Foster Parenting Reflections

My most recent post for Vanderbilt Children's Hospital's Wishing Well blog is up today: Foster Parenting: the Good, the Bad, the Ugly.

I was nervous to be the "voice of foster parenting" for the blog, having been at it less than three years (and with only three official placements, thanks to BGC's extended stay!) but I tried to make clear that I'm only speaking from our experiences, with the gaps filled in somewhat from stories I've read on other foster moms' blogs.

I used the above pic of Claire and a little girl we did respite for. (It was BGC's first weekend with us and we'd already agreed to do respite, so we had FOUR little girls for four days. It was awesome.) It's hard to find good pictures of foster kids that I can share publicly, since their faces can't be visible. But Claire looked kind of forlorn in this pic, so it seemed to suit the topic!

To update on BGC, she did finally move to be with her pre-adoptive family!!! We are so excited for them. We'd hoped we'd see her walk unassisted before leaving our home, but she was really close—walking with just a hand to hold—and just a few weeks later, started to walk on her own. We saw a video of her getting up from a sit and taking four or five steps—so exciting! I can't wait to see it in person at a shower for BGC and her new mommy next week.

I mention in my Wishing Well post our frustration with how slowly things move in foster care. I can't count the number of times I said about BGC, "I'm sure by [X month] she'll have moved," and then many more months passed by! When she finally did move, it was so anticlimactic (preceded by a week or two of "maybe tomorrow" or "maybe Monday") that I forgot to tell our parents when she'd actually moved! It was kind of funny how both sets asked me, maybe three days or a week after, "So how's BGC?" or "Did BGC end up moving?" and I had to be like "oh yeah, last Wednesday!"

She will still be "in the system" for a while, since kids have to be with the family that plans to adopt them for at least six months before the adoption can take place. That would be early December, so maybe before Christmas, she'll have permanency! Another "maybe". . . shouldn't get our hopes up too much. There is also the complication of termination of parental rights. BGC's dad is contesting the motion, so there is a trial for that coming up as well. I feel for him, understanding the emotional resistance to just giving her up voluntarily, but there is just no way he could give her the care and stability she needs.

DCS gives/encourages families to take a break after a long placement, so we are officially "on hold" right now. Given that we'll go on hold again when Baby 3 is imminent, there isn't much time to offer care, but we do hope to provide a short-term home for a child in need before taking another break while Baby 3 is small.

Updates

I've been thinking a lot lately about why I blog. Or rather, why I feel like I should blog, since I don't very often! I'm long past the notion of trying to build readership and earn money off of affiliate links or anything. When I have something a little deeper I want to share about parenting philosophies or foster care, it's nice to have this space in which to write it.

But mainly, I just like to share parties I throw and crafts I make and cute things my kids are doing. (Someone hold me accountable for sharing Kate's My Little Pony birthday party and the girls' shared sister room, please!) Some people like to pin those ideas, and that always feels good, but what's the point, really?

Then I think about the blogs I still enjoy reading. I read some of the big thinkers and writers in contemporary Christianity, people whose work is relevant to my work, but to be honest, I don't do that for fun. And I've grown quite tired of the lifestyle bloggers who share so many money-making sponsored posts. The blogs I enjoy most, the ones I hope to see when I pull up Feedly, are the moms and foster moms just sharing their lives. Whether I know them in real life or just feel like I do, I like seeing what they and their kids are up to, what their homes look like, how they spend their time. "Human interest" in its purest form.

And I suspect that's why anyone reads this blog. So in that spirit, here are some updates on each member of Team Kelley.

Matt:

Superdad!!

His big news of late is a new "appointment." That's what, in the United Methodist Church, they call a new pastoral assignment. (In the UMC, bishops assign pastors to churches within a certain geographic area; churches do not do their own search or calling of pastors.) So, in June, we'll be leaving Arlington UMC, where Matt was baptized 34 years ago and where we have served for the last four years, and heading to the Associate Pastor position Christ UMC of Franklin, where Matt was confirmed about 22 years ago! Having these prior personal connections to churches is not really something the bishop is concerned with, but they are nice coincidences that we enjoy. Since Matt grew up at Christ UMC and has so many family friends there, visiting there (as I have occasionally over the past ten years) has often felt like visiting my home church in Louisville—a church home away from home, if you will. Matt also just finished the first year of his Doctor of Ministry program!!

