Starting the Adoption Process Again

So,
We have started the Adoption Paper work, just within the past few weeks. Ivy is becoming more and more independent and we are starting to feel that there is another baby that is suppose to come to our family. The Adoption process is a lot of work just to prepare to start showing birth moms our profile. We almost have all the paperwork done. We just need to schedule to do a home study and create a family profile. I know I know those are both huge things. But, we don't plan on showing birth moms our profile until March. So, we have some time. By then Ivy will be 18 months. It took us 3 1/2 years to get her. Hopefully it won't take us that long to get our next baby. Now we know by our experience that whomever is supposed to be in our family will come when they are supposed to and we need to just have faith.

In the mean time we are going to continue to have loads of fun and enjoy our sweet children. They are all growing up so much! I can't believe our oldest is going to be 11 soon. Oh how time flies.

Baby Ivy is One!

Wow! How quickly this past year has gone. As you can see (by me not posting since we announced Ivy's birth) we have been busy. We can't get enough of our baby Ivy. She brings so much joy to all of our lives and we can't imagine life without her. We love you so much sweetie and can't wait to see how much you will change this next year.

Isn't she just adorable? It's crazy to look at her pictures when she was a newborn because she looked so different. 

Ivy has such a cute personality and we just adore her. 

We welcome Baby I to our Family

We feel so blessed to have a new sweet little one join our family. For the complete story click on the link for our Adoption Story over to the right. She has such a sweet spirit and we feel like one in a million to have her.

What a great summer this has turned out to be!

So, June was just about survival for me and I guess all of us. Every day it was just about going to appointments for the foster kids, making sure they didn't get into trouble, keeping my sanity through the craziness, etc. We let our foster kids' case worker know that we didn't feel good about pursuing adoption with these kids and that they needed to find a new foster family for these kids. To make a long story short, it took them a month to find a good fit for them, which seems fine to an outsider, but for me it seemed like an eternity. Every day was so hard and my nerves were shot. Foster care is the hardest thing we have ever done in our lives. We learned a lot, but that chapter has sailed for us. Now we are with a new adoption agency and will pursue adoption with them until we show 20 birth moms, then if we don't have a baby after that, we will just move on with our little family and continue to enjoy the life we have. We have had a great summer. We have gone swimming a lot, visited family and friends, and enjoyed each others company. I think my kids are ready to go back to school, and I'm getting ready for them. Lilly still has 1 more year of preschool and then she will be going to Kindergarten. I have been doing my preschool prep and am pretty much good to go. I will probably have my open house next week! I can't believe summer is coming to an end. It has gone by so fast! Here are a few pics from our summer:

Baby Fever

I guess it is about time that I actually post something on our blog. I have been pretty busy with life and haven't made the time to update you (the reader).
Our foster kids are still with us. Can you believe it? I seriously didn't think we would still have them. Their birth mom had the opportunity to have them back with her since January. She still hasn't gotten housing and done a few other things and therefore we still have them.
I wish I knew what her plans were. But, soon enough (by May 1st, their permanency hearing) we will know. Unless the judge decides to extend their case.
It's so hard to be patient! I love being a foster mom, but their are a few things we want to do. And can't really plan, until we know where our foster kids are going. Like go to DISNEYLAND. That was our main trip we were going to go on this year. We will be flying, so I guess we will just have to wait. Plus if we still have our foster kids we will probably need special helpers with us or something. Can you imagine having 6 kids under the age of 9 at Disneyland with just Wes and I?
I have been thinking a lot about Adoption lately. I get really baby hungry around this time of year. This year especially because, last year at this time we had our foster baby T. I have been missing her so much lately. She is over a year old now, but I still imagine her as a new born in my head.
I have been doing a bit of research into the agency we want to pursue if we don't adopt our foster kids.
Some people get spring fever around this time of year, but I get "baby fever".
I can't imagine having to take care of a new born having 6 kids already, but I like to plan for the future. I guess I'm trying to protect myself and plan for something that will give me comfort if we have to say "goodbye" to our Foster kids. I do have comfort in knowing that we still have 3 beautiful Biological kids who aren't going anywhere. But, I know we can provide for more.

I'm not really sure what I want. I know that our Foster Kids would probably be best off with us. They would have a loving Dad and Mom, a safe home, opportunities, routine, etc.
But, they still love their mom. I think that if their mom is going to change her ways, and be able to provide for them...she might deserve them back. They are her kids and all. But, I don't really see that happening.
I think I am just split because these children are a lot of work to take care of, but we love them a ton too.
So, here's to the future.....I will keep you posted. (Even if I am just writing to the future me who will be going back and reading my online journals).

