Things can change overnight…obviously. We went from leaving work one Monday morning just me and Jonathan and by the time we got home from work we had two extra little ones in the house. How life can change in an instant. Well yesterday life changed again for us, but this time not unexpectedly. We left work yesterday morning with two little boys that were going to daycare and came home last evening just Jonathan and myself. For those of you who are lost…the boys were placed in another home yesterday. There were spots that opened up in a group home with children their age and the foster mom has more experience with that age group/discipline issues. Its what is best for the boys. We will miss them, they are really sweet kids! We are now back to waiting for a new placement. This time we expect to be waiting longer because we are asking for such a younger age (8 months or younger) and only 1, no siblings this time.

Here are some things I learned from being a “mom” to two little toddlers!

* Your time is no longer your time
* You are constantly on the go
* Sleep….what’s that
* Expect 4 to 5 tantrums a day
* Bedtime is my favorite time of day
* Expect to have toys, diapers, clothes, shoes, juice cups and such EVERYWHERE
* Its hard to have your house ready to show for selling purposes all the time with two toddlers
* It’s easier just to eat at home
* Our schedule revolves around nap time…give or take 2 hours
* They will often mimic each others behavior – good or bad – especially when they see it gets an adults attention
* They don’t need a lot to be content
* They can be content with the basics- a blanket and a few toys-until they see someone else has something different.
* The best way to avoid meltdowns/tantrums is to redirect their attention–but sometimes no amount of redirecting will help.
* It’s difficult when you only have 2 people that can watch your kids and they live 45 minutes away.

But we also learned that having two little ones in the house can be fun, enjoyable and exciting. It was nice to see how, even for a short time, we changed their lives and their behavior. Knowing we had an impact in their lives and hopefully that will affect them throughout the rest of their life. We are excited to get a baby and have a whole new set of challenges! We’ll keep you all updated.

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For those of you who don’t, I’m sure your wondering why a password? Monday afternoon we got a call that CPS had two little boys that needed emergency placement. They are ages 1 and 2 and the sweetest kids ever. We told CPS we would take the boys and by Monday night our lives changed dramatically. Because the boys are in foster care, I have made any posts/pictures about them private with a required password due to safety reasons and to protects the kids. I also won’t refer to them with their names unless its in a private post.

We have had the boys for about 4 days and have enjoyed having them in our home. We don’t know how long they will be with us, it could be for a month, 6 months, or it could even be permanently. There have been some meltdowns with the boys but nothing out of the ordinary from a normal toddler. I’m pretty sure they have never been told no before and always got what they wanted. They are only about a year apart and because they are so close in age, they tend to fight over toys a lot. If any of you have little boys and know of a way to keep them from fighting over the toys and then melting down because we told them no or to share, please advise! we are going to have to start using time outs for the oldest one, that’s not going to be fun but it needs to be done, something needs to be done. It does just break my heart though because, not only are these people they hardly know telling them no and putting them in time out but their whole environment has changed, they smells, the food they eat, the people that are around them, how they are responded to, etc.

They do sleep pretty well at night, the last few nights they have slept about 10 hours a night. We actually have to wake them up in the mornings, they won’t like it when we have to start waking them up 2 hours earlier than we are now for daycare. As I type this, the little one just woke up and the oldest is still sleeping. He fought it and fought it for about 30 minutes before finally crashing, he needed a nap. He has been cranky all day and clingy. I sat in the rocker with him just holding him as he fell asleep for about 45 minutes. then once I put him in his bed he woke up and wanted me to hold him again…that’s when he started crying for a a while. I went in to get the youngest when he woke up and the oldest had curled up in the chair with his blanket and fell asleep. I don’t think the oldest feels that well so that’s probably why he’s been cranky today. Like I said earlier, my heart breaks for these kids, when they cry, I have no clue what’s going through their heads…even though they are 1 and 2 yrs old.

It will be interesting when we start them in daycare, to see how they handle it. We are having issues with getting their immunizations, what they have had and what they need and so forth, and we need them to start daycare, so we’ll have to stay home a few days next week before we can put them in daycare.