Kate:

Kindergarten is almost over, and it has been a great year. She enjoys school, and loves the independence of riding the school bus and getting up to her own alarm clock (sometimes). She's learned a lot and almost always loves doing her homework. They get the whole week's packet of "home fun" on Monday, with small assignments for each night, and she usually does the whole thing within twenty minutes of getting home on Monday. I wrote a year or more ago about Kate's perfectionism, and how she is sometimes reluctant to try things she may not do perfectly right away. This has been the case with reading out loud. She reads well, but obviously doesn't know every word in most books, so we have to beg and plead and bribe to get her to try. She doesn't have such anxiety when it comes to math, and eagerly asks us to quiz her on addition, subtraction, and lately even multiplication! (They aren't covering that in school yet, but somehow she got the idea in her head, and she gets the concept well enough to calculate products up to 25 or so!)

Kate is doing soccer this spring at the YMCA, and as much as my competitive girl likes scoring goals in practice, she is clearly a natural-born defender. Like most soccer teams this age, the kids tend to run around in a pack, kicking the ball in any old direction, but if the other team gets too close to her goal (i.e. on her half of the field), Kate will break away from the pack to run back and protect her goal. I was a back in field hockey, so it's cool to see Kate enjoying defense too. I made sure to praise her a lot when a goal scored by her teammate would not have happened without her kick further back on the field. She's still doing gymnastics as well, loves to roller skate, and is excited for a variety of camps we have her signed up for this summer: gymnastics, drama, and "invention" camp.

Claire:

Claire is still Mommy's little barnacle, so attached to me that she won't even let Matt pour her a cup of milk if I am in the vicinity. Still a combo of sweet, snuggly, serious, and silly, she can also throw fits with the best of them. The "terrible twos" are supposedly really the worst between 2.5 and 3.5, and Claire turned 3.5 a couple weeks ago. So those irrational fits over the type of cup I gave her or the order in which her shoes were put on will magically come to an end, right? Right.

She likes to color and play dress up, dollhouse, and pretend. She can write her name (preferring to spell it CLARIE, though). She even wrote it upside down once, such that it was readable from where I was standing, which I thought was pretty impressive. She's doing gymnastics now too, and has the cutest dance moves. She sings a lot too, whether it's a song from Frozen acted out with the girls' Anna and Elsa dolls, or just her running soundtrack of humming and nonsense lyrics while she's doing other stuff. (I'm so excited for the children's choirs at our new church!)

Selfie with Mommy at gymnastics

Both girls like to watch videos on Netflix a lot more than I would like, but it's fun to see all these '80s characters revived: My Little Pony, Care Bears, and Strawberry Shortcake. They were in a Magic School Bus phase too for a while (not a revival/recreation, but the actual old episodes, which explains why Kate vehemently insists Pluto—or Bluto, as she says it—is indeed a planet). They also just discovered "Okay Google" on our phones, and like to verbally search for things. It always thinks Claire says "Okay Doodle," though, and Kate doesn't quite get why searching for "family photos" doesn't just bring up pics of our own family. Searching for "Shake It Off" is most successful, and they love to watch that Taylor Swift video.

BGC:

Yes, she's still with us. As my college psych professor used to say, "Things always take longer than they do." Her future adoptive parents (who, if you see me on Facebook, tag us in their posts about "CLS"—Certain Little Someone—that's BGC) have been taking their classes and doing their home study and all that, so their approval as pre-adoptive foster parents will come through soon. (By next week, in fact--I've been sitting on this half-written post for quite a while.) They've been keeping her on the weekends and when we go out of town, so the official transition should be very easy. She's over 2 1/2 now, having been with us 21 out of her 31 months of life. Permanency won't happen for her before her third birthday (since she needs to be with her pre-adoptive parents six months before adoption can take place) but hopefully not too long after that. Would this calendar year be wishful thinking? You never can tell, the way the state moves. After about four months MIA, we finally got some news/had contact with her parents. These absences are close to the official definition of legal abandonment, but not quite, but termination of parental rights is pretty much a foregone conclusion. While sad, this will make her adoption a smoother process.

As usual, we are astounded by her development. She got her cochlear implants a month or two ago, and seems to enjoy hearing what's going on around her! She's learning more sounds now, and getting serious about speech therapy. And, after months (and months--even before the spica cast) of being able to stand but hating it, she's pulling up to a stand all by herself and even cruising around the coffee table! She'll walk while pushing our ottoman (more stability and resistance than a walker toy) or while holding someone's hands. She just might take her first independent steps before leaving us—I wouldn't be surprised!

