Well... we’re back.

When we recorded our last episode in June, we were literally getting ready to leave for vacation with our three oldest kids. We had been consistently recording for more than a year, and we decided it was probably time to take a little summer break.

Turns out the break lasted a little longer than we expected.

We came home from vacation, started looking ahead to the last few weeks of summer, and thought we had a pretty good idea of what life was going to look like.

Then, at 7:06 one Thursday morning, Whitney got a text from someone she hadn’t talked to in about six years:

“Any chance you are looking for a pre-adoptive or foster baby boy?”

First of all, are foster parents ever looking for another foster placement?

But after a phone call, a lot of conversation, and realizing we didn’t really have a good reason to say no, we said yes.

So... we have seven kids now.

In this episode, we’re catching you up on everything that has happened since we disappeared for the summer. We talk about welcoming our newest little guy, adjusting to life as a family of nine, adding another G tube to the family, getting four kids back to four different school situations, dealing with hand, foot and mouth disease at possibly the worst possible time, and why our plans to start recording again kept getting pushed back.

We also talk about something really cool God was already putting into place before we ever got that text.

Our church recently launched care communities to support foster and adoptive families, and ours was coming together at almost exactly the same time we were being asked to consider another placement. Since then, people have helped with meals, school drop offs, activities, babysitting, mowing the lawn, and a whole bunch of other things that make a huge difference when you’re juggling seven kids.

And somehow, the couple who volunteered to give us a date night once a month includes a pediatric nurse who already knows how to use a G tube.

You can’t make this stuff up.

We also share a really encouraging update about Lia, talk about what the first few days of a medically complex foster placement actually look like, and share one of the sweetest compliments we’ve received as foster parents.

Mostly, though, this episode is us catching up with you.

Life has been full. It has been chaotic. There have been a ridiculous number of diapers. And for the last couple of months, instead of talking about Dream Small, we’ve mostly just been living it.

Toward the end of the conversation, Whitney shares something this season has been teaching us:

Hold your plans loosely.

Sometimes the thing you never planned for ends up being the thing God was preparing you for all along.

We’re glad to be back.

In This Episode

We talk about:

• Where we’ve been since June
• The 7:06 a.m. text that changed our summer
• Why we said yes to foster placement number 15
• Becoming a family of nine
• What adding another medically complex child actually looks like
• G tubes, therapies, visits, school schedules, diapers, and general chaos
• The unfortunately timed hand, foot and mouth outbreak
• How our church care community has stepped up around our family
• A huge milestone for Leah
• What our newest little guy’s case manager recently told Whitney
• Learning to accept help instead of trying to do everything ourselves
• Why we’re learning to hold our plans a little more loosely

Support The Podcast

If you enjoy Dream Small and want to help support the show:

https://dream-small-podcast.captivate.fm/support

Speaking Requests

If your church, conference, or organization would like Jason and Whitney to speak about foster care, adoption, faith, leadership, or living a meaningful life through small acts of faithfulness, contact [email protected].

Join the Dream Small Community

Join our weekly devotional newsletter for Biblical encouragement connected to the conversations we’re having on the podcast:

https://captivate.us4.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=c75f5dfcf9d690c6c9f256d22&id=d17b98130b

Follow & Contact

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Music Credit

“Paradise Found” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons.

And I'd say, don't hold your plans so tightly. Hold them loosely in your hands, because you might miss the opportunity for something God is putting right in front of you.

If you hold on too tightly to your plans and your expectations and your dreams and what you think everything should look like, you can miss out on beautiful opportunities that God's giving you.

Welcome to Dream Small, where we believe God does big things through the small and everyday faithfulness of his people. I'm Jason.

And I'm Whitney. We're a family of eight who's fostered, adopted, and. And stumbled our way through learning that small, everyday choices can change lives.

In a world that tells you to chase big, we dare you to dream small.

Because you know what? It's not about chasing fame. It's about choosing faithfulness. Hi, everybody.

We're back.

We're back. It has been Whitney's back a lot more than a minute.

Back again.

Are you trying to be like, Backstreets back right now?

No. Eminem?

No. It was Backstreet.

No. Shady's back. Back again.

Okay. I'm thinking Backstreet's back. All right.

You strike me more as the Backstreet type. All right, come on.

We're back.

Yeah, we took a little bit of a hiatus there.

Yeah. Remember that last episode when, you know, we were going on vacation and so.

Just assume everybody hasn't listened to the last episode. So we're talking about our family trip we're taking.

We intentionally took a break.

I'm not there yet. For over a year. We have very well stuck to our scheduled plan for the most part of.

