parenting – Page 4

Adoption, foster, giveaway, parenting, photography

Time to catch up + Giveaway Time

January 13, 2017January 13, 2017by Sheridan Johnson12 Comments

brielleblog

I truly can’t believe Friday has come once again! It seems so long away on Mondays, and then before you know it.. it’s the weekend! I am linking up with Karli, who blogs on over at September Farm to tell you about five happenings with the Johnsons,this Friday!

First off, let me apologize for not really blogging in the last couple of weeks. Once all my kids went back to school, I thought I would have the time/motivation to keep this going pretty steady.. but that didn’t exactly happen! So, I wanted to do a little catch up with you all and a pretty cool giveaway at the end!

My oldest two went to get their updated psychological evaluations done, which I am pretty excited to see what the outcome of that is. When children are in foster care, they must do this yearly to keep up with how the children are adjusting to their families, friends, foster parents, and overall environment. I will be most interested in seeing a comparison from when they first came into the “system” to see where they are at now.
My infamous overscheduling occurred again where I was supposed to take baby girl to get her monthly synergis shots at the same time as the boys needed to be taken out of school to make their counseling appointment on time. Let’s just say.. Nana and Papa are the absolute greatest!!
Baby girl has had some HUGE milestones happening lately, especially for a mircopreemie such as herself. She is 9 months old (but 5 months old adjusted age since she was born 4 more months early), and for the first time is able to sit on her own (even if it’s for a little while), and making huge strides in weight growth (baby girl is 15 pounds now which is so good for her), and making a lot of improvement in her ability to turn from back to belly!
I spoke to the Lawyer for the first time who is going to be representing us in the fight for custody for baby girl! Nothing can be officially made until baby girl has been with us for 6 months, but hopefully soon we will know something regarding her case and where to go from here!
I got all my boys a hair cut(including my husbands) and that was the best money I have spent in a long time! Their hair cuts have been WAY overdue, and we keep saying every time that “the next check we will make time to do it”, but I decided today was going to be the day, and they all LOVED it! They look so handsome and so grown up!!

** Now best for LAST!

In order to be entered into my $25 Visa Giftcard giveaway, you must click on the Rafflecopter giveaway below and follow the tasks! 🙂 Good Luck everyone!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Adoption, foster, monthly update, parenting

Best and Worst of 2016

January 4, 2017January 4, 2017by Sheridan Johnson3 Comments

1.) A year since Rochelle passed away ❤

This post was so sweet and special to me.. because in just a few days, it will make the 2 year mark since she has passed away. So sweet and special to us!

2.) My beautiful Rhyleigh and her best friend Jade closing one chapter of their life!

I loved taking photos of these sweet girls, and can’t believe it’s almost been a year since these were taken!

3.) Everyone could use these tips during their foster/adopt journey

I wish I would have known these 10 tips before going through a very long home study with so many intimate questions!

4.) Shane and I celebrated our 11 year dating anniversary!

I love the fact that we made it through SO many obstacles and still together after 11 years! We have literally grown up together! ❤

5.)We built a FENCE!

I loved the fact that my parents literally mapped out a plan and made it happen! Shane even got his friends out here to help! So awesome!!

6.)This is the day that forever changed our life!!

This was the day that got licensed!! It was SO crazy and surreal and we couldn’t believe it!

7.) The time our baby girl turned 3..

This was SUCH a great time, because this was the last day as a single child.. We literally got our first foster child the day after!

8.) This is the day we got our BABY GIRL!

I didn’t think our family could be happier, until baby girl joined us and completely melted our hearts!

9.) This is the day that I turned 28.. like WHAT?

Such a funny day, noticing how extremely close I am to being 30!

10.)Such a sad moment for our family!

This post was so hard to write..

11.) I was SO nervous before this happened…

This meeting answered a lot of questions for me, but we still don’t know what to expect…

12.)We thought we would get great news before Christmas..

We were SO hopeful for this Trial.. and when nothing happened.. it definitely set us wayy back! Cheers to something happening in the next Trial on Jan. 23rd!

I LOVED so much about last year, and I am so glad I got to document it! I know it’s so far and few between that I get to actually spend time here anymore.. but with 5 kids.. it’s all about balance! Love each and every one of my readers! Thank you SO MUCH for making 2016 SO great!!

