A new addition to our Ohana

Yesterday we got a call from Placement! It was totally unexpected because we just adopted the boys a month ago! We are getting placed with a 13 day old baby girl. I called John and told him he had to come home. He came home and got pulled over at the end of our street. He should've gotten a ticket, but he explained to the cop that we were foster parents and we had to get to the hospital to pick up a baby. He came on home and we waited for the CPS worker to call us. John drove me CRAZY. I was already antsy and him setting there asking me every 15 minutes if they had forgot us...if they had placed her with another family. I tried to assure him that wasn't the case but now he's freaking me out! She finally called and said she was just waiting for the paperwork to go through to put Princess in DCS custody and then we'd meet at the hospital. After an eternity we get to the hospital and I meet Princess. I fell in love from the moment I saw her. Ok ok, I was in love from the moment they called us. We ended up having to wait until today to bring her home because the doctor wanted to train me to take care of the medical issues she has. It's been a long day and John ended up having to go to work today but we're doing great. The boys love her. When I told Sam he said "Aww! Mom, God answered our prayers." I told him that she wasn't a sister and we were just going to take care of her. He told me "Mom, I asked God for a sister and he's given her to us. Believe me, we're keeping her!" How do you argue with that? LOL Landon was excited at first but by the time I brought her down to the car he told the nurse "we don't need a baby sister. You can take her back upstairs, please." Oh I wonder what the next few days have in store for us! LOL

What Makes a Mother?

I am posting this for my angel babies. Madison, Elijah, Michael, please know that Mommy and Daddy and your brothers love you very much. I am so blessed to be your Mommy. I can't wait until the day I can hold you in my arms and get kisses from you for Mother's Day. Please give Grammie kisses from all of us and tell her we miss her so. Give hugs and kisses to Aunt Flossie and Mamaw Vela too please. With love - Mommy.

What Makes A Mother?

I thought of you and closed my eyes
and prayed to God today
I asked "What makes a Mother?"
and I know I heard Him say

"A Mother has a baby"
This we know is true
"But, God, can you be a Mother
When your baby's not with you?"

"Yes, you can" He replied
With confidence in His voice
"I give many women babies
When they leave is not their choice

Some I send for a lifetime
And others for a day
And some I send to feel your womb
But there's no need to stay"

"I just don't understand this, God
I want my baby here"
He took a breath and cleared His throat
And then I saw a tear

"I wish that I could show you
What your child is doing today
If you could see your child smile
With other children and say

'We go to Earth to learn our lessons
Of love and life and fear
My Mommy loved me oh so much
I got to come straight here.

I feel so lucky to have a Mom
Who had so much love for me
I learned my lesson very quickly
My Mommy set me free

I miss my Mommy oh so much
But I visit her each day
When she goes to sleep
On her pillow's where I lay

I stroke her hair and kiss her cheek
And whisper in her ear
Mommy, don't be sad today
I'm your baby and I'm here'

"So you see my dear sweet one
Your children are okay
Your babies are in My home
And this is where they'll stay

They'll wait for you with Me
Until our lesson is through
And on the day that you come home
They'll be at the gates for you

So now you see what makes a Mother
It's the feeling in your heart
It's the love you had so much of
Right from the very start

Though some on Earth may not realize
you are
Author Unknown... a Mother
Until their time is done
They'll be up here with Me one day
And know you're the best one!"


Author Unknown

Daddy, Can I Borrow $25?

Can I Borrow $25.
00

A man came home from work late, tired and irritated, to find his 5-year old son waiting for him at the door.


SON: Daddy, may I ask you a question?

DAD: Yeah sure, what is it? Replied the man.


SON: Daddy, how much do you make an hour?

DAD: That's none of your business. Why do you ask such a thing? The man said angrily.


SON: I just want to know.
Please tell me, how much do you make an hour?

DAD: If you must know, I make $50 an hour. SON: Oh, the little boy replied, with his head down.


SON: Daddy, may I please borrow $25?

The father was furious, If the only reason you asked that is so you can borrow some money to buy a silly toy or some other nonsense, then you march yourself straight to your room and go to bed. Think about why you are being so selfish. I don't work hard everyday for such childish frivolities. The little boy quietly went to his room and shut the door.


The man sat down and started to get even angrier about the little boy's questions. How dare he ask such questions only to get some money? After about an hour or so, the man had calmed down, and started to think: Maybe there was something he really needed to buy with that $25.00 and he really didn't ask for money very often.


