There seemed to be a brief period of time when there weren't any kids we wanted to know more about, or the ones we were seeking info on we weren't really excited about. There is a brother and sister we are looking at now that I can see in our home: Kajon 9 (M)/Kajonae 6 (F). Their names, though... I keep calling them "cajun" and "cajunay" but it's probably more like "kay-john" and "kay-johnny"??
We still haven't heard anything about 2 boys that I mentioned before, Dario and Austin - we're still open to learning more about them, if we ever do.
There are 2 boys listed on the MNadopt website without pictures and it says they require assistance from others. We finally asked about them and found out they are both autistic, one is severe and profound. I have worked with the severely autistic on and off for 2 years, I don't think I can voluntarily take 2 of them on as my children for the rest of their lives. Though, some of the kids we could adopt may need the help of an adult for the rest of their lives as well.
Once a month Suzanne has a "task force" meeting where new kids are presented, she has been sending us flyers from these meetings for the past couple of months. We just received a packet this weekend, most, as usual are individual kids. There is one group in there that I would ask more about if Kajon and Kajonae don't work out. They are young (5,4 and 2) and the oldest has Down's Syndrome. Again, it's a lifelong commitment to parenting such a child, but some are more independent than others. I don't know how much you can tell at age 5, especially with the background of foster care, etc.

only a sib group for us

We decided we want to continue to focus on only sibling groups - at least for now. We aren't in a hurry, so we don't need to change our plans to accommodate a schedule we set for ourselves. We hadn't thought the matching process would be as difficult as it is, certainly not with the obstacles we've encountered, but we realize this is how it is and can change how we feel about/react to it.

We requested information on 2 groups of brothers, interestingly, both groups are 10 and 11 year olds. After a week we still don't have any information on one group (Suzanne requested the info from the boys' worker and hasn't heard back). The other group may or may not be available. They have been with a family since July that had the intent to adopt them, then recently said they no longer wanted to, and now have said that they changed their minds and do want to adopt them. So there is a team meeting scheduled for next Friday (2/12) where the family and the boys' workers and maybe therapists will get together and get to the bottom of this, along with a decision. Their worker is still taking home studies from families (not knowing how this is going to turn out) so we had ours sent in.

I've cooled my jets

Thank you for the responses to the previous post, we did get some feedback from Suzanne that helped. She noticed that the kids that were already placed and those that don't want to be adopted were definitely not listed on the public version of MNadopt. Most likely they are only on the private version (the one that Suzanne and her counterparts have access to) for legal reasons. Even if they claim they don't want to be adopted, there is a legal requirement that their information be made public. And those that have recently been placed, or are still in the process of being placed but have a family chosen are only on the private version. These are things she hadn't realized, so we all learned something there.
Our foster care license came in the mail today, yay!
We are wondering if we want to consider adopting just one child now and another one or two down the road (they require a minimum of 1 year between adoptions). We did ask Suzanne and the process for a 2nd adoption is abbreviated quite a bit. What we are going through now we would have to repeat, but what we've done prior to this would be much less. We have some talking and thinking to do... we'll figure it out.

continued frustration

After looking at the list of 110 we match, we found all the groups of 2s and 3s and requested more info on them (most of them weren't listed on the website so we only knew gender, age, race). There were 11 groups of kids. Just heard back some yesterday and some today about them: 5 groups are already placed, 1 turned out to be a group of 4, 1 group doesn't want to be adopted, 1 group she can't find (???) and 1 group sounds a bit daunting. That leaves 2 possible groups and 1 we haven't heard anything back on. So, why, WHY! are we even shown these groups that are already placed or don't want to be adopted? Why are we wasting our time and energy on them?

This is frustrating!!

After waiting to get questions answered and to hear more information on Tavion/Chase/Otez we hear today that they are being placed with someone else. Something happened in their current living situation making it necessary for them to need immediate placement. Whenever possible they look for "concurrent" placement - a foster home that will adopt them, so this isn't just one more move for them. For unknown reasons they chose to place them with the other family that was considering them instead of us. There may be a relationship between this family and the county worker, we don't know why. It would've been risky for them to suddenly place them with us since we have learned very little about the boys at this point and we could easily choose not to adopt them later on. The frustrating part is we have been trying to get information, we wanted it, we sought it, but we weren't getting it - that seems to be the norm. I realize the social- and county workers are overloaded with work, they have a lot to do and are pulled in many directions. Logically I can recognize this and understand why it takes so long for anything to happen, but emotionally I get frustrated and angry with the lack of response and slowness with information.

We haven't heard anymore on Christopher/Isaac/Yulianna, we know their worker was interested in another family and are pursuing them, so that must all be moving forward.

So it's back to the drawing board. We have our list of 110 matches we can sort through and begin the process over again.

inspection

When Suzanne had left our house following the inspection for the foster care license she had some questions she needed to ask before giving us the approval:
1) if a 2nd form of egress is necessary from a basement even though it's not used for sleeping
2) if the lightweight screen in front of the fireplace is OK or needs to be permanent glass doors
3) if the furnace needs to be inspected every year
So, the basement and fireplace are fine as is, but we do need a furnace inspection - not a big deal. She also answered a few questions we had about Tavion/Chase/Otez. Due to the holidays and varied schedules we know we won't hear anything more until after the first of the year. Oh, we also found out there is another family that has shown interest in these 3 boys.

I took some time today and looked at the list of 110 kids that we "match." There are 23 sibling groups and 43 individual kids. We are willing to take a single child, but we will not have only 1 child, which means we would have to go through this whole process a 2nd time - not a fun notion. We haven't done any more with this list, haven't ruled any kids out or chosen any we want to pursue. We have our 2 groups of 3 that we are looking at - doesn't seem right to have our hand in too many pots.

the beginning of regular posts

I have always intended this blog to be something others could follow on a regular basis, but the reality has been that things moved pretty slowly and there weren't events to share. Now we have been approved as adoptive parents and are in the matching process. This moves along much more quickly. Since late October we have already sought information on 6 different groups of kids. Some had other families also interested, some turned out to be more than we could handle, and some we are still pursuing. We haven't been daunted by any of these kids going to homes other than ours - this whole thing is about the kids - if they are in a good home we are happy for them.

The matching process happens in a couple different ways:
1) we can request info on a kid(s) we've seen on the website www.mnadopt.org
2) our social worker can hear about a kid(s) and think of us, giving us preliminary info
3) other workers across the state can read about us and think we might be a good match
4) a computer program can say we "match" kids per some data they've gathered. Because we are so open to what kids(s) we will take in we were matched with 110 kids

Currently we are considering 2 separate sibling groups:
1) Tavion 6/Chase 5/Otez 18mos. The worker for these boys saw our info and wanted us to consider them. We have learned some preliminary info and have requested to learn more. The behaviors the boys have exhibited is all on par for what we have been told to expect: aggressive, ADHD, attachment disorder. Otez does have a serious heart condition that will require special attention for the rest of his (possibly short) life.
2) Christopher 10/Isaac 9/Yulianna 8. We started learning about them last month, but our worker kinda dropped the ball on this. We had a lengthy meeting with her and she had taken several notes for herself, some of which were questions we wanted posed to the kids' worker. Shortly after our meeting 2 boys came into the picture that were a possibility for us to take in and I think that got her sidetracked. Their worker has already begun interviewing and working with a family for these 3, but is willing to meet with us - though we would be the back-up in case this other family drops out.

That's where we are right now. As things happen fairly quickly now I'll have things to post on a regular basis.