Lesson 3 ~ My boys are growing up!

My boys are growing up. I still think of them as my little boys and having a 1 year old and three year old in the house made me realize how grown-up my boys are becoming.
I am not saying I am going to make them get a job and pay their own way now, but I needed a wake-up call that they need more responsibility and some room to grow. I take my job as a parent seriously (sometimes too much) and I can be downright mean if anyone messes with my kids. That's just the way I am. God is helping me to realize they are growing up and I will have to let go. They are becoming young men and they need to make some mistakes and deal with the consequences. Ethan is my onery one. I am going to have to crack down on that boy because all he has to do is give me his impish little grin and get me to laughing and he knows his punishment will be forgotten.
For the last ten years I have poured all of my energy into being a Mom. I realized that I need to start letting them go and have adventures and experiences on their own. They need a little more freedom to figure out who they want to be and not just be who I think they should be. I want to prepare them for the world and I want them to always know that they have a place to come and their parents will always support them and love them, but at the same time I don't want to make it too comfortable and have them both living here when they are 30.

Jesus in the Bathtub ?!?!

This is one of the experiences I had with our oldest foster child who was 3 years old.

Randy and I have made a habit of reading to Elijah and Ethan and praying for them and over them every night as we tuck them into bed. We have done this since Elijah was a baby.
When we got our "new" boys we knew this would be a great opportunity to tell them about Jesus and just pray blessings over their lives.
Neither one of the boys wanted to be put to bed, they were scared and confused, so Randy put a cd player in their room and put in a worship cd. After about the 3rd night the didn't even fuss at going to bed. The oldest wanted his songs on and he went to bed fine.
I would pray with them both and read a Bible story to them every night. It became our bedtime ritual and it helped calm them and they were no longer fearful of being alone or going to sleep.
The last night we had them the oldest asked me if Jesus was going to sleep on his floor again. It kind of gave me goosebumps because when a child talks about spiritual things I listen. I think they are more in tune to the spritual than adults and I tend to believe what they tell me. So I thought " How cool is that! Jesus sleeping in my house!"
So anyway I'm sure you are curious about Jesus in the bathtub!
The last day we had them I was in the bathroom with the oldest ( we were potty training so I spent a lot of time in the bathroom, cheering or sometimes bribing him to" please go potty!")
He was sitting on his little potty seat and looked at the bathtub. We had the kids dinosaurs lined up around the edge of the bathtub. He pointed and said "hey, there's the man over there with the dinosaurs." I looked and thought maybe there was some toy he was looking at. There wasn't. So I asked him about the man. My first thought was there was a demon in my bathtub and I just didn't want to have to deal with that. So I asked him "Is it a good man or bad man?"
He really didn't give me an answer. So I said" If you want the man to go away, just say 'In Jesus name get out of here'".
So he says " Jesus you get out of here!"
"No, No, we want Jesus to stay, if it is a bad man tell him to go." I say.
So he looks at me with his cute little smile and keeps looking at the bathtub and he finally repeats " Jesus name get out of here."
So I am not really sure what it was, but if Jesus was sleeping on the floor with him I believe he was in the bathtub looking over Him. Maybe He was cheering on the potty accomplishments, too!

Lesson Two~ A good mind set is esstential

I realized the mind set I had going into the whole foster system would probably make me or break me. The sytem has problems, if I focused on the problems I was always going to be in constant turmoil. I decided that God Is in control. I say that, but there are times when I just didn't believe it. Randy and I have been through court cases and when the judge would make a decision that "seemed" as though it was against us I would instantly think God hated us- He must or this decision would have been different.
After going through the trials over our farm, I really know that God does work all things for good and when it seems the most desparate and hopeless, He shines like the brightest star and gives new hope and a new way out!
I never would have thought that all those court dates and being miserable for a time, building this house would prepare us so perfectly for fostering.
When we got our "new" boys, I knew we would only have them a short time (I just didn't know it was going to be 3 weeks short).
My plan was to send them home better than they came. So we just jumped in as a family and started tackling things one day at a time. It amazes me how much we accomplished in 3 short weeks. God is so good!
When we got the call for them to go back to their family I will admit I was mad and I knew this wasn't the best. I had so many other things I wanted to teach them and have them accomplish.
This is where going through things and not getting the answer I wanted helped so much. After my initial mad wore off I thought about it. God is in control and He does know what is best, so I am going to make this positive. I am now going to trust Him to care for these 2 boys and know I did the best I could in the time God gave me to care for them.
I walked away in peace instead of fear and worry.
God helped us to go into the situation with our minds set on Him and what He wanted us to do.

