Quick August Update

I can't believe it is August! This is the month that was for so long projected to be the month we opened our home for a foster placement. Well, hold on to your horses...we are pushing back one month. Tomorrow is my last day with Amerita, the company I have worked for the past five years. And later this month I will start a new job and a hospital just up the road from our house. So I need a few weeks to settle in to a new job and a new schedule before this life change. Also as it turns out we have to retake a couple classes because we started our classes in August last year and a couple are required annually. SO...we need a little more time to get everything worked out. But we are super excited! And I hope to have even more updates this month as we get closer and closer to becoming parents. :)

This Is For All of Us

In the beginning I said that I would post resources along the way and I haven't done that in a while so here are two.

Find your future children!!!

Okay so I made up that name, but the link will take you to adoptchildren.org, or the Texas Adoption Resource Exchange website. One there you can look at pictures of children waiting for parents to claim them forever in their family and love them. Because I know that there are others God is calling, to step out of their comfort zone and be His hands and feet to children who need parents. I am praying for you!!!

And for those of you who are thinking, "something is pulling on my heart but not adoption" that's great too! Here is a link to The Radiance Foundation. I met a guy named Ryan Bomberger at an event last week and his organization has great visual media that we can all learn from, and more ideas on how to get involved. His story is pretty cool too. His biological mother was raped and she chose to give birth to him. She also chose parents to raise him so he was adopted by parents who adopted 10 kids! He is black, parents are white, there's all kinds of fun "issues" in there that didn't turn out the way the world tells you they will!

Check out the Radiance Foundation!

Foster Focused

Late August is when we will open up our home for a foster placement. God willing, Trey will be all finished with paramedic school and the national board exam mid July, we hope to take some vacation time and we have the wedding of a close friend mid-August. So, late August we should be back into our routine and ready to be parents. That sounds crazy! Is anyone ever "ready" to parents? You guys tell me! We feel ready and are incredibly excited but nervous at the same time.

Foster care in Texas goes a little bit like this...
     1. Incident reported to CPS   
     2. CPS shows up and decides if kids should be removed from the situation
     3. CPS calls agencies to report number of kids needing placement and their age(s)      
     4. Each agency finds a family to take the kid(s)  
     5. When a family says YES the agency calls CPS
     6. The first agency to call back "wins"

What that looks like on our side...
     1. Phone rings to Trey or Caroline any time of the day or night
     2. Covenant Kids says something like "we got called on 2 kids, 3 year old and 5 year old, can you take them in the next few hours?"
     3. Whoever answers says yes or no (no time to call the other if we aren't together)
     4. Covenant Kids calls back to say if and when a social worker will be bringing the kids to our home
     5. We freak out and head home from wherever we are!

We are will open our home for up to two kids (most likely siblings) between ages 2-6 years old, boys girls or one of each. Once they are placed in our home the parents will have court hearings at appointed intervals and the judge will decide first if foster care is necessary and then what the parent(s) must do to get them back. At any point in the process, family members can step up and say they can care for the children and a homestudy will be conducted to make sure they can provide a safe environment. The goal of the state is for family to raise family.

Adoption, which is our desire and long term goal, is far in the future. Parents whose children are in foster care have one year from the time children were placed to comply with the judge's orders and get their children back, before their parental rights are terminated. And they can request a 30-day extension. Also, family members can come forward at any point in the process to care for the kids. After 13 months in foster care, if the parents did not comply with the judge (and their parental rights are terminated) and no family wants to or is deemed safe to care for the children, THEN they will be considered waiting for adoption.

All that to say, we will be foster parents for 13 months at the very least before moving towards adoption. If at any point the children placed in our home are re-joined to their biological families we will start the process over.

It Is Good

James 1:27 Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our Father is this; to visit orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

Lately I have been noticing how many people tell me how good it is that we are going to be foster parents and one day adopt. Some have even told me that they have told their friends who also say what a good thing it is. So we want to give credit where credit is due. God is good and we are vessels for His goodness. He loves orphans and children more than we can imagine and charges christians, in the bible, to care for them. And He has put in our hearts to do that by caring for children who are temporarily without parents (foster care) and some day to adopt orphans and give them a permanent family.

We agree that it is good to care for foster children and orphans and hope that everyone who reads this will consider asking God how you can be a vessel for His goodness. Because when we take part in something God is doing, we will be blessed as well.

And if you don't believe God is good, ask Him if it's true. I believe He will answer you. 

