Huge update!

On Feb 19, we received a call from our agency about a foster to adopt situation. It was for a sibling group-girl and a boy. After telling me the details, I told the casemanager that this sounds like a situation that would be perfect for us. I told her I'd verify with Andy but basically I was saying yes. I called Andy and his response was...say yes!!! I called our case manager back and she said that she'd already let them know that we were very interested. She called me back later that day to said that we were the first ones to respond and that the worker for the county was very interested in us. This all happened very fast and then it slowed down from there.

Since we had said yes, our agency wouldn't call us about any other placements. So we waited...1 week..nothing, 2 weeks...nothing, 3 weeks..nothing. These were the longest three weeks ever! I admit that I avoided blogging during that time as I didn't want to say anything about the call as I didn't want to "jinx" it. I didn't even tell my parents about getting the call until after the second week. The great part during this time was that my sister was in Florida doing an internship and was really busy so I didn't get to talk to her much. I didn't want to say anything as she gets just as excited as we do and I knew she had a lot going on. Her internship was at a place that does dolphin therapy with special needs kids. This was a dream of hers! She has loved dolphins since, well, I think she was born making dolphin sounds. HA! Anywho...back to the waiting..long, long, long!

On March 15, the caseworker and GAL for the kids called our agency with some questions about us. Our agency said that if they were still interested, they would call us to set up a time to meet with us. We were told they were looking at the homestudies of a couple other foster to adopt families and would probably meet with two or three families before they made a decision. About 15 min after I spoke to our casemanager, I heard from the caseworker...they wanted to meet with us! YEAH!! We set up an appointment for March 22. They said they will give us more info about the kids/the case and then let us see if we're still interested as well as give them time to see if they think it would be a good match for the kids. They said they may not make a final decision for a couple of weeks. Needless to say we were very excited as well as very nervous.

I finally told my sister about "the call" the night before the meeting. This was a new step for us so I wanted her to know what was going on. Plus it's really really hard not to tell my sister about something this huge. I tell her everything! When she would call me, all I could think was please don't ask me about if we got a call cause I knew I couldn't not tell her if she asked. When I would talk to her, I'd ask her tons of questions about her stuff and then if the conversation would shift to me and Andy, I'd change it again or hurry to get off the phone. I really hope I never have to do that again!! =)

March 22 finally arrived and we had the meeting with the GAL(Guardian Ad litem-attorney that looks out for kids best interest), adoption caseworker, and ongoing caseworker. They told us about the kids, the case, and asked us some questions. We felt really positive during the meeting and hoped that they thought we'd be a good match for the kids. At the end of the meeting, they said to think about our decision and to call them by that Friday to let them know what we decided. Then they would make their decision as to if we'd be a good match. One of the caseworkers said that typically alot of people "just know" if it's going to be a good fit or not but they wanted to give us the time to really think about the decision.

When they walked out the door, Andy and I looked at each other and just smiled. We both knew what our answer would be...we want to be the foster to adopt home for these kiddos. We decided to just sleep on it and call them the next morning. I called at 10:00 the next day to and left a message saying, "Yes, we want to be the foster to adopt home and we would be thrilled if you picked us. " About 20 minutes later, the adoption worker called me back to say she had let the team know that we had said yes and they were very happy. I asked when they would be making their decision as to if they would pick us to be the home. She said that they only met with us and had decided at the visit that we would be a great fit for the kids. YEAH!

We then set up our first meeting to meet the kids and their aunt(who they currently live with) for March 31. We were beyond excited and couldn't wait to start the next part of this long journey.