Family Newsletter 2011

So, I guess I should do some type of a newsletter this year. I have just been so busy and sick with a cough/cold I haven't had much time. Here it goes...

We have had an awesome year this year. We have become foster Certified and had baby T (in April/May). She was such a good baby. We had our hearts crushed when Kinship came forward and she had to go with them. We won't forget her and we were so thrilled to have her, even if it was for such a short time. Now we have a sibling group of 3. We got them in October. It has been one of the hardest things Wes and I have ever done, but we have learned so much that we wouldn't trade it for anything. These kids have changed so much for the better in their speech, their behavior, and every aspect of their lives. R has learned how to communicate better when he is upset, he has learned to read better and is doing better with his numbers, and he loves to eat! :) M has come the farthest. He was a holy terror when we first got him. Even though he has a ways to go with sharing and not getting so upset about little things, he has learned how to control his emotions, is learning how to use the toilet, is so much happier, and loves going to Preschool on the bus. A is becoming more engaged and becoming more aware of her surroundings. She is talking more and more each day, and she is leaps and bounds above what she was when we first got her. I think in a few months she will be ready to be potty trained. She has developed such an attitude lately, typical of a 2 year old. She has these big brown eyes and cute dimples. Our foster kids are some of the cutest little Hispanic kids ever and we just feel blessed to be able to have them in our home. We will probably have them until the spring, or until their mom can start their trial home placement. We will have to see if their mom minds her P's and Q's.

We have traveled a lot this year. In March we went to San Diego and went to Sea World, Lego land, and the beach. We had a blast touring San Diego and excited to hopefully go to Disneyland next year. In July Wes and I went to Hawaii for our 10 year. It was awesome to get away and show Wes the areas I had already been when I was 17. We went to the Temple, the Polynesian Cultural Center, some awesome places to eat, we stayed at Turtle Bay, surfed, walked on the beach hand and hand, went to Waikiki, Pearl Harbor, the swap meet, etc. (It was a vacation we will never forget).

We also went to Idaho this year a few times. With my parents we went to the Ranch and had a great time in the cabin and hiking around. We also went to my Dad's side of the families family Reunion. It was really fun to be up in the woods in these cool cabins. With Wes's parents we went horseback riding on their horses. That was really fun for the kids to be able to ride a horse for the first time. We also went boating and our boys smoked it up on the knee boards. We have been riding our four wheelers around a lot this year. Ethan is saving up to start riding the little quad this next year. I can't believe our kids are growing up so fast! We love to be able to get out and experience new things, especially for our kids. Making memories is what it is all about. Right?

Wes has been really busy at work this year. He just landed a new contract with a company that he has been wanting to be with for a while. He's excited, but feels a lot of pressure to impress them, so they will want to send more work his way. He is such a great Dad and if it weren't for him we wouldn't be able to do foster care. It's also nice that he works from home. He loves to spend time with each of the kids and brings so much to our family. Wes has also kept busy being the ward mission leader. He is so dedicated to go to those 6:30 morning meetings.

I (Becky) have still been busy teaching preschool and enjoying it so much. It's fun to have new kids each year and some returning ones. It is so rewarding to be a mom and a teacher, just to see the results slowly over time of the hard work I put into it. I am the Young Women's secretary and Personal Progress Leader. I love the girls and learned a lot from them. I have also worked a lot on my blog ziggyfoods.blogspot.com. I don't have much time to work on it now, but it was fun when I had the time.

Byron is nine now! Crazy. He is so fun to be with. He laughs a lot and is continuing to love hanging out with adults. He has a lot of friends and loves school. Byron has a witty personality. He still draws a ton every day and I just love to see the new things he comes up with. He is thriving in school and loves to read. Byron played soccer and football this year. He also did Karate. He has decided to take a break for a while. He will probably play soccer in the spring.

Ethan turned seven this year. He is still joking and being silly a lot. He adds so much humor to our family. He loves his video games and did really well in soccer this year. He is reading up a storm and reads way above his grade level. He has loved having a foster brother his same age and will miss him a ton when he leaves. His new thing is right when he gets home from school he changes into his "comfy" clothes. He is so my son.

Lilly is four now. She is a little lady and we have enjoyed spending a lot of alone time together while our foster kids go to their birth mom visits every week. (I try to trade off with each of our biological kids. They love the one on one dates). Lilly started dance this year. She just had a Christmas performance and Lilly did so well! I was so proud of our little girl. I also think that it is cool she is taking clogging. I took clogging when I was in third grade and loved it. Lilly is starting to read and is just so clever.