I’m sure in another week or so I’ll post another update about the boys.

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front

and back

To me it’s a big change but so much easier to fix in the mornings! Especially since I just bought a chi! What have I done all these years without a chi??! It’s amazing. As one of my friends says “once you go chi, you never go back!” I hear ya, Jen!

These are some of my favorite pictures I have taken over the last few years.

During the last 6 months or so I haven’t take many photos, I’ve been in a photography rut! My excuse is, “I just don’t have anything to take pictures of.” In 2010 I want to get back into it and start taking more pictures. A few weeks ago we went out to Jonathan’s uncle and aunts house for Christmas and I took this photo. This photo reminds me how much I love photography and why. I love the time of day when the sun sets. The colors in the sky are usually amazing and it always seems peaceful at that time of the day.

For the last 10 years or so I’ve asked my dad if I could refinish the dresser so I can use it, I always got the same answer, “it’s so dirty and old and I don’t want to clean it out because I don’t know where I’ll put the stuff that’s in it.” So when we started fixing up the babies room I tried one more time and to my surprise they said yes. All it took was for me to say it’s for a grandchild–geeze! So I went and picked up the dresser and brought it home. I stripped it – all 10 layers of paint, sanded it and repainted it. I stained the top of the dresser to match another dresser I refinished a few years ago that is in the room as well. Here are some pictures of the dresser before I started and then the finished product.

In February Jonathan and I went on our first cruise to Cozumel and Progresso, Mexico with our friends Josh and Shalyn.

Jonathan and I completed our first bike race, Tour Dallas, with our friend Todd. We had a great time and hope to do it again this year.

A few months later, we rode in another bike ride, Mesquite Rodeo Ride. We attempted this one but about 10-12 miles in I was done, my heart couldn’t take anymore.

We took a visit to the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens on Memorial Day Weekend

Our good friend Tami got married to Michael in May and Jonathan and I were the photographers.

In July Jonathan and I went on another cruise to the Bahamas with my parents, his parents and his sister and brother-in-law. We had a great time with everyone!

In August we put our house on the market so we can move closer to both our families. We are hoping to move to the Forney or Rockwall area. Hopefully our home will sell in 2010 and we can move closer to our families.

In October we started the process to become foster parents so we can adopt through CPS. We had to do about 32 hours of classroom training, we filled out 1000 pieces of paperwork, done drug screenings, got our fingerprints done with the FBI, and have completed our homestudy so we are just playing the waiting game now. For our homestudy we had to have the babies room set up with the crib and everything so we moved our guest room into the office and set up the babies room.

Throughout the year we went to a few of my nephew, Jake’s, soccer games and spent time with my niece, Brooklyn.

We spent Thanksgiving and Christmas with both of our families and rang in the new year with some friends. We started 2010 the same way we started 2009, a birthday bash with my family and the medlins.

We finally got an updated picture of all the Turner-Medlin “kids” and their significant other.

So here’s to the New Year and a happy and joyous 2010. We anticipate 2010 to be a big year for us as we bring a little one into our home and hopefully adopt a child this year. I wish all of you a wonderful new year and hope your dreams and goals of 2010 come true!

We have been so busy the last few months with the foster care training and getting ready for the homestudies and bringing a little one into the house that we didn’t really have much time to do a Christmas card like last year. So we’re sending you all a Christmas card via my blog! We want to wish each and everyone of you a very Merry Christmas and hope you get to spend your time with family and loved ones this holiday season!

We have two weeks left of pre service classes, we have to get all the million papers turned in, get our fingerprints done with the FBI and then one of us has to get his drug test (I already did)…after all that is done we can schedule our pre service visit and homestudy. They told us that there is a very good possibility we could be licensed with the state by January!! The agency told us we needed the room set up with the crib and all for the pre service visit so we went out and got our crib this weekend.

We decided to use the room we had been using as a guest room for the nursery so we had to combine the guest room and office. So we moved the bed into the office and cleared out the other room to complete the transformation.

