Life under a rock

**I wrote this blog post a week ago but it's just been sitting on my desktop, waiting.  Honestly, I wasn't sure if I was going to post it or not.  It's very personal and I wrote it mainly to just get some thoughts out of my head.  I'm one of those that it really does help to write things down.  

I am choosing to go ahead and post it so that those that follow will know the true ups and downs of this journey.  I'm grateful for the path we are on but that has never made it easy or even enjoyable.**

This title can be taken one of three ways, all of which apply, but only one that I meant for this post.

1) We are living under the Rock of Ages (Jesus).  This is absolutely true and most days it’s the only thing that keeps us going, giving us hope and strength.

2) The weight on our shoulders, stress of unknown, feels like a boulder.

3) But lastly, the last two months have kind of felt like we are secluded, living in a cave away from “normal” civilization, so to speak.

Foster care is LONELY.  I’m not going to sugar coat it.  Yes, foster care is wonderful (in its own way) and it provided us with an amazing son and now a beautiful baby boy that we are deeply in love with.  However, there are so many rules, regulations and stigmas that go along with it that it can leave you feeling helpless and out of control.

I am a proud mom.  But I have TWO sons, only one of which I can show off.  I can’t show you pictures of this beautiful baby boy.  I can’t call him mine or use my last name with him.  In fact, unless you are in my close circle, you may not even know I have him!  It feels like we are leading this secret life.  We try to be normal parents but we aren’t normal parents.  We are foster parents.  There is no easy way to describe that.  We love these children like our own, but they are not our own, and we have no idea how long or if they’ll stay with us.

I saw this great quote on Facebook from Human’s of Foster Care:

"What advice would you give other parents looking to adopt?"
"If you are feeling led to adopt then pursue it. There will be roadblocks. Period. End of discussion. You are fighting for the life of a child. That life will not be given freely to you. You will experience heartache. You will experience exhaustion. You will experience hurt. Every adoption begins with a loss.

That quote really hit me.  We knew this road would not be easy.  We felt lead to this.  We will pursue it.  However, even though this is not a new road to us, the journey the second time is no easier or less frustrating/stressful/tiresome.

Please pray for the case of our baby and for our patience.

Days of Waiting...

Two Years, 5 Months, 10 days

893 days

21,432 hours

It doesn't matter how you say it, we've waited a long time.

On this day of love (Valentine's Day), I'm reflecting on my blessings, but I can't diminish the fact that pieces of my heart aren't with me anymore.  A piece of my heart went with Kenian.  A piece to the baby boy we were promised but never received.  A piece to our baby, wherever he/she is right now.

I love my husband.  I love my son.  I love our home and safety.

Today we chose to celebrate a "family-date" instead of Sam and I leaving Eli with family to celebrate V-day alone.  Eli chose the place, so of course, our "romantic" V-day began at Daylight Donuts, followed by a trip to the library.  Games of Uno, reading books and movies are on the agenda for the rest of the day.

And yet, I haven't been able to stop thinking about who is not with us today.  The one that I love and have not yet met.

I read a great article recently that said the waiting is a prison of sorts.  It consumes you and traps you.  Hours turn to days, days to weeks, weeks to months and months to years.  And if you aren't careful, the time you are loosing could be wasted on the "what-ifs" and "whens".  They went on to say that you should live fully in the moment, the present time, but be prepared and faithfully trusting that good is still to come.

I am trying.  It's hard and not getting any easier as time passes.

We are more than half-way through the contract with California and that scares us.  We have been licensed for over a month now (for foster care), with no calls, and that frustrates us.  (Add to the fact that we were called twice BEFORE we were licensed and were unable to accept the babies...)

I am happy.  I am grateful.  I am loved.  (Repeat...)

Happy Day of Love, Everyone.

Crystal Bridges Art Museum - Jan 18th

Through my window...

There are some people that don't understand the joys of living in the country.  There are members of my own family that think we crazy for living out where we do (ahem*Mom).  It scares some people if you can't see other humans for days (PRAISE JESUS!), or hear constant traffic, or have light after dark.  If you've never experienced the true darkness of the country at night, you are missing out on a beautiful thing.  Especially tonight as I hear the gentle rain falling outside....

But what I enjoy most is the variety of wildlife. 
**However, I must make a side note here that I HATE coyotes.  Terrified.  Despise them. Can't. stand. their. sound.  I have my Dad to thank for that.  Ha!! 
Besides those awful creatures though, I enjoy watching and hearing the others. 

Tonight, as I stood at my kitchen window, I watched three deer drink from the small pond, not 20 yards from the back door.  They are not scared.  They are gorgeous.  After they finish drinking, they meander slowly across the clearing.  I am reminded of one of my favorite songs and one that I sang repeatedly to Eli as a baby:

"As the deer panteth for the water, so my soul longeth after you.  You alone are my hearts desire and I long to worship you.  You alone are my strength, my shield.  To you alone may my spirit yield..."

