Hi everyone,

It has been a loooonnnng time since I've posted on the site - I used to post on various ttc and pregnancy boards on this site, but that part of my life is on hold for a while. I used to lurk some on this board last year, but never posted. It's so great to see the board so active now!

My husband and I just became officially licensed foster parents, and we are both excited yet terrified! LOL This has been a long road for us, but I really feel like this is the right one. We were actively ttc from 2002 - 2005, and after our 4th loss decided it was time for a break. We looked quite a while into infant adoption, but decided we just couldn't afford that kind of money up front right now. Then someone talked to me about foster adoption and at first I wasn't interested! Just didn't think we could emotionally handle a child leaving us. But more and more we talked to others who fostered and adopted from social services, and we became more interested. And over time I realized how right this path was for us, I'm totally into it now. The way we feel, as much as we've been through, any children we parent, no matter for how long, will get a ton of attention, love and caring from us. And who better to get this love than the children who need it the most?

We are officially licensed to have up to three kids (a twin bed in one room and a twin bed and a crib in another room) - so now the thought of going from having no kids to an instant foster family is pretty crazy! We are mainly interested in legal risk placements, for children whose parental rights have not been terminated yet, but who are at high risk for having them terminated - and since we're foster adoption we'd agree to adopt once rights were terminated. Our other preferences are for one child or a sibling group of 2, boys or girls, 0 - 5 or 6 years, neglected children, open to mild (but not severe) developmental needs, and African-American or biracial (both my husband and I are African-American). We've officially been released from our licensing social worker and just waiting to hear from our placement social worker - and waiting to get that call!

After that long intro, my question is: what in the world do we do now?! I feel somewhat prepared, our children's rooms are set up great, we've got tons of toys, bottles and other feeding stuff, a car seat, potty, sheets, various clothes. But I still feel so unprepared! It's so hard to know what we really need to have now, without knowing what age, gender, or even how many children we'll get for our first placement. So any suggestions are helpful.

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4 Angels ~ 12/02 ~ 5/03 ~ 9/04 ~ 10/05

:Welcome Shavon!

I am so glad you found us again. We have a great group of support here!

I believe we have three families exploring adoption through foster care and I have to say it has been very exciting hearing about their journey.

I am doing international adoption in Vietnam, just waiting to be matched.

The wait is the hardest part kind of were you are right now, you have been working so hard and so fast to stop and wait. Oh it drives me crazy.

It sounds like you are pretty prepared and I'm sure once the first phone call comes in you will be running like a mad women trying to get those finishing touches prepared.

Please keep us posted and I look forward to getting to know you.

Kristine

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& Shavon! I am also a fairly new licensed foster parent, we got our license in July and 2 weeks later we got our 1st placement. We also considered doing legal risk placements but decided that we didn't really want to wait to long on getting a placement so we went ahead and got certified as foster to adopt and told our agency we were also willing to take in kiddos that weren't available for adoption. Just last week we got our second placement, a 2 month old baby girl! Now life as I know it has been hectic but I just what were doing.

As far as what else you might need, maybe some baby wipes, baby body wash, diaper bag, bibs, car seat for a toddler and infant, high chair, a stroller. What you can also do since you don't know what gender you might be placed with go with a neutral color/theme! Also do you work or are you a sahm? The reason I'm asking is because you might want to take 2 or so days when you get your first placement.

If you have any questions, just let me know.

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Well dang. I know I wrote a good reply to this post. Really, I did.

I can't remember exactly what I said, but I know I said welcome to the board and that I too am a fost to adopt mom and that you actually sound very prepared.

Gotta run, my little fost to adopt is squalling from the bedroom. DH is having a time of it putting her back to sleep.


~m

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Thanks for the welcome, everyone!

I know we are probably about as prepared we can be, which doesn't feel very prepared! And I do have a lot of those items on my "list", I've just got to get up and do some more shopping at some point. I agree that the hardest part of this is waiting, not knowing when this is going to happen, and wondering how crazy it's going to be when we do get a placement.

Ruby, I do work full time, but I'll probably take about a week off for our first placement, plus maybe working some part-time for up to another week or two for us to get adjusted, depending on if we need it. I work doing developmental assessments for children under 5, in various parts of the state, but I pretty much make my own schedule and I spend a lot of time writing reports, so I put in hours at flexible times. I just contacted our HR person about FMLA paperwork, and I can use some vacation leave and other leave for a little time off. My husband is a full time student and doesn't work, so he's going to be the primary caregiver since he'll be home more than I will be - and he's very excited about this! Very amusing.

Lately I've been spending some time focusing on daycare, because we are definitely going to need daycare. Our licensing social worker gave us a list of a TON of places that accept DSS payments for daycare, but it's up to us to find a place, and I just started working on that this week. I was freaking out a little, as anyone would do when you look over a list of over 200 daycares in our city alone, but we go out to visit our first daycares tomorrow. I have no idea how this will go, since we don't even know any ages of children we will have in our care and when, but I'm hoping we'll find a group of several places we'll like and just hope one of them have some availability when we do get a placement! But we'll see.

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4 Angels ~ 12/02 ~ 5/03 ~ 9/04 ~ 10/05

Good luck finding a great daycare Shavon. It is so important to love the place you're putting your little ones, isn't it?

I love hearing your updates.

~m

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