Can you tell I love my kids and like to brag about them? Ha ha.

We have had such an eventful year and are looking forward to what next year brings us. Life is so unpredictable and we are learning so much from our experiences. We know we can't do anything without the savior. We appreciate the comfort and guidance we get from Heavenly Father through our trials. Life is about strengthening our character, endurance, and our testimonies. We love all of you and are so blessed to have such great friends and family.

Happy New Year!
Wes, Becky,
Byron, Ethan, Lilly
& our foster kids R, M, and A.

They're with us

So, on Friday we found out our foster kids will be with us for a few more months, if their mom wises up. It will continue to be challenging, but we can do it. The Lord has been there thus far and we know he will continue to give us strength and energy to deal with these kids. We love them so much and we are relieved they are going to be in a safe and loving home for a while. :)

It's all in God's hands

So, tomorrow we find out if our foster kids will be going to live with their Grandma. She lives with a guy who is married to someone else in Mexico. Originally she didn't want to adopt them if their mom failed. But, now she changed her mind. Their are a lot of little things about the whole thing drive me insane. But at the end of the day, it is all up to DCFS. They usually choose kinship if they barely scrape by and are good enough.
I know that I have said a million times that we are done with Foster care, but after this I think we are. It's just hard for me to work so hard and then DCFS always choosing kinship no matter what.
We will see what the future holds for us. I am completely exhausted at the end of each day. We have learned so much through this experience that will help us throughout our lives and hopefully we have helped these kids learn certain things that they can take with them.
Anyway, just wanted to record my feelings a bit. Now I need to go deal with screaming kids in the next room. :)

Bear River Bottoms

This year we have been getting out of the house a lot. With Six kids if you don't get out, you go insane! We went to this place near Logan Called Little Bear River Bottoms or something. It was so fun. The kids played on this huge pile of one ton straw bails. It was cool because they had little spots for the kids to play in and since they were one ton, they weren't mov'n. We also went in some corn mazes and a twine maze. Our favorite part was the hay ride. We weren't going to go, but the driver came over and needed some more riders. He cut us a great deal. It was so funny, it was a little haunted. The main guy asked for some volunteers.  Byron and Ethan went up. They went in this outhouse and this guy with a scary mask went up behind them. It was so funny to watch because Ethan got pretty scared. He was trying to act tough, but he was scared. It was in broad daylight and the guy geared it toward kids.
Then it was so funny because the kids were talking on the way home about what our driver on the hayride said. There was a part that he claimed we got sprayed with water that had cow poo in it. Then one of the kids said it was cow pee. Ethan spoke up all matter of factly and said, "No, cow pee is milk". Wes and I laughed and laughed about that. It's funny what kids put together in their minds.

Are you serious!?

So,
We expected to have to say goodbye to our foster children this week. We were heart broken, relieved, scared for the kids (because we didn't know if a 23 year old boy with a girl friend could handle these kids, plus we didn't know what the environment was like), etc.
Today I got an email from their case worker saying.....the uncle didn't pass the background check. That was unexpected.
We are going to continue to love these kids and help them feel safe.
We will have them for Halloween. Which will be fun. Halloween is a kids Holiday and it's so fun to see their excitement.
Life is so unexpected, seriously!
For today I am relieved and happy. :) Who would have thought I would welcome this wild life of having six kids and love these foster kids as I do.
Wes is really happy too!
We have just gotten so far with breaking through their shells and figuring out what we can do for them to help their development.
They call us "Mom" and "Dad" and just seem so happy here.
Lets see what Heavenly Father chooses to happen with these Foster kids and what path they are suppose to take.
So, keep us in your prayers. We need them coming. :)
Our prayers were definitely answered.

Oh the heart ache

Today our foster kids' case worker came to our house to see their environment and deliver us the bad news. Kinship has come forward! I can't believe that the exact same thing that happened with our last placement is happening again. I think I am in a state of shock, disbelief, and sadness. I just want to crawl in a hole and weep!
But, I know I have to go on. Just knowing these sweet kids are probably going to be out of our house within the next few weeks just kills me. It's hard because we have seen so much progress already.
They probably will be raised in day care. With an uncle and his girlfriend who both work.
Whatever. We are done.
We have given this our all, and some may call us selfish to not want to do Foster Care again. But oh well.
We had hoped to have these kids for at least 6 months, or maybe forever. But, I guess it's not up to us.
Wes says he doesn't even want to try to adopt either. So, our hopes of building our family may be over. We'll see, when things calm down a bit he may have a softening of heart.
But, for now I am going to cuddle the ones in my care and continue to wonder what Heavenly Father has planned for me.
Just had to vent. I am going to go crawl in my hole now. :)

