that we are all set. Our license has been approved and we are officially licensed foster parents.

Now we wait for THE call.

The one that will really start the newest chapter in our journey.

Waiting...waiting...waiting...

Yesterday was three months since our application was received by our agency.

We've waited for the application to be reviewed.
Waited for the background checks to be completed.
Waited for classes to be available.
Waited for inspections.
Waited for the agency to receive our fingerprinting.
Waited for our home study.
Waited for our home study to be turned in and then reviewed.
Waited to sign for our home verification.
And now we are waiting on the state to approve our license.

After we have our license, we will wait for our first call for placements. I'm tired of waiting.

All I can think about is the kids who will come into our home.

What have they been through? How much love are they getting right now? Do they have anyone who hugs them? What will they be like? What kinds of things will they like to do? Will they be angry, or sad, or maybe both? How old are they? Will they be the ones who stay with us forever, or will we be able to reunite them with their birth families?

We have this empty room in our house that can be filled by them. And I have an empty place in my heart waiting for them. And I'm ready for both to be filled.

God has perfect timing and he has the perfect children for us.
But I can't stop checking my phone. Praying for a call that we are licensed, and our home is open.

"I want to be a ballerina teacher when I get big..."

Year two of dance started tonight. Tap and Ballet. This kid absolutely l.o.v.e.s dance. She would wear her ballet shoes and leotard everywhere we went if I would let her. You heard me right. She prefers ballet over tap.

Which I can't say I mind one bit.

I love seeing her so excited about something. It never gets old watching her eyes light up when she realizes that "TODAY IS DANCE DAY!"

So here are some pictures of my super awesome kiddo, learning to be what she wants to be when she gets big.
Because every post is better with pictures.

Cheers to year two. May it be as awesome as year one.

Our Foster Kid's Room

I wanted so badly to see what other foster parents had set up for their kiddos. I wanted to know how they were keeping it gender neutral. So here is a post for those new foster parents getting their room ready. Here's some detailed photos of what's in our foster room. 

One thing we have decided (the reason the bed looks very bare), is that we are going to take our kiddos shopping to get their own bedding that they like, and we will move the decorations around to match their likes. :)

I kind of really, really love this room. I'm so ready for it to be filled with kiddos. 

Getting Ready for Foster Care

After we turned in our application to our agency in late June, I hit everything full force. I was filling out paperwork like a mad woman, and gathering everything we could possibly need to care for children in our age range.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the many other blogs about foster families getting their kid's rooms together, dealing with the paperwork (which seems never ending), and I especially loved to blogs about all the craziness involved with foster care. 

This post will be a photo blog about our journey so far. 

It all started with this dresser. It was mine when I was a little girl. Somewhere along the way it was painted lots of different colors. So we took it back to the way I remembered it. Plain white. :)

 This was the foster room after doing a little clean up and using some primer over the marks that somehow covered the walls!

 

I did a little online shopping to get one new outfit for each size/gender of the kiddos we could be taking in. I wanted to make sure that they had some clean clothes when they first get placed with us, before we have a chance to go shopping. And OH was I ever surprised when I came across a MEGA sale at Target online!

While on our anniversary trip this summer we did a little shopping and came home with an infant carseat and a new crib. When we were at Target the carseat was marked at $99.99. At check-out we discovered that it had been marked down to $38.98! *insert happy dance here* 

Rylie-bug helping paint the foster room! She's been such a big helper! :)

We obviously had to remove the old deck that was splintering, and was in HORRIBLE condition. We replaced with with two floating decks, and some awesome mulch. All these iPhone pictures don't do it justice. Plus, I have all kinds of cute decorations that need to be put out here! 

We've been SO blessed by donations from friends and family! I'm pretty sure we will have the best dressed kids in town!

There has been SO much more done to our house to get it ready that I haven't included here. We completely redid our playroom, had to rearrange door knobs, fire extinguishers installed, rearrange our cabinets, and pantry to get everything right where they tell you to have it! So much more that I wish I would have taken pictures of! :)

This brings us to where we are now. Waiting.

Waiting for them to finish writing our home study, and get our license ready for signing. 

I'm not good at waiting.

I.am.so.ready.to.have.placements. 

God's timing is perfect. God's timing is what we are waiting on. 

I'm just ready for that time to be here.

PS. Please excuse the poor iPhone quality pictures from this post. :)

I'm going to do a blog that is JUST about the foster kid's room. I'm pretty proud of how I was able to keep it gender and age neutral!