Wilson’s World

We finished our training tonight! Yay!

We had CPR/1st Aid tonight and are now done. Jarod hung in there as he was just diagnosed with an inner and outer ear infection along with high blood pressure. He has to go back in two weeks and recheck his blood pressure. This is not our month!!!!!!

Wendy will contact me next week and we’ll set up appointments for interviews and make sure I’ve gotten all the paperwork in. She does have to do some research to see if we’ll need to get a background check from WA. We’ve only been in MA a little over 2 years so I can understand why. I’m already on file in WA because of teaching so hopefully that makes it easier.

OH, when we showed up for CPR tonight we all had to wait a bit because they were having a meeting in the conference room. I had to run back down to get some papers I forgot in the car and on my way back I passed a Mom, son and a placement child in the hallway. He was a teenager and she was introducing her son to him. As they passed I realized what was going on and turned my head to take note and it was so sad to see him walking with his “new family” going to his “new home” and all he had was a small clear trash bag with maybe a change of clothes in it, that’s it! It’s heartbreaking to see these poor kids leaving what they know with nothing from what they knew except their memories. How HARD and SCARY!!

There were also two more little boys(placements) that were there with their Foster Mom, she was in the CPR class. Not sure if they were new placements or not but they were young, brothers that were under 4. Too cute but very connected with their Foster Mom, that was heart warming!

So today was one of those days, sort of. Our babysitter got the stomach bug and wasn’t able to sit tonight. I made like 10 phone calls and EVERYONE had something else tonight. Therefore Jarod stayed home and missed MAPP Training. Which actually was okay, we are allowed to miss one and plus he’s the co-mentor, so he’s not as important as I am ;0).

Anyways, we’re done. Yes, done! We finished like 3 chapters tonight and watched a fire safety video. Now all we have to do is CPR training next week. Wendy said she liked to finish it up early and she wasn’t kidding!

As for where we go from here, Wendy will look over my paperwork and start making appointments for interviews, starting with the kiddos :0). It’s all very exciting and nerve wracking at the same time.

I’m also reading a book, yes a book, about tools for Foster Parents. I like it! I actually might buy it to have on hand. The one I have is from the library. I also have the big huge binder to go through that we got from our training.

One step closer :0)

So we are half-way done with MAPP Training! It’s going well and we are learning lots about taking in a child.  A lot of it is  common sense but there are things that you have to do differently then you would do with your own children, so that will be a change.

We still have a good turn out in our class, everyone has stuck with it :0). We watch videos, read through our binder of a million papers and do activities.

We are also working on finishing up our paperwork so that we can get it turned it by the end of class. We aren’t really looking for a placement until August. So we’ll see how it goes!

Tonight was our first night of MAPP training at MENTOR. We got there on time and STARVING! Luckily they ordered pizza for dinner… awesome!!

There were a lot more people then I thought, at least 13. It was a good introduction and good info, especially about discipline. Just a eye opener about how what you normally do with your own kids won’t work with Foster Kids because they need the opposite… good point!

We did finish up early which was nice. Since this was just the introduction night it will be neat to see if everyone returns Thursday. We will!

Sent in our application to MENTOR today!

They have to have it before we can start our MAPP Training. So we should be all set to start next week!

Oh, so we are moving forward with the Foster Care training. We will start our MAPP training during the first week of June. One of Preston’s classmate’s older sisters is going to babysit for us, yay! I even have back-up sitters from my Moms’ Group if we are in a jam but hopefully A_ will be able to do all of them. So far her calendar looks good.

It’s going to be a long month with two trainings a week, including CPR but it will be worth it. Now we just need to finish up our applications and get them sent in!

So today we finally had our “Home Visit” from MENTOR. It went really well!!

Wendy got here a little after 2 and was here until 3. We sat down and filled out some paperwork and then we wandered through the house…Preston led the way. He was SO excited to show someone our house and ALL his stuff. He was quite the chatterbox! We went through every room in the house except the master bedroom. She measured the bedrooms to make sure they meet their requirements, they do. She checked the hot water in the bathroom to make sure it doesn’t burn anyone, it doesn’t. The things we will most likely need to do is get our water professionally tested(I tested it and it’s fine, a kit from Home Depot), have our furnace checked and the fireplace too. Otherwise everything else is good.

Now she sends our CORI’s(background check) in and gets the paperwork in order. Then we will finish filling out our applications and get them in and decide if we are going to do the MAPP training in June or wait a little bit.

Oh, by the way we are going to work with MENTOR! I like that I don’t have to do two weekly meetings. They do have a group support meeting every week that you are encouraged to go to but are not obligated to.

Anyways, it’s exciting, fast but exciting :0)

I totally forgot to mention that Wendy from MENTOR had to cancel her visit yesterday. But we did reschedule for next Tuesday. Though I did receive a packet she mailed…. LOTS of papers!

I need to give Dare Family Serivces a call to confrim something and then meet Wendy from Mentor to give us an idea of who will be the better angency for us to work with.

Keep you posted :0)

So I contacted Casey Family Services in Lowell and spoke to someone there. I don’t think they will work for us as they specialize in adolescents, age 12-16. We’re not quite ready to tackle the teens yet :0).

Since that wasn’t going to work and I’m still not fond on the 45 minute drive to Danvers once a week I contacted another agency, MENTOR. They are much like the other agencies but I don’t think they require a weekly drive to their office, but if they do, it’s only 20-30 minutes. The lady that contacted me today, Wendy is going to stop by next Tuesday and check out the house to make sure it meets their requirements. Then we will go from there.

Yep, I got a call from Dare Family Services this afternoon. Basically just wanting to know if I have any other questions and to make sure I was clear on a couple of things. She is sending me the application packet but I’m also going to be looking into Casey Family Services, which is another Foster Care Service but is much closer then the one I would have to drive to for Dare… 15 minutes vs 45 minutes!!

I already have information from Casey so I just need to call and ask a few questions and maybe set up a meeting with them and go from there. This way we can see which “company” we want to work with/feel comfortable with.

I’ll keep you updated :0)