Yes, we stuck to our schedule recording.

And releasing a podcast every week for over a year in the midst of everything of life. And then we went on vacation in June, and we recorded a podcast literally minutes before leaving for vacation with our three oldest.

Because I just felt really compelled to record a podcast and explain why we were only going on vacation with three kids instead of six. And during that podcast, Jason, what were some of the things we talked about?

Some of the things you said were. Can I tell you something? I said, nah, sure. I'm trying to get baby fever. Oh, okay.

Then I realized we were going on a trip, and trips historically precede a new placement. So we went on. We went on our vacation, had a really fun, fun vacation.

It was great, and it worked out exactly how we planned, wanted the intended outcome. You wanted it was wonderful.

Yeah, it was wonderful. It was wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.

And in Indiana, school goes back in July. So we got back from family trip. Very quickly transitioned to back to school.

Well, very quickly transitioned back to, oh my word, we only have a couple more weeks of summer left.

Right?

Yeah.

And wanting to kind of like soak in those moments with the kids and, you know, just get back to life and enjoy summer.

And then what happened on a Friday morning the second week of July?

Is that. No. Is that the phone call?

Yeah, the text message.

That was a Thursday morning.

What? Thursday morning?

Yeah, Thursday morning.

Thank you. That makes a very important distinction in our story. Go ahead.

7Am on a Thursday morning, I got a text message. Hold on. I'm actually going to pull it up to read it because it's just that funny. Like 7am on Thursday, July 9th. Good morning.

Any chance you are looking for a pre, adoptive or foster? A baby boy, he's precious and easy, but has a G tube one year old. If not, do you know anyone that was at 7:06am?

Who's it from?

Well, I'm gonna get there.

So first of all, the text message is funny because are you looking for it? Like, no, I'm never looking for a foster kid. Like, that's not. I understand her question, but that made me giggle. Just listen to you read it.

Like, are you looking for. No, no, I'm not looking for any foster kids.

Right.

Go ahead.

And it's just funny. This message came from a woman I hadn't spoken to in about six years.

It was Leah's former nursing case manager from her case when she was having visits with her biological mother.

And because of her medical needs, there would be a visit facilitator and a nursing case manager to kind of make sure that her medical needs were being met. Train and equip mom at the same time. And this woman reached out to me asking me this question, and I haven't talked to her in forever.

And she said, I went to bed praying about a potential home for this family, for this child. And she said, I woke up and I woke up and God put Jason and Whitney Small in my mind.

She was like, I don't even know how I knew your husband's name, but so I was like, oh my word. Jason was still at home that morning. He hadn't left for work yet.

And I was like, Jason, she messaged me this, like at 7am it isn't even her job to find a placement. Like, God's telling her something like, we've got to at least listen to what she has to say.

Well, I don't think we needed convinced that strongly to consider it because I think my response was I don't have a good reason to say no.

After we spoke to her, you said that.

Yeah. We both were open to it. As we've shared, we typically start with yeses and get to knows. So it was a. The default answer is yes.

Well, it felt crazy either way.

Everything we do is we weren't planning on.

We felt we were done at six.

Ish.

Right.

Yeah. God did not consider.

God is right.

God did not consider our perspective on if we were done at six.

He knows what he's gonna do. We know God's gonna do what God's gonna do. But yeah. So we talked with her on the phone that morning.

We should add this little guy is. Was coming from another foster home. He was, he' foster care since he was born and he's 16 months. Ish.

Yeah.

So yeah, go ahead, walk them through the story.

So yeah, we spoke with her on the phone for probably 45 minutes and we got off the phone and she answered all of our questions and you know, Jason and I were like, well, we'll talk and you know, I'll let you know, we'll pray on it. Which for us. And Jason looked at me after when we got the phone and he goes, the only reasons I have to say no would be purely selfish.

So I can't say no. He said, ultimately it's up to you. It impacts you a lot more. It impacts your day to day, your life a lot more.

Because he knew like I'd be at home with two one year olds and a two year old and then juggling four kids in school, which we're coming into school season at that point, so. But yeah. And I was like, well, geez, Jason say that? Like I can't top that.

Like he's telling me I'm all in for this baby. The only reason you want to say.

Yeah, he's like, the only reason I'd have to say no are purely selfish. I'm like, oh, thanks.

If you want to say no, I guess you can. But she. Yeah, yeah.

So yeah. So you know, I messaged her back and I was like, we're less and less. We're a yes unless God closes this door.

Yeah. So we said yes. What's also funny is maybe not haha funny.