Me and Baby 3:

We go together, you know, for another 20 weeks! (Halfway point is today!) Per usual with my pregnancies, I am still frequently sick, especially when in motion. So, working from home is a good thing, but travel and even the short drive up to Kate's school are precarious. When traveling to Chicago and NYC in the last couple months, I've gotten sick on planes, trains (well, the subway platform), busses, and automobiles. Something different about this pregnancy, which has made us think it could be a boy, is a total food aversion that I'm just now coming out of. Previously, I'd maybe feel averse to a very specific thing, for a period of time, but never so completely as in this pregnancy. For 2-3 months, I was avoiding coffee and most meat, but it went so far beyond specific foods to a total apathy and anxiety about food. Nothing sounded good, and then I'd feel so anxious leading up to meal times that I'd throw up, just because meals don't sound good or I don't know how I'll feel about the particular meal. As with my other pregnancies, fruit is most universally appealing and craveable. Nachos/burrito bowls (vegetarian) have kind of been a thing this time around. I had one awesome grocery trip at about 8 weeks, when my philosophy was "anything that looks appealing to Jessica goes in the cart." At that point, it was crab cakes and egg rolls and corn dogs and other random things. Now, the grocery list is "just the facts, ma'am, and don't even look at the meat section, or pretty much any food not pre-approved."

16 weeks or so? We need to do another one!

Nonetheless, I still always love being pregnant, mainly because it makes me feel so good about my body! Our "big" ultrasound is next Wednesday, and since Kate will be out of school by then, we're taking the girls to see Baby on the screen! Pretty much everybody (except me and Granna) is rooting for a boy, and I'm more or less cool either way. We aren't dead set on any names yet, but we'll figure it out soon, once we know Baby's sex.


And since I've been so bad about posting lately, here are a few more photos of what we've been up to:

Family fun at a carnival--both girls seen bouncing behind us

Matt and I went to NYC for respective work stuff.
We worked in some fun, like a stop at the "Big Gay Ice Cream" shop in Greenwich Village.

Before my author meetings one morning, I worked at the coffee shop across from Studio1A,
so I could see the Today Show filming!

The girlies on Easter

Family pic on Easter

Lots of play tea parties with their "sweet treats"

Backyard water play now that it's warm
(and now that the neighborhood pool opened, it's cool again!)

So that's what we've been up to. Next week will be a big one, with a meeting scheduled for BGC's official transition, and then our ultrasound the next day, which happens to be Kate's last (half) day of kindergarten, so let the summer begin!

BGC Updates

So, yesterday, I spent nine hours at Vanderbilt Children's Hospital. Fortunately, I was still able to get six hours of work done. But between the time of waiting and working, I was accompanying BGC as she had her cochlear implant surgery.

We're old pros on the surgery floor now (there's more protocol than you think--this time I actually obeyed the rules and didn't take a to-go cup of coffee into the waiting room, where food and drink are not allowed, out of respect for all the kids awaiting surgery, who haven't been allowed to eat or drink in many hours!)

Our last two visits were for her hip surgery. She was in that spica cast from August 11 to November 4. That's a long time. I posted my tips for caring for a baby in a spica cast on Vanderbilt's Wishing Well blog, if you want to learn more about it!

You may be surprised she's still with us. It's been almost 18 months. I can't remember the last update I gave, but she's had two different families presented as potential pre-adoptive families, and both have backed out. She even had a couple overnight visits with the second one, who we thought was perfect but ended up having some sudden personal issues to deal with.

There's a third I've talked to, but in an unexpected twist, BGC's day care teacher and her husband actually have felt called to adopt her! They're not foster parents or in any adoptive agency process, but because of the established relationship, DCS plans to expedite their approval so BGC can go live with them!! They'll have to take all the foster care training classes and wait six months and endure the Termination of Parental Rights proceedings for BGC's birth parents, but they can start making a forever family together, and that is really exciting. She's 28 months old already, so it would be nice to have some permanency for her by her third birthday!

Developmentally, BGC is getting close to standing up and then cruising. After getting the spica off, she bounced right back to crawling very quickly. Her fine motor and communication skills had improved so much in the time we were unable to work on gross motor skills. Her communication is limited to less than ten signs, but her overall interpersonal skills have grown. Now with the cochlear implant on her weaker side, and keeping the hearing aid on her somewhat stronger side, she should grow by leaps and bounds in the coming months. But that will be for her new family to enjoy :0)

Creepy Crawly Party

Well, we've not only had BGC with us for more than a year, we've had her with us for two birthdays now! Last year, she had only been with us about six weeks when she turned one, so we did a little Sesame Street mini-party at church after our casual evening service.

