Still Waiting...

I took the initiative to call our Social Worker yesterday. She said she had just been reviewing our case file with the agency director and they still needed clarification on two things.

The first was the issue of having our own children. Okay. We get this A LOT. But I thought we had already hashed this out. So, I talked to her about it again. I told her we did not know if we were having our own kids, but were not going to rule it out. I told her that we felt God was calling us to expand our family through adoption first. I told her that there were almost 40,000 kids in the Texas foster care system and that we were burdened about that. She said okay. She also said it would be an issue with CPS so they needed to be prepared to explain. I told her that if anything, having our own kids would be easier at this point but we wanted to be in God's will. Thank goodness He is truly in control, and not our agency or CPS. I was honestly tempted to tell her that I had lied, and I really was infertile. Shoot, maybe I am? I have no idea really :)

The next item up for clarification was Greg's employment. The agency felt that he might be a "job hopper". I explained that he left his job of five years because they cut their staff, doubled his work load, and didn't raise his salary. So he left to work for Brinks, but in commissioned sales you are expected to be pushy and keep asking after someone tells you no. Greg was not cut out for that. He also got in trouble for telling people they would be better off financially sticking with their current company. My husband has integrity and I am proud of that. I am not saying that everyone in sales lacks integrity. It just wasn't the job for Greg. I explained that Greg always has a job with his Dad and so when he left Brinks of course he went there so that we would have income. He is also working a part-time job. Either the agency is afraid that Greg is not stable financially (although we had to disclose our savings and other assets to them) OR, they are afraid we are trying to do this for the money. Ha! Basic kids have a reimbursement of $22 a day. About $660 a month. Wow, with two kids (the most we will take) we could be raking in a big $1320 a month! Whoopee, I think I'll just skip the teaching job and live off that. Please. After daycare (yes my mother-in-law will probably keep them if they are not school aged but I will not let her do it for free), food, clothing, activities, medication and whatever other misc. items they will need, how much of that will really be left over? Anyway the social worker said my explanation made sense and she would share that with the agency director. I told her that if she thought this could be a real issue I would rather that she just tell me so we would be prepared for a wait. She said no, that she didn't think it would be a problem. But hey she also told me in November that we could be getting calls by mid-December, early January :)

On a brighter note, I started my student teaching residency this week. It is going really well. I am currently studying Macbeth, so I can start teaching that in two weeks. I will be honest and say that I am an English major who does not like Shakespeare. I knew that teaching was a hard job but I never truly realized how much work it was. I can see how hard my first year will be, starting from scratch and no mentor teacher there to help. But at least I will have a paycheck - this working for free stuff is for the birds!

Greg should hear about one of his job interviews this week, hopefully by Tuesday or Wednesday. It will involve long hours and possibly working on Sundays (we are hoping he could still make the morning or evening service, one) but in this economy, we're interested. He also heard back from a city job that he had past their test so he will call them Monday to find out what happens next.

God is faithful! This whole "adventure" has really tested our faith and (I believe) made it stronger.