Luke started Kindergarten

So, at the beginning of the school year, the charter school that the girls go to agreed to let Luke start a transitional Kindergarten class after he turned 5.  Well, he turned 5 on February 12th, and he was impatient to go. I hung on as long as I could.  (He was sick, too, so I got him for a couple more days.)

But, I couldn't hang on to him forever, so yesterday he went to his first day of Kindergarten. Isn't he handsome? He did pretty good and seemed to really enjoy it.

More family pictures

Email addresses added

Hello friends and family,
I have been writing on our family blog lately and realized that not many of you were getting the posts. I have added all of the emails of people I thought would be interested in getting the email updates each time I post. If you'd like your email address added or removed, please let me know. Also, please check out the most recent posts.  There is so much going on!
With love,
Celese

Pictures of Conner

So, since everyone has been asking for pictures of Conner, I thought I'd post a couple. I hope they work ok. They were just some we were taking yesterday when he was here again.

Announcemnt -- Conner

I finally feel like we are at the point where we can make an announcement.  We have talked to very few people about this because it is just one of those things that you can never count on.

Back in August we made the decision to be foster parents.  Part of it came from Luke desperately wanting a brother, and part of it came from us wanting to do some good.  I'm not exactly sure what our reasons were other than that we knew it was what the Lord directed us.

I spent many months taking training classes, filling out paperwork, and making the changes in our house that are required for a foster home.  There were many problems with the county, though, and after a couple of situations, I withdrew our application.  I was discouraged and couldn't understand why we had felt it was right, but didn't even get through the application process.

The weekend before I withdrew our application, I met a woman who is a social worker at a foster family agency.  I called her when we were done working with the county and decided to work to be a foster family through the Legacy agency.  What a blessing that has been! They are positive and kind.  It has been a much better experience.

I procrastinated turning in my application to Legacy for quite a long time because I was scared.  Mostly, I was scared about the home inspection.  But, I finally got up the courage and turned in the application. We had very limited attributes of what we felt would be best in our home -- a little boy between the ages of 3 and 5.  When I turned in the application, the social worker reminded me that with such limits, it would most likely take a very long time to get a child. But, while I was at the office talking with her, a fax came in about a little boy that was 5.  She was as surprised as I was.  It felt like God was speaking right to us.

So, with a little boy in mind, we got to work on the process even more seriously.  It has been a long roller coaster.  We are having to do some remodelling on our home; another round of fingerprints, paperwork, and classes; and a whole lot more praying. However, it is all paying off and Conner should be joining our family soon.

Conner is 5 years old.  He is already completely adoptable.  He has had a tough life already, but we are looking forward to being able to help him and love him and have him join our family.  It should only be a few more weeks until then and hopefully no longer than  year until the adoption is final. Although it will be quite a change to have four kids in our family, we are very excited!!!