I am the oldest of 6 kids, for the present. I have 2 biological Brothers (13 and 14), 1 adopted brother(3), 1 foster brother(2) and 1 (ONLY 1!!!!!!) foster sister, born January 6, 2010. I am 16. The two oldest boys(what i call my 'older brothers' cuz they are older than the other two..) and I were born in Houston, and lived there till we moved to Austin when I was 7. For years I had asked mom and dad for a sister, but of course one didn't show up until recently, well there were a few others, but that's another story.
When I was 12, going on 13, me, my mom and some friends of ours all went to a mother daughter retreat, were we met a family in our area who was starting a foster agency. My mom was interested, but figured my dad would say no, for he had for adoption, in the past. That was in March. In May, we went to a Family conference, in the same place, and saw the family again. They told mom they had a 10 yr old, blind girl that needed placement, and since my dad was blind, they wondered if we were interested in becoming a foster family for her (YAY A GIRL....that's one....). My mom, still believing my dad would say no, said she would ask him, but was sure it wouldn't happen, but as she says, she gave it to God, would really enjoy more children, but would take whatever the answer was. when we got home (for dad couldn't get away from work for the week) she asked him, and...........He said YES!!!!! the only thing was, our house was full of boxes (we had just had a shared garage sale with some friends, and were planning on doing it again at our house, as there was ALOT of stuff left over) and we needed to get a HUGE list of requirements done before we could become a foster family.
What followed was a whirlwind week, we had to schedule inspections with the fire department, and others that I can't remember, get CPR/First Aid certification (fortunately, only mom was required at the time, though all of us have recently be re-certified for the second time). We had 2 families who were willing to come over and help us clean our house, take boxes off to goodwill, and de-clutter areas of the house I had forgotten about....:P
My room was probably the worst. I had so much stuff, it was crazy, I was a paper collector for sure, and I didn't like to get rid of stuff I had been given....and after 6 years, it adds up....plus I had enough stuffed animals to cover my bed, and hang up in a sling on the wall...so yeah, crazy definitely fits my room.....I am SLOWLY improving. Anywho, somehow by the next Monday (we started on a Monday) we had gone through all of the important rooms in the house, which would leave out the garage, the shed, and what was known as the office.....which is now my room(That's another story....another whirlwind, but this time only 5 days). That Monday was May 15, my 3 yr old brothers bday. We were certified that Monday.
Before the 10 yr. old (uh, lets call her Lori) was brought to us, mom asked dad if we could get 1 infant(i don't know why, but mom and dad had decided that older kids would be easier, and infants would be harder, and we wanted only older kids. Well in the last almost 4 years, we have found that littler ones are easier, cuz they are easier to train.....go figure...)....an infant was born on the day we were certified, and 2 days later, Wednesday May 17, he arrived at our house at 1:30 in the afternoon. This marked the beginning of our journey through foster care. The next day Lori arrived at our house at the same time. Unfortunetly, we didn't know what we do now, and weren't able to respond and react to her as we should've. As most foster children do, she had bad circumstances put her in foster care, and she was a hurt child. We knew this, but we didn't UNDERSTAND it, and never could. Within 6 months, she had left us, because we didn't know how to handle her.
We have had lots of kids, and maybe I will type about them as I remember good times (or lessons learned) with them, but for now we have our max of 6, with the newborn 'Shoey', and 2 yr. old 'Calvin', unfortunely, I can't post pictures of foster kids, so I will have lots of pictures to post if and when we adopt any kids......(I got a good camera for Christmas, and love to use it and show others, especially the show others part.....)
Right now we are studying James as a family, and this verse jumped out at me:
James 1:27
~Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.~
I feel like I can relate to the first part, and SHOULD relate to the last part.....
TTYL-Type To Ya Later........Woo
