First arrival

In this case, it's the arrival of our foster license!  Our worker called today to say that it's arrived. She will mail it if she can't find a time to bring it over herself.  Then we'll (hopefully) get either more information or a call for a kiddo.  Hurray!

I've been substitute teaching at the preschool level for the last few weeks, three days a week or so. We've got some pretty tough kids, and it's made me nervous.  Please pray that both our worker and we will have wisdom and discernment to accept children into our home that are a perfect match for our abilities and their needs and that He will fill us both with confidence!

Thanks!

News?

Our foster care social worker called yesterday asking to meet with us for a home visit, but I had my phone off while I was teaching and missed the call, then I called back and left a message, so I'm waiting to hear back from her. I don't know if it's a regularly scheduled visit or if there's News. In the meantime, we ought to finish installing the gate and I need to tidy up a few different areas that we've been lax about.

That's all that's going on so far. Keep praying!

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

We have clearance!

The turn-around was really fabulous on this one. While we were on vacation, we received a call from the CI that the final home study had been submitted on November 26, and the following week we received the official letter with signatures on it stating we are cleared and ready to roll.

Of course, the children we're seeking for adoption are typically not often available, which is why we chose the foster-adoption route this time around. So our files will be sent to the county foster offices eventually (date unspecified) and we'll see what they need. But we're moving forward!