A Heart-filled Weekend

I got a call Friday morning asking me if I could take a 9-year old girl for the weekend only. The worker actually had very few details. After praying (when we have few details, we rely on prayer, and haven't regretted it yet!) and texting L., we felt good about it, and said yes. To be honest, after so many babies (all of our foster children had been age 6 or under, 81% were 3 or under!), I was pretty excited to have someone that I could talk to, reason with, and that could dress themselves!

Shay (pseuodoname) came a few hours earlier than I was expecting, right after the babies went down for their naps, and right before I had a chance to straighten up and prepare her room. As with most children in our care, she did not want to be there and just wanted to be with her mom. She spent the first few hours crying and turning down food. I didn’t want to push anything and wanted to give her her space, but eventually, I sat next to her and said “I know you don’t feel like talking, and that’s okay. I know you don’t want to be here, and I’m sorry that you have to be here. I’m going to read you a book, and if you want to talk about it, you can, but if not, that’s okay.” I then read her Maybe Days, a children’s book about Foster Care. I made commentary along the way. I stressed that it wasn’t her fault that she was in foster care. I explained that I don’t know the details of her plan, just that she needed a safe place for the weekend. I also explained that she was kind of waiting for the grown ups to work on their plan, and it was okay if she could have as much fun as possible while waiting on them. I offered her some paper, pencils, and markers to write her mom or anyone else a letter, or draw them a picture, and she accepted. That seemed to help her a lot.

After she ate and I gave her a tour of the house (which I had managed to straighten up!) she became calmer. She slowly warmed up bit by bit as the weekend went on. And she was a wonderful help! She helped take care of the babies (put their shoes on, hold their hands when walking, etc.), cleaned up almost everything after herself, folded and put away her own laundry, and even helped me with the cooking! (I’ll admit it - having a break from the constant and exhausting physical care that babies require was great!) I really enjoyed her company and chatting with and getting to know her. We also had a super fun weekend, full of crafts, making cookies, going on walks, jumping on the neighbor's trampoline, watching some of our high school's football game, going to the playground, going to church, watching movies, putting up our Christmas tree, being silly in the backyard... I was happy for her when Monday came and she left, but was sad for us! The babies in particular really, really loved her. They would fight over who got to hold her hand, sit in her lap, etc., and she was so patient and gentle with all of the children. 

I’m grateful for the chance to have gotten to know such a wonderful person and to have helped such an amazing girl to, maybe, have a little bit of fun even while in such a circumstance.