Ironic funny is I was headed to my annual boys hillbilly weekend trip over to Ohio with two of my buddies.

When he needed to come here.

On that following Thursday. And he was coming here. He came here on that Friday.

So Whitney started the journey with this new little guy and six other kids by herself for about 48 hours.

Yeah, that was fun.

So, yeah, we're now a foster family, adoptive family, biological family. Just all kinds of families of nine. Me and Whit and then seven kids, three of whom are two and under.

Yeah. How about that? Do you want to talk about how many diapers I change in a day? I thought about that.

I was like, if it didn't feel nasty, I would just, like, pile them up over the course of one day.

Gross.

And just leave them in, like, a cute little basket in the living room and just, like, be like, look what I did today.

I mean, just when I come home alone, the number of diapers I change, we get, like, a little assembly line going.

Literally.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, give me that one. Give me that one.

Anyway. But, yeah. And then, you know, just as life would have it, he came and when. Are you okay with me sharing this? You look at me like, funny.

No, I was looking at her notes, just, yeah, go, yeah.

Which I haven't looked at at all.

This is absolutely part of the story. Yeah.

And this is another reason we were like, well, we're just gonna have to keep hitting pause on everything. Yeah, this. This impacted quite a bit of things. But he came and he had, like, this, like, these scabs all over his cute little hands and his arms.

And Zef, Sam's like, oh, yeah. He just had hand, foot, and mouth, like, at placement. She's literally handing him to me. And she says that. And I was like, what?

And she goes, oh, he's not contagious anymore. It's okay. Everything's scabbed over. I was like, okay.

Hand, foot, and mouth was doing a lot of work there because we quickly found out that it was not had hand foot in mouth.

It was definitely so contagious because two.

Of our kiddos got it.

We were at the state fair with Leah the next week, and guess who spiked a fever? And then who excitedly told me the next day, mommy, look at all my polka dots.

Yeah.

Oh, bless.

I mean, that was coming. That was up right up against when school was starting, luckily.

And we had. We've recorded before about Lainey's love's blood drive.

Oh, yeah.

We had that scheduled for the 25th of July.

Had to cancel.

We had to. Leah's polka dots appeared the night before Lainey's blood drive, so we had to postpone that.

And, you know, last minute shuffle Everything around and tell all the donors that, sorry, we have to find a new date because no one wants to come around our family right now. Yeah, it was awful.

And Leah, she was a game time decision on whether or not we send her off to school on her first day because she was, she was, she was healing up. No fever, she was acting good, no bot like. But she still had the spots and if the spots are still, for lack of a better word, wet.

Yeah, you can't send them to school. Luckily all her scabbed over and everything we read and we're told said once they scab over, they're good. And so we sent her off to school.

Hopefully none of her classmates got hand foot in mouth.

Well, I mean if they did, it's not on us, it's on her nurse. Like. Thankfully, Leah has a nursing case manager through Medicaid, Medicare. Medicaid. I was Medicaid.

She's on the family support waiver and, or no, the health and wellness waiver. Anyway, that doesn't really matter. Her nurse was here at the house visiting her the day before school started.

And you know, I talked to Leslie about this hand, foot and mouth situation. She looked at Leah's scabs. Leslie said, no scab, no school. So she like set the groundwork. So it didn't even have to be me being mean.

I didn't have to feel like the parent for once. I didn't have to make a decision.

She totally took ownership.

Leslie took ownership and just we really like, Leslie laid the path down for.

She's one of those older gals that kind of says and does what she wants. But she's, she's lovely.

Oh, she's wonderful.

She's lovely. She's awesome. Has a real fun, like spunky personality. A little. Yeah, great personality.

Yeah, she doesn't mess around.

So we're all back to school now.

Yeah, school happened, those two, those two weeks of getting four kids, you did really good. Four different schools was a lot. The back to school supply list was a lot. I'm not gonna lie.

Well, it sounds like you built now.

The fact that I have like this surplus of back to school supplies and I don't know how and why, because I made this spreadsheet and we bought exactly what was on it. And then all of a sudden it's like I could actually send another kid back to school based on all the supplies I have left.

Yeah, if you're, if you're from out of state that goes back to school at a normal time, send us a Message.

And I got you.

We might be able to ship you some school supplies. Summer. Summer was good. We thought. We, like, we intentionally tried to buy. We.

I mean, Whitney tried to make summer slow down and have us just kind of focus and really spend July doing what we wanted to do as a family. Right. And, well, we did. Not to say we didn't happen. It didn't do. But we still had to change course.

