Meeting Gretchen

Gretchen was the first social worker to enter our house.  She was also the first social worker to be bitten by Abby.  Yup, you read that right. The social worker that was coming to make sure we have a clean, safe, nurturing home was bitten by our dog.  Gretchen was so gracious to us about it.  She told me that she forgot what I had told her on the phone and that it was her own fault. Really, Gretchen, it's not your fault, our dog just has high special needs.  Anyways besides the embarrassing first bite, our meeting with Gretchen went really well.  She asked us why we want to foster to adopt and answered all of our questions.  In a couple of weeks we should be getting training information to start our 9 week parenting class that will hit on some competencies that we should have in order to be the best we can for children in care.

I am so excited. Already God has shown us grace through our encounter with Gretchen. Also, I (Laura) have been taking a trainer's class for the MAPP program (foster parent training class in Kansas) and I have been surrounded for two weeks by people who have done or are doing the same thing of adopting through foster care.  The conversations have been encouraging, truthful, and hopeful.  I feel that God is putting people in our path at the right time.

Gretchen also told us that as soon as our house is licensed and we finish our classes we will be getting calls for placements. She told us that right now there are 140 kids in JACKSON county that are waiting for forever homes.  140 children in our county alone?? That blew my mind to think that there were so many kiddos in Kansas City that were ready to be adopted.  I really hope that someone who reads this blog is encouraged to think about being foster parents.  So many children need the basics and so many parents don't know how to do that.

A cool thing that most states are doing now is a partnership with bio parents instead of a view that all bio parents are bad people. I will write more on that later.
So here we are.  Waiting to start classes and be licensed.

Dear kiddos,
we love you so much. we can't wait to meet you. I know that when you come to our house it will be the worst day of your life. You probably will have been taking out of a familiar place and plunked down in the house full of strangers. You had to leave everything you knew and start over. I am so sorry that we have to meet this way.  Just know that we love you and will give you the space and time you need to feel comfortable and loved.  Love you ~l.

a labor of love

So the big news is.... Adoption!

Dear Husband and I want to start our family and we feel that adoption is the way to start for us. So this blog is a way to keep family, friends, and others who are interested in the process, up to date on the adventure of finding our children.

A labor of love is a title from one of the husband's previous post from a different blog and I thought it fit with this new adventure. I won't be laboring in a physical way that some of my friends have or will do soon, but we will be laboring in this process of finding our children. Our labor is a labor of love. We will be filling out forms, going through classes, getting background checked, having our references called and grilled, praying, and hoping that our kids are safe right now and are waiting for us to find them. All of this to choose our kiddos. We choose them because we love them. Sort of like God choosing us because he loved us.

Below are some common questions that have been asked by others in our lives that you might be asking right now.

1. "L and J, where are you adopting from?"

Well good question, we are adopting domestically and we are going through the state of Missouri to start our process. This means that we will be adopting an American born kiddo that may or may not be the same race as us.

2. "Who are you wanting to adopt?"

When we talk about our family the vision in both our heads has been one full of boys. We feel like boys are on our hearts and that we should search for our son/s. We are open to the idea of adopting sibling sets. Sibling sets are the hardest to adopt because most people want to adopt one at a time. We think that it would be awesome if God had a set of brothers that were waiting on us. God has the details we just have ideas.

3. "Why adoption?"

There will probably be many posts about this very question of why adoption. For us we have the luxury of choosing adoption. This isn't a last attempt to create a family. It's not that we can't get pregnant or that we have some physical issue that keeps us from creating our own. For us, it's a choice. It means we choose to love a child. It means we choose to have our family look like this. We choose to take in a child, who has weathered more than you and I, and we choose to raise this child. To love this child. To provide, to encourage, to guide, to spoil, to teach soccer to, to watch them grow, to introduce them to grandmas and Mimi's and aunts and uncles. To bring them into a family that loves them for who they are. To show them support that never ends. Adoption for us is a choice.

So that's our news. Keep checking back to see how our labor of love is going.

That's all for now!