Man, these last couple weeks, months and years have been so hard.  Jesus has at times been the only strength keeping us going.  He shows up in the most beautiful and sometimes surprising ways.

Tonight, He sent three deer to remind me of His goodness....

Adoption/Foster update

For once, we have good news to report!! :)

As of today, we are "officially" foster parents again!  We are signing the final documents at 4 pm today (worker is coming to our home for the last inspection) and then we have our final class (3 hours long on how to administer medications... seriously?!) at 6 pm tonight in Joplin.  There won't be anything stopping us now from receiving a child when one comes along!  EVEN BETTER, we won't have to deal with this particular worker anymore!!!!!  YEAH! 

And on the California front, not that I'm holding my breath anymore, but our newest update (sent yesterday) is more optimistic than we've seen in a couple months:

We ended up having a busier December then we were expecting! January looks
to be a busy month too! Here's to a good year!
 
Your update:
Your profile was shown 4 times this month! 2 of these expectant mothers
have chosen families and we are waiting for the other 2 to decided- you
are in consideration for both of these expectant moms (they have not put
anyone in any order just yet.) But as soon as they do we will let you
know!  Your online profile has tripled in views as well! 

Thank you all for the prayers!  Our excitement is building!!

My letter to bid 2014 "good-bye"

Dear 2014,

You brought with you so much change this past year.  Some good, some just plain hard.

Sam had 3 jobs in one year (and all the emotions that go with job changes).  The good news is that he finally found a job that makes him happy, where he's respected and that will allow him to learn and promote up.  I survived my first full year as a stay-at-home mom!  I still love it, even on the "bad" days. 

Sam and I celebrated 10 years of marriage on May 22nd.  Can it REALLY be 10 years already?!  I can honestly and truly say that it only gets better as the years go on.

I also celebrated the... dare I say it... big 30!!!  I survived and the world didn't crumble.  Really, it wasn't as bad as I'd thought it would be.  Sam surprised me BIG with a birthday party at Roaring River with family and then the biggest surprise was getting my best friend to fly in from Canada!  I had no idea of any of it!!  Sandi stayed the weekend with us and it was wonderful. 

Pre-surprise - I was bored and hungry and starting to get whiny... LOL!

Best surprise EVER!!

Can't he just smile normal?!

We decided that we'd waited long enough on our private adoption and felt a strong calling back into foster care.  We'd had little to no interest in our family from birth mothers through the agency for the entire year.  We initiated the process again back in October and nearly completed it by the end of the year (anticipating completion by January 10th).  The process included going through all of the screenings, classes, home inspections, etc all over again... and the extreme stress and frustration that can sometime (read "always") come with it.  Simultaneously, we also updated our private home study (for the private agency) and that included all the same as above, x2.  The process has been very hard, no lie.  Probably harder this time than the first time because it was repetitive and frustrating knowing we were capable and still being "investigated".  (This is going to be hard to understand unless you've been involved.)

We all had our bouts of illness this year.  Eli spent the majority of the spring/early summer in and out of the doctor's office, until he was finally treated for symptomatic asthma.  (We have this under control now and he's doing much better!).  Earlier this winter, our whole family had their share of the flu, but I got the brunt of it, catching it 3 separate times!

Both of our dogs died this year.  Our oldest dog, Sadie, died Sept. 18th from a tumor related issue.  She was 11 years old, the dog Sam had given me as an engagement gift.  A very sentimental loss for both of us.  Duke, at 7 years old, died less than a month later, on Oct. 8th, after spending 3 days being treated at the vet for a disease he contracted from a tick.  This was heartbreaking to loose them both so quickly and so close together.  We were not looking to add another animal to our household for a while, but.... a week later, some of our friends found a puppy that was lost and abandoned.  Meet Lucky, our Beagle and newest member of our family!

Arrived Oct. 20th ~ approx. 4 months old

Sadie - on the last walk in the woods she ever took

Duke - such a large, gentle soul

Eli is growing and changing and it some ways it's amazing and in some ways it's more than I think I can handle.  He is so challenging and frustrating and funny and smart....

In other good news, we acquired 10 more acres of land adjoining to our property earlier this year.  Our little haven, our little slice of paradise, our farm for our children to grow up on.

The end of this year was hard, just in the fact that we aren't where we thought we'd be looking back at the end of 2013.  Our finances aren't ideal, our family is still only 3 people, our home improvement plans are still just plans... all of those "resolutions" are just words on paper.

