Book for Parents

JESUS CALLING - Sarah Young  I was told about this book one week and the next week I received it from my step mother.  She told me that it was helping her as she was dealing with some stressful times.  In the beginning of the devotional Sarah Young explains how she came to write this book.  The book is written as Jesus is talking to you.  I have been reading it daily before I even get out of bed.  The peace Jesus is giving me through this devotional is amazing.  It is my recommendation that you get this book to help you through anything you are going through.  I am planning on giving these out as gifts.

The Holidays

The holidays are upon us.  To foster children, adopted children and their families, this can be the hardest time of the year.  Until the parents have been through a few of these each holiday is a new adventure and generally not in a fun way.

Our oldest spent almost the first four years of her life being with us destroying our time and hers.  Because she didn't communicate well the first couple of years we had no idea what was going on.  One year on her birthday, we canceled the family party because she had been extremely out of control and I wasn't going to put other people through what we had experienced.  After giving her, her presents and finding her in a calm mood.  I asked her, " What is going on?  This is your birthday it's suppose to be fun."  

She replied, " My mom never bought me a backpack for school, she never gave me school clothes, she never gave me food......."  Then she proceeded to list all of her 4 siblings one at a time repeating what she had said about herself.  Wow!  That is what was on her mind the whole time.  Who would know that would bother her, after we had given those things to her?  

I can say now after 10 years she has settled into our routine and traditions.  Her sister who came 5 years ago, has her own baggage.  She has handled it totally different.  Because she was adopted for 5 years, she thought she had her forever family.  When she first came to us, she had fantasy stories of her holidays with her adopted mom and grandparents.  Her adopted mom had told us what really happened so we know most of it wasn't true.  But do I have to say, her outlook made things a little easier.  She anticipated each holiday with great enthusiasm enjoying new traditions and stories of past holidays.  Unfortunately, she has now used some of those stories and placed herself in them even though she was not with us : )

To those of you who are caring for children outside of your family for the holidays, my prayers go out to you.  God will bless you and the children through you as you rely on His peace and wisdom.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Well one issue down and many more to go.  We finally got our daughter's name changed on her social security card.  After almost 3 weeks!  I had taken her to the Social Security Office, sat there with her for an hour and a half.  When we finally saw someone, we were at the counter for 3 minutes.  I was told I had to have the original court orders. I had copies.  My husband and I tore the house apart and had no idea what happened to the "original" court orders.  A couple of friends of mine, one who works at the court building and another who has a friend in the court building, helped me.  After 3 weeks of conversations and phone calls, we were told, "No one has the original they are filed in the court."  DUH!  So I took my daughter out of school again, fortunately we only sat for an hour this time.  I explained everything to the man at the counter and he said, "Yeah that guy is new and is going through training right now."  Wow!

Many don't know all that is involved with adopting children.  I certainly didn't.  My husband and I would l never change a thing, our daughters are truly a blessing.  We could not even imagine where we would be or for that matter where our daughters would be if God hadn't brought us together.  To be trusted by God with these two beautiful girls is amazing.  To see what they came out of and where they are now is hard to even describe.

After 10 years for our oldest and 5 years for our youngest it is still hard for them to trust new circumstances and people.  Our extended family still is strange to them.  For our oldest if she doesn't see you weekly, she tends to treat you like a stranger.  This can be difficult for the average person to understand.  The girls learned early on, that people were not to be trusted and only they could protect themselves.  To this day, my oldest will question me when I am driving, where I am going.  

I had someone the other day say, "I don't understand what is so hard about responding to a simple hello."  I responded that most of us have not experienced the kind of rejection, neglect, abuse, etc that these children have.  I know I did not grow up in an abusive home, but as the youngest of four, I learned early on that I had nothing worthy to say, because I could never get a word in edge wise.  So I spent most of my childhood and adult life being very quiet.  But most will tell you I have made up for that now.  

Anyway, I'm not a psychologist, but sometimes I think I play one at home, the girls are very complicated.  God is truly trying to teach me to not  "......lean on my own understanding, but trust in the Lord..."  I always thought I did trust the Lord until this year when I keep saying, "But I don't understand......"  and God reminds me, "I told you,it's not your job to understand, your job is to be obedient."

Blessings

Have you ever heard the song Blessings?  It's by Laura Story.  Check it out.  The past month I have had to remind myself that all that is happening in our family is building my character to be more like Christ.  I certainly don't like all of the work being a stay at home mom of three teenagers mean, two of which have varying special needs, but I know that God is growing me to be what He wants me to be for His glory and my good.  I am also very grateful that God has given me the opportunity to be home for my children and many days I enjoy them so much.  I enjoy the young adults they are becoming.

