January foster care meeting

This morning we met with the head of foster care in Dorchester County to work on getting our license. We showed her the house, did some paperwork, talked about our hopes for our child, had a lot of questions answered. Also learned that we have to complete the auto-biography, the 10 page essay question document that the adoption office didn't need us to do for the third time. But apparently, the foster office can't use the home study as a replacement for it, so we have to do it anyway. My hands aren't used to writing so much, and my index finger swelled up a lot by page seven. The swelling's gone down over the last couple of hours, but it's very stiff; I had hoped to be finished writing today so we can send this off tomorrow, but we'll see how much more my finger joints can take.

Thankfully, she was exceptionally optimistic. She seemed to like what she saw, and as we finished up talking about what children we're most interested in parenting, she said, "I've got just the situation in mind!" So either she simply understands what we want, or she's actually got a child somewhere waiting for our license. Either way, it's good to know that there's really hope this way. So we'll see what happens!

We also got details on boring necessities like a breakdown of stipend monies, birthparent visitation, and DSS visitation, the details of which I won't bore you with. If you really want to know them, send me email.

Please continue to pray that the child God has for us is ready, and that He thinks we're ready too... and that He'll make the system move it all along quickly... we're very tired of waiting!

Stuff-Gathering

As we intend to be foster parents, but don't know what age or gender our child will be, we're collecting up things as folks offer or we come across good deals. Since I know there's going to be some folks who want, (over the course of holidays or whatnot), to gift us things, I figured a list of stuff we already have - or specifically need - may be helpful. I'll try to keep it updated as we go along.

Clothes:
*Note: clothes may, in many cases, go home with the child so we may need to have a continuous supply in each category. With that in mind, even if we "have some" we may still need some eventually.

Unisex Winter 0-6 mo. - needed
Unisex Winter 6-12 mo. - needed
Unisex Winter 12+ mo. - have some
Girl stuff Winter 0-6 mo. - have some

Girl stuff Winter 6-12 mo. - have someGirl stuff Winter 12+ mo. - have some

Unisex Summer 0-6 mo. - needed
Unisex Summer 6-12 mo. - needed
Unisex Summer 12+ mo. - needed
Girl stuff Summer 0-6 mo. - needed
Girl stuff Summer 6-12 mo. - have some Girl stuff Summer 12+ mo. - have some

*Note - have not sorted past 12 months; will be also needing toddler clothes.

Socks - have some, but mostly pink. Need boy socks.

Onesie extenders - have

Other stuff:
baby swing - have
plastic cups w/ sippy lids - have
car seat newborn-20lbs - needed
car seat 20-40lbs - have
bottles - needed
high chair/booster seat - needed
crib - have
crib sheet sets - have
diapers - needed (we're doing cloth, so I'll post specifics later)
toddler/preschool toys - we have plenty
infant toys - needed
board books - needed