Foster2Forever

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We have a New Baby!!! (Plus Contest Winners)

NEW FOSTER BABY
Friday night was date night! We had child care arranged and were looking forward to a nice dinner together. Something Foster Dad and I rarely get to do having 3- and 1-year-old boys. I also had a very busy weekend planned. But when you are a foster home – your plans (and sometimes your entire life) can change with 1 phone call!

{Read how my life changed forever on March 4, 2008}

A 4-month-old baby boy needed a place to stay! I just couldn’t say “NO”!
He has been a challenge: the wailing the first night in unfamiliar surroundings is the absolute worst.
However, he is now adjusting well (since we began feeding him with a Dr. Brown’s bottle) and giving us smiles and giggles!  He will be moving to another foster home in a few days.

I HEART FACES
On Saturday afternoon, I had the privilege (by winning) of attending the I Heart Faces Dream BIG photography workshop. 
(Foster Dad had to juggle 2 little ones – as Stinkpot spent the day with his cousins in Fort Worth)
I learned how to actually use manual mode on my DSLR Canon Rebel XS.  Thanks, Michelle!

If you follow this blog, you know that I like to participate in the I Heart Faces weekly challenges. This week’s challenge is orange. To make it fun – see the last 3 years of Stinkpot at the pumpkin patch.

SHUTTERFLY HOUSE PARTY
On Sunday, I hosted a House Party sponsored by Shutterfly. Here’s my BEAUTIFUL niece, Jennifer, giving a BIG shout-out to Shutterfly for the FREE photobook!

HALLOWEEN COSTUME CONTEST WINNERS
We had 26 entries in our Halloween costume contest and the winners (as chosen by Foster Dad) are…

And the winners EACH win (from Shutterfly, of course) – 
8×8 hard cover photo book and 10 photo Christmas cards!!!


GIVEAWAYS
Keep posted this week as we will have spontaneous giveaways to our readers and Facebook fans!

You can win a free photo book by entering our Adoption Celebration giveaway! We have only 25 entries so far!  Remember if you follow on Google, subscribe to our newsletter, are a fan on Facebook, – be sure and LEAVE A COMMENT (or 2) HERE to enter!!!

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2 FUNNY FRIDAY and Giveaways

 Have you entered the giveaways yet?  Foster2Forever is celebrating National Adoption Month by giving away great prizes from Shutterfly!

  • Win a free photo book by entering our Adoption Celebration giveaway! We have only 8 entries so far!  Remember if you follow on Google, subscribe to our newsletter, are a fan on Facebook, OR LINK UP BELOW, etc. – be sure and LEAVE A COMMENT HERE to enter!!!
BIG TEXAS WELCOME to our 2FunnyFriday carnival!!! 
Link up to your cute stories, photos, or other things that make us smile. 
(be sure and add the Foster2Forever button to your post)

 Her you go – Our case worker sent us a series of pictures of parenting failures.
She stated,”Some people just aren’t meant to be parents. Don’t let me see you doing this!”


Have you ever seen (or done) something like this before??? (At least I realized the items were too heavy before it crushed the baby…)

Have a great weekend enjoying your family! Come back Monday to see the winner(s) of our Halloween costume contest. Who do you think winners should be???

Hugs to y’all!

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I HEART…. Trans-Racial Adoption!

Today – we have a special guest blogger, Melody, from I Heart…small kitchen appliances talking openly about TRANS-RACIAL ADOPTION in the South!

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When my husband and I decided to adopt one of the first discussions we had was about race. We grew up in a very traditional part of the South where the lines between neighborhoods were not so ‘imaginary.’ We asked ourselves all the questions you would expect.

“Will our families accept a child that isn’t Caucasian?”
“Are we prepared to raise a child from a different culture?”
“Will we love a child that doesn’t look like us?”
“Will that child love us, when he/she realizes we aren’t the same?”

We also had a great list reasons why we could adopt outside of our race:

  • We now live in a major city with EVERY culture imaginable. So, no matter what race we ended up adopting, we would be able to expose them to their culture.
  • We have so many friends of different cultures – Hispanic, Indian, African-American.
  • No matter what kind of hair we ended up with…someone could help us fix it! haha!
  • Most important we just wanted to be able to say YES!
“Yes, we will make it work even if it means we might be uncomfortable at first.”
“Yes, we will pursue whatever means necessary to raise a healthy, contributing member of society.”
“Yes, we are willing to make a lifetime commitment to a child that has no other option.”

