Keeping my eyes above the waves, holding a baby that belongs to Him and not me...

It's Sunday morning and we had a sick 5 year old last night so he, baby M and I are all taking it easy at home, vegging out on the couch while Tyler took the other two with him to church.  So I have an unexpected free morning and thought I'd write out how I've been feeling about our foster care journey lately.  

When we started the adoption/foster care journey our prayer was "Spirit lead us where our trust is without borders, let us walk upon the waters, where ever you call us."

We brought baby M home from the NICU when he was 12 days old.  We are the only family he's known.  He has molded seamlessly into our family and I can't picture our lives without him.  But soon that might be the case.  He has a distant relative that has expressed interest in raising him.  Her home study starts this coming Friday.  If she passes, it will move fairly quickly.  But I'm not convinced that she is capable of caring for him or really the best fit for him.  I'm very supportive of reuniting with family when possible but in this case I just can't get fully on board.  

But as hard as this whole situation is, I am so thankful that I can't control any of it.  

Wait, is that a typo?  Did she really just say that she's glad she can't control where baby M ends up?  

It's not a typo.  I'm so thankful that it's not up to me to decide where his future will be.  I have come to realize that I "like" the situations that God has put us in, where we have zero control.  Why?  Because it FORCES me to trust.  If I had control over the situation I wouldn't need to rely on God, because I would THINK I know the best answer and rely on my own opinion on it.  But because I can't see the future, I can't see or know for sure what this relative is like and capable of.  She might be the best thing for him and I just can't see it right now.  But God knows.  His sovereign hand will be the guide.  He's guiding the home study assessor and has the power to interfere and make sure baby M doesn't go with this relative IF this is a bad placement for him.  OR he will allow her to pass and give her legal custody of baby M.  God has never failed and He won't start now.  In both cases I have full trust that God's hands are all over this and my soul rests in His embrace.  

But I'm broken.  My heart is shredded every morning by that adorable giggle when I sing a good morning song to him.  He's leading me out into the deep waters where without him, we would drown.  He's knocking down the borders of my trust.  Stretching us to trust him more and more. 

So I will call upon Your name.  I'm praying over this sweet life.  That God's will would be done.  My eyes are locked on Jesus and not the waves that are growing higher and higher.  I'm trusting Him to walk us through these scary waves, while holding a baby that belongs to Him and not me.  Jesus' love for baby M is infinitely more than I could even imagine, so my fear is replaced with Trust.  

I had been thinking about trusting God fully in our circumstances and I was driving (to pick up chick-fil-a for supper!) by myself last night and when this song came on I realized just how perfect it explained what I was feeling and thinking about M's situation.  I highlighted the lyrics above where they were applicable but read the whole song here:

Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)

Hillsong United

You call me out upon the waters
The great unknown where feet may fail
And there I find You in the mystery
In oceans deep
My faith will stand

And I will call upon Your name
And keep my eyes above the waves
When oceans rise
My soul will rest in Your embrace
For I am Yours and You are mine

Your grace abounds in deepest waters
Your sovereign hand
Will be my guide
Where feet may fail and fear surrounds me
You've never failed and You won't start now

So I will call upon Your name
And keep my eyes above the waves
When oceans rise
My soul will rest in Your embrace
For I am Yours and You are mine

Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger

In the presence of my Savior.

I will call upon Your Name
Keep my eyes above the waves
My soul will rest in Your embrace
I am Yours and You are mine

Foster Care: getting the room ready

It's been quite awhile since I've blogged over here and I kinda miss it.  I didn't miss it for a long time. Life is so busy that this was one thing that I had to let go of in this season of life.  It's fun for me but it was also just one more thing to do.  But now that we are going to be doing foster care, my goal is to blog along the way not only to document things but also to inform all of you of what foster care really looks like.  The good, bad and the ugly.  Foster care gets such a bad rep and all you ever hear about are all the out of control kids and bad behaving teenagers etc.  I hope to shed some light on the other side of foster care and show you all what it's really like.  I'm not going to sugar coat it though either.  We know it won't be all rainbows and stars.  It's going to be hard.  But it's gonna be worth it.  God has called us to this and even though we know we aren't anything special, we know He will equip us what what we need as we go.  

