Calls?

Many have been asking if we have gotten any placement calls yet. The answer is yes. We have gotten two calls so far. Both times DHS was trying to locate families for children out of the age range we said we were able to parent. One call was for a sibling group of several teens and we just aren't able to do that at this stage of life. So we have had to say no both times. I know there is someone (or several someones) specific out there who is supposed to be here. I know God has a plan for our foster care ministry and He prepared us at the right time so that we are able to be available for those specific children. He did the same with Hannah's adoption. We needed to be ready and waiting in advance because the call came suddenly and in an unexpected way. So although the kids and I race to the phone every time it rings, we will wait patiently for God to fulfill His plans. I will let you know when we have a little visitor. 

January - March '16

Please excuse my typos when I write. I do know how to properly write a sentence......except for comma usage, that is. Those little buggers have been a thorn in my flesh for decades. My problem is that it's usually 2am when I am writing these posts, so my brain isn't working at full capacity. I never seem to have time to write during any other point during the day.  I'll give you four guesses why.....

I now jump every time the phone rings, but we have not wound up with any placement calls yet. I still need a convertible car seat in case we have a toddler, but other than that we are ready and are just waiting. Actually, I do have a convertible seat, but it expires in July. I'm praying the Lord provides something else by then. Hopefully, it will be something unisex because the one I have is very pink. I do have infant seats, just not the kind for toddlers. I have to take a spending break for a bit. There were several things we needed to get/ do to prepared for foster children and it's all adding up very quickly.

We've celebrated 4 out of our 6 birthdays already this year. Micah turned 8 in January. We aren't really doing big parties anymore, so on Micah's birthday we had a game night. My birthday kiddos also get a special breakfast and the dinner of their choice. He wanted loaded nachos with his special  dairy free cheese.

He got a couple new games for his birthday as well as some other things.

Aunt Bekah sent a big box of gluten free cookies, which he shared.

 We really miss being able to go to Georgetown Cupcakes (TLC's DC Cupcakes), so I decided it was finally time to learn to replicate some at home. So for Micah's birthday, I made gluten free, mostly dairy free chocolate lava fudge cupcakes with peanut butter frosting. They were actually really good and I think that if I just gave you one, you wouldn't realize it was a special cupcake unless I told you. It's actually really bad that I know how to make these now, because I am tempted to whip some up more often than I should. Micah loved them and we had a fun day celebrating his birthday.

This boy is getting too big. The week before this it was his turn for what we call "A Date with Dad." He wanted to go hunting with John. They didn't get anything, but he enjoyed going and can't wait to go again next season.

Micah and Daddy on their hunting date

In February, we all experienced our first Iowa caucus. I got to help count the ballots. We took the kids with us. It didn't go the way I wanted it to go, but I'm still glad I went.

Waiting for the caucus to start.

We also went to our first concert as a family. We went to Winter Jam, which is a Christian concert with multiple acts. Tickets are only $10, but are first come, first served. You wait outside in the cold in long lines and are not guaranteed a seat. We were not impressed, for the most part, and won't bother going next year.

Watching the concert

We also celebrated Hannah's 6th birthday. Yes, you read that right. She is 6 already!! Say what? (She's missing a bunch of teeth!)

Grandma Sharon was in town the weekend before Hannah's birthday, so we celebrated a couple days early. Hannah chose pizza for her dinner and she requested caramel brownies in lieu of cake.

We played games with grandma and opened gifts.

Then on her actual birthday, we played hooky and went to the zoo. This little girl LOVES animals. It's really a shame that she's allergic to several of them. She also got the bike she had requested. She wanted a "big girl bike, with a basket and a kickstand and no training wheels." It was really hard to find, as most bikes her size still come with training wheels and therefore do not need kickstands. But John finally found her one and she loves it. This girl has been riding without training wheels since last summer.

She was blessed that we actually had a few warm days in Feb and she was able to enjoy her bike.

We also celebrated Nathanael's half birthday at the end of the month.

9.5! The double digits are almost here!

