Introducing Austin!

Just a few fun photos of our Little Man!

Little Man is...

….Legally Free!! The contested termination trial began on January 28, and finally today, at around 5 pm, the judge handed down her decision that he is legally free and that parental rights will be terminated. It has been a long time coming, and we are so thankful for the outcome! We especially want to thank all of you for your support and prayers during this last year and half. It has been a long haul, but we really feel blessed that God has worked through it all.

Little Man's new name will be Austin Charles – and we are going to slowly start integrating his new name into our daily lives. We think it will be pretty easy – we’ve hinted around for a few months now with him about the name.

The next step, just like with Daniel & Gretchen, is to be assigned an adoption case worker. Then we have a few months of waiting for all the paperwork to go through. Hurry up and wait, hurry up and wait! Hopefully, we’ll be assigned the same case worker for all three kids, and be able to adopt all three on the same day. That’s the next thing you can pray with us about. They tell us it will take about 6 months to do all the adoption paperwork and bureaucratic red tape, so perhaps late summer, early fall it can all be finalized. We will be planning a rather large celebration party at that time, and we are hoping the weather will still be good so we can have it at a local park.

Thank you again for all your love and prayers and support for our family. We feel very blessed to be able to adopt these kids – they have definitely made our lives richer!

Want to win an IPod?

Head on over to this blog - Baggage that goes with mine - and find the IPod post to sign up to win. This is a great blog to read, and I'm sure you'll enjoy it!

Little Man's Trial...

...is almost over! What started out to be a 4 day trial has really drug on. This morning the state finished their cross-exam of birth mom. Feb. 20 the two lawyers will do their closing arguments, and on Feb. 22 the judge will render her verdict. So far, all state parties are confident that the judge will sign termination. But until we see the ink on the paper, we are still nervous. And now we have another couple of weeks to wait. It's been a crazy week and a half, and I've never had so many headaches in one week as this past one. But we are done for a while, and can finally get back into a normal routine with our kids. I'll keep you posted!

Gretchen's 1st birthday photos

Friday night we took Gretchen for her 1st Birthday photos. Here are a few we took at home before heading to the studio. Isn't she a cutie?!?

Little Guy & Baby Girl are.....

….Legally Free!! The termination hearing was held Friday afternoon. It was scheduled for 1:30, and we all waited until 2:15 for the parents to show up, and they never did, nor did any of their family members. The judge heard the testimony from the social worker regarding the details of the case, and decided it was in the kids’ best interest to sever parental ties and sign the termination orders. It was a relief for us, that is for sure, although very sad that no one from their bio family cared enough to show up. Little Guy and Baby Girl are now going to be officially known as Daniel and Gretchen! And finally, here is a photo of the two little ones!

The next step is to be assigned an adoption case worker. Then we have a few months of waiting for all the paperwork to go through. Hurry up and wait, hurry up and wait!

And we’ll be back in court on Monday and Tuesday for Little Man’s case, and hopefully we’ll be able to send out an e-mail on Tuesday or Wednesday announcing the same thing for him – that he is legally free.

Readers - Hello!

After my last post, I got some comments from people I didn't know were reading my blog. And now, I'm curious! If you are reading my blog, and if you don't mind doing so, would you post a quick comment as to how you found me? I started this blog as just an outlet for me, and have quickly found many people in my situation that I can connect with, and it's wonderful! I have some absolutely fantastic friends here in my town, but only a few of them truly understand this "foster world". It's been so nice to connect with other people through this blog who are in the trenches of fostering.

So, drop me a line, I'd love to meet you! Even if you are not a foster parent, and are just reading my blog for kicks and giggles, drop me a line! Please????

Naming Help Needed, please

I have an issue that I need some advice on. Our oldest foster child, Little Man, should be legally free very soon, and we will be starting the adoption process with him. We have been calling him is birth name since he came to us, mostly because his visits with birth mom have continued twice a week. He will be three in March, and has been a foster child since 9 days of age, and has been in our home since he was 14 months old.

We had always talked about changing his name, and even have one picked out. I'm still pretty sure we will be doing this. However, my dilemma comes to the scrapbooking part. Of course, I am very behind in scrapbooking, so there are hardly any pages done of any of my kiddos. But when it comes to scrapbooking him, do I use his birth name on the pages up until we get to adopt him, or do we use his permanent name on anything pre-adoption? I don't know why I struggle with this, but I do.

Our other two kiddos - full siblings - have not seen their birth parents in almost a year, and so we have been calling them their permanent names since April '07. We will be faced with the same kind of dilemma with some of their pictures as well.

Does anyone have any experience or wisdom in this for me???? Please????

I scrapbooked today!!

This was a huge accomplishment for me! I love to scrapbook, but ever since we moved into this new house - March '07 - I have not been able to get my craft room set back up like it was in our old house. Right now, the craft room has one worktable, and it is covered with random stamping and scrapbooking things. It also has a sewing table, and I keep that pretty accessible, but otherwise the whole room is filled with boxes of craft stuff - and other crap - that I just can't find time to go through or move! The room is right above the boys' bedroom, and it seems that the only time I really have to go through it is when the boys are sleeping, and I hate to make the noise it takes to clean out that room. My goal is to have my craft room all set up by the end of February. I know it seems like a strange prayer request - but please pray that I get that goal accomplished. I really need a room that I can retreat to every once in a while and get back to my stamping, scrapbooking and quilting.

I got a double page spread done today - at a friend's house for a CTMH workshop - and it was of Little Guy's first haircut. Of course, he got this haircut over a year ago! But better late than never I suppose! Now I am really itching to do more scrapbooking, especially since Baby Girl's 1st birthday (did I just SAY that?) is next Thursday, and the party is next Saturday, and I want to have a small scrapbook on display of pictures of her throughout her first year. We'll see.......

Done with Speech Therapy!!

Little Guy is officially done with speech therapy. His therapist re-tested him today, and he is doing remarkable well considering how he started. She is really pleased with his progress, as are we, and has decided to let the therapy go for 6 months and re-evaluate him at the end of July. This is good news - first, because he is doing so well, and second, because now we don't have to have bad Friday afternoons. His ST was on Fridays at 1 pm - which was really bad for napping. He normally goes down for a nap around 12:30 or 1:00, and Fridays really threw him off. And he's my one kid that desperately needs to adhere to a schedule. Little Man is fine when our schedule gets wonky, but Little Guy really doesn't do well.

So, hats of to our wonderful therapist - she really got him talking well! Now, if I can just end his little temper tantrums......

Yikes!!!