Well, we have started something crazy over here. We are now foster parents. It is crazy, insane, magical, trying, complicated, and rewarding. A few years ago, our family saw a movie called Instant Family. It was about a foster family. We all came out of the movie feeling like we should do it. My girls kept bugging us for quite a few months after to get on it. I also kept having things happen that pointed me in that direction. Co workers brought it up, I would hear about the huge need Colorado Springs had for foster families, and it kept tugging on my heart.
I finally called an agency and the women who answered the phone was awesome. We hit it off and talked for an hour. I went in that night to tour the building. I took my daughters and we all just felt so strongly that we needed to do this as a family. Nate and I started the classes and got everything done pretty quick. Covid happened and we pushed pause. I had so many changes with home schooling, I didn't think I could add more on top of that. Covid was so unreal and scary in the beginning, we didn't know what was even happening, so we just dealt with that.
Covid finally became the new normal and we got back on the foster train in April 2021. We finished everything about June/July, right after Mckenna left for her mission. I knew we would be getting girls, Kenna felt that too. I wanted to sale our kid furniture and every time I posted it on Facebook, someone would want it and I would get a sinking feeling. I would cancel the add and feel that I needed to keep it for the "girls" we would be getting. Nate kept wondering why we didn't get a call right away. We had a big trip planned at the beginning of August and I felt we would get a call when we got home. And that is exactly how it happened.
On August 10th 2021 we got the call. Nate and I got the call and the woman said "Katie, I know you don't want babies, and multiples but we have these 4 little girls and you are our only hope. We don't have another family in Colorado Springs that can take all 4 and they will be split up. She sent us a picture and we had about 10 minutes to decide. We pulled the truck over and looked at the picture of them. Our hearts melted and we thought, we can at least try right? I had to go to work and Nate had to work that night as well. We told them we would do it. They said a home supervisor would bring them to our house until I could get home.
I will never forget that day at work. I was training someone and I was trying to stay focused. It was impossible, I was so scattered. I remember texting friends that it all happened and a friend went straight to my house and dropped off a ton of toys and cloths. Nate met them for a few minutes on his way out the door to work. He called me a said "They are the most beautiful little girls, they have these big brown eyes." We both had no idea at that moment, how much our lives were about to change. I remember walking into the house and seeing 4 little girls sitting in my living room, playing perfectly well mannered with all the toys. I remember wondering where in the world I would even start.
In the next few days, the stuff started rolling in from Hope and home (our agency) and our community. Car seats, high chair, toys, cloths, play pens, and everything in between. I remember the second night vividly. We had to tell the girls their "rights" as foster kids. I remember sitting on the bottom trundle with 4 little girls huddled around me. I explained that they could call if they didn't feel safe, that they had a voice and all the other things on the list. I told them I loved them.
They told me about their baby brother John, how he had died, and how he was in heaven. They wanted to know if God was taking care of him. I told them that I had a really pretty picture of God with children and that I could hang it in their room. They were excited. I hung it on a nail that was already their. I told them that they could pray to God for comfort and peace. In that moment, I could feel the veil so thin. I could feel that their guardian angels were surrounding us. These girls walked into my home and brought their angels with them. In that moment, I knew this was all so much bigger than me and that I was not in it alone. Not on this side or the veil, or on the other.
Little did I know how hard it would get, how challenging, and how it would break me in so many ways. It has been as Nate says "the hardest, most rewarding thing we have ever done".