Since we are still trying to sell our house, we didn’t want to paint the room so we found these wall decals that just stick to the wall – there pretty awesome! They were pretty easy to put up, just a tedious task as each of the leaves had to be individually placed…and for a perfectionist like me, that took some time.

I also re-painted and re-stained a small chest of drawers I had in my room all growing up so we can use it in the nursery. And after that, repainted it…long story short, I bought flat paint instead of semi-gloss, not sure what I was thinking when I bought it but it’s ok now, the world is all good again.

It’s very strange to think that within the next couple of months, we could have a little one in the house. But it could also take a while before we get a placement so we are trying not to get toooo excited. Who am I kidding, I can’t help but be excited!

This has been such an emotional time in our lives (well, mine anyways) and I feel sad, angry, disappointed and every other emotion that comes along with infertility, but at the same time I am excited, happy, joyous, hopeful and thankful at the thought of bringing a child into our home and family that we will care for and love at the time they need it most.

We are supposed to read 3 books that the Baptist Home recommends and then write a “book report” on what we learned from the book. The books we are reading are good books and bring up topics you may not think about in adoption. One of the books talks about how the whole pre-service time prior to an adoption (or in our case, foster care) is like a pregnancy. They call it “pregnant by adoption”. The author says “If I were six months pregnant, people would be drooling over me, but since I’m expecting by adoption, I get so much nonchalance, shock and plain old rudeness. Adoption is sometimes treated as not being ‘real’ (and, of course, with all the hopes and fears, some of us hold back our excitement) therefore, it would be helpful for those around us to understand our need to be treated as if we are expecting, or pregnant by adoption.” This is very true…if I were pregnant, I’d have a big belly and people would just know that we were expecting, but because I don’t have that, people don’t know or get excited about it. Don’t get me wrong, the people we are close to have shown their support and excitement. A few months back when I made a comment about us adopting on facebook, I got several comments from people, but my favorite comment and the one that meant the most to me was from my friend Amy…all she said was “How exciting, I didn’t know you were ‘expecting’”. I don’t think she’ll ever know how much that simple comment meant to me! I will say, it was kind of strange going into babies r us to buy our crib and nursery stuff not having a baby at home or knowing one is on the way. But it is an experience that mothers and fathers-to-be get to go through, so why shouldn’t we?

As we are preparing to bring a child into the home we are doing the same stuff most parents would, setting up the nursery, getting excited and thinking of what the child will be like. But for us, there are some differences from those who are actually going to give birth. We have to go to parenting classes, we have to have the fire marshal come and do a health/fire safety check of our home, we have to have someone come interview us and ask us all kinds of personal information to make sure we will be “fit parents”. We also have to think about some of the struggles that come with adoption. Adoption has positive and negative elements, none of us wants to acknowledge the negative, painful side–which is, loss. But the truth is, the very act of adoption is built upon loss. For the birth parents, the loss of their biological offspring, the relationship that could have been, a very part of themselves. For the adoptive parents, the loss of giving birth to a biological child, the child whose face will never mirror theirs. And for the adopted child, the loss of the birth parents, the earliest experiences of belonging and acceptance. To deny adoption loss is to deny the emotional reality of everyone involved.

We are very excited and can’t wait to see what the next few months will bring. We just ask for your continued prayers and support as we wait for a little one to join the family!

There you have it, our dinning room table for under $100. Well, almost…we still need to get some chairs or benches. There are 4 chairs but only 3 are usable…one of them is broken and you can’t sit in it. But other than that, I love it!

It was first created in the 1880s by George Renninger of the Wunderle Candy Company, the three colors of candy corn are meant to symbolize actual corn. Each piece is approximately the size of a whole kernel of corn, as if it fell off a ripe or dried ear of corn. Candy corn is made primarily from sugar, corn syrup and honey. Working by hand, the original manufacturers first combined sugar, corn syrup and water and cooked them into a slurry. Fondant was added for texture, and marshmallows provided a soft bite. The final mixture was then heated and poured into shaped molds. Three passes were required during the pouring process, one for each colored section. Few changes have been made to the process or recipe, with machines now performing the tasks formerly done by people.