So I heard from the supervisor that is reviewing our home study and she said she has 3 other home studies to approve before ours so it's looking like we will be approved and then licensed beginning of next week!!!!!  

So since we could potentially get a call the day we get licensed, we've been getting ready for awhile now and the nursery is officially done and ready for our first placement!  So I thought I'd show you all what it looks like.  When trying to figure out how I wanted to decorate it to not only be gender neutral but also for a foster placement and of course cheap or free, so I did a lot of searching for foster rooms on Pinterest to get ideas.   I found quite a few free printables, I used frames that I had on hand and painted them white, changed up the curtains a little, painted a dresser white and used it as the changing table and got creative with storage solutions.  Here is how it turned out...

I love how this collage turned out!  And even better, it was free!  I had all these frames already and the prints I searched high and low on pinterest for and they were all free printables.  But I didn't just find free printables and that was it, I carefully chose each one specifically for this room.  

And here is the finished dresser/changing table, I absolutely love how it turned out.

(the pictures of Dietrich will be replaced with pictures of the child)

Because we live in a split level home, we have a grand total of ZERO storage. So this closet has many functions.  Right now it has all of Dietrichs hanging clothes, a dresser for storage of baby items that we may need on a short notice once we get a placement, several sizes of diapers, extra blankets, and this is even where we have to store our luggage when it's not being used and up on the top shelf is my wedding dress all boxed up! We make it work :)

So there is the room!  All we need is a 0-2 year old to come stay in it!  We truly cannot wait to start this journey and I hope you all follow along as we wade these unknown waters and bring you along for the journey!  

"Because there are kids who need homes. Tonight. In our city."

I wanted to write and update everyone on our latest adoption changes!  We have been officially waiting with our domestic adoption agency for almost a year.  In that year we have had two exciting calls telling us that we were picked by a birth mother.  But so were 2-3 more couples.  We all met with the birth mom, she asked us questions, we asked her questions and we went home and waited to hear if we were matched.  Both times we got the disappointing call that the birth mom did not choose us.  It's a very emotional rollercoaster but our perspective in all of this is that adoption is not about us.  It's about what is best for the child.  So as much as we want to add to our family and wanted those babies, we were happy that these birth mom's were brave enough to choose life for them and the best family that they thought for their unborn babies, even if that family wasn't ours.

But through this whole past year, foster care has been brought to our attention more and more.  I've met tons of families who are foster parents, read so many blog posts about families who have fostered/adopted and their experiences, done tons of research and through it all, God hasn't left me alone about it.  

So we have decided to change directions with our adoption.  We are going to do foster to adopt.  We have started the 9 days (12 classes, 36 hours) of classes and training.  We have completed the first class and we will get the 8 that are left, done in the next 3 weeks.  We also have to have another home study done (our current one doesn't transfer even though it hasn't expired yet) and will hopefully be licensed soon!  

We are very, VERY excited about this change and can't wait to start.

On our mark.....get set.....GO!

But wait Marie, I have so many questions!

Ask away!  Feel free to ask me in person or just keep reading because I've answered some FAQ's down below.....because I'm a mind reader ;) and I know what most of you might be thinking since I had some of these same questions.



Why in the world would you do foster care?

We, as Christians, are told to "look after orphans and widows in their distress" James 1:27.  That looks different for every family.  Some sponsor orphans, some adopt, some financially support those adopting, some do foster care and still some support foster families.
For our family that looked like adopting an orphan.  To give a child a home who needs it.  To help a hurting child.  We initially pursued international adoption but the doors were closed with every country we looked at.  Either we were too young, already had too many children, or because of Tyler's job, we couldn't travel to certain countries.  So then foster care came to mind briefly but I was scared.  We had had a bad experience with not being able to adopt Baby J almost 4 years ago and I made up excuses about why we couldn't do foster care.  So we decided on Domestic Infant adoption.  And as I wrote up above, we've gotten really good at being "rejected." Haha.  We got "rejected" again and again and to us it started to feel like God was closing this door.  We began praying about if we were supposed to change directions and do foster care.  And once we started praying about it, God just kept opening door after door.  I would randomly talk to a friend who was also considering foster care, or stumble upon a blog on foster care, or hear an interview on the radio with social workers in our own COUNTY.  And with the more I talked to people and the more I read the less scary it seemed and the more doable it became.  And the more excited about it I became.

