It is not news to anyone that all families go through multiple seasons….seasons of hard, struggle, pain and then seasons of calm, ease, and peace. Right now our little Team Brave Dinosaurs is in a bit of a season of hard – so I thought it might be helpful to my little blog but also for my heart for me to reflect on the start of our journey and all of the beautiful messes we created together when starting our family.

As many of you know, my husband and I had always planned to build our family first by adopting a child/children. We were open to many different possibilities of doing this although we had started working towards a possible international adoption. Many countries require a marriage of at least 2 years before applying so we were chugging along, enjoying our free time and quiet up until that point. God definitely had a different plan and in February of 2013, He asked us to take in two of His most loved, yet most broken. All we had to do was say “yes.”  Easy to type in a sentence, much harder to dive in and do. But we did.
We believe that their story up until that point is just that, THEIR story and I will not be diving into that story here on the blog.

When we picked up WonderGIRL and WonderBOY (WG and WB) from the DSHS office, they were SOOOO excited to be coming home with their school counselor. What a treat to see one of your teachers’ homes, kitchens, and even have a sleepover!!! I still remember WG’s exact three questions in the car as we drove to our house
1. When we have dinner, will we all eat together at a table?
2. Will you take us to church?
3. Do I call you Mommy?
Three questions from a very excited kiddo, but three questions that without any filter, highlighted her need for belonging, for love, and for help in her healing process.

We had absolutely NO kid-friendly items in our house – I blame my occupation for that, because all of the good stuff was in my office/classroom at school. The kiddos passed the time by sliding up and down our stairs, filling our house with the most genuine and uninhibited laughs I had ever heard.

We got to go on a Target shopping spree (Mama’s favorite!!!) for essential items that night. As we piled plastic plates, cups, class valentines, toothbrushes, etc. onto the conveyor belt and as the prices beeped onto the screen, WG was frozen and locked on the screen. As the total climbed, her head began to significantly droop. She turned to me as I pulled out my wallet, and said quietly, “I am so sorry. You really don’t have to pay for all of this.” To which I replied, “We want you to feel comfortable. We care about you. We will do whatever it takes to make you feel safe and at home while you stay with us.” This perked her up enough to walk hand-in-hand with me to the car as we left the store.

It’s funny that many of the rituals and routines we started that first week, we still do 19 months later. And many of our “firsts” (new experiences to them) are still activities we love doing together – movie theater dates, walking to the park, visiting the fire station, and sliding down those darn stairs (my poor banister).

Going from zero kids and a relatively quiet house to parents of two was obviously a culture shock for hubby and I. We navigated that carefully, fumbled endlessly, and joked about not even being in the same chapter, let alone on the same page in the whole parenting game. Some of the most precious moments I will cherish with my husband were some of those first nights after we put the children to bed and we would process, cry, hug and really take in the impact of our new normal.

Our second night together was Valentine’s Day so we brought the children to a romantic date at Red Robin. You can see in the picture above how shy and clingy both were in public – for those of you that know them now, it is shocking to see them so still!!! At dinner, WG was very honest in saying that the words “family”, “foster”, “mom”, “dad”, etc. made her feel uncomfortable. We discussed that instead we were a TEAM and Scott and I were their coaches. We called the shots and kept everyone safe. Of course we needed a team name and identity so each child got to pick one word to describe our team. I’m sure this doesn’t surprise anyone that WG chose “brave” (I might have said crazy at that point in time) and sweet 5 year old, all-boy WB chose “dinosaurs”. It obviously stuck and thinking about that conversation brings the sweetest sense of peace to my heart because it was the first family decision we made together. Both children finally had a voice and control – 11 and 5 years too late, but we were ready to make up for lost time in that realm as quickly as possible.

We are #soblessed to have these two in our life and honored to have the opportunity to change their seemingly dark path and point it towards the light. They fill our hearts with unspeakable joy, passion, and love (along with wall dings, endless cereal droppings, and laundry but who’s keeping track). More on our story and a current legal update will be coming in a later blog post – thanks for reading and to most of you reading this, thank you for supporting us through the start of it all and continuing through the present.