Adoption, dance, foster, parenting

Anticipated

November 19, 2016November 19, 2016by Sheridan Johnson3 Comments

November 7th, was the day we were waiting for, when we agreed to foster-to-adopt our 3 precious boys. It was the day the court was going to terminate the rights of mom and dad, and start our 6 month adoption process…

Or so we thought.

You see, everyone showed, the lawyers for each of the boys, and the lawyers of the parents, the CPS workers, the CASA workers, my caseworker, many other individuals that have been involved in their 1 year foster care process, and my mom and I. The thing that amazes me is that everyone took time out of their day to show up.. everyone except for the parents (the mom and dad of the boys).

It was VERY frustrating to us and many others. The parents called their lawyers about 5 minutes before the Trial started and told them that they weren’t able to make it due to “car trouble in Houston” and they had no way to make it there. Well, they have been knowing about this date since the boys first hearing after they were removed, so this was a MAJOR day in their court case.

The Judge did not want to continue on without the parents at the hearing, in person, and decided to open the case and suspend it for another five weeks, until Dec. 13th to give the parents another chance to show up in attendance so their cases could be presented to the Judge.

The parents requested an extra visit with the boys this last Friday, since they felt they deserved another visit before the next Trial is set, and so CPS granted it. Except for the small fact, that their mom cancelled the visit the morning of, and I had to pick up the boys from school Friday (on early release) and tell them that they don’t get to go see their mom because of cancellation issues. It hurt my heart, to see their hearts hurting.

They won’t willingly relinquish their rights, so we are having to go this route of courts, hearings, trials, and many loopholes in between.

God brought us to this, and He will bring us through this. We know these boys are placed in our lives for a reason, and we cannot wait to see them grow, mature, and flourish in the near future! They have so much ahead of them!

If the Judge decides to give the boys back to their mom and dad (which is a VERY small chance), we know it’s all in Gods plan. Please keeping praying for us and our sweet family♥

Adoption, foster, parenting

The first 48!

October 23, 2016by Sheridan Johnson3 Comments

October 23 2016.jpg

When it comes to fostering-to-adopt you, it fits different guidelines than a typical fostering guidelines. They want to prepare the kids and the family with whats to come, so they do kind of similar to a meet and greet with the foster kids and the adoptive family. That’s where an overnight stay comes in to play.

It’s amazing how quick all of this transpired, because literally by Thursday (a day after we decided to say “yes” to adopting these three boys), we were already going to have them for the weekend and get to spend the night/precious time with them before they come to officially stay with us.

Shane and I chose to meet in a common place (McDonalds), thinking it would be best for all the kids to get to know each other by playing and feel less awkward/apprehensive about the situation that was about to occur. What we quickly found out when we arrived was that there was no playground for them to play on, so we just had to make the best of the situation.

Both foster families that the kids are staying at, met up with Shane and I (and the girls), and the CASA( Court appointed special advocate) worker was there during the initial meet up/drop off. It went better than we thought it would. No tears were involved, the boys were pretty excited to be able to stay with us and have a weekend of fun!

We decided after picking them all up and loading them up in car seats (Can you believe we have 4 kids in carseats out of 5 now?? lol) that we would take them to the park to get to know them a little better with a lot less pressure of immediately going home to our house. It was SO fun and Brielle and baby girl loved being there, the everything just meshed so well that I know this is exactly what we were meant to be doing in life. We got some pizza on our way home and all ate dinner, and watched a t.v show before putting them all in bed. (there were NO tears from anyone, and they all went straight to sleep and just blended in with our night time routine.)

Once they all woke up in the morning, Shane cooked everyone breakfast (they ate SO well), and we started to get ready for church (I asked ahead of time from the foster families that if they could please pack a church outfit for the boys that would so great) and then we headed out(only 15 minutes late–amazing!) We had to make sure that we had all of their stuff packed up that they came with, because shortly after church, we were supposed to meet up at McDonalds to drop them back off with their foster families and meet up with the CASA worker again to see how everything went.

They all did SO good in church, and we decided to treat them to a little more park fun before meeting up at the drop off and just so we can have just a little bit more time getting to know them and cherish the little moments. They were sad to be leaving us, but we told them on Halloween we will have so much fun trick-or-treating and then they won’t have to leave again after that, and that made them feel a little better.

It was an exhausting but oh SO good last 48 hours and can’t wait until we get to make this our new “normal” on Oct. 31st! Thank you EVERYONE for the sweet comments and prayers! Keep them coming, we are going to forever need them.