While I was reading all those blog posts I came across one that really stuck with me.  We were passionate about domestic adoption because it was a way to give pregnant women another option instead of abortion.  And it absolutely is but there are also lots of women who chose life for their babies and decide to try and parent that child.  And sometimes that decision doesn't turn out the way she had hoped and her precious babies need to spend some time in a safe foster home while she tries to get her life back to how she had planned.  This particular statement stuck with me, "BE THE SAFETY NET these kids need when their mother's decision to choose life doesn't go the way she hoped it would.  We can't just ring our hands about how our society is going to hell in a handbasket based on the latest revelation from Planned Parenthood.  People, GO GET THE HANDBASKET, THERE'S A CHILD IN IT."  -A Musing Maralee   And the need for foster parents has become greater.  In the past 5 years the number of kids in foster care, in our county alone, has more than doubled.

Are you going to be able to handle it?  Getting emotionally attached and then have to give the child back to their birth parents?

That's a very valid question because yes it will be hard to get attached to a sweet child and then have to let them go back to their parents or relatives.  I know people will tell me that they could never do it because they would get too attached, but that's the point.  These kiddos need someone to attach to them.  In order for them to learn to attach to someone, they have to learn what healthy attachment is.  The reality is, the hard life that these children have had so far is much worse than any grief I will have to work through when they leave.  So I'm not afraid to grieve.  I'm afraid of what would happen to these children if no one took the risk to love them.  So we are willing to take that risk.  :)

But the system is so broken, there's no way I could deal with it.

Yes sometimes the system seems so broken and these kids are held hostage by it moving slowly.  We can use that as an excuse to not get involved or we can be a safe place these kids call home while they wait.

What about your boys? Won't they be exposed to these "damaged kids?"

Our boys are our top priority.  We have talked to them about Foster care and how it looks different then what a domestic adoption was going to be like.  And they are excited too.  As long as it's in the best interest of our boys, we will continue with foster care.  And for our family we have decided that we won't break the birth order.  So we will accept children younger than Dietrich.  I know that breaking the birth order works for some families but we have decided to not do it.

Why are children placed in foster care?

Children who are placed in foster care have either been abused or neglected in some way and foster care is a safe place for them to stay until their parents can make changes and get their life back on track.  If that doesn't happen then other options are explored.

How long will the foster child be in your home?  At what point are you able to adopt them?

I'm still learning it all but a general answer is that for 6 months, the child's case worker is working with mom or dad to get them back on the right track and at 6 months there is a meeting to decide whether or not they will still keep working on reunification with parents or if they are now going to be looking for permanency (meaning adoption)  And I think at that point even if permanency is the route they will be taking, it can take quite a few more months before adoption can be possible.  I think the average time it takes is 12-15 months.


Foster care is a switch in how we view adoption.  We've changed how we think about it.  Because right now as we become foster parents, our goal is to give a loving and safe home to a child for as long as they need it.  Whether that is a couple months or for forever.  We are willing :)

And one last quote to leave you with that hit me hard, "It's scary, right?  Scary to think about letting a child into your life that might leave you, or getting involved with some shady biological families, or letting "the state" into your home.  There are lots of reasons to be intimidated about foster care, but just one BIG reason to do it.

Because there are kids who need homes.  Tonight.  In your city."
-A Musing Maralee.


Here are some great blog posts to read:

http://www.amusingmaralee.com/2015/08/the-system-is-too-broken-is-not-a-good-excuse/

http://www.amusingmaralee.com/2015/07/outraged-at-planned-parenthood-support-foster-kids/

http://www.amusingmaralee.com/2015/02/so-you-want-to-adopt-from-foster-care/

http://www.amusingmaralee.com/2014/04/minimize-the-negative-impact-of-foster-care-on-your-kids/