Between trying to gain legal custody of our oldest adopted daughter, changing her name legally, applying for Social Sec. Disability for her and her daily needs sometimes I feel like I am going crazy.  Then my son who is intellectually a college student and chronologically & emotionally a normal teenage boy needs help in keeping focused on priorities such as; homework, finding a university to attend next year, working on Eagle Scout Project, working and keeping a social life.  Finally, our youngest daughter whom we took legal custody of after being adopted by someone else, is a very "normal teenage girl" in some ways,  but very immature emotionally and doesn't quite grasp the idea of consequences.  They are all blessings and I know God has given them to us for a reason.  My husband and I wouldn't change a thing about each of them.  

God has blessed me with friends who not only let me vent when things are constantly coming at me, but also help me connect with people who can help.

We had a frost in Michigan yesterday.  It actually looked like a thin layer of snow on the ground.  I love Fall in Michigan and feel very blessed to see it every year.  In honor of the frost I made these cookies yesterday.  They are easy to make, unique and yummy!

Michigan Pumpkin Frost Cookies

2 c butter                      2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla                   2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt                       2 c sugar
2 c pumpkin                  4 c flour
2 tsp baking soda          2 tsp cinnamon
1 c chopped walnuts      1 c raisins
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2 c brown sugar, firmly packed                                             6 Tbsp butter
8 Tbsp milk                                                                          2 c powdered sugar

Cream butter and 2 c sugar.  Add eggs, pumpkin and vanilla.  Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon and stir into creamed mixture.  Add raisins and nuts.  Drop by teaspoonfuls on greased cookie sheet and bake in preheated 350 degree oven for 12 minutes.  When cookies are cool, frost with icing.

To make icing: Boil brown sugar, 6 Tbsp butter and milk for 2 minutes, cool.  Add powdered sugar and stir to desired consistency.  Spread on cookies

Going Forward

October 23, 2013

After much excitement and lots of prayer I started talking to everyone whether I knew them or not, about our idea.  People asked lots of questions that helped me do some further investigating.  As of today there are 5 people that are interested in helping with this home.  It was amazing how God placed people in my path that I would never have even imagined.  One was my nephew.  He is an adult who has been looking for a “place to plug into”.  When I called him he told me that he had just prayed that God would give him a place in children’s lives.  He has so much potential.  The first thing I asked him to do is think about being our chef for luncheons or dinners we might host for potential benefactors.  Then as we talked we talked about the possibility of him being in charge of food service and the chef for the home.  He loved the idea and we even talked about him teaching the kids how to cook.  Then as I talked to my sister, his aunt, she suggested he could even have a garage where he could work on cars with the boys.  Cars are definitely his passion.  We all got so excited.  Then a few months later someone pointed me to a home in Northern Michigan.  I checked it out on line and guess what?  Every year they get a junk car that needs work and put it back in working condition.  When it’s done they sell the car!  This is almost more than I can believe.  We are definitely headed in the right direction!

October 21, 2013

October 21, 2013

After many doctor’s, therapy, tutoring and more it became very clear to me that the agency we went through did nothing to help our daughter or her 4 siblings.  At one point during the process I even contacted the governor of our state to investigate.  I was convinced that if the group of children had been neglected by the foster system there were more.  Fortunately, the governor did respond and investigated the agency and heads did roll.  We were foster parents for 5 years and in that time of taking children to the agency weekly for parent visits I determined that I could count the number of good foster homes on one hand.

When I reported one women who I witnessed weekly verbally and emotionally abusing her foster children I was told, she was one of the best foster parents they had.  She was single, worked full time and had 7 special needs foster children!  Shortly after I reported what I had seen, she was given a failure to thrive baby.  The baby almost died in the two weeks she had it, all because she would take it to the doctor, because she didn’t have the child’s Medicaid card.  Fortunately, they did investigate this women and shut her home down.

That is the worst case that I saw, but there were many others.  We had to stop fostering because our daughter was a lot of work.  I always said she was like having three children.  But I knew I wasn’t done, I just didn’t know what else I could do.  I spent many days crying out to God, “Why?”  I wanted to do more, but she took so much out of me.  For a few years, I even felt that my passion for children was gone and I didn’t know if I would ever get it back. 

Then one day I was walking with my dogs.  I ran into a women.  We walked together and towards the end of our walk she told me that she was a children’s advocate for a local county.  She also told me that she had vision for a children’s home, because she believed as I did that the foster system is so broken.  About 5 years before this conversation, I had a similar conversation with a mom of a boy who was in my son’s scout troop.  This was it!!  All the way home I cried out to God, thank you for revealing this to me.

Our daughter was becoming easier to handle, in fact we had recently taken legal custody of her biological sister. (that’s another story)  I was feeling like I needed to move on, I knew that when my son went to college I would need to go back to work.

I called my friend from years earlier and told her my ideas.  She agreed she would start praying about it.