A sigh of relief

Today was such a fabulous. Today is going to go down on the books as one of the best days I have had. Today we have learned that our foster son Nicholas' (who will now be called Isaiah) biological parents rights were terminated. I am so excited to be able to begin the adoption process on our baby boy. Our little Isaiah has Down Syndrome and he is the sweetest little guy. I love him to pieces and he is just so perfect. Perfect in every way. I just love him so much. He has been through so much while living with his biological family. I will save that story for a later date as he is not yet adopted and I cannot give that info out yet. But he has come so far while being in our care. I give my heavenly father all the credit. We could not do this without him. I believe my little man has come so far because of our miracle working God. God answer's prayers and he has shown his love grace on my Isaiah. My heart truly goes out to his biological family. He has 6 other brother and sisters who truly love him. They were all returned to their parents a few months back. The other children were not treated or negleted in the way that Isaiah was treated. Yes, they were neglected, but I guess they did enough to get them back. But due to Isaiah needs they just didn't seem to understand everything that was involved with caring for a child with Down Syndrome nor did they want to educate themselves on the needs of a child with Down Syndrome. They had 18 months to learn, educate, participate, and show up to appointments that they just refused to go to. So in a way I am happy that he was not returned home as this would pose a very big problem for Isaiah. He would be neglected again and probably fall more behind. After I post his story while in the custody of his parents you will understand more. But believe me, I do grieve for his parents. I know they just didn't care for their child properly, but still they are human with feelings and emotions. We are not allowed for his family to have any contact with him. Sometimes they allow it, but because of the severity of the neglect we cannot. So I pray for his siblings. I pray for strength. I just could not imagine losing my brother. But it had to be done.

This is my little Isaiah (Bubby, this is what I did when I found out you are mine forever)

 

Next, As some may know we have been in a battle to keep custody of our foster son Cameron who has been with us from birth. The grandmother (who has been found to not be the legal grandmother) was granted visitation with Cameron as they were confident he was going to move there. But we got word today that those visitation have been suspended and now that gets a step closer in completing his adoption. I am so excited.

Cameron (who is also known as Urijah)

 

I do have a prayer request. We have inquired about a little girl who is 10 yrs. old and has been waiting for a forever home for a year and a half now. Our adoption worker has told us she will not recommend us to adopt her. I beleive that God can work this situation out and give this little girl to us so she can have a forever home. God is bigger than caseworkers. I pray Lord that you work through this and make a way for little Alisia to be with us. Lord her adoption worker has requested that our adoption worker send our homestudy to her so that she can check us out. Lord our worker is standing in the way for this adoption to go through. Lord we have had many complications with this worker. Lord I ask that you remove her out of the way or that Alisia's casewroker would be proactive and determined to get Alisia in our home. Lord I pray for Alisia. Lord please give her peace and please hold her in your arms as she waits and waits. Lord our arms are wide open and we really want her. Lord thank you for working on her behalf and ours. I pray Lord if this is your will that you would make this happen. Amen.

Busy, busy, busy

     This past week I have been very busy. We have had to wonderful little boys spending some time with us. They are a friends foster boys. We watch them periodically for her. They are so fun and very well behaved. My family always have a lot of fun with them. My daughter Madisyn is totally in love with the littlest one. He also adores her. Madisyn babies him alot. I am not a huge fan of babying little kids, but she really likes him alot and he can easily be reverted back to not being babyied (sp?).

     This past Saturday my parents came over for some remodeling of their "villa" as my dad calls it. We have offered them a room to live in. They graciously accepetd and I am thrilled. We have given them the living area in the basement and my dad is reverting it into a little apartment. It was used as the children's playroom, er, junk room :). The toys in that room were overflowing and it was becoming quite rediculous. I will be slimming down there toy consumption because I have found if they abdundant toys, they really din't play with ALL of them. So we are going to be sort of limiting their toy consumption. I am not saying they cannot have toys, but once it gets over the top they really don't appreciate them as much. We will be allowing educational toys, play dough, legos, lincoln logs, outdoor supplies like soccer balls, footballs, etc. Stuff that we can all do together as a family rather than just saying, "Go play in your playroom". This approach will get us more involved as a family. Don't get me wrong, we are very close as a family now, but this will bond us even closer. If we look at it this way, at christmas time if the children each get 7 toys each and we currently have 7 children that is a grand total of 49 toys. That probably would not include toys from relatives and this is not counting the multitude of toys they currently have. Now if we had 2 childrent than maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal. I also see that we are not done growing our family and I am not sure when we will be. I forsee us have many, many children. So we need to put a slight limit on all of the toys that get accumulated by our children. I am o.k. with this because I would rather spend time with my children instead of them going off into another room all of the time. So this what we did this past week and weekend.

     Here are some pictures of some of the children playing outside on a rather unusual and very pleasant spring day:

This is Arianna playing in the yard. I think she is looking at a map.

This is Owen cruisin' on his and Corey's new power wheels 4-wheeler, with Emma trying to catch him.

Emma looking out of their playhouse.

Here is Arianna looking out of the doll house

This picture is hard to see, but he has just lost his second top front tooth. Now he is missing his two front theeth. He was a little scared about it though. 

