Smile!

January is a month of fresh starts and clean slates, a chance to do better, try harder, be more. Some Januarys ago I had decided that I would make it a goal to smile more - more often, more sincerely, at more people. Don't you know that God was ready to help me work on that goal.

During January 2008 things looked like this: Samara and Sierra were attending Head Start, the boys were in school, and Haily was with us - a beautiful blue-eyed, pleasant, easy-going eight month old little girl. The days had a structure and routine which flowed very well - it was quite easy to smile. Aside from some school issues with Sierra at Head Start (if you've read an earlier post, you might remember that there were some behavioral concerns) and the normal meetings and visits, family life was very managable and enjoyable.

Late in the day on Wednesday, January 2, a phone call came from the agency asking if we could take in twin five month old babies. Placement was needed immediately as the babies had just been picked up from their previous home and were in the office waiting until another foster family placement could be arranged. The plan was for us to care for the twins until Friday of that week so that the agency had time to find a more long-term placement. So within two hours Baby Boy and Baby Girl and all their baby equipment were delivered to our home.

We did a little rearranging of our schedule; Stan was able to take the girls to Head Start on his way to work in the morning and pick them up and bring them home during his lunch time, there were a few appointments that needed to be rescheduled, but overall the week was fairly open. We adopted a camp-out-in-the-living-room mentality so that the three babies could play, eat, and sleep with full supervision. This was definitely do-able for four days.

By that Friday morning we hadn't heard a thing from the agency, and I hadn't thought (or had time to have a thought) to call them. Late on Friday a supervisor called and asked if the twins could stay through the weekend and possibly into the following week. What did they expect me to say? These poor kids had just gone through a total upheaval, and although they were doing okay, there were some health concerns (Baby Girl had an awful runny nose and consistent cough) as well as the need for Early Intervention to be involved (Baby Boy was not able to push up on his arms when on his belly and did not even try to roll over) - but since we were an emergency placement, we had no medical information and little contact with the case worker about what we should be doing.

After a week, we had gotten to know these precious babies pretty well; Baby Girl was very demanding all day long and into the night - not a good sleeper and waking up fussing so that she would wake her brother, Baby Boy was much more laid back, but almost too calm and passive - he was often the last one tended to out of the three since his cry was not the loudest. We were able to establish a new routine to include the needs of the twins and still try to meet the needs of Haily and the older kids. But honestly, it was getting less and less easy to smile.

It was during this time that Sierra's problems in school flared (no surprise there) and we - the school and her parents - decided that she should stay at home. Stan continued to transport Samara back and forth to school in the morning and on his lunch break. To keep up with the other family acitivities we also had boatloads of help from family and friends: my mom, my cousin, and a few foster mom friends were on-call to come and sit with the babies if I needed to get to a violin lesson, doctor's appointment, family visit for Haily, or just to the store for more formula and diapers.

As the end of week two approached with no confirmation from the agency about the length of the babies' stay, and with little contact with a brand new case worker, things began to stretch thin. While the kids enjoyed having hotdogs and chicken nuggets for dinner, we were hankering for some more substantial meals and meal times where we could all sit down together without one of us needing to jump up to care for a baby. Smiles were becoming rarely sighted occurances and sleep deprivation was manifesting itself.

It wasn't so much the needs of three babies and the five older kids that was wearying as much as the not-knowing of the plan for placement. We might have worked harder at getting the twins on a schedule and should have had them to the doctor if we had known that this four day placement would evolve into four weeks. And while it was sad to see them leave after having bonded with them over what felt like way more than a month, it was good to know that there would be more stability in their future. So there were reasons - and more energy - to smile.

Bigger reasons came about two years later when we heard through the foster family grapevine of a family (who are friends of our friends) who had just taken in twins - a brother and sister - with the same names of the babies that we had cared for in 2008. This family was going to adopt these twins who had apparently bounced around the system for two years without a permanent home.

Through the miracle of adoption and the close-knit network that it creates, we were able to rejoice as this family became a forever family: the twins had found their parents, and these compassionate, committed, and consistent parents found their children, the children God had chosen just for them. We are amazed at and so thankful for God's workings and ways - and we have smiles on our faces and in our hearts.