This year, we gave her the full Kelley-family birthday treatment with a "Creepy Crawly" themed party in honor of her (pre-spica-cast) creeping and crawling and all her other progress in the last year. I can't show you how big and robust she's getting these days, how much more interactive and verbal (her few babbly sounds are big steps, with hearing loss as profound as hers!), but I can show you her sweet 2nd birthday party, at which friends and family celebrated her growth.

I found the invite on Etsy, and personalized the text.

For the centerpiece, I just used flowers, flanked by a light-up ladybug toy we have and a caterpillar I made from styrofoam balls that will do double-duty in a game at Claire's Halloween birthday party in two weeks.

 

Since it was a morning party, a "buggy brunch," the cake was a tower of doughnuts, being climbed by an orange doughnut-hole caterpillar (stuck in with toothpicks). I love the little name banner I made to hang over the doughnut "cake" (letters obscured for blog-sharing, of course).

Bloody Marys and mimosas for the grownups, plus juice boxes for the kids (BGC learned how to drink through a straw via said juice boxes today, actually!)

 Kate and Claire helped me with much of the food, like putting grapes on skewers for our "grape-a-pillars."

Cinnamon rolls became "cinnamon roll-y polys."

I used crescent roll dough with bacon and American cheese to make these little pastry "snails." I read online that broccoli slaw makes good antennae (and felt gratified that I was not the only person out there looking to create edible bug anatomy).

 I also made a bunch of quiche muffins, no cutesy name required.

For an activity to keep kiddos occupied, I put out supplies for crafting little bugs out of mini styrofoam balls, pipe cleaners, toothpicks, and pony beads.

These were the products left at the end of the party!

 

Happy birthday, BGC. This is going to be a big year for you!

Taking My Kids Off the Pedestal

I'm honored to be a contributor this year to Vanderbilt Children's Hospital's Children's Wishing Well blog. We've spent a lot of time at VCH this year with "Baby Girl Chandler" (AKA "BGC" on this blog), and though that isn't a prerequisite for contributing to Wishing Well, it has increased my knowledge of and appreciation for children's health care.

My first post is up on Wishing Well today, and in it, I share some thoughts about foster care that have been swimming around my heart and mind for quite a while. It felt really good to let it out. Though I didn't emphasize the religious basis of these thoughts in the published post, I'll say here that it all began with a book that I actually didn't even read.

I used to get a lot of review copies in my old job as editor of Circuit Rider and Ministry Matters, and (shocker) I didn’t have time to read them all, but I tried to give the appealing ones at least a little peek. That’s where I saw the line in Jennie Allen’s Anything that advocated praying a crazy prayer, that of offering God “anything.” Anything God wanted or needed from you, you offer that up. That is definitely a frightening thought, especially since my first thought was “my kids.” If I offer God anything, God might take my kids. That’s not a theologically sound thought, and I definitely don’t think God kills kids, takes anybody because he “needs another angel” or whatnot. That’s crazy. But as I weighed that crazy thought with the calling to foster care that I was already pondering—had been pondering for a while—I realized that, yes, in a way, answering God’s call would mean offering something of my kids.

The idea that opening our home to other children might mean my own children having less—less space, less attention, less of our disposable income, anything less than our undivided focus—I would be sacrificing something that my own privileged kids may take for granted. Not so much space and time and stuff, but their place on the pedestal of our family’s life.

This pedestal, all shiny white with Corinthian detail, has a plaque on it that says:

These children are special.

These children deserve the best of everything.

These children, by virtue of being born into a comparatively well-off family in a safe suburb, should be shielded from people not like us.

These children should not have to share the good things they have with those who have not.


To read the rest, go visit Children's Wishing Well.

Ten on Tuesday

Blogging has not been a priority lately (clearly), but I think I can handle ten quick items to share what's up with Team Kelley these days.

1. Kate transitioned to school wonderfully. She likes her teacher, her class, the library, going to P.E., art, and music class. She slept like crazy one afternoon during the first week, but other than that, hasn't seemed abnormally tired or anything. She and Claire are still live wires at bedtime, though Kate does conk out before Claire, these days.

