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.

October 8

Anna did not speak, she raged every hour on the hour.  At one meal time our kitchen table went flying. Within 3 days I called the agency and told them she would not work in our house.  She needed serious help.  I was told, “We have 30 days to find her another home.  It was at this time I found out she had moved 7 times in 18 months.  I also found in her report, that two different psychologist from the agency and written that she was beyond what they could do in the agency. 

At her first visit with her family, that I took her to, she went into the room and within seconds came running out screaming and grabbed hold of me.  I had to convince her that I wasn’t going to leave.  Two years later after many doctor’s appointments, therapy, a lengthy letter to the governor of Michigan regarding the agencies actions and even a child protective services allegation, we adopted Anna.  I had spent two years crying out to God, to find her a good Christian home and trying to “make Anna likeable so someone would take her”.  God, my husband and our son said she’s ours and we will keep her.

Eleven years later, Anna has moments of talking too much, has a heart that is kind, compassionate and gentle.  She is cognitively impaired, we are not sure if from birth or from the sexual abuse and severe neglect she endured the first 8 years of her life.  After 6 months of being living with us she revealed to me and only to me to this day, the sexual abuse she endured by both parents the first 7 years of her life.

October 3rd

A couple of weeks later, we got a call.  The caseworker said that my little friend was looking for a new home.  Her recent foster parents had bagged up her stuff and dropped her at the agency.  This of course made myself and my family very angry, we said yes we would take her.

When they showed up at our door it was 8pm on a Wednesday night.  The little girl at the door was not my little friend.  The case worker, very worried, said, “you’ll take her won’t you?”  As she said this the child pushed through the door, dropped her coat on the floor and went running through the house as if she knew where everything was at.  So I said, “We’ll try her through the weekend to see how she fits with our family.”  The caseworker proceeded to show me the IEP from her previous school.  I had never read an IEP and neither had the caseworker, so what we thought was 80% achievement was actually a goal of 80%. 

To make it a little easier to write, I will name our daughter Anna, not her real name.  Anna did not say a word to us, I went through the black garbage bag she came with to find pajamas and found nothing but trash.  I think the former foster parents wanted her out of their house so fast, they started throwing things in the bag.  There were shoes 3 sizes too big, a training bra, broken toys, a nasty stuffed animal, box of broken crayons, and miscellaneous garbage.  No other clothes.  So I put her to bed in some pajamas that we had and tucked her in. 

  

October 1, 2013

Our second child was another 20 month old boy.  His middle name was the same as mine : )  He came to us in the middle of the night.  The agency called me at midnight and asked if we would take him.  The feds had just raided where he and his family were staying and he was taken into custody.  We agreed and he arrived at 3 in the morning asleep.  I put him to bed.  The next morning around 11 I was sitting at the kitchen table when I heard little footsteps coming down the stairs.  When he got to the bottom he had a smile that filled up his whole face and ran right to me.  I was immediately in love.

He had such a sweet spirit, we didn't know everything about him but we knew he had been loved.  He fit into our family and our lives like he had always been there.  Never a moments trouble.  A couple of weeks later we visited his teenage mother in a shelter.  She had him at a young age and lived with her mother, mother's boy friend and sisters.  The agency wanted us to take her for a short time until another relative could take both of them.  She joined us and a short time turned into almost 2 years.

While they were still with us I took them to the agency to visit her mother weekly. Every week I would see other foster children who were also there to visit parents.  I met with and talked to many foster parents, unfortunately, I can count on one hand how many were good foster parents.

One little girl, I saw every week.  She clearly had lice in her hair and was not being taken care of.  Her and I would spend the whole time talking, cleaning the play area and playing games.  She was 8 years old and the oldest of 5 siblings.  They had all been sexually abused by their parents and the 6 year old was in a mental hospital.  All 5 of the children were in different homes because they could not be placed together because of their behavior.  I talked to the supervisor and told her that if this child would ever need a different home my family would be interested in taking her.