And summer was still good.

Oh, it's great.

We had a. You know, it's funny, like, too hot. The kids, all the big kids always think about, what are the craziest stories I could tell my friends.

When you go back, back to school, if the teacher asks, what's the wildest thing that happened to you this summer? And the kids always point out, oh, we can tell them this story. And, oh, we can tell them this story.

And it's just cool because I'm like, yeah, you have plenty of things you can offer up.

So we transitioned into accepting. Our little guy said, yes.

We did the dream small thing, and we started not intentionally making more content to share with you guys without that being the reason.

So, yeah, we've just been quiet because we've been living it, right?

Yeah, we've been living it. We just give you an idea of just how things have gone. Yesterday was the plan day to record this episode. I was up at 4 on a Friday morning. Yeah, 30.

Got up, coffee, set up all of our stuff, and lo and behold, every kid in the house woke up, like, at 5:15.

Like, not exaggerating, we had all the babies up by, like, five, four out of bed.

The only kids that weren't up were our big ones.

Yeah, the ones who had to be up to get ready for school.

So let me Real quick pause here. If you're new to this, like, the show, follow the show, share the show.

I should feel like. I feel like I should be, like, playing some kind of, like, music right here that, like, encourages people to, like, act.

Like, Lainey was telling me last night that, like, food signs are typically red because it makes people think they're hungry and they have to go. Like, a lot of fast food signs are red.

She's in student media, so she thinks she's.

And then green is supposed to make you think it's healthy. Like, that's why Subway is green. Like, I feel like I need to have, like, music here that elicits people to want to like and follow.

What color music would you play?

Yellow.

Great yellow music. So, yeah, please, like, share, follow the show and just so, you know, we're pausing on the whole YouTube video thing because we wanted to get going.

And that takes more time because I'm still learning that we'll get back to there eventually, but it'll be on YouTube still. It just won't be a live video.

It'll be, yeah, we're just baby stepping, getting back. I mean, everything. You know, we don't put in a whole lot of effort behind the podcast, but Jason does.

And Jason's capacity right now is just a little bit smaller because when he gets home, I need him.

So the greetings. When I get home from work, typically the dog greets me first. Then the two year old and the one year old both kind of come over and greet me.

Yeah.

And then Whitney and I don't get.

A. I let that happen.

Yeah, I was gonna say, you can't.

I would love to greet you before that, but, like, there's no way, like, there's no point to fight the little people. And the dog.

Through the dog and the dog. Two of the little people.

Jason, last night, Friday evening, I've been with the kids all week. He says, do you want me to stop for dinner on the way home? He already asked him to pick up Lainey from soccer at the end of soccer.

So that already has him getting home later than normal. And then he says, do you want me? So I'm picking up dinner. Like, no, I want you home.

Get home.

I want your hands here to help with babies. I want you home. If we need dinner, I will leave and go get dinner.

I am leaving. We don't need dinner, but I'm leaving. I'm just gonna drive around. We. As we're.

As we were talking about this episode, we just figured we would do just like. So you guys know there's gonna be, I don't think any big giant takeaways for anybody. Maybe we will get there, but you never know.

It's kind of a life update from us while we were gone for so long and the craziness that has ensued.

And I know you all miss her voices so much.

Actually, yesterday my former UPS rep called me because I called her about business stuff.

Yeah.

And she said, hey, when are you and your wife going to start recording again? I miss listening to you guys.

No way.

Aw.

Well, thanks. That's nice.

Her name is Cass. And I told her it's like, funny you say that. We actually tried this morning and the reason why we haven't recorded happened.

Right?

I mean, even as we're recording now at six o' Clock on a Saturday morning. Our four year old's upstairs raving like he's just talking. Geez. So what else can we talk about? Our newest little guy.

I think it's worth talking about some of the amazing, you know, blessings we need to talk affirmations that we've had.

Yes, I definitely wanted to talk about that. Thank you for remembering to do that. So as we were during springtime, our church launched care communities.

Yeah, this was the other reason you were like, we have to say yes. Like this is very clearly, like this timing isn't a coincidence. Okay, go ahead.

Our church launched care communities. We have been praying since we started foster care that our church, it would be considered a megachurch.

It's large, it's a good church, good people, good pastors, good Bible teaching that our church would become more involved in foster care and adoption because we feel that is such a strong biblical call that. So Whitney is back from getting the toddler back to bed. And she reports our three year old and our four year old share a bedroom.

She's at three.

She's almost three. She'll be three in October. She's two and whatever they were playing. No more monkeys jumping on the bed.