 

2. Kate especially loves riding the bus. I had planned to take her in the morning (to allow us 20-30 extra minutes at home) and let her ride home, but she was totally eager to ride the bus both ways. The bus stop is around the corner from us (or just across a couple yards, if the grass isn't too wet) and Claire insists on coming too in the mornings. Kate feels independent, and has made some of her best school friends so far on the bus—another kindergartener (different class) and her first or second grade sister—who live across a couple yards in a different direction. They draw and do hair on the bus rides and have a great time.

 

3. Claire and Kate are super-into My Little Pony these days. It's so funny how kid-obsessions emerge so quickly and then disappear as quickly as they came. But they love to watch the cartoon on netflix, play with the couple of pony toys they have (my mom is wishing she had kept mine from the '80s!), and call themselves the different ponies, depending on what color they are wearing that day. My favorite is Twilight Sparkle, and I have the Pony theme song in my head all the time. That and the theme from Orange is the New Black.

4. Claire is pretty well potty trained these days, partially thanks to some My Little Pony panties I bribed her with to go #2 on the potty. (I have an aversion to clothing with branded characters on it, but sometimes a mom's gotta do what a mom's gotta do.)

5. BGC is doing better than we expected with her spica cast. Not near so whiny about it as we thought. She likes to be held a lot, since the cast gets hot and uncomfortable, but she's a trooper. And besides the bean bag chair, we've found ways to get her strapped in to her high chair, stroller, and the grocery cart, which I really didn't think would be possible! She gets this one off next week and another one put on for another six weeks. Hopefully that will be it, but there might be another cast or brace after that. Ugh.

6. Summer is essentially (if not officially) over. The pool is closed, we did one last item on our summer to-do list (a movie at the zoo last Friday night, or a "zoovie"), and I broke out the boxes of fall/winter clothing. Claire was excited to see all the "new" clothes appear in her drawers, and the fact that they were Kate's just makes it better! Poor thing—she'll get tired of hand-me-downs eventually, I'm sure.

7. It's consignment sale season! Of course, I don't really need much this year, since Kate wears uniform clothes to school and the littles get all the hand-me-downs. But Kate will need some cool-weather stuff for weekends and breaks, and BGC needs more long-sleeved dresses, since tops and pants don't work with her cast!

8. We're also quickly coming on birthday season in the Kelley house. My kids, husband, parents, and Jesus all have birthdays between October and January, so it's one family holiday after another scattered throughout all the secular holidays. BGC and Claire's parties are just two weeks apart in October, so I am planning, planning, planning! I even bought a little notebook to sketch my party ideas in . . . and of course had to retroactively chronicle the kids' parties from the last five years before digging in to this year's shindigs! (of course)

9. Totally random one before closing this list. Kate's P.E. teacher is named Ms. Aydelott. It's pronounced "ate-a-lot," and when Kate came home telling me this her first week, I didn't believe her. Then I concluded it must have been a mnemonic device for some similar-sounding name and Kate just got confused. Then I saw it in print and thought, wow. Of course the woman had to become a health and fitness fanatic, with a name like that! 

10. The BGC update: her parents have disappeared. So while we were so hopeful for their reunification with her (more hopeful and supportive than the social workers ever were!) that is now a presumed impossibility, and adoption is on the table. Matt and I did not go into foster care looking to adopt, but told ourselves we'd be open to it if the situation presented itself. So, we're in a time of major discernment on that. Lots of factors to consider, factors too personal to blog about. But that's what's up.

What's up with you?

A Whole Year

It's hard to believe, but today marks one year since BGC came into foster care. I remember in those early days, shopping at a consignment sale and saying to my mother-in-law, "I'll go ahead and get this sweet pea costume, 'cause I'm betting she'll still be with us at Halloween."

I said it with a tone of voice implying it might be kind of a stretch, gee-I-can't-believe-she-could-be-with-us-ten-weeks. Little did I know. She was only our third placement, and we didn't really know much of her situation yet. I also bought a Christmas dress at that sale, saying "If she's not with us at Christmas, she can still wear it, wherever she is!"

This spring, I started saying "I wouldn't be surprised if she's still with us at the one-year mark." And now I'm just planning on her birthday, Halloween, Christmas . . . who knows.

I've started using Instagram in the past few weeks, so if you "follow" me on there, you may know BGC had her big hip surgery last week.

