Ok... it has taken quite some time, but here it is

Tamra will surely post following this, to correct everything, but I wanted to get this thing going.

So.... for those of you who don't know, we have moved to Kansas. (Like 3 years ago!!!) j/k

This last summer we took the family back to CA to visit family and attend Tamra's niece Jessica's wedding. It was a whirlwind couple of weeks, but we really had a great time. It was the first time in about 5 years that Tamra's siblings and their families were all in the same place at the same time, with the exception of Andrew.(He was definitely missed, but has a fabulous excuse!) We had a great time visiting both sides of the family. The boys really enjoyed playing with all their cousins, and getting to know their aunts and uncles. We enjoyed connecting with them as well, and have become much closer to them.

Something we shared with most, if not all, was our decision as a family to pursue adoption as a way to grow our family. Many details were not known at the time, only that we were going to see what happened. Well, it has been a few months and after many classes, paperwork, training, paperwork, home visits, more paperwork, background checks (and Yes...for all you jokers, Ray did pass all of them:) ), even more paperwork, home studies, and yet even more paperwork, we have finally made some progress. We are finally licensed for foster care/adoption. We will be using this blog to update all of you on our family, and how we're doing, as well as provide updates on our journey to adoption.

We had chosen to adopt through the foster care program for many reasons I won't go into detail about here. Tamra is happy to share those details with anyone who would like to call. (She is trying to use up her unlimited minutes!) Nevertheless, because of the nature of the needs in foster care, we did not expect to be able to adopt any children anytime soon, rather expected to assist those children in need of a safe and loving home life for an uncertain period of time before having the opportunity to pursue making permanent additions to our own family. It is surprising, and sad, to learn just how many children there are in need of a safe, caring, supporting, and loving place to live. It can really tug at your heartstrings, but we are relying on each other, and our faith to help us with this.

About three weeks ago, our case worker notified us of a brother and sister who had recently become eligible for adoption. The legal stuff had already been completed, and they would soon be seeking a permanent forever family to love these children. We immediately expressed an interest, and felt very comfortable right away with this possibility. Later we learned their names and ages, Zaire is 2 years 4 months old, and his sister Zanae is 1 year 5 months. They are both very healthy, Zaire has a slight delay in his speech and is making progress, Zaire is very protective of his little sister, and both are affectionate toward one another.

We were not able to meet them until this past Tuesday due to the holidays, and schedules of the case managers and current foster parents. Our family all went to meet them this week, and the visit went very well. Immediately upon our arrival, Zaire reached for Tamra to pick him up (as we understand is fairly common) and Zanae reached up for Ray to pick her up (Which is NOT common at all.) This put the current foster parents a little at ease, and must have put Zaire at ease too as he fell asleep in Tamra's lap after only having been there about 15 minutes!! (Needless to say, she was a little melted.) In total we spent about 1.5 hours playing with the kids (Zaire woke up when some other kids came in) and really enjoyed the time. The conversation with the kids' case worker and the foster parents had already turned to speaking about us becoming the adoptive family before we even left. We were both very calm throughout the entire visit, and Ethan really enjoyed playing with Zaire and Zanae. Kyler was more observing and trying to help us than playing, but as soon as we got in the car explained how these two kids were the right ones for our family, and were the best fit. (He really is excited about this whole thing.) Before we left we planned an "in-home" visit at our house for Jan. 12th.

Assuming the visit on the 12th goes well (and everybody believes it will), the kiddos case worker will pursue moving them into our home, as a foster-to-adopt home, sometime before the 19th. Yes, before the 19th!! So, it could be a very crazy week. The rest is still up in the air somewhat, but we do know that if all goes as planned, the earliest they can be formally adopted into our family will be 6 months from the date they arrive in our home. So, we still have many things that will need to happen before that time.

We have already moved Kyler into what was our office. He will share with the office as we begin to finish our basement, and build an office down there. He is excited to have a much bigger room, and to be the "Big Brother." Ethan is dead set on sharing a room with Zaire, so he will be moving into Kyler's old room which offers more options for 2 beds. Zanae will move into Ethan's old room, and be right next to ours. We are hoping to begin finishing the basement sometime in February, but we'll see how that goes. As would be our luck, the lull in Ray's work is about to end, and he is preparing for a very busy 1st quarter. The basement will be interesting as we work to get done what we can while he is in town, with all the other things we have going on.

So, that is our brief update on things. Next time we'll fill you in more on the day-to-day stuff.

Thank you to everyone who has been so supportful of this journey! It means a lot to have our friends and family behind us on this one. We are trying to remain as objective as possible, as there are no guarantees, but we also are hoping we can provide these two beautiful kids with a family who loves them, and where they can be allowed to reach their fullest potential. Please keep us in your prayers.

RTKandE