They were both bouncing on their beds. And that's what Braden's noise was. No more monkeys jumping on the bed. And his little high pitch pitched sing songy voice.

At least they were having fun.

So springtime, Nothing like a 6am Jumping party.

Our church wants care communities. And we were chosen to do one. So we've been going through the process.

We were chosen to be served by one.

What did I say?

To do one.

Yeah, we were chosen.

We're not actively doing much.

Sorry, I said that very poorly. We were chosen to be served by one. And that process has been ongoing. Meet and greeting and all that.

In the middle of that process of getting that really like stood up, like in full force is when we get this call.

No, not even the care community was.

Finally the meet and greet that Saturday morning when we. That's. That was a Saturday between when we got the call and when we got him.

Yes, yes.

Yeah, don't tell me. No, I remember the timeline.

I thought you were saying in the middle of them just like organizing the care community. I was like, no, it was beyond that. Like the care community was identified. There was people.

Like I said, it was in effect,.

It was already going place to like, you know, meals and child care. And we were having our meet and greet the Saturday after we talked to my friend.

If you let me finish I probably will describe it. So this, when we get this call, Whitney and I knew this care community was in place and they were going to be serving us.

And it wasn't like kind of serving us like they're going. A lot of people were really, really serving us. The care community is in place, doing amazing things. So we, like God was setting this up.

He knew we were gonna need to take in this little guy, obviously months ago. So that was part of the reason.

He was like handing us this like, plate full of support.

It was a fairly easy yes. When we got the call and learned about little buddy. And it was fairly easy yes. Because I'm like, we can't like, God's been setting this up.

Right. It still felt like a really big yes.

It is still a big yes. But just to give you some context of what this care community has done for us, we've talked about Mimi, also known as Stephanie.

She's the grand poobah of our care community.

She's the leader who like helps organize.

All people know what grand poobah means.

Okay.

And she's doing a wonderful job, both kind of coordinating the care community and serving us. Still. Her and another gal are helping get Leah to school.

Leah and Braden.

Leah and Braden to school.

To save me from loading up three littles, the 2 year old and two 1 year olds every single morning. Yeah.

Stephanie's always helping pick up, staying at.

The house, our schedule. Yeah. It's just because we have four kids in four different locations.

Well, Brayden's in two different locations and then the three big kids are in two different schools. But none of them ride buses. I think I've talked about that before. There's no buses. They're all in private school.

And then Laney's in soccer and Benny's doing robotics and Leah has gymnastics. So there's always people somewhere.

Some other things folks on the scare community are doing for us. There is a guy that has offered to help mow the grass. He's taken Leah to gymnastics. We're getting a meal once a week.

There's a young couple that has graciously offered one Friday evening a month so that Whitney and I can go do a date night.

Yes. And let's stop there for a second. What's an amazing God thing about this? Remember I said this new placement has a G tube and he is fully G tube fed.

Like Leah has a G tube, but like, she's good. Like right now. Hers is just for hydration when needed. We're phasing it out, which is another huge praise report. In July, she had a swallow study.

Yeah, she had a swallow study. And she's doing so well. So anyway, so the swallow study.

First time she's had six swallow studies since she's been with us. More when?

I don't know. It's been a lot.

She's had a bunch. We'll just say a lot.

She's always failed them.

Always failed them. And this is the first one she's passed. So we're officially now in the weaning phase.

So she can get her G2, which is, like, gonna be a podcast episode of it.

Yeah. So little buddy, in a lot of ways, he presents very similarly to baby Leah. And he is fully. Except he's a boy, obviously, he's a girl.

Except he is fully G tube fed, though, now, that makes it trickier to find babysitting because not everyone is confident or competent to use a G tube. Right.

By the way, G tubes for all you foster parents out there that might get asked to take a baby with a G tube, they sound scary and overwhelming. They're actually pretty simple once you learn how to use them.

Yeah.

Just as a side note.

Yeah. It's just the training that you need to get training and be comfortable with it. Right. And all of the potential what ifs that come along with that.

But this couple that signed up to graciously babysit for us once a month, all of our children. Seven, just for clarity, she is a pediatric nurse who, being a pediatric nurse, she knows G tubes.

Like, how good is God that the person who wants to watch our children once a month can take care of literally all of our children's physical needs? Amazing. Like, God knew, right? I was like, this is like, how good is he?

Yeah. So it's funny. They're a really sweet young couple. She's. She's a pediatric nurse. Right. Kids don't phase her. She's used to it all.