As you can see, its really healthy for you as well! I mean, what’s not to love, it’s got sugar, corn syrup and honey!! Have you tried the carmel apple candy corn? It’s simply amazing, a sweet carmely (is that word) taste of candy apples…MMmmmmm I need to go find some of those now! Happy fall ya’ll!

Ok, I’m getting old! I’ve never really been one to go to concerts or like them. I just don’t enjoy standing the whole time and especially 2 inches away from the person next to me. Jonathan and I went to the needtobreathe concert at the House of Blues Thursday night with Tim and Kara and lets just say we left before the main act. By the time two other musicians played we had been standing like 3 hours and were ready to go. I can’t stand for more than about 30 minutes without being in quite a bit of pain from my back so 3 hours is asking A LOT of me. Our legs were tired and sore and my back was killing me so we left. But before we left we got to listen to a guy named Matthew Mayfield and then a girl from Canada named Serena Ryder. They were both pretty good, I like the style of Serena Ryder, kinda folk-popish. Over all we had a good night, other than coming to the realization I’m old.

We have decided to do a foster to adoption with CPS. Basically we would get a child that is in CPS custody and foster them for a while and then adopt them. You have to foster a child in your home for 6 months before you can legally adopt them. We started filling out the adoption application this weekend and our orientation is next week. The first week of november we start our foster parent classes and then after that (mid December) we’ll complete a home study (wherever we’re living at the time- hopefully not here) and then we’ll be certified to accept a child. There are a million and 1 papers to fill out, get notarized and send in. Plus inspections by the fire department, health department and all other kinds of stuff we’ll have to do but it will all be worth it in the end.

Now for the most common statement I have heard since telling people we were starting the adoption process…drum roll please……..”Now that you’re doing this, you’ll get pregnant”. To be honest, this statement never really bothered me until now…now everytime I hear it I cringe and take offense. I’m sorry but if it hasn’t happened in almost 2 years, why would it happen now!! Statistics show that a whopping 5% of couples who stop trying to get pregnant and adopt get pregnant after they adopt…the same as people who simply stop treatment for infertility. I’m not saying it won’t happen, I’m just saying there is a very slim chance that it will. And, the next most common statement or question I get since telling people we are adopting is…”what will you do if you get pregnant?” What do you mean, what will I do?? We’ll be thrilled! I for one, am not going to just sit around and wait 5 years for us to get pregnant. If we adopt and then get pregnant–GREAT, we’ll just have 2 babies. On the other hand, if we get pregnant while we are going through the classes and beginning of the process, we may put it off for a while, but we’ll cross that bridge when/if we get to it. We will adopt though, just maybe not in the next 6 months.

As thrilled as I am about the possibility of adoption and bringing a baby into our home – at the same time, I’m also sad, angry, disappointed and a part of me feels like I’d be giving up on the possibility of us having our own biological child. But I can only handle the emotional roller coaster we call our lives right now for so long. The tolls the treatments are taking on me physically are getting a little too much to handle as well.

Stay tuned for updates on the whole adoption process – I promise I’ll keep you updated.

“Couples experiencing infertility often receive well-meaning but extremely insensitive “advice.” We can all list the most popular ones: “Just relax and you’ll get pregnant,” or “adopt and you’ll get pregnant,” of the most painful from those who think they’ve got the goods on God’s plan, “Maybe God never meant for you to have children.” The sheer audacity of making a statement like that never fails to amaze me.

These same people would never walk up to someone seeking treatment for cancer and say, “Maybe God never meant for you to live.” However, because I am infertile, I’m supposed to get on with my life. It’s hard to understand that people cannot see infertility for what it is, a disease for which I have to seek treatment. What if Jonas Salk had said to the parents of polio victims, “Maybe God meant for thousands of our children to be cripples, live in an iron lung or die.” What if he’d never tried to find a cure? Who could think for one minute that that was God’s plan?