The man went to the door of the little boy's room and opened the door. 'Are you asleep, son?' He asked. 'No daddy, I'm awake, replied the boy. 'I've been thinking, maybe I was too hard on you earlier said the man. 'It's been a long day and I took out my aggravation on you. Here's the $25 you asked for.


The little boy sat straight up, smiling. Oh, thank you daddy! He yelled. Then, reaching under his pillow he pulled out some crumpled up bills. The man saw that the boy already had money, started to get angry again. The little boy slowly counted out his money, and then looked up at his father. Why do you want more money if you already have some? The father grumbled. Because I didn't have enough, but now I do, the little boy replied.


Daddy, I have $50 now.
Can I buy an hour of your time?

Please come home early tomorrow. I would like to have dinner with you. The father was crushed. He put his arms around his little son, and he begged for his forgiveness.


It's just a short reminder to all of you working so hard in life. We should not let time slip through our fingers without having spent some time with those who really matter to us, those close to our hearts. Do remember to share that $50 worth of your time with someone you love.


If we die tomorrow, the company that we are working for could easily replace us in a matter of hours. But the family & friends we leave behind will feel the loss for the rest of their lives.

Our Journey to Forever

Our Journey to Forever

June 28th, 2007 we found out that we were pregnant with our third child and ended up miscarrying all three times. This time was different . I had always taken my miscarriages hard, but this one was especially difficult. It seemed like God had opened the Heavens and answered all of our prayers in one simple little BFP. Four days later we found out that wasn’t the case and that we had lost another baby. I grieved harder for our lost blessing than I ever had before. John and I had already been talking about becoming foster parents with the hopes of adopting, but I couldn’t give that any thought. All I wanted to do was lay down and die. I didn’t understand how a God who loved me so much could allow me to hurt so badly.

At the beginning of 2007 we talked about adoption and said that if we hadn’t gotten pregnant by January 2008 that we would look into the PATH classes required for foster parents. By October I really started considering this opinion again. We had always said that we became parents when we were pregnant with Madison and just because we lost her didn’t mean that we weren’t parents. I knew that we both wanted to be “earth parents.” John was just there along for the ride because he didn’t want to hurt me. He didn’t want to pressure me into doing something I wasn’t ready for. We talked and talked and talked. We finally made the call and were sent our application packet. We filled it out and sent it back in.

Because Mom lived with us she had to attend classes with us. Looking back, I am so glad she did. Each week I took John to work and then she and I would pick him up from work. We all crowded into this tiny room with about 12 other couples. We all had the same goal – we wanted to help children. I was amazed how many young couples were in our class. Many of them had fertility issues as well. In the middle of our training our case worker (A) came out to meet with us and get us started in the home study process. All of our classmates were very surprised that things were happening so quickly for us because many hadn’t even heard from their worker yet and we’d already had two visits with ours. I remember our trainer telling us that they must have a placement in mind for us already.

We finished our classes and our home study about the same time. Our last class was February 26th. At this point our case worker had to really get in there and get down to business. They had to go back 5 years to do our background checks. Unfortunately, we had lived in GA for 6 months in 2003. She called Worth County who told them they couldn’t give her the info. I called them and they told me the same thing. She had spent weeks trying to get this info and here we were on the tail end of it. A came back out on March 3rd and told us that they still weren’t able to get the info but they had a placement in mind for us so she was going to try to get her supervisor to approve us anyway. She left telling me that she was going back to the office and would get us approved and would call me later that day. She hadn’t been gone 30 minutes by when she called me to tell me her supervisor was out of the office but she was still working on it. 15 minutes later she calls back to tell me she got another supervisor to sign off on it and we were approved. She tells me that Placement would be calling me shortly to talk to us about our placement.

Placement called me and told me that the boys had some behavior issues and that Sam was on medication for his behaviors. I found out later that week that it was so bad that both Sam and Landon got kicked out of daycare the Monday we were approved and we almost didn’t get the boys. I said tons of prayers and praise because I knew that God was in the middle of this. T, the boys case worker called me to talk to me. She also gave me Aunt Janet’s number so I could talk to her. Everyone told me that this was going to be an adoptive placement so if we weren’t interested in adopting we needed to speak up now. Of course we wanted to adopt. We were told that it would be an open and shut case because the birth parents were nowhere to be found and hadn’t seen or talked to the boys in forever. The boys had been in her care for the last year so she was a huge help. She talked to me for nearly an hour and then sent a huge packet with T when she dropped off the boys.