And her husband, they came over to babysit for us on a Sunday morning because one of our best friends and his daughter were getting baptized. And we're like, we want to go, obviously. And we didn't want to take our entire kids. It wasn't our church. We typically attend.

And they don't always have kids ministry.

They don't always have kids.

So I was like, we can't have all of them.

So they came over and I asked Ben, I was like, hey, how you doing with babies? He's like, I've never held one. I'm like, okay. Kudos to them, though, for jumping in that takes a lot of guts to just. Anyway, we're back again.

But yeah, it's been incredible that God was preparing that care community for us in advance so that we could accept this placement. And taking on this placement, there's just a little bit of the burden that would come with having a seventh kiddo second of whom has a G tube.

We don't have to do it all by ourself.

God is so good.

Yeah.

He's been so good to us.

Little. It's great. Little guy has transitioned. I don't know if flawlessly is too strong of a word, but pretty flawlessly into our home. He sleeps great.

He's a really content kid. Our two little ones, him and our other one year old we've nicknamed Fat man and little boy because one is very chubby and one is very not. Yeah.

What else about our new placement that.

Might be good for now? I mean, we could share more stuff later too.

Let's share just some as we're kind of putting a bow on our we're Back episode. Share some of the ways our care community, in what, six weeks, they've been going full steam ahead.

Some of the ways they've really blessed us, like your trip to the park, Turkey run. Just some of the other things that they've really helped with.

Yeah.

Gosh, when was it was the week before Lainey and Benny started school. That week. They started school on a Thursday.

Did you go Wednesday or Tuesday?

Tuesday. Oh. Because Leah started the week. I was like, where was Leah? Leah started school a week early. All of our kids had a staggered start.

Leah was already in school and Stephanie said the foster baby, the new one, was at a visit. And Stephanie said, let me take the two other babies, the one year old and two year old for the day so you can do something with Benny and Lainey.

Just have a fun day with them. She goes, would you like that? I was like, yes, I would love that. And yeah, so we got to go to a state park that's an hour and a half drive away.

And we went on the most incredible hike and it was the sweetest day. And I told Stephanie, like, they kept saying so much, like, thank you, Mommy. Thank you for taking us. Thank you, Mommy meant so much to me.

But seeing how much it also meant to them, Right. Like that time that they got with just, Mommy was so special that state park you.

Because I didn't get to go because I was out of PTO at work. So I had to go to work. And the state park, the picture you Guys sent. If you're not.

If you just got dropped down in there by some aliens, you would never guess that that state park is in the middle of Indiana. There's like cliffs. Not too much.

Well, Benny would tell you it's actually like really close to Illinois.

Yeah.

So you made that very abundantly clear.

With me that he was.

What other thing? I mean, just a meal every week has been helpful. Just that one meal where you just.

The help. Like I can pick up so and so or I can take so and so here. There's been a lot of.

Oh, well, let me grab Lainey from practice since I'm going to be right there. Right.

Well, let me take her so you don't have to load up.

Let me take her so you don't have to load everyone up. Just like the God has strategically placed people in our life that are able to look at the big picture and say, oh, I can help you in this way.

Instead of me even having to say or think about how I might need help, they're kind of one step ahead because I can't function very well in the near future. I'm functioning in the present and what has to get done. And it's not even my choice. It's just the situation that we're living in with all the kids.

Because you can plan for the future and things will change too.

Things do change, right? Yeah. And we plan for the future as much as possible. Like looking at the week ahead and what the schedule looks like and who's going to cover what.

But there's just so much and so much changes. And then you have visit times that change or you have kids that have blowouts when you're trying to load them up for school pickup or.

It's a thing. It is a thing.

It is a thing. And then throwing in coordinating enough G tube feeds on the along the way into the schedule and making that work and fit and it's just a lot.

It's a lot to juggle. It's a mental load to juggle. So having people that God has strategically placed in our life that see that chaos that you're living in and so.

Let's hold on just so for good contacts about chaos, let's describe what it's like getting a new placement that has a G tube and therapies already in place.

Okay.

Just.

This might be a whole episode. I'm not sure how long you want.

To go do the four minute high level thing, because it's not like the little guy just got dropped off and you're good. See you in a month. Describe like the first week. Just in three to five minutes.

Oh, well, it's a lot of phone calls, a lot of figuring things out. I mean, so he came, he came on a Friday afternoon. He came with his feeding supplies.

I was actually told that he can drink thickened liquids and eat food, but he only came with like feeding supplies for bolus G tube feeds. So the first thing I had to do was call his nurse. Excuse me.