What do I think God meant when he gave me infertility?

I think he meant for my husband and I to grow closer, become stronger, love deeper. I think God meant for us to find the fortitude within ourselves to get up every time infertility knocks us down. I think God meant for our medical community to discover medicines, invent medical equipment, create procedures and protocols. I think God meant for us to find a cure for infertility.

No, God never meant for me not to have children. That’s not my destiny; that’s just a fork in the road I’m on. I’ve been placed on the road less traveled, and like it or not, I’m a better person for it. Clearly, God meant for me to develop more compassion, deeper courage, and greater inner strength on this journey to resolution, and I haven’t let him down.

Frankly, if the truth be known, I think God has singled me out for a special treatment. I think God meant for me to build a thirst for a child so strong and so deep that when that baby is finally placed in my arms, it will be the longest, coolest, most refreshing drink I’ve ever known.

While I would never choose infertility, I cannot deny that a fertile woman could never know the joy that awaits me. Yes, one way or another, I will have a baby of my own. And the next time someone wants to offer me unsolicited advice I’ll say, “Don’t tell me what God meant when he handed me infertility. I already know.”

One day God will give us the gift of a child, it may not come all wrapped up with a nice shiny bow on it, but it will be a gift from God. And, I for one will say that there was no way I was not meant to be a mom. We will have a family one day, whether it’s biologically or through adoption.

Each November Brian, our pastor at Encounter, does a series that talks about storms. One year it was titled “storm chasers” and another was called “chase the lion”, it’s where he sits down with couples/individuals and talks to them about a “storm” they have gone through. These “storms” as we call it could be dealing with grief from losing a loved one, or a spouse who had an affair and they worked through it and recommitted their life to one another. Well, this is our storm and how we handle it will be our testimony to others. This topic always reminds me of the Casting Crowns song, “Praise You In The Storm”. As we sang it on Sunday, it has a whole new meaning now! I love this song:

Praise you in this storm

I lift my eyes onto the hills
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth
I lift my eyes onto the hills
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth

But in the end, it’s time to move on.

We finally did it, we put our house on the market today…It’s for sale! I love our house, I really do. I don’t love the location of it. It’s not that I don’t like Red Oak and the area, it’s fine, just not for me. Both Jonathan and I work in downtown Dallas and both of our families are about 45 – 50 minutes away. For most people, that’s plenty close….for me, it’s too far. I want to be able to call up my sister-in-law and in 15 minutes we are meeting for lunch or going shopping or whatever. We spend so many weekends in Dallas and do a lot in the Dallas area after work that I feel like we live in Dallas but sleep in Red Oak. Here has been my dilema…Jonathan would prefer to stay here or even further out than we are. I haven’t really pushed the issue of moving before now because I didn’t want to take Jonathan away from the area that he wants to live. He is a part of a Wednesday morning mens group with our church and if we moved he wouldn’t be able to keep going to that…and I didn’t want to be the reason for that. So the dilema comes in when I have to decide, do I stay in a place that I don’t like, an area that I don’t have but a few friends, and always wanting to be closer to my family. Or, do I try to talk him into moving and ultimately pull him away from his friends and church that he loves. So after a lot of thinking and going back and forth it comes down to the fact that I was so unhappy I had to talk him into moving but at the same time feel guilty about it because I know he doesn’t really want to move and I’m taking him away from friends. (It’s not like we are never going to see them again, we won’t be moving that far)

One day, somehow, we are going to have a family and I want to be close to our family when that happens. Another factor in our decision is that we weren’t sure we would get what we needed/wanted for our house. We don’t know what will happen with the housing market in the future….if we wait, will it get better or worse? After talking to a few realtors and seeing what other houses are going for, we decided to go for it. So for the next few months or longer (hopefully not that long) we will be living in a house that is neat and tidy and ready for potential buyers to view it at any moment! Anyone wanna buy a house?!