We started work on daddy's new office space. This house has 4 bedrooms. John and I are in one, Hannah is in one, and all three boys share a room. We were using the fourth room as our home office space, since we lost our den/office with this move. In order to use this bedroom as a foster care bedroom, a new space had to be found for John's office. I prayed and the Lord gave me a vision of how to make it all work. Our downstairs consists of a bathroom, the boys' room, our storage room, and then the rest is a big open space. We were using this as a school room and a playroom. The space is actually big enough that the Lord showed me we could wall off the school room area and make it into our new office space and still have lots of playroom space left. We weren't really using it as a school space anyhow. We have found we prefer to haul all our books upstairs and work in the living room and dining room. So we weren't going to miss the space downstairs. Here is how it used to look.

Here is the school room space. The doorway on the right leads to the upstairs.

March was a whirlwind! We finished up the foster care classes, finished our final paperwork, and had our final homestudy visit. We also finished up the new office and then I repainted the old office and had fun setting it up as a nursery.

This is dad's right hand man. He is always right up under John if there is a project going on.

Me too!

We decided to go with a cubicle rather than a room. It makes it a lot easier, as you don't have to deal with permits and codes this way. Here is the finished product. It's been working out really well and the kids still have tons of playroom space to play in. It's a big sacrifice for John. He lost peace and quiet in the office, since he's now in the playroom without real walls. He also sometimes has to stop his music (and if you know John, you know there is always music in the background) so the boys can practice piano. But he was willing to do it for the foster children that will come and I know God will bless him for that.

We put up a baby gate instead of a door.

It's a tight fit and we are still figuring out the exact way we want everything, but it definitely works. I haven't hung John's photos and awards back up yet, but will do that soon.

It's a music room/office.

Here is the only photo I could find of the old office before. It's from when we were just moving in. We had John's computer, our bookshelves, our file cabinet, and our printer in there.

 I really didn't want to paint, but this room was so dark that I just felt like I had to. I want to offer a light and happy looking room to a child who is going trough trauma.

See how dark this room was? 

 

 

 

Painting over the dark colors

Here are some after photos of the nursery. I absolutely LOVE how it turned out.

This is taken from the doorway just like the "before" office photo above. What a difference!

This is my favorite part. If there is any one thing I want the kids to know while they are here, it is this- Jesus loves them.

Our church hosted a sumo wrestling event mid-March and the boys really enjoyed that.

Then came Resurrection Sunday! I love to dress up my babies. :) I will continue to do it as long as I can get away with it.

I sang "Redeemer" at my church. They don't really do much special music at my church, and I am not sure why. I am the only one that I know of that has sung specials there in the almost two years we have been attending. I prayed the Lord would use it to minister to people and He did. I got so many comments that day and every Sunday since then.

We decided that we would continue our new tradition of celebrating a Messianic style Passover. I know there are some who would be highly offended at this, but we decided to celebrate Passover on Easter Sunday, even though the actual date was not for several more weeks. I know you can't just move holidays around, but when Jesus rose from the dead, it was during Passover and there is so much significance to that. I feel that our Passover celebration is most fitting on the day we celebrate Christ's resurrection, so that's how we will continue to do it. We also used homemade Resurrection Eggs this year to remind the kids of everything leading up to Jesus' death and resurrection. (http://www.southernsavers.com/diy-resurrection-eggs-1). I made gluten free Resurrection Rolls for Easter breakfast. These rolls were pretty cool. You wrap the dough around a marshmallow and then you bake them. During the cooking, the marshmallow melts and they are hollow when you bite into them. The tomb is empty; He lives!

Eating our rolls before heading to church

 We also continued our foot washing tradition. We do secret things for each other to bless one another and leave a footprint when we are done. Here someone had taken out the recycle for Hannah, which is normally her chore. This is something my mother started with my siblings and I and I have enjoyed keeping it alive.

 I made homemade matzo this year, so that I could keep it gluten free.

I apparently forgot to take any photos of our Passover meal and celebration. Oops.

So that is my update for the first three months of the year. We were crazy busy during those months and are glad to now be on the other side of them!

We're official!!

I just received our foster care license in the mail! We are now officially approved and able to accept placements. A friend from my class was already called yesterday, so we could have a child here any day now. Please continue to pray for us as we continue to prepare to walk this road.