To figure out like where the discrepancy is here because I was told he can drink thick and liquids. He didn't come with any thickener. You know, what rate does he get his G tube feed at? How much does he get? How often? I didn't know anything. So.

So just think about that. We're getting a brand new kid in the house and Whitney does not know the amount of food this kid needs to eat on a given day and what time segments.

That's a big piece of information, right. It could be very stressful.

If you don't know which, that could be stressful for anyone. I think back to our very first placement who ate food normally and she was about the same age, about 15 months.

And we soon learned that she would eat anything in front of her to the point of too much and then making herself sick. But yeah, you just never know. But when it's G tube fed, they're completely reliant upon you for their nutrition and you need to do it right.

Pretty.

There's pretty typically a hospital directive in place of a doctor's. You know, when you have a G.

Tube, the feeding plan is almost like a prescription. And the fact of how often, how much, how fast, all that kind of.

Yeah, yeah. How many mls over a day, which means how many mls per feed, how many times a day, all that good stuff. So I didn't know any of that.

So I had to figure all that out with now seven kids in the house, Jason gone on a Friday afternoon. So the first feed looked a little interesting and it was fine. We figured it out.

I did not do it the typical way because I was like, I don't, I'm not sure which way. There's a couple different ways you can do a G tube feed. So all of that, but all the.

Ways, we had never done one. The way we were told to do one with him. Yeah, we never did one that way with Leah. Yeah, the bolus feed laying flat on your back.

Oh, and that too. Yeah. And then the nurse was like, yeah. He actually takes it like really well, just laying on the floor. I was like, what?

Because typically you feed kids in an upright position and then leave them sitting upright for like 30 minutes. Post feed.

Yeah.

So they don't vomit it up or aspirate. So it's like, okay, one.

One thing we will share about our new little guy is Leah, when she was a baby, hated everybody all the time and was sick. And just this little guy is content and happy and much.

Yeah.

Temperament wise, much better off than little Leah girl was when she was a baby.

Yeah. But it was so just kind of like, you know, when I say chaos, kind of figuring all everything out right in the midst of still that it's.

It's a mentally exhausting thing because you're trying to figure everything out in the midst of caring for.

You're making sure.

Meeting everyone's needs.

You're making sure kiddo. Getting fed. What he needs to get fed. That's a lot of pressure if nobody gave you any context. Right. That's a lot. Yeah.

Right, right, right. And it turns out he cannot drink anything. So it's like, okay, someone's lines got crossed.

Just give you a glimpse into the lovely care of foster care. Like, people who've been with him for a long time still don't really fully like the nurses did, but like, you.

Know, hand, foot and mouth, all these little details.

So Whitney's figuring out feeds and then she also has to coordinate how many different therapies.

Yeah. And then all of a sudden, like, apparently he just had a new first steps eval in June and it hadn't gone into effect yet.

So now all of a sudden, he's getting three hours of first steps a week. And I was like, wait, what?

First steps is Young kid. State therapy, sponsored therapy is all it is.

Yeah, it's a nationwide thing.

We've had that conversation seven times.

So. Yeah. So coordinating that, getting connected with everyone and the. The coordinate, the first steps coordinator, that's a fourth person.

And then, you know, meeting the gal, getting connected with her, meeting the visit supervisor, the nursing case manager. There's just a lot of extra people that you get to know, which is great. I love it.

I love getting to know everyone, but it's just throwing a lot of extra into a kind of chaotic household. It's just. It was just a lot. I'm not complaining. Like, no. Every placement I feel like I'm complaining, but it's.

No, you're just giving a glimpse into what it's like. That's all you're doing. Tell the story. Yeah. No, that's what we need to do. We need to tell the story of what we've experienced.

And any placement is a lot when they first show up, let alone a medically fragile, higher level need kid like the little buddy we got. Yeah, I mean he's pretty easy going, he's pretty good.

But he still has needs that are unique. Right. So. Yeah.

So yeah.

Whitney spent the first thing we. I guess we won't get into.

First to what? Get into one thing.

Just the fact that in DCS world he's a cans one.

Oh yeah.

But I mean it's also fun thing about his case, he's the first foster kiddo we've gotten in a long, long time that feels like his bio parent is doing it. She's doing it. It's really cool to see like we're. Last night Whitney and I sat and talked and said like this could be.

So excited for her.

One of those things where what you call it? Co care.

Co care. Yeah.

Well we help like if he goes home back to mama that we're able to help her be successful. Yeah, she's doing it. She's really cool to see.

Yes. Yeah, very.

What else for this episode. So we're going to get back at it. I'm not sure if I'm ready to commit to an episode every single week yet.

