I've done a blog before about my older girls but not my youngest two. When Gary and I got married I had my three older girls and we thought our family was complete. However, God had other plans for us and placed in our hearts the desire to add a little boy to our family. Yep, we knew what we wanted a little boy about 3 years old.
So we checked out options and decided we wanted to go with Missouri Baptist Children's Home for adoption. Now this required us to attend training classes once a month for six months. So we started our training and once a week we traveled from our home in Bethany, Mo to Kansas City to attend our training classes (about a one and a half hour drive). We attended STARS training which qualified us to be foster parents but we chose not to do that. We wanted to adopt and that meant another two months of training. We finished our training and all the interviews, paper work and were given a humongous notebook of children eligible for adoption in Jackson County. So sad to see so many kids needing home; at that time there were 3,000 children in that book.
Well, again, God had other plans for us that were not exactly what we expected. Remember me saying we wanted a little boy about 3 years old? Well, God had our caseworker send us a picture of a little 5 year old boy and his 9 year old sister. Yep, you guessed it - they captured our heart and we started weekend visits shortly after the little boy turned 6. Within six weeks they were living with us permanently and the final adoption occurred within 7 months. They were brother and sister and had the same mother. Both children were developmentally delayed and special needs children.
And our life changed dramatically!!! I cannot even begin to explain all the changes. We had tears, hugs, laughter, exhaustion, loss of patience, and memories. We would not change one minute of it.
One of the favorite memories we love to share as a family is when they were spending one of their first weekends with us. Our son Chris had a little toy car that he drove around in the house. They were playing 'drive-thru'. Chris also had a microphone that went with some toy and they were using it for the order window. One of the older girls and her friend were hanging out with me in the kitchen while I fixed dinner, Gary was watching TV in the living room where the kids were playing and I believe another daughter was upstairs. We had a big house.
So, Chris drives up to the order window and orders a Happy Meal. Amanda asks if he wants fries with that and he says yes. Then Chris says "honk honk!!!" using his imaginary horn. Amanda yells at the top of her lungs "quit honking you bas****!!"
Utter silence fills our household at this point. In the kitchen the two girls and I look at each other and walk to the door to look in the living room to see what is going on. Gary quietly tells the kids, who are looking at him with questioning eyes knowing that they are probably in big trouble, "go to your rooms".
After they head upstairs he starts laughing. And my husband, being the restaurant manager that he has been all his life says his first thought was 'where have they been going through drive thru?'
That little boy is now 21 years old and even with his special needs he has shown us how resourceful he can be. His IQ level has limited him in some aspects but we have never treated him as if he had a disability. Instead, we pushed him to do the very best he could. He has applied and gotten himself a job and is currently working 30-40 hours per work. Prior to his job we had him volunteer at a local nursing home. Five days a week he gets himself up and fixes his breakfast and goes to work and is there by 6:30 am. He prepares his lunch and currently we are having him prepare one meal a week for us. All this in preparation for him getting a small apartment where he can have more independence. Yes, we realize that we will need to assist him with budgeting. We do that already by allowing him to have so much a week to spend as he wants and we help him save the rest. A few weeks ago he went and bought himself a new bedroom set consisting of full size bed, dresser, night stand, mattress and box springs. This was bought with money that we helped save for him. He was very proud of the fact that he was able to save that money and get his own furniture. We are very proud of the fact that he has gotten his own job, gets himself up and to work on his own. Getting himself to work means riding his bicycle.
His sister has more emotional problems and we have been very fortunate to find a group home that she lives in within 30 minutes of us. This is a wonderful place for her as she requires a more structured environment than what we can provide living here at home. She is very happy there and because of the structure she has actually become somewhat of a leader at her home. She comes home for visits and calls frequently (sometimes as many as 17 times a week LOL). She is now 25 years old, works outside the group home and assists with others in the home. We are proud of the way she has matured and how caring she is to others in the home.
She has had a boyfriend for several years. He also lives at the group home. We now have the privilege of helping her plan her upcoming wedding. We are very happy for her. She has found someone she loves and who loves her. The group home is making accommodations so they can continue to live at the home. She is excited to be planning a wedding and we are excited for her.
What a road we have travelled with those two! And it is not over yet.
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