Blue Shoes

These little blue shoes went in the donate pile today as all 3 of my boys have outgrown them. They seemed like the perfect tangible symbol of this season of life for us. We are finally headed to adoption in our foster care case and have decided we will be closing our home after this case. Which essential means we will no longer be licensed foster parents. These little blue shoes were the first thing I bought when I decided I was going to become a foster parent more than 5 years ago. I hadn’t even started my classes at that point but they were on sale for a couple of bucks and I needed a physical object to make the whole thing seem real for me. As I cleaned out the kids closet today and said good bye to all the baby clothes my kids have outgrown my heart is both so very full of joy and happiness and also am overwhelming sadness. We know for our family that we are at our max and don’t want to add any more kiddos but knowing we are totally done is hard. I had no idea what my foster care journey would look like when I started. I thought I’d foster 25 kids and maybe one would stay. I had no idea my first placement would be mine forever or that my second placement would follow a few years later. I always knew I wanted a lot of kids, but there was never really a number in my head. 3 is good, we are good with 3, 3 is a lot. I have more I want to do, more kiddos in care I want to support, more foster parents and more biological parents I want to walk beside but that will look just a little different going forward. Supporting kids in care doesn’t come in just the form of being a foster parent. The whole system needs so much support in every area and I’m excited to see where my heart and my passions and my skills will lead me as we close this chapter and open another one.