Our Story

I have basically known my entire life that I was going to be a foster parent. This was not something that was optional in my eyes. I am not sure where this sureness came from or when it even started. It could have been when my sister was adopted, all the baby sitting I did, my passion for children… It could have been all those commercials on TV about children in other countries needing to be “saved”, or maybe it was all the LMN and Lifetime shows I watched while everyone else was watching cartoons on Saturday mornings. But I always knew God wanted me to be a foster parent and there was to be NO conversation about it. It is funny to think back to the “dating years” because I recall actually telling my now husband, “I love kids! Do you love kids? I WILL be a foster parent one day so you might as well accept that or move on!”

Well the journey took a LOT longer than I would have liked, especially since it seems like everyone from my small town has kids and is married by the age of 22. Plus the fact that I (we) are foster parents in a completely different state then we grew up in still baffles me, but I knew that no matter when or how it happened, it would happen because I was so sure God had this planned for me, period.

So after our big, completely unexpected, move out of state we began the conversations of foster care again. We talked about this over and over again, basically saying what a great idea it was but not really knowing where to begin.

After the move I ended up with possibly the best job ever (the jury is still out) and have gotten to meet some really great people. Lucky for me some of those people are foster parents and others were in the process of beginning foster parents. I was able to talk with them and in February we made a move, literally from an apartment to a house, and made the big FC leap and requested paperwork for the licensing process. It was easier, in some ways, than I had thought it would be, and way more complicated in other ways. However, after a l-o-n-g few months of paperwork, paperwork, paperwork, doctors appointments (I’ll leave out my husband’s horror stories from this), home visits, purchasing beds, sheets, wall décor (thanks to my wonderful mother), dressers, doing more paperwork, more home visits, 14 hours of training, and more paperwork,

WE ARE FINALLY LICENSED FOSTER PARENTS!!

We (well I) received the call on Friday, June 28, 2013 at 2:33 PM (yes, I saved it) that we were licensed and they wanted to talk to us about a child! I was so excited that I screamed and startled my co-workers (luckily we were outside)! I was so excited that I cut off the voicemail and didn’t finish listening to it (which would prove to be a problem later). I guess what I should mention is that the call came in at 2:33 pm however I did not see the missed call until 5:30 PM! I returned the call, to the number which showed up on my caller Id. We’ll apparently after 5pm that line is redirected to an emergency answering service and they were none too happy that I was calling and wasn’t really sure what I was calling about. I didn’t have a child’s name or where the child was from. I hung up very disappointed as I really wanted to know about this child, but decided I would just have to wait….

Well later that night I listened to the voicemail again and learned the worker had actually called from the office but left her cell number. I was so mad at myself! I was so excited that I called her at 9:30pm (which I absolutely hate when my clients do it to me) and left a voicemail. It was a long weekend waiting and wondering when and if we would get a call about this child or any other child.

FINALLY, Monday morning came and at 8:15am we got the call about little miss C. After I spoke with the worker about how we were ABSOLUTELY ready for a child, and NO we did NOT want to wait awhile after getting licensed to take a child (who does that?), I was given a few details and I (of course being responsible) told them I would run it by my husband and call them back. Keenan had just gotten home from work and we were talking when the call came in. I gave him the details and his response was, “well of course we’ll take her, I mean where else is she going to go!” We were so excited, we started talking about all the different things we needed to do to prepare. Because of little miss’s “issues” we knew that the computer and our phones would need pass codes, the TV would from now on be G rated, and we would need to put a monitor in her room. I called the caseworker (CW) back and said we would absolutely take her and I would be off by 5pm but would leave early if necessary!

Well, we ended up having to wait a whole day to get her, due to scheduling of visits and transporting her from another town, but Tuesday was the day. We were so excited we could not wait!