Overall, it sounds like I'm complaining, but I'm not entirely.  Generally, this year was a happy year.  We are still healthy and together.  We have great memories of this year, even if they are just common, ordinary, everyday type memories.  This year grew us and changed us and worked on our patience. (grade: C+ on patience... not failing but barely passing!! LOL)

I bid you, 2014, a hearty farewell.  I'm glad to see you go and I'm looking forward, optimistically, at what 2015 can hold for us.

Love,

Jenny

Thanksgiving 2014

Eli's 2014 Interview

This has been the year of superheros, ninjas, pirates, puppy dogs, dirt, burps & toots... basically, all things boy!

We FINALLY mastered daytime potty training (night time is still a work in progress) and he got enrolled in Parents As Teachers (Eli calls it "school").  He is exceptionally smart and is scoring higher than average for his age, however, we are working on attention span and obedience.

Eli's Interview Answers: (age: 3 years, 8 months, 1 week)

Favorite TV show:  Wild Kratts (PBS)
What I'm best at:  coloring
If I could change my name, it would be:  EY (pronounced E-Y)
Favorite color:  orange
Favorite toy:  Bumblebee costume
When I grow up I want to be:  a mechanic
Favorite things to sleep with:  blue blankie and Jasper (stuffed dog)
Favorite book to read:  Curious George
Favorite movie:  Robots
Favorite food:  Every food!! (Mom says: Isn't that the truth!  At age 3, he now out-eats his mother!!)
Favorite animal:  Hippo
Favorite sport: Soccer
My best friend is: Asher Jones
My favorite thing about this year is:  sitting on Santa's lap
What I most look forward to this next year:  going to the beach!
Favorite song:  You are my Sunshine
Favorite thing to do with my Dad:  wrestle
Favorite thing to do with my Mom:  make cookies

Back from Blogging Hiatus...

Hello my fellow handful of blog followers...

I've not had the desire to blog for a while on our adoption process because there has either been no news or not great news and I just got tired of repeating it.  Like if I put it in writing, it somehow solidifies the truth of it more than if we kept it silent.

There has been so much fun/busy stuff happening in our everyday life and I will get around to catching up on all of that soon.  I have so many pictures to post that it might take a while before I get up to speed on all of it.

However, this post is specifically an update on where our new journey lies in adding to our family.

If any of you remember from 2 years ago, we said we would NEVER, EVER, NOT-IN-A-MILLION-YEARS, EVER, EVER, EVER do foster care again.  So..... yeah..... ummmm...... I guess the best I can do is relate this to giving birth (from what I've heard).  The journey is full of unpleasantness, you are at times miserable and the pain is excruciating.  And then you hold your baby and you forget about all of that.  And then you decide to do it again.  And then you remember again how unpleasant it was the first time.

So, you guessed it, we are currently back in the "system".  For about a year, Missouri Baptist Children's Home has been pursuing us to get us to come back and work with them.  MBCH is the foster care organization that we received Eli through.  They are not directly the State, so things are done a little differently.  Theoretically, working with them instead of DFS will be better for us.  The caseworker that helped us finalize Eli's adoption is now the director of the Joplin branch, so that is a huge plus for us. 

Due to the fact that our foster/adoption license has expired, we are having to redo all of it.  We have already started our training classes again, every Thursday night for 3 hours each for 5 weeks.  Paperwork by the stacks, fingerprints, doctors visits, well water tests and home studies. 

We are already running into a few "obstacles".  Financially, while foster care is "free", there are expenses that they will not cover, some of those things listed above.  Also, our home study specialist is being a "stickler" (I'm really trying to be nice here) and he is forcing us to do some updates on our house that seem unrealistic and ridiculous.

It's going to take us a few months to finish all of the items we have to do to finish our licensing, but optimistically, we are hoping to be ready to accept children by late January or February 2015.  We are requesting one child at a time, age 2 years or younger, boy or girl.

Eli is very excited to be a big brother and we are working to help him understand what this is going to be like, especially for him, if we have kids coming and going from our home.

From our California adoption process: things haven't changed in a long time.  We are still only getting updates once per month.  Supposedly birth moms are looking at us and our online profile is going well, but we continue to be "not the right fit".  Our contract has 2 years and 7 months left.  We've been waiting so long with their agency that we are needing to update all of our paperwork/home study for them also, and we are in the process of simultaneously updating it while finishing paperwork for MBCH.  Updating our home study/paperwork for California will be around $300 or so.  They know that we are now working with another adoption avenue and they are fine with that and it shouldn't affect our chances any with them.

Well, now it's out there and you know where we are.  Please pray for us and our journey often.  Specifically for "extra grace" for our MBCH trainer/home study specialist.  He is one of those people that you need extra doses of patience to deal with. 

This is only the beginning of the paperwork. (Week one)