Well that was unexpected

So, we have 3 new foster kids.
We were just about to let our foster license expire within weeks. We had just completed all the paperwork and the homestudy for a new Adoption Agency. Then one day I got this situation in an email of 3 foster children the state was looking for a placement for. They were three hispanic children ages:6,3,and 2. Boy, Boy, and girl. For some reason I was just about to delete the email and something told me to talk to Wes about it. So, that night I did. We figured we did have room and it would fit perfectly into our home to have the girls share a room and two boys to share a room upstairs and then the other boys share a room downstairs. We prayed about it, couldn't sleep over it. But, we didn't hear back. We figured they had chosen another family.
A few days later our licencor called to see if we had space for 3 more kids. I asked her if they were considering us and she said she wasn't sure. A few hours later one of the case workers from our local agency called and said they wanted to offer the children to us. She told me about them. The problems that they had didn't seem to be anything we couldn't handle.
Originally we wouldn't take any child older than our youngest and for sure no more than 2 kids. But, for some reason we felt good about this situation. The first day we went down to visit them, I was so nervous! We went to meet them at the shelter they were living at after they got removed from their mom. I didn't feel an instant bond or love for them. The middle one kept climbing and jumping off things onto me. He bit my hair, ran into me a lot, and hit his head against my jaw. The youngest one was stand offish and kept saying no and wouldn't engage. The oldest was fine, but bickered with his siblings. Then we went outside and played with them. That's when we bonded a bit with them. The older one heard we had a trampoline and wanted to come home with us that night. The middle one was responsive to my teaching and the youngest one wanted to be held by Wes. I still wasn't sure about it.
Then next day we went and picked them up. We had our kids with us and we all fill up our vehicle.
The first few days were way hard and I felt so overwhelmed I kept asking Wes, "Are we sure we can do this". By the end of each day we both crash.
The middle child has proven to be the most difficult. But, we have seen the most progress with.
Come to find out they didn't have any discipline at all and the birth mom appears to be afraid of the middle one, because she just doesn't know how to control him.
They are all gorgeous kids! They have dark brown eyes and long eye lashes. My friend at church yesterday said we look like a giant ice cream cone with chocolate and vanilla swirl. And I am the cherry on top. I thought that was cute.
Every day it gets easier and we are beginning to handle it.
I think the hardest thing about the whole foster care thing is the appointments. Dentist, Doctor, WIC, Mental Health Assessment, School Enrollment, Birth Mom visits, etc. It seems like we have at least one appointment a day. But, it will slow down. It is just really hard to continue on with life and everything we were doing before like Dance, Football, Soccer, Karate, Preschool, etc.
But, we are making do. We can't do it without Heavenly Fathers help. We know he has had a hand in this for sure.
So, we will have these little ones in our home for at least 5-6 months, Could be 12, or forever at this point. We just don't know. Our main goal is to teach, love, and try to make a positive impact on these kids.
It has been so rewarding to teach them about prayer and the gospel. Our oldest foster child said the prayer in Primary yesterday. It is so worth it to be a Foster Parent, but I wouldn't recommend it for the faint at heart. Because, it is very challenging.

And the busyness begins!

I love the fall! This year it seems like everyday I have at least two extra things besides Preschool planned. Byron started Football, Ethan soccer, and Lilly dance/clogging/gymnastics-it's just a once a week class that the teacher teaches all three of those things. Our kids are having a blast and love to have something they do. It's nice that none of them have gotten in the way of the other. 

 I was at the grocery store the other day and couldn't resist these little angels! We have been open to the idea of getting kitties since our stray cat was killed by that stray dog that came in our neighborhood. The White and Black one is "Rio" and the striped one is "Silvia". They are so entertaining to watch and play with.

Felix and Midnight are not liking these two little new additions. They are jealous, but they also look so fun to chase. Whenever we take the kitties outside they are watched well, because they are both so tiny!

What a fun Spur of the moment weekend

Over Labor Day Weekend Wes learned that he didn't have to work on Monday. So, we decided to go up to Idaho for a long weekend with Wes's parents.

We brought our quads up and rode them a lot. We went swimming at "The Ledge", a favorite swimming hole the locals like to go to. We played games, rode horses, went to the park, ate good food, and enjoyed each other's company.

Here are some pics...
Can you tell I am a little camera happy?