WOW 5 Years old today...

My little man is 5 years old today. It really has just gone by so very fast. It is just amazing how much my little guy has changed and matured over this past year. He is growing into a handsome young boy. Not that he wasn't already. But something about being five just makes me look at my kids differenlty. He is entering into a different phase of life and I am excited to see what his 5th year of life will bring him. It is awesome to celebrate this birthday with my precious blessing. So here are some pics of his special 5th birthday.

He has never watched spider man so I have no idea how he got into liking spider man so much.

Blowing out his birthday candle.

The spider man toy grandma bought him.

The motorcycle jacket grandma got him. We all loved this coat.

His new spider man bike daddy and mommy got him. He got to pick from 3 bikes and he choose the spider man one, of course :)

This is the first day we got Owen. He was 14 months old. My he really looks different.

And another one from his first day with us.

Another topic...

                                                        Pic of Cameron and hubby Mark

So I just tried to write a blog about a very special person, but the words were not forming right. So I saved it and I will finish at a later time when I can hopefully express my thoughts more clearly. So I will write on another topic today.

My day has been a litlle crazy. For that matter my week has been crazy. We have been very busy and not busy with school, ugh :( We have had alot of arrands to do this week. Hopefully we will be able to somehow make this week of school up. I am sure I can, even if we have to do Saturday and Sunday school. I do not like missing school at all.

Anyway, my little miss Emma is having a pretty rough week. She has been quite defiant. Hopefully it will pass quickly. I am hoping for a better week next week. We have had two little ones that I have been watching since this past Saturday. If the schedule changes or something changes with the family dynamics she gets a little uneasy. It's not that she dislikes the new kids it is just hard for her to adjust. Things will be back to normal next week and I think she will be better. Today was really difficult for her. Cameron went for an overnight visit with his grandmother, yesterday, (this grandmother is trying to gain custody of him now after 2 years of him being with us, ugh) and the kids are not dong well with that. They are really upset by this. We are all praying that he stays with is. So again another change has happened and she might be unhappy but unable to express how she feels in words. Change is so hard for my Emma.

We have all enjoyed the 2 little ones we have had this week. They are so adorable and they did very well. These two little ones are foster children as well. We were watching them for their foster mom who had surgery this week. One of them got sick but it was all good. She made it through and it was very brief. They are leaving in just a little bit and Cameron will be back in a couple of hours. I can't wait.

Continue to pray for our ordeal with Cameron. The DHS is not budging and they are very in favor of sending him with his grandma. We now are having to take them to court which is really unfortunate, but we feel this is the right decision for Cameron. Cameron has known no other family. We have had him since his birth. We took him home from the hospital and we are all very attached. I pray we will only have to go to court one time and the desicion will be made. It can get very expensive (which we have already spent several thousand dollars on a lawyer). But we got the best of the best when choosing our lawyer. We wanted the best. We feel very strong that Cameron should stay with us. So please keep us in your prayers. It is a very difficult process for my husbamd and myself. We are trying not to get to stressed. But honestly that is very difficult.

Well I guess I wrote on more than one topic, but hey it is all good :)

Today

   Today I am not feeling the greatest. I was up in the middle of the night with some nausea. It is probably due to me stressing over Cameron's adoption. I really wish it was just all over with. I was up crying a little last night just thinking about it. I know everything is in God's hands but honestly sometimes I really worry. I just can't imagine being without my Cameron.

     On another note we are having a blast in school. The kids are learning so much. They are having so much fun. I am already looking into what we are going to be doing next year. I can't wait to order my stuff for next year. We homeschool year round. One of the reasons we homeschool year round is that Emma has FAS and if you take to long of a break she will forget everything she has been taught and we would have to re-teach her. Although in the summer it won't be as intense. It will be more laid back because we really like to be outdoors during the summer. I use the A Beka curriculum. I love it. It is working for my so we feel we should stick with it if it working. No need to find something new if it is working out. Most everyone I know etiher puts their own things together or uses sort of a Chorlotte Mason approach to schooling. Although I really like these types of approaches I am not sure it would work well for me as the teacher. I am just to nervous to try it. So for now we will stick to what we have been doing.

     This eveinng I took my girls out to play in the snow. The fresh air felt wonderful. They really had a good time. They both tried to ride their bikes through the snow which was pretty funny. The just couldn't figure out why their bikes would not move. They made snow angles and we have a couple of hills in our yard so I pushed the girls down the hills. They got a thrill out of that. Unfortuantley my boys could not join myself and the girls, due to some obedience issues. Maybe tomorrow the can have a chance to make it out side. I will post the pics of the girls playing outside when I get a chance to upload to my computer.

Nicholas (Isaiah James), Adyline Elizabeth, Cameron Michael

      Today I will introduce Nicholas (whose named will be changed to Isaiah James when adopted), Adyline and Cameron. I can't say to much as these three little ones are not officailly adopted yet. We are very close to the end of our adoption with Ady. Cameorn is still in the early stages of adoption and we have not started the process with Nicholas yet.

