The Christmas tree is up and fully decorated with all the ornaments that have meaning from the past years. The stockings are hung and the house is all decorated for Christmas along with the festivals and excitement of Christmas. While for most of us, our Christmas is built around tradition. Some foster children however, do not have this.

I have yet to have a foster child that has experienced what most people consider a normal Christmas with the Christmas tree, decorations, baking cookies, singing Christmas carols, making crafts, etc. with their biological or birth... more

The decision to stay at home with your foster children and have a few relatives over for the holidays is your first option. Spending the holidays at a family member’s home is another option. I really think it has a lot to do with the foster children you have in your home at the time and your family members.

Taking a foster child that has major behavior issues to your Aunt Martha’s house for the holiday may need some extra consideration. How does she feel about children, especially with behavior issues? How is she going to react if the child has a melt down and the... more

In my personal experience involving foster children, preparing for Thanksgiving can be a great benefit for everyone. It helps boost their self esteem, while truly making them feel part of things instead of an outsider. Also, I found that keeping them involved with chores (good ones – all chores are not bad) and preparing for the holiday helps keep their behaviors for the most part controlled. Better to have them busy and involved than sulking around or acting out.

We have made placemats before for everyone. I’ve got one to do with the kiddos that helps given the idea... more

Understanding that they may not necessarily feel very thankful even through they are safe and not being sexually abused, beaten, burned with cigarettes and just completely neglected. These foster children still have their own strong feelings about things and what is happening in their lives. While it may be hard to understand how a child would miss being in an abuse situation, it is still an emotion that they are feeling. Feelings that anyone has are not wrong, we all have the right to our own feelings.

We have a tradition in our family that when we sit down for Thanksgiving... more

Some people may not think this is necessarily a holiday that foster children will react to, but that is not the case with most foster children. We have what I believe to be the traditional Thanksgiving dinner with a large amount of food (with lots of leftovers) and your extended family sharing the holiday with you. Foster children have always been surprised when we have Thanksgiving at our house, or at family members home.

They do not understand why I am preparing that much food. One foster son we had continually asked, “When are the other people going to get here?” After... more

Holidays are a time of celebration, family time together, and happiness. In foster homes holidays are all of these things, but also a time of stress, behaviors, acting out, sorrow, sadness, confusion, and an overall insecurity of everything. While I do realize most people to do not understand this in the slightest, it is just how things are. We have to find ways to make difficult situations easier and helping these foster children cope.

“Holidays are suppose to be fun”, is sometime I hear more than I would like too. Believe me; I do not want to be dealing with issues... more

Today, we got our National Adoption Day packet for our adoption, so we are very excited. This year we will be spending National Adoption Day with other families (like a couple of hundred) with the great honor of adopting a child and parenting through adoption.

This is a big day in foster care. A number of foster children are adopted on this day as a true celebration instead of the traditional legal courthouse. In most cases, for foster children that are adopted on this day, the legal services are provided pro bono, which is a great blessing for foster parents. You will still... more

This can be quite a mix for dealing with behaviors. A large number of foster children do not have the traditional Halloween with customs, pumpkins, and trick or treat. Young foster children that I have parented were very confused, scared and unsure of everything. While I think they somewhat enjoyed the experience but they were withdrawal and quite.

A few children only went to a few houses to trick or treat then went home with me to hand out candy while my husband took the other ones on. The realty is that some children have great difficulties with the whole experience and it... more

Cool autumn days are here with crisp autumn nights which are a nice change. In foster care, things change drastically in the autumn. Getting foster children settled back into school when school has never been an important part of their life is a huge chore. Their issues with school leads to the foster parent spending a lot of time on the phone with school officials, parent conferences, ARD meeting (special ed. meeting), etc.

In foster care, the number of foster children coming into care tends to increase during the autumn and holidays. Some foster homes may take in... more

The year can bring different foster children with some many different needs for a foster mom to care for and love. A foster mom steps up to parent the children that have been abused, neglected by their biological families and forgotten by society. She endures the hatred, anger and aggression that may come from a foster child, because she is the one in the maternal role. She did not cause the pain the foster child is dealing with, but she is the one dealing with the effects.

If the time should come when foster children learn they will not be returning home and that they will be placed up for adoption, it is the foster mom who is there. She will be the one to hold and love the crying... more