Will this surprise everybody when we drop one?

I think we can commit to at least every other week. So we'll get you an episode every other week barring getting new placements or who knows.

Jason. Okay. So when Jason got back from hillbilly weekend Sunday, I had just had seven children for since Friday afternoon.

Sunday afternoon he gets back and he meets little guy and you know, gets to see all the other kids and you know, Sunday afternoon feels pretty like smooth and delightful. And he goes, man, like with how much our care community is helping, I think we could probably take another. It's like you need to shut your mouth.

Whitney looked at me. He looked at me with the fury of a thousand burning suns. But oh crap, what was I gonna say? Oh, before we wrap up, new little guys.

FCM from DCS came by the house Friday to check on them like she needs to monthly. And she paid Whitney one of the biggest compliments we've been paid as foster parents since we've been doing it. What did she say? Whitney?

Yeah, it was really sweet.

We were sitting in the playroom, it was her, myself, the two 1 year olds and their 2 year old daughter and just said like the kids are playing, we're talking.

It's a lot of little kids, but they're actually really good overall. They're funny, they're together.

They get along great together. They do really well.

They're really cute when they all play together.

When they all want you, they all want you. And that's the hard part.

Anyway, sorry.

But she said she was like, you know, I thought he was happy before, and I thought he was doing well. She said, I've never seen him look this content or this happy. She. And she actually looked at him and apologized. She's like, I'm sorry, buddy.

I thought you were good like that. She said, whitney, I've never seen him look so content and so happy and so at peace as like. She said, you can see it in his face.

You can see it in his demeanor, you know? You know how I remember when he first came to us? I told Jason, I'm asking him if he remembers.

Do you remember when I said that he's not really playing with toys?

Yes.

Like, at first, like, I was like, I don't know if he knows how to play with toys. Like, he just kind of sits and doesn't.

Just kind of just sits and hangs.

It was really sad. And he's engaging with toys now, and he's. And, like, she witnessed that, right?

And, like, she was like, yeah, like, now that you say that, I've seen that, too. She said that the daycare he was in was, like, silent. Like, what daycare is quiet? She was like, there was never, like, any music on.

Like, the kids were silent. Like, I was like, well, I don't think it was a very good daycare.

Doesn't sound good.

Doesn't sound very healthy either.

But, yeah, just hearing Whitney relay that story of the saying, you can like, how content, how much better he looks, how much better he.

It was really wonderful to hear.

Really good to know that our love for the little guy is penetrating his little soul somehow, and he feels safe, loved, and secure, and it's being expressed.

Yes.

Biggest takeaway for you guys. The listeners say, yes, do the small things, even if it feels really scary and crazy.

I think I'd take it one step further and I'd say, don't hold your plans so tightly. Hold them loosely in your hands, because you might miss the opportunity for something God is putting right in front of you.

If you hold on too tightly to your plans and your expectations and your dreams and what you think everything should look like, you can miss out on beautiful opportunities that God's giving you. And it might be serving in the mundane of your home where no one else sees. Right. Like, I get that. It's not.

I'm not saying it's easy and it's not gonna be.

It's not gonna be sexy.

And I told Jason that, like, the other day, like, he prayed over me because I woke up with a spirit of discontentment. And I just felt like on a.

Morning where I had just done a Bible study about how important gratitude is to spiritual warfare. Right?

Yes. And you said you were like, I just read about this and the antidote for discontentment is gratitude.

And ever since then, I've thankfully been kind of had a renewal of my mind regularly on the daily that this is specifically where God has placed me.

And it may not be beautiful, and it may be a whole lot of diapers, and it may be a whole lot of phone calls and people in the house constantly that, like, I can't even go for a walk because, like, there's no time in the schedule just to put the kids in a wagon and go for a walk. Right. But. But this is exactly where he's called me for a purpose. Right. And not to lose sight of that.

It is beautiful. You said it might not be beautiful. It is beautiful. Like, it's not.

It is. It might not feel that way, like, but feelings lie.

Getting up in the middle of the night and changing a diaper and holding a kid, that's. That. That's worship. That's beautiful. It's not fun. Yeah, sometimes it's fun, I guess. Yeah, but not a lot.

But think about the ministry, right? And the opportunity to serve and bless other people. So, yeah, I just wanted to leave everybody with that. All right, you guys, that concludes our.

Welcome back, welcome back episode.

Back at it. What's that? I wanted to sing that song again. Dream Smalls back. All right. Okay, I'm done. All right, you guys, until next time, keep dreaming small.

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