Kim & Justin

The happiness and heartbreak of foster care

Justin and I have been foster parents for over 5 years.  We started shortly after our first biological child was born and were quickly placed with our now oldest daughter.  That first round of foster care was amazing, we found our forever child and had a clear outcome to adoption.

3 years ago we started fostering again (after taking a break to adopt our oldest and have 3 more biological children).  This time we wanted to help families reunite, but always would be open to growing our family through adoption.  We’ve had dozens of children in our home in the past 3 years.  Some for a long time and some for just days or weeks.  We’ve had kids from just a few weeks old up to 12 years old.  We’ve even had 10 kids total at one time.

There are lots of ups and downs of foster care.  Lots of love, laughter, and sharing.  And lots of tears and disappointments.  All of our foster placements though move on in the end.  We’ve reunited kids with their birth moms and sent some to loving family. 

My heart breaks every time a placement leaves.  I hope that they are safe and loved.  I wonder if they will remember the time with our family.

Through adoption we hope that we will no longer have to worry.  We want a child to stay with us forever; to watch them grow and blossom into beautiful children and adults. 

(Pictured: our last foster placement, toddler twins that have returned to loving biological family)