So, here we are, in the middle of our first placement with a GORGEOUS Hispanic girl. We were so blessed to be able to meet her at just 4 days old and she will be turning 1 year old next week. It has been an AMAZING year that I wouldn’t trade for anything. Reflecting back, here is how our lives have been affected by having a a child of a different race in our family.

1. Awareness
We have become SO aware of every Hispanic child that crosses our paths. Height, weight, skin color, eye shape, hair color. I must admit, before having a Hispanic child, in my naivety, they all looked similar to me. Now, I notice every difference and how unique and amazing each child is. And, wow, they wear more jewelry than me!

2. Language
We haven’t had a language barrier with our daughter simply because she has only known us from birth. However, due to an open adoption, she comes with an Aunt, Uncle, 5 cousins and a sister – few of whom we can communicate with. Our visits with them are frustrating. I often feel like I’m not getting the whole story or things are being said about our family in a negative light. But, I can not confirm or deny this! Which is even worse! The reality is that while our daughter will be able to live a whole, healthy life speaking English, she needs to know Spanish. I want her to be able to communicate with her entire family one day. This is definitely still a work in progress.

3. The Peanut Gallery
You know, all the people that have something to say, but at the end of the day their opinion doesn’t matter a hill of beans! There aren’t as many as you would think. Remember, we live in a very large city, one of the 4 largest in the country. So, it’s not odd at all to see parents with children that don’t look exactly like them. When we visit ‘home,’ though, we do get quite a bit of attention. Mostly because most of them have never seen a Hispanic baby, and she is so darn cute!

4. Love really is blind
One year later, we can not imagine our lives without our daughter. She’s an amazing little bundle of energy that makes me smile all the time! I don’t see her differences – I see her similarities. She smiles like me, she’s brave like her papa and she adores music…like both of us.

Trust me, this is just the beginning. It will not always be this easy. I wonder (worry) about how she will process our differences when she is older.

  • Who will she identify with at school?
  • Will she feel closer to her biological family, than us?
  • Will I really be able to raise her to appreciate her culture?

I don’t have any of the answers. So much will depend on her personality and our pro-activity. But, our answer to her will always be YES. When it’s easy and when it’s hard.

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Halloween Costume Contest – Wordless Wednesday

Welcome to Wordless Wednesday!  In celebration of National Adoption Month, we are having a Halloween Costume Contest!  You can win 10 photo Christmas cards from Shutterfly!

Just add your Halloween photos to the linky below. Contest winners will be announced on Monday!

Don’t forget to enter to win a 8×8 hard-cover photo book from Shutterfly (worth $29.99)!

Come back Friday for 2FunnyFriday – a meme to link your funny, cute, amusing stories and pictures that make us smile!

Here’s our family at Halloween –

Foster Dad proved his eternal love for me by wearing that get-up!
Good Luck!

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MAMA FOSTER: Adopting Through Foster Care

Hello Everyone!

My name is Mama Foster, I choose to hide who I am so I can share the REAL stories of fostering my wonderful kids.

I want to thank Penny for letting me guest post!  I love her blog (I check it up to twice a day!) – I am a total blog stalker!

I thought I would share with you guys a little of what I have learned about adopting through foster care because, trust me, it is nothing like I thought it would be!

My husband and I have an 8 year old son that we made the old fashion way.  After my annoyingly eventful pregnancy I really didn’t have any desire to get pregnant again.  He was born healthy and beautiful and I was thankful for that, and that it was over with!!  So, we went almost 5 years without being too worried about adding more kids to our family-plus we were young, we had time.

So, after my son’s 6th birthday I FINALLY was feeling baby crazy, but not pregnancy crazy.  My husband and I had always thought about adoption but it never became quite as real as it did when my husband finally said “We should just adopt!” after I had asked God to show me if we should adopt by having my husband finally be the one to bring it up!

So, long story short, we settled on foster to adopt.  Sounds easy right?  -all you foster moms can stop laugh now –

We got licensed and our first call was for a 2 year old little girl we were only supposed to have for 3 months.

We had her for 16 wonderful months.
Yankee Hat walk 64 Camp fireWe were head over heels in love with her.

We had walked through fire for her and with her.
We had hoped to adopt her.

And then the judge sent her back to her ill prepared mom.

That was only 3 weeks ago, if that.

Our wounds are still fresh, and though I have not mentioned them, we have had 2 other foster children as well.  One went on to be adopted by someone else and one is still with us but will probably be returned to her mother as well.

What I have learned through ALL of this is that these children desperately need someone who is willing to risk everything to love them during this time of total upheaval in their lives.  As I mentioned on my own blog a few days ago, I was very scared that we would not be able to handle a child we loved leaving.  Little did I know what it would really do.  My daughter, yes-MY daughter, leaving has lit a fire inside of me.