Timeline

Happy New Year! We are getting so excited about all that may happen in 2012. It is crazy to think this is the year we could become parents. And for those of you wondering "when are y'all going to get the show on the road??" here is our timeline... and some details below.

January: Paramedic School, Finish Paperwork
February: Paramedic School, Homestudy (hopefully)
March, April: Paramedic School
May: Trey's Clinical Rotations
June: Trey's Ambulance rides for training
July: Trey will be assigned a semi-permanent station (hopefully), we will adjust to being back on his 24hrs on/48 hrs off schedule and open up our home for a foster placement!

For those of you who haven't heard, Trey started paramedic school on Tuesday. He is already an EMT and has been riding the fire engine and fire trucks since July 2010, but Dallas Fire Department requires all firefighters to become paramedics before they can ride the ambulance. And he has to be able to do shifts on the ambulance before he can get a permanent spot at a station. Thankfully Dallas sends the guys (and gals) to school and he has reunited with his buddies from the fire academy, which has been fun for him. For the first few months, Trey will go to school Monday through Friday from 7am-4pm. So we actually see each other every day and will have whole weekends together! We plan to use some of them to finish up the paperwork (which took the back burner during the holidays), get our homestudy completed and become officially verified through the state as foster/adoptive parents. We are waiting to settle into a predictable routine before opening up our home for a placement.

More on the "Why"

Everyone grows up looking at things a certain way. Either the way things were, the way things were taught to them...everyone has their paradigm through which they look at life. Adoption is the same way. It may surprise you how many people have offered me names/numbers of a fertility specialist. For many people when they hear the word "adoption" they also hear "we can't get pregnant".  And I don't blame anyone for that perspective because I know that is how many people have come to know about adoption. We enjoy our opportunities to expose more people to the heart of why we are going to adopt.  

The verse under our picture (on this blog) is Jesus telling us to love others as He loved us. He loved us first and after we accept His love we then have something to offer others. I engraved that verse in Trey's wedding ring because my promise to him in marriage is to love him like Christ loves me; unconditionally. And that is the same way we view our commitment to our future children. 

A friend shared with me an article where a pastor acknowledges that God tells all Christians to care for widows and orphans, but warns that not all should adopt. He addresses the truth that adoption should not be to meet the needs and/or wants of the parents, but adopting and parenting for that matter is a selfless act of loving someone in need. Please read it and expose yourself to what may be a paradigm shift. :)  Click here to read: Don't Adopt!

Where We Are In The Process

Our agency is called Covenant Kids (will refer to as CK) and has locations in Arlington and Plano. We chose them for several reasons. First we knew others at our church had used them and had good experiences. Also since the agency provides all the training and on-going support, we wanted a Christian organization that would be coming from a biblical perspective. And lastly they only required us to have been married one year rather than two.

In June our official process began...and let me say it is a PROCESS. Here is an overview of the steps and where we are in them. (This can take from 4 months-1 year, depending on how much free time you have.)

1. Application - Completed and submitted in June.
2. Training - Started in July doing several hours each month. We have completed 25 of 30 hours.  Training includes all kinds of things including learning "the system", meds for ADHD & depression, CPR, first aid, abuse and neglect, behavior modification, SIDS and shaken baby syndrome, and everything in between. 
3. Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork - We are making our way through this part. They want a copy of every official document you have had in your life plus things you have probably not thought about in your life. Here are some examples: driver's license, marriage license, SS card, transcripts, auto insurance, home insurance, pet vaccinations, health insurance, home floor plan (drawn) with escape routes, driving record, fire inspection, health inspection, house rules/consequences/rewards, disaster plan, daily routine (weekday & weekend), personal referrals. 
4. Required Reading: We are required to read The Connected Child and The Whole Life Adoption Book and recommended to also read Beyond Consequences, Logic and Control. (The links provided will take to sites where you can learn what these books are about.)
5. Home study: This will not be completed until all our paperwork and training is submitted. We are projecting end of the year. Once this is completed, reviewed (which can take 30 days) and approved, we will be a verified home. 

We have already learned SO MUCH. There have been many times we wished we could bring a group of family and friends with us. If you want to know more, and we hope that many of you do because you are close enough to us that you will be an intimate part of our family or because God is leading you down the same road, please read a book! CK suggests The Connected Child if you choose just one. 

For more information on our agency and because they have links to many more resources, check out:  http://www.covenantkids.org/