An x-ray months ago showed that her hip was dislocated and probably had been since birth. The ball of the joint was basically not visible at all, but they didn't know how much they would have to do to it until they were in there messing around with it. So, after a delay and then a rescheduled surgery date, she finally had that surgery last Thursday. Once they put her under and started messing with the joint, they found they could maneuver it into place without a cut! They did a small incision to lengthen a tendon, and put her in the spica cast to immobilize the joint for a few months, and supposedly things will grow in that time to keep the joint how it's supposed to be!

So, now we're learning to diaper and carry and do everything else with her in a spica cast. Add that to the list of new experiences we've gained through foster care!

We're not as hopeful about her case as we had been. Her parents, who had been so attentive and so determined to do whatever needed to be done to get her back, have kind of fallen off the map. No contact with anyone in the system for five weeks, and their phone is disconnected, so we can't reach them either.

BGC has come such a long way in one year—from a ten-month-old who couldn't even roll over to a 22-month old who is (was) crawling and moving toward pulling up/climbing. I hate that the surgery and cast will set her back in mobility, but we'll work on her communication (try to keep those $^%&*# hearing aids in!) and fine motor skills while she's laid up, and maybe she'll be walking by 2 1/2!

Why Fostering Is Like Dating

I wouldn't say I dated a ton before finding my Reverend Charming—one other serious boyfriend and maybe two other relationships that reached the "official" status. (Oh, how thankful I am not to have uttered the term "DTR"—"defining the relationship"— in over a decade!) But those relationships and other steady dates (for lack of a better definition!) brought more than just fun and romance to my life. 

They introduced me to and immersed me in hobbies and characteristics I might never have otherwise given a second thought. And it is that aspect of dating that has come to mind at various times over the course of our first year of fostering. 

I remember the moment my "classic rock education" began, when Bob Seger's "Old Time Rock 'n' Roll" came on the radio while my high school sweetheart and I were in the car, and I guessed that it was Little Richard singing! What followed were many awesome mix tapes that I still enjoy today, and an appreciation for Billy Joel, Paul Simon, James Taylor, and other artists of the 1970s and '80s.

In college, I dated guys with passions for film scoring and musical theatre, and learned a lot from them about Alan Silvestri and John Williams, and a lot of shows less well-known than those in which I played minor roles in high school.

Beyond music, these relationships (and non-relationships) taught me about Tourette's Syndrome (it's not all about swearing), golf, baseball, the Baptist church, the Episcopal Church, cigar-smoking, and various cities around the South from which these young men hailed. Lest this seem like "Runaway Bride," where Julia Roberts doesn't even know what kind of eggs she likes, I hope maybe these fellows learned something about religion, Russia, or language (grammar, linguistics, etymology, etc.) from me. Or maybe not—my interests don't sound as interesting in comparison!

But in our year of fostering, exposure to and relationships with children and adults from different backgrounds and life experiences has taught me things I might not otherwise have immersed myself in. 

Things like:

how African American hair and skin require different care and styling. . . 

how race and poverty are so connected in America . . .

how family members who try to break patterns that fuel the cycle of poverty end up estranged . . .

how the juvenile and family court system works (and where that courthouse is even located in our city) . . .

where education ranks on Maslow's hierarchy of needs (after shelter and stability) . . .

what "white privilege" really looks like (actually, Matt learned that. I'll share that story sometime) . . .

the frustrations of parenting a teenager (oh, curfews and one-word answers!) . . .

the challenges (i.e. multitudes of doctor and therapy appointments) of parenting a special needs child . . .

navigating the prison and criminal court system . . .

how people can have substance abuse problems and criminal issues and still be devoted parents . . .

how thrilling it is to see progress like a 16-month-old child finally able to sit up! (without that boppy, too) . . .

how bizarre it is to get excited over a child nomming a toy or NOT gagging at phlegm in her throat, because dealing with semi-solid stuff in her mouth is a major project in therapy. . .

how vital social services like TennCare and TEIS (Tennessee Early Intervention System) are . . . and more.

BGC gets her hearing aids next week, so we'll start navigating those changes (oh, big girls, please keep the noise down—she can actually hear you now!) and add speech therapy to our weekly regimen of developmental, physical, and feeding therapy.

We're in the home stretch of reunification with BGC's parents, so we're navigating a tricky but very special relationship right now (a double-date, so to speak?) We're going to a training next week about "Working with Birth Parents," and we'll have some positive examples to share, gladly offering a counterbalance to some of the tougher situations our fellow foster parents may have to share.