Friday, March 7th, 2008 our lives changed forever. T was supposed to show up at 10. She didn’t get here until close to 11. I was really starting to freak out. I remember sitting on BTB talking to Lauren waiting for them to arrive. I think my BTB sisters were as excited as I was. She finally shows up and knocks on the door “Are you Mrs. Eastman?” “Yes!” “I’m T and I have the boys with me.” It was at this point she unloaded the boys. Sam came in first “Are you my new Mommy? My Mommy Janet said we were getting a new mommy. Are you her?” (yes I melted and cried right then.) “Yes sweetheart, I am your new mommy.” About this time she brings in Landon and he’s not as excited to see me. He’s really snuggly with T. T hands him to me as she goes to unload a Walmart Super Center full of stuff into my living room. Did I mention how blessed my boys were? ;) I took the boys to show them their new room after they met Grammie. Mom set with them while we were filling out the paper work. We finished that and T left. She said she’d call me on Monday. I go back in the hallway where I immediately start to panic. This room that we had spent months preparing for our precious babies, was destroyed in less than 20 minutes. There wasn’t one toy in a box - everything was EVERYWHERE! Landon starts crying because he doesn’t know where he is. It’s at this point that I ask Mom what I’d gotten into. They gave me a couple hours before the bleeding started.

I don’t know how we survived the weekend. I thought for sure that they would kill me before it was over with. There was two of them…one of me… the odds weren’t pretty. Thanks to the help of Janet, we made it through. She talked to the boys a lot that weekend which helped calm Sam down. Then Sunday came… Rob and Janet brought another Walmart size shipment of everything under the sun into my living room. I remember thinking to myself “how do two little boys have so much stuff?” It seriously took me a week to get through it all.

We were finally able to get Sam into a good therapist, but not before we went through our share of bad ones. The first one we went to just let him play but didn’t interact with him at all. We’d waited months for this appointment and once we had it I left without another and “just call back when you feel like he needs to be seen.” I got out of there and called T “um, yeah this isn’t going to work.” So they set us up with an in home specialist that would be coming out once a week. He told me that he had never worked with children Sam’s age but we’d figure it out together. (Oh gee) He came for several weeks. He would sit on my couch and watch the boys play. So during this time I had to find things to do with the boys that would keep them entertained in the living room so that he could watch them. Problem, my boys looked at him as a jungle gym and wanted to climb all over him. He would tell me I was doing a good job and he didn’t know how to help me. (then will you kindly stop interrupting my week?) Did I mention the annoying little articles he would print out that had absolutely nothing useful in them? Yeah, we were back to square one again. Then we found Dr. E. She was the keeper! By this time both of them had calmed down a lot. She was able to give me tips and tricks to deal with phone calls from the birth parents.

Ah, yes, the birth parents! Did I mention they decided to be a part of their kids’ lives right after we got them? My kids had a total of 3-4 visits with them before they surrendered their rights (over the span of a year). We had weekly phone calls with them. Afterwards by boys acted like they did when they first got here. They were so mean to each other. They just couldn’t handle their security being disrupted again.

March 7th marked one year with our boys. It wasn’t until then that I could really look back and see how far we’ve come. We’ve had our ups and our downs. We sadly said goodbye to my mother (Grammie) right after Christmas. We had an awesome first Christmas together. I am so thankful she was here for it. December 28th we woke up. The boys played with and talked to Grammie while we all got ready for church. I talked to her for a while then got ready for church myself. We left and I called out to her as I always did “I love you Mama. I’ll see you when we get home from church.” We stopped to visit Aunt Flossie before we came home. I called Mom who didn’t answer not uncommon, but my heart sank after the second phone call. I flew home and John rushed in and told me that she was unconscious, but was breathing. He came out to get the boys out of the van and I rushed in. She wasn’t breathing. She was cold. We both started CPR and I called 911. They finally got here and worked on her for awhile before taking her to the hospital. John and the boys finally got to the hospital and we were taken to a room with my brother and were told she didn’t make it. That was the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to go through as a person and as a family. Sam was so attached to his Grammie. She was his best friend. There was nowhere she could go that he wasn’t right there with her. We go to the grave yard often and take flowers when we go. I think it’s helped Sam. Landon will still ask to go the funeral home to see Grammie. That’s when it gets really hard. I gently hug him and tell him that Grammie’s body is in the grave but her spirit is in Heaven. He seems ok with that in the moment.
I never thought I would be here today having gone through the adoption that we both prayed for so long. They are legally mine now, but she’s not here to celebrate with. I can imagine the party that is going on in Heaven today, though. I know she’s up there watching over us and is smiling. I am so thankful to God for the blessings that this last year as brought me. If she can’t be here with me, I take comfort she is with my angel babies. I hope my kids will always remember their Grammie and how much she loved them!

