How many in your party?

Five. No wait 8 Ummm OK headcount!
Well the foster care licensor and the adoption licensor left today. It looks as if our home study will be approved shortly! We are going to be licensed/approved for three children.
So our family may be growing by leaps and bounds shortly. Cross your fingers and hope for an amazingly perfect match soon ;)

Wednesday

Both the foster care licensor and the adoption licensor will be here to do another inspection. We are doing really well at getting the house in miiaculate condition. My oldest though is on my list. He has a list(SHORT) of things to do. He left to go to a bithday party yesterday which is fine but then he called asking if he could sleep over. I said yes on the condition he came home early today. Well at quarter after THREE pm he calls and says he is on his way home. He gets home and cannot understand why we are disappointed. Or understand why he has "all of these chores to do in one day" GRRRRR
DH is off to the hardware store. A few little things we need. However it will be at least 2 hours before he is home. He has the hearth gate to install and book shelves.
But he is working his arse off to get things done which with his current schedule and workload is amazing.
OK I am off of here.

step one

done.
The foster care licensing inspection is over with. she came and loked at the house and all we got 'compliant' on everything we do have to secure the fireplace screen to the wall. Odd but we have to.
The adoption licensor had to reschedule because of an emergency meeting. But she will be here tomorrow afternon.
So we are on the way
She (the licensor) kept asking how many children we wanted. Would we take 3? Would we be open to 3? Would we prefer boys? or girls?She seemed amazed we didnm't care about the gender. Just want to be able to properly room them. The fact that dh said he would love for us to have a sibling group made her eye get a bit bigger lol

Close

Wednesday is the day, the home study!!! DH will be home in time to help calm my insanity! I know it won't be all that bad. We are getting ALL of the home visits done in one shot if everything goes well.
The adoption licensor sounds very excited at the fact that we are looking for a sibling group or pair.
Here is to hoping it won't be long waiting!

Reading

I am filling my time with reading. There are so darn many books out there on adoption. The last one I read dealt mainly with the loss a child who is adopted feels. The guilt and loss of their bio family even if they were adopted from birth. It also gave tips on how to ease these feeling of grief in the child. Also how the adoptive parents will also feel guilt and loss. Loss for not carrying the child loss of not being the first to see his or her face when they are born. So for book one... I learned a lot

WOW

Color me shocked. The foster care lcensor and the adoption licensor got together compared schedules and they are BOTH coming next Wednesday!! Woohoo Two birds one stone tada.
I am very impressed so far with the level of communication. So score one for DSHS in Washington.

Got a call

today from our adoption case worker/licensor. She and the foster care worker are going to try to coordinate a visit together! we can hope they get things in order and the home studies aren't spread out.
She had no information about us other than the application. This could be REALLY fun.

We have a

DATE!! Yesireee Bob a date for our homestudy. The first one at least. A couple of days after dh gets home we are scheduled.

and we have....

Contact!! woohoo I got a hold of our worker (NOT the one dh had the interview with grrr) they are missing some things and some other stuff needs done. Like two of my references need to be returned (cough cough) They lost my medical report and they need TB info. So that all will be taken care of and we are setting up a date for the foster care licensing part of the home study. I have to have 2! They now made it so much easier (insert dripping sarcasm here) by making us go through two homestudies with two different people because we also want to adopt and not just foster.

still

no contact. But with the holidays and all I don't expect anything until near my birthday (which is the 11th for you gift buying types ;p ). The house is getting in order. Just keeping it there is key.

Giving

Well we went and bought presents for the foster boys. My boys picked out 4 outfits for each boy a couple of books for each boy and about 6 toys for each boy. Of course we got their requested itemmmm toothbrushes! I wish I could have bought twice as much. To be honest I had a ton of fun so did the boys.

Then fast forward a few days.... I get an email fron the placement coordinator of one of the boys. She was asking where in the spproval process we were for possible placement of this boy IN OUR HOME. WOW I get an email from the fcurrent foster mom too. I reply back to the worker that we were just buying for a child in need our intention wasn't to get him placed in our home or anything but we would like to know more about the boy before saying No or yes. Well She is now on vacation until after Christmas. It turns out yesterday there was a meeting about this boy and his future. We were brought up as an option for placement and they wanted to expedite our license!! This boys worker called our worker and her supervisor as well to help push things along.
It is all a whirlwind to me and totally amazing ok and amazingly odd lol. I am just curious about the boy and if he would be a good placement here etc. So I am waiting to hear SOMETHING.

Nothing

Yeah still no contact from DSHS. Maybe they are awaiting all of my referrals to come back? Who knows. But man oh man I would like to know how things are going. I guess I could look at it this way. No news means nothing is wrong right? That means we are not mising any paperwork or anything.

bluuuuuuueeee rooooommmmm

you saw me standing aloooone. OK not close but here is the room I need to get the bed of course and hang the pictures back up...

Done

Well the room is painted. It is very blue :) But with the bedding set and the colors of the furniture it will be very nice :) The fact that my son likes it is the most important. I have some sore muscles and a hurt foot. But that is about it.
I have to wait on the funding to but the mattresses too that is the pain. and let me say, DAMN mattresses are expensive. I want to know how those decorating shows do those things for so darn cheap? With the beds and paint and bedding and mattresses....about $1500.

#1's room is next paint, a bed and a mattress at least his will only be about $600 ish.

Good news we are getting furniture that will grow with the kids so we won't have to keep buying

OMG

I am at the point where the deeper I get into reorganizing the more overwhelmed I feel. I know part of it is my anxiety so I do my best to make sure I do not let it really overwhelm me. That could turn into an aniety attack. I have really been using my skills well to control them. I am trying to take one step at a time and I realize that DSHS is not looking for perfection. They are just looking for a safe home.

the beds

Will be here.... About Tuesday!! woohoo. Good news and bad news though. I really need to step up my work on little mans room. I am REALLY trying to get him to clean up the little mini disaster area I found under his bed EEEK. But he is resisting me every step. He makes things so hard because he stalls so darn politely! lol I love him to bit but I am about to tear out my hair. I refuse to clean his room entirely by myself THEN paint THEN put the bed together etc. HECK no. I clean my room he should clean his right? Maybe I should hire out LOL

I know

the location of every reference....as in I know that they have them except for one. The one reference we have in WA!!! lol

And let me say the reference letter is pretty in depth! I had to fill one out it was I think six simple questions long. The one for WA is about 15 questions some questions are multi question questions. A HUGE thank you to my references for taking all of the time!

Great!

Well our reference in South Carolina got her letter on Saturday as well! So they are all out :) Some progress is being made :)

references

Well my Mom got her reference letter from DSHS! That means that my other references should have theirs soon! It is moving along. The odd thing we still have not been contacted lol. So had it not been for my Mom letting me know she got her letter I would have no clue progress was being made haha

CHECK!!!!

Ok my to do/to buy list is quickly turning into a DONE list.


-fire place screen BOUGHT
-Locking file cabinet BOUGHT
-Waterproof matress pads. BOUGHT
-First aid kit BOUGHT (got a first responder kit)
-fire extinguisher BOUGHT
-Bunk beds BOUGHT
-Car seat GOT IT I got an infant one and will get another convertible seat as well