We entered foster care because we have something to share—a room with a crib and a bed, extra car seats, a modicum of flexibility and openness—but there is so much we gain in the process as well. Namely, a wider view of the world, seeing things that are right under our noses, maybe in a different area of town or different wing of the hospital—so close yet so far away, only because luck and chance and birth have kept it far away.

These relationships aren't forever, but they expand our minds and hearts nonetheless.

Sesame Street Mini-Party

Given how much I love throwing kid parties with a cute theme woven throughout, the thought crossed my mind earlier this year how it might work if one of our guest kids had a birthday during his or her time with us. I imagined meeting up with the child's family at a park or somewhere convenient for them (if unsupervised visits were approved, of course).

As it turned out, BGC's birthday was a few weeks ago, about six weeks after she came to us, but her family would not be able to join us for a party. I certainly wanted to celebrate her (and her mom made a point at our first supervised visit of asking me to send pictures of BGC on her birthday, party or not) but wondered what we should do. Invite a bunch of our friends and family over, like we would for Kate or Claire's birthday? Just sing to her at dinnertime, the five of us around the kitchen table? She's only one, and doesn't eat table food yet, so she wouldn't remember it or even get to enjoy a bite of cake. What to do?

As it turned out, I thought about the people who have seen and helped us care for BGC in her time with us, and I thought of our church family. Like the rest of our PKs, she has been at church at least three times a week (Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Wednesday evening) and everyone has welcomed and doted on her as they would any new child in our community. Since our Sunday evening service, The Road, is a smaller and more casual gathering that always includes dessert afterward, I had the idea to have a little mini-party in that time when everyone is milling around after the service, enjoying cookies or cupcakes and starting to break down the tables, sound equipment, etc.

My chosen theme was Sesame Street, mainly because I wanted to make these cute cupcakes I'd seen online! Since I was working with just a tabletop instead of a whole house (our downstairs, at least) the other thematic elements were just napkins, balloons in an Elmo basket, a little card I designed (since invites weren't necessary), and Elmo himself!

 

Claire thought the cupcakes were pretty tasty (even if she just licks the frosting off and leaves the cake!) I wish I could show you how cute BGC looked in her red dress and rainbow party bow, but here's a glimpse along with a very handsome shot of our dear pater familias.

To update/clarify on a few things: It is looking like BGC will be with us until at least April or so, and that is just fine. She fits into our family so well, being toted along to gymnastics and church and being doted on by two big sisters. We enjoy our visits with her parents and feel confident they'll work their plan and be reunited with her in the spring. She has some developmental delays, so we've started several therapies to help her catch up. (I'm so grateful to my premie-mama friend Nancy for helping me know even where to start!)

And if you don't know what "BGC" is all about, it's short for her blog alias, "Baby Girl Chandler," which itself is a reference to my favorite, most quotable show, Friends, which Matt likes to remind me began almost twenty years ago and went off the air almost ten years ago. Eeek!

Fall Fun on the Farm

 

 

You know I can't resist fun fall family excursions. On the first weekend of October (my favorite month, and it's almost over already!) we took the kids out to Lucky Ladd Farm about 30 miles away to enjoy the festivities. There were animals, mazes, slides and rides, and of course pumpkins!

 Kate fed the goats, and while Claire was interested, she was too afraid to let the goat near her hand. She walked around nonchalantly instead, hands in pockets! Somehow that seems "so Claire" to me, but I remember Kate doing that too at that age. Pockets are fun when you're almost two!

 

I love this pic. Cute kiddo with a pumpkin. She'll be two the day after Halloween, so she gets asked two questions a lot these days, occasionally mixing up the answers:

What are you going to be for Halloween, Claire?

"TWO!" 

How old will you be on your birthday, Claire?

"e-bug!" (ladybug)

The big girls enjoyed riding the barrel train (pulled by a tractor) and getting really dirty. Baby Girl Chandler mostly rode in the stroller, but enjoyed examining a pumpkin up close, too.

 

 

The corn box (like a sandbox, but with corn kernels!) provided some good sensory therapy for BGC. I don't talk about her case on here, of course, or personal details, but I'll say she does have some developmental delays and is getting various therapies. I was so glad to have my friend Nancy to advise me on where to even start getting BGC the help she needs!

Less than a week until Halloween! Thank goodness we can keep the pumpkin-themed fun going until Thanksgiving, or I'd be pretty sad.