April 2nd 2009, we adopted two of the most beautiful miracles. Sam and Landon became part of our forever ohana. I can’t believe it’s finally real. No one will come take them, they will really be here forever.

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No Time for Flash Cards

My friend, Allie, has a great site for preschool art projects and activities. She is a former preschool teacher and is now a SAHM to her precious son. My boys love her site and all of the cute videos she puts up. Check it out! You'll find lots of great things to do with your kids.

www.notimeforflashcards.com

Grieving is Part of the Process

It's been a while since I've made a post. We had a good Thanksgiving and a very nice Christmas. Santa was more than generous to our boys and they were spoiled by family too. Life was everything I could ask for. I wish I could say the same thing about my new year.

Sunday, December 28, 2008 started off as any other Sunday would. We got up and got ready for church. John usually takes care of the boys and gets them dressed for church so I can have a few minutes of extra sleep. Yeah, he overslept. We were fussing. The boys were playing with Mom (Grammie). Mom was fussing at John because he forgot to something for her the night before. I went in and talked to Mom. It was a typical Sunday morning at our house. We finally got ready to leave. The boys hugged and kissed Grammie. I did as I always did when I left. "Bye Mom. I love you! See you after church." "I love you too baby girl. See you later." If only I knew then what I know now.

We went to church. After church we stopped to see my aunt who is in the nursing home. She was in rare form. I always call Mom to tell her how Flossie is doing, when she doesn't go with us. Today was no exception. She didn't answer. Nothing uncommon. Mom would leave her phone on the bed when she got up, despite me fussing at her to take it with her in case something happened. She would sleep with it under her pillow. Something was different this time. I felt this pit in my stomach. I knew something was wrong. I called her about 20 times on the way home. I rushed through town. I knew we were going to the hospital and didn't want to get the boys out, so John ran in and called me. He told me he thought she was breathing but she was unconscious. I made him come back out and get the boys out and flew into the house.

When I got to her room, part of me knew that this was the end, but I was in denial. I thought she was breathing too, but when I removed her oxygen, I felt how cold she was and she was blue. John came in and we started CPR on her while I called 911. They got here and worked on her for about 20 minutes. Looking back, I know it was simply to make us feel better. They finally left with her. I got to the hospital and the EMT told me she didn't make it. We were taken into the "death room" and slowly my siblings started gathering. My pastor took our boys so John could be with me and we went to see her. She was so cold. All I could do was cry. The next day we went to plan her funeral. I feel like we lived at the funeral home for nearly 3 days. I had to be with her.

Please let me stop and explain a bit before I go on. I am a Christian. I believe in Heaven and salvation. I know where my mom is. I grieve for the what if's, what should've beens, what could bes. My mother went through so much in her live and I know she is sitting with Jesus enjoying her new legs (amputee) , and drinking as much water as she wants (CHF - fluid restriction). I grieve for ME - MY loss. I grieve for my boys and their loss. I grieve for my husband's loss because she was more of a mother to him than anyone had ever been. I grieve knowing my future children will never get a chance to know this extraordinary woman.

It's been two weeks now and it still feels like she should be coming home any moment. In my head I know she isn't coming back, but sometimes I get lost in thought and forget. This is the longest I've ever been away from her. When we go out somewhere I still feel like I should be calling to check on her. I've had 3 miscarriages and suffered other losses too, but this is, by far, the hardest thing I've ever had to face in my life. My mom was my best friend. She was BB's best friend too. In my entire life, I don't think I spent more than 30 days away from her. This is the longest I've ever been away from her. It's different and each day has it's challenges. She will forever live in our hearts and I know we will see her again when this life is no more. I try to hold on to that hope. It's hard though. I don't think I'll ever look at the new year the same way again. My New Year's Eve was spent in the grave yard at the burial service of my Mom.