Lesson One~ Sleep is Essential

I can cook dinner while feeding a baby, discipline a 3 year old, administer a spelling test all while loading the dishwasher and correcting a math test, but ask me to do that on 2 hours of sleep and you get a crazy woman who cries all day and can't form a coherent sentence.
I learned that I can live without a shower for a day, chocolate, eating, having a moment of complete silence, but I CAN NOT function without sleep.
So I guess next time I will try to not be super woman. I was trying to keep my house as clean as I did before we added more kids and keep the boys on their same school schedule. That was insanity and I should have just taken a nap every once and awhile. Shouldn't have taken a rocket scientist to figure that one out!

Up-Date

Just wanted to give everyone a quick up-date on yesterday. We had an informational meeting with the family and their caseworker when we gave them the boys.
God was in that room. I felt His presence and peace. Everything went so well and I want to believe that this family WILL make it.
The most awesome thing is when the family thanks you for what you have done for their kids. They thanked us so many times for the work we had done with them and the accomplishments the boys had achieved. The Dad even shook our hands and said we can see the boys anytime we want. I just don't know how often that happens.
Randy told them how much the oldest loved church and the parents said he was afraid of a lot of people and wasn't used to be around anyone, but their family. We kind of laughed and told them how friendly he was and was introducing himself to everyone and wanted to always sit with"the Girls". He is already a ladies man!
Randy and I walked away sad, but hopeful and filled with peace. Originally I couldn't believe it and thought it was a horrible idea that they were going with Grandma. Now I am filled with peace and am comforted after our meeting that these boys are loved and will be taken care of.
Not to sayI don't miss them. All night I was praying " Oh, I hope they go to bed well and don't cry all night."
More to come on our Lessons Learned~

3 short or long weeks

Our first try at fostering will come to an end this afternoon.
We are sad. It didn't take long for us to let these kids into our hearts.
Elijah was an awesome big brother, almost too much. After one week the baby was so spoiled he didn't want to walk anymore. Ethan shows his emotions differently and he did have a hard time adjusting to sharing me with 2 boys who required more of my attention. Both of my boys asked me " So when are we getting more kids? Are we going to adopt the next ones?"
Randy and I have some decisions to make before the next phone call to foster comes and we want to do what God wants and not what our flesh wants.
So I will write more about our first experience and how it has changed us and what we have learned, but for now I need to get prepared for this afternoon when I have to give back 2 boys I would claim as my own and keep forever(if I could).
Any prayers would be appreciated so much. Thanks to all of you who also got attatched to these precious boys and I hope you will continue to pray for them that God will always have His Hand on them and in the end their whole family will be saved. Isn't that what God really wants? Healthy families who serve and love Him. This is my prayer for this family.

Sleep- It is a beautiful thing!

I just wanted to give an up-date to you all.
I am in a better frame of mind. Thank-you for all the prayers and pep-talks and love. We couldn't have made it through without it.
We survived the funeral. it wasn't as bad as I thought, You might still pray for my Dad if you think of it. He holds all his emotions in so you never really know how he is.

As far as fostering goes- we are finally getting some sleep-so I feel a little more coherent now.
I love to get a good nights rest almost as much as I love chocolate so for the last week I was really a mess. randy was able to stay home 3 days for the funeral. He is such an amazing husband, I hated to see him go back to work today.
God is good though. I am not giving up. We will work through this and I know we will get settled sooner or later.