In January, 2019, just 3 months after we moved to Colorado, God put adoption on my heart. I had felt the burden to adopt years before, but it just never felt like the right time and Tyler was never fully on board. But when I mentioned my desire to Tyler in January, he did not hesitate. We noticed right away that our church had an emphasis on adoption. They have "Orphan Sunday" in November every year and not only is our Pastor's wife in charge of the foster/adoption support group called, Woven Families, but she had adopted two kids herself. It wasn't long before Tyler and I contacted her and set up a meeting with her and her husband.
We told them our story and how God moved us to Grand Junction. Then, we proceeded to share our hearts about adoption. We asked lots of questions and they told us our options. We knew domestic adoption was what we were called to at this time in our lives, and that we should at least get information about fostering to adopt. They gave us the name and number of an agent and agency to contact for more info.
Days later, I got the courage to call. I started out by saying that we had an interest in fostering to adopt and the lady laughed at me. Haha. Not exactly what I was expecting! Looking back, it was the perfect first impression of our foster agent, who we absolutely love:). There was such a need in Colorado that we would have to be willing to foster and reunite them with their parents, not just adopt. BUT in order to foster the babies (which is our desire), we would have to be a concurrent (willing to adopt) home. She was very honest and forthcoming with me. I wrote down lots of info and told her I'd be in contact. Honestly, I put it all on the back burner. I figured, I did my part and God would have to do the rest. Well, just three days later, she texted me and asked me if I was ready to meet with her. I asked Tyler if he was ready and right away he said, "Let's do this." As long as God was opening doors, we would walk through them!
We met with our foster agent and the ball started rolling fast. We filled out lots of paperwork, took five online classes, got physicals done on all six of us, read training manuals, watched videos, got our fingerprints done at a local police station, and did CPR/First Aid training. Next step was Core classes which is a 12 hour training required by the state. We had planned on taking classes at a local Christian organization that following April, but after setting up babysitters for our boys and planning on a 2 day training, they canceled just days before. The next training wasn't going to be until October. Such a bummer! Well, randomly, our foster agent contacted us and said she was going to be leading Core classes herself in May. Woot woot! So we attended those and got our credits. Then we had three separate homestudies where she met with me, then Tyler, and then the boys individually. Then we had our home inspection. We were required to have 46 hours of training the first year, so that has kept us busy. Finally in July of 2019, after lots of work and preparation, we received our Foster license! We are already in the process of renewing our license. Crazy it's almost been a year!
We have had opportunities to do respite care (temporary care provided to caregivers for foster kids) and have enjoyed spending time with some fantastic kiddos. We have been so proud of our boys for how much love they have shown to these kids. One special experience we had was with two kids, ages 10 and 12, who we clicked with almost immediately. We had them first for a week and then again for a weekend. After expressing to our agent how much we cared about these kids, she set up a meeting to discuss their case further. The agency was wanting to find a concurrent home for them. We attended the meeting and prayed about taking these kids in as our own. We prayed for open and closed doors. We were just going to keep walking through them as long as they were open! A day before we were going to give them our answer, the door slammed shut. It was sad and disappointing for sure. I had already imagined them in our family, but I was also thankful for a closed door. We want what God wants and He answered our prayers. We were willing, but God has other plans for us. We have had confirmation after confirmation about our decision and we are so thankful for a God who answers prayer. He is so faithful.
Fostering is full of ups and downs. We have experienced it already and we've barely scratched the surface. We have been excited about kiddos coming to our home, only to have it fall through several times. It's emotionally exhausting, but we know God has the perfect child in mind for our family. We are eager to see what God has in store!
To be continued ;)
We met with our foster agent and the ball started rolling fast. We filled out lots of paperwork, took five online classes, got physicals done on all six of us, read training manuals, watched videos, got our fingerprints done at a local police station, and did CPR/First Aid training. Next step was Core classes which is a 12 hour training required by the state. We had planned on taking classes at a local Christian organization that following April, but after setting up babysitters for our boys and planning on a 2 day training, they canceled just days before. The next training wasn't going to be until October. Such a bummer! Well, randomly, our foster agent contacted us and said she was going to be leading Core classes herself in May. Woot woot! So we attended those and got our credits. Then we had three separate homestudies where she met with me, then Tyler, and then the boys individually. Then we had our home inspection. We were required to have 46 hours of training the first year, so that has kept us busy. Finally in July of 2019, after lots of work and preparation, we received our Foster license! We are already in the process of renewing our license. Crazy it's almost been a year!
We have had opportunities to do respite care (temporary care provided to caregivers for foster kids) and have enjoyed spending time with some fantastic kiddos. We have been so proud of our boys for how much love they have shown to these kids. One special experience we had was with two kids, ages 10 and 12, who we clicked with almost immediately. We had them first for a week and then again for a weekend. After expressing to our agent how much we cared about these kids, she set up a meeting to discuss their case further. The agency was wanting to find a concurrent home for them. We attended the meeting and prayed about taking these kids in as our own. We prayed for open and closed doors. We were just going to keep walking through them as long as they were open! A day before we were going to give them our answer, the door slammed shut. It was sad and disappointing for sure. I had already imagined them in our family, but I was also thankful for a closed door. We want what God wants and He answered our prayers. We were willing, but God has other plans for us. We have had confirmation after confirmation about our decision and we are so thankful for a God who answers prayer. He is so faithful.
Fostering is full of ups and downs. We have experienced it already and we've barely scratched the surface. We have been excited about kiddos coming to our home, only to have it fall through several times. It's emotionally exhausting, but we know God has the perfect child in mind for our family. We are eager to see what God has in store!
To be continued ;)