     I will start with Nicholas. He has down syndrome and he is the sweetest little guy. He and I are so much in love with each other :) He is such an easy guy to care for and he is so laid back. He hardly cries and is just full of joy. Having him makes me want to adopt ten more down syndrome children. What joy he brings to me everyday. Our whole family just adores him. It truly is a blessing to have him in our lives. I will be honest at first I was very scared to take him. I had never really been around a child with down syndrome and I really didn't know how to care for him. But we believe that every child is a gift and I could not turn my face nor my heart away form him just because he has down syndrome. I felt this way before he came into our care. We found out we were getiing him about 4 days before he actully came home. He was in the hospital when we got the call to take him. We were able to go visit him at the hospital and I was the first person that he made eye contact with. I literally cried when I held him. He was so very precious. All of my fears seemed to disappear when I held him for the first time. What a joyful little guy.

     Now it's Adyline's turn. Adyline is a very affectionate littel girl. She is also a very fearful girl. I believe that comes from her past. However she is improving with each new day. She feels secure here with us and I htink she realizes tha she is safe so she is making tremendous progress. She is a very intelligent little girl. Very quiet in her speech, with many people not knowing she really can talk. She is very shy. Very frightened in new places or with unknown faces. However within a few minutes she calms down. Ady has Fetal Alcohol and Cerebal Palsey in her legs. Thakfully this has not interfered with her mind. We are hoping with physical therapy and time she can possible outgrow this since it is not really severe. She is such a cutie and we are so happy to have her in our family.

     Cameron...He is a super, SUPER busy guy. Into everything he can possibly get into. He gets into everything EXCEPT his toys. He is so very cute. I should have known he was going to be this way. When he was a baby, he was the most diffucult baby. He cried or should I say SCREAMED ALL the time. Did not sleep through the night until he was 6 months old. Even now he really doesn't sleep much but he does sleep through the night thank goodness :). He is such a funny guy. Very funny. He has us laughing all of the time. Even though he is busy guy he is so much fun. I have to know where he is at ALL the time. You never know what he has found or what he might be getting into. He used to scream at us if we didn't give him his food fast enough. He still tries to scream at us once in a while but I think he has figured out that he doesn't get his food until he stops screaming. LOL. We quit going to restaurants for fear that he might scream everyone out of the restaurant. But the other day I took all of the kids to lunch with my mom and her good friends and he did excellent. So now I think we can start making trips to out to eat now :)

     After all of theses kiddos are adopted I will give you their story. Since I don't have biological children I can't give you a birth story so I will give you an adoption story :)  

Also the first pic is Nicholas, then of course Ady and then Cameron

Emma Grace

  

  Today I introduce you to Emma Grace. Oh my, my Emma Grace! How I could say so much about her. She is the cutest, tiniest little girl you may have seen at 4 yrs. old. My 2 yr. old weighs more than her. She weighs in at 27 lbs. Such a cutie!

     I will start by saying this little girl even though she is not biologically my daughter could really pass as my biological daughter. Not in her looks but in her personality. She is so much like me. My mom really likes to remind me of that :) So much like me in good ways and in bad ways, lol :) My little peanut was brought into our lives when she was 12 hours old. Her biological mother left almost immediatly after she birthed her and never returned. So we were called by our local DHS and were so thrilled to have her in our family. She only weighed 4 lbs 12 oz. at birth. She was so tiny. She could wear doll clothing (and yes we put her in doll clothing :) ) Premie clothes were huge on her. I remember when we brought her home 4 days later that I creid because I was afraid. Afraid of what, I reallt don't know. Maybe because she was so small? Not really sure. It wasn't fear of not being able to care for her, I really think it was because she was so tiny.

     Our adventure with Emma has been a whirlwind. Many ups and downs with her. Many, many days of tears because of not knowing what I could do for her. She was born addicted to cocaine and has fetal alcohol syndrome. At the age of 2 she was so destructive to herself that I was extremely concerned  and had to take her to the doctor. She would bang her head off of objects or literally fall down right where she was at with so much force that it didn't matter what was in her way. So many times she had bruises all over her face because of her meltdowns. She really could not help it. Her mind was just overloaded. We had to take her to a specialist who told me that both sides of her brain did not funtion at the same time which causes her meltdowns (due to prenatal exposure to alcohol). I remember on one of those very bad days counting every 30 seconds a major, MAJOR meltdown. That is not an exageration at all. No words can express how serious these meltdowns were. They were not just a 2 year old meltdown, they were very serious! We were finally able to get her on some medication because the seriousness of her issues were very extreme. I am not one to medicate, but my husband and I both agree it is best. Although it does not completly take away her meltdowns or other issues it does help alot. I do hope one day that we can take her off the medication. I just feel so bad for her.

Emma is also such a sweet, sweet little girl who can melt your heart in an instant. Her laugh is so contagious. And her smile goes on forever. She is very effectionate and so lovable. Our days with her are always unknown. We have no idea what the day will bring with Emma. But one thing is for sure, I know that I will continue to love her through every struggle each and every day. Even though we don't know her mood from one minute to the next I know we will always love her. She is such a blessing. I