I saw the sadness in her eyes of going in between our two homes.

I saw the confusion of having 2 mommies.

I was there when she told me her uncle was molesting her – repeatedly.

I took her to the ER.

I did everything within my legal power to help her.

When I say that we walked through fire for her, it was truly WITH her.  These children have to do this with OR without us.  They can either live with a family that gives them 100% or one who isn’t worried about what is going on in their little hearts.  I went into this to adopt, to get my kids and get out-but that wasn’t God’s plan.

He has called us to do more than what we planned.  He has called us to give up some of our comfort for a little one that has all of theirs stripped away.

Fire in the skyOh, and in the mean time God had been working behind the scenes to bring our family hope after such a devastating loss.

The week after our daughter left we finally met a little boy that we have been asked to adopt.

He is almost 2 years old, and has blonde hair and greenish eyes just like our biological son.

God does not miss a thing.  He has a plan and I truly mean it when I say, we are just blessed to be asked to be part of it.


Mama Foster is a 20 something mom and wife who has been married to her awesome hubby for 9 years.  She has fostered 3 kids so far since she and her husband were licensed to foster 2 years ago.  She and her husband are currently working to get their first official adoptable son home as soon as possible, the adoption is via the United States Foster Care System.  She enjoys spoiling all her kids rotten and taking pictures of them while she does it.  She blogs her heart out at http://mamafoster.blogspot.com

Be sure to add your adoption story to our blog hop!!!

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ADOPTION CELEBRATION!!! {Giveaways and Blog Hop}

NOVEMBER IS NATIONAL ADOPTION MONTH!!!
Here at Foster2Forever, we are celebrating theadoptionof our Stinkpot and future adoption of our Lil Bit through our state’s foster care system.  You can join in the celebration in a number of ways.

ADOPTION BLOG HOP
For the entire month of November, you can join our Adoption Blog Hop with your adoption story. Whether it’s through foster care, a private agency or internationally – and join us even if your adoption journey isn’t complete.
Go to our ADOPTION BLOG HOP page to join in the fun!

Foster2Forever will also have our regular 2FUNNYFRIDAY meme for you to link up your cute stories, photos, or other things that make us smile.

This month we will also have a WORDLESS WEDNESDAY linky, too! For this Wordless Wednesday, November 3rd, we will have a Halloween Costume Contest with prizes! So be sure and add your Halloween photos to our linky on Wednesday!

SPECIAL GUEST WRITERS
Foster2Forever is excited to have other adoptive families share in our celebration this month by sharing their stories. Join us on Tuesdays and Thursdays during November to hear their views on a number of adoption topics.

BASIC BITS FOR BEGINNING BLOGGERS
A few weeks ago, I attended Bloggy Boot Camp in Austin, Texas.  I was completely overwhelmed by the plethora of information to absorb and implement.  The most emphasized topic was to move to WordPress and have self-hosted dot com.  In other words, to be really successful and efficient, I need to implement a www.foster2forever.com using WordPress! No more dot blogspot.com or dot wordpress.com!

I have a full-time career, manage a home, and have 3-year-old and 1-year-old boys – I can’t do all this at once! SO, next month, I will begin this project SLOWLY week-by-week with a goal to move Foster2Forever.blogspot.com to WordPress and become Foster2Forever.com in January.
Please join me through this journey on Tuesdays beginning December 7th???

GIVEAWAYS
For National Adoption Month, Foster2Forever will have great giveaways throughout the month.

Our first giveaway is a hard cover 8×8 photobook from Shutterfly! A $29.99 value!

In order to enter, complete any of the following below and leave a separate comment below for each entry. Current subscribers and friends, don’t forget to enter!!!

  • Blog about National Adoption Month and this giveaway (3 entries) – leave the perma-link to your post!
  • Subscribe to the Foster2Forever newsletter (2 entries)
  • Like Foster2Forever on Facebook (2 entries)
  • Add the Foster2Forever button to your website (2 entries) – leave your web address
  • Add Foster2Forever to your blogroll (2 entries) – leave your web address
  • Join in our Blog Hops and Memes – Adoption, Wordless Wednesday, 2FunnyFriday (1 entry per hop)
  • Follow Foster2Forever through Google Friend Connect (1 entry)
  • Follow @Foster2Forever on Twitter (1 entry) – leave your Twitter handle
  • Tweet this:  Celebrate Adoption by entering to win a FREE photobook from @Shutterfly and @Foster2Forever #giveaway http://ow.ly/326sz (1 entry per tweet – once daily)
  • Follow @Shutterfly on Twitter (1 entry) – leave your Twitter handle 

Enter by midnight on Saturday, November 13th. Winner will be announced on Monday, November 15th!
Wishing y’all good luck!

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BLOGGY AND MOMMY BOOT CAMPS!

BLOGGY BOOT CAMP
Yes, I was fortunate enough to attend the SITS Girls Bloggy Boot Camp this weekend.  What incredible speakers!

Laurie Turk aka the Tip Junkie overwhelmed us all with all the incredible tools she uses to make the most of her time blogging.  Yesterday, I began writing a list of all the to-do’s and stopped at 20 – realizing that I had to compile a PLAN OF ACTION for this blog.  I will share the beginning of that list later this week!

Jessica Gottlieb who goes by her real name spoke on privacy — very scary!!!

Angela England the “Renaissance Woman” gave us a rundown of SEO – Search Engine Optimization – that had our heads spinning. How can someone find your blog on the ever-expanding internet?

The discussion after lunch led by SITS Girl, Tiffany, and the hilarious Jessica Bern – was a real eye-opener for me about branding. I really didn’t think this applied to this website, but, yes, it can…more on that on a later post.

Kerri Jackson Case of Damn You, Little Rock did an amusing presentation on writing and telling the truth.  Truth has consequences!

The oh-so-cute Amy Locurto, yes, of I Heart Faces fame, spoke openly about taking great pictures.  We LOVED the background and dialog of those beautiful photos we admire.

The most inspiring presentation was given by LaQuishe Wright on “How SEO Helped Channing Tatum Find Me!”  (Channing Tatum is that really hot actor from “Dear John“) Her blog is his official website – yikes!

I HEART BLOGGERS WITH FACES
I met so many bloggers on one day that I’m trying to remember everyone.  I didn’t take many pictures, but here’s a photo I took of Christina of Ramblings of a Closet Writer to remind us to perform our monthly breast exams and have a mammogram completed as recommended. (I actually had mine yesterday!)

MOMMY BOOT CAMP
I have taken off work a few days to put our 3-year-old, Stinkpot, through Mommy Boot Camp.  He has been totally out of control at the day care.

In Mommy Boot Camp, if he didn’t say “Yes, Ma’am” when asked to do something (or pottied in his pants), he was put in the corner. Of course, he tried to move just 2 inches out of the corner, but I would move him back 2 inches each time.  Each time out was 2 minutes on the timer. He would get to “hold me” after the timer went off. After a few times, he finally got it and went to the corner himself.

So I took him back to day care yesterday during my mammogram.  He did really well until about 11a.m. (he had 3 good hours) when he had a major meltdown.  I went into the day care and put him in the corner for 3 minutes, having to move him back 2 inches a few times.  He ate lunch, and we came home and took a 3 hour nap.


The day care was utter chaos with 24 3-year-olds and only 2 teachers. We MUST find a day care or nanny with a smaller teacher-student ratio! The worst problem is that Stinkpot is not potty-trained. I ordered Potty Power DVD from Amazon, and I’m anxiously awaiting it’s arrival!

GIVEAWAY WINNER
With Bloggy and Mommy Boot Camps going on, I messed up and didn’t post a link-up for 2FunnyFriday for the Beauty Case giveaway. However, we did receive 10 comments and #5 was our winner! Congratulations to Annette from Kingwood!!!
You can visit her blog Up in the Air to send your best wishes.

Miscellany Monday @ lowercase letters

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MY SON LOSIN’ IT!

My 3-year-old JD, is just that – a mess!!!

For 2 days now, we have received a page full of bad behavior listed in detail – hitting, biting, and scratching the teacher, punching and kicking his friends, and other aggressive behavior.

We took him off Singulair for his asthma on October 2nd due to the labeling warnings of mood swings and aggression.  He did better at first, but now his behavior is getting worse and worse. He even came at Daddy with his mouth open to BITE him!

Today, I am staying at home with him to:
(a) give the daycare a break;
(b) give JD a break;
(c) make an appointment with a doctor;
(d) possibly look for a more structured daycare.
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Have a blessed week!

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Shop til You Drop

Life with 2 little ones has been crazy busy lately!  We are still dealing with behavior issues with Stinkpot even after taking him off his Singulair asthma medication. He also seems to sometimes be jealous of the baby, Lil Bit.  I’ve been trying to show Stinkpot lots of individual attention.

Stinkpot went grocery shopping with me on Saturday. I tried to hurry home before naptime but…

I’m also getting ready for Bloggy Boot Camp on Saturday!

Have a blessed week!
Simply Being Mommy 125x125

I’m Clever

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