Our First Respite Weekend and NO AIR CONDITIONING!

 

Friday, August 21

We began preparing for our first kiddo, Mr. D, the day before.  I had changed bed sheets and linens and put a few snacks in his room along a with note of how excited we were to have him and to make himself at home.  There were a few thing I wasn't sure about like, if would need help with homework for the weekend or not, as well as if we need to stock some toiletry items for him.  Also, wouldn't you know it, before he arrived the A/C froze up.  So, we are going to have to suffer through the weekend without A/C. It seems, every time we have guests the A/C goes out!!  Adding it to the repair list and moving on.  It is what it is.

Now the question of what will we do this weekend comes up.  I figured we would just got with the flow and kind of let him dictate it, whether we just chill and hang out or if we will be active.  Trying not to force anything on him or pushing him do things, even though we would be excited to do all kinds of things.  The secret is to not be overwhelming and allow them to have time to breath and prepare for any transition.  Even if it is something as simple as running an errand.  Giving them a heads up that is going to happen and then again a few minutes before it happens.  I'll give an example in our story.

It is 3:15pm and there is a knock at the door.  It Mr. D and his foster mom dropping him off for the weekend.  I introduce myself and show him to his room so he can get settled in while his mom and I talk about any medication needs and other important information.  She communicates to me the pertinent information and and talk about pickup time on Sunday and then she sends me a text message with her contact info in case I needed anything as well as the link to his 4pm Zoom meeting as well as his 6pm call with his biological Dad.  Right before she walked out the door I realized that I didn't even know her name!  So asked, "Hey, I forgot to task and no one has told me yet, what's your name?"  In all the excitement of welcoming Mr. D. I had forgotten that!

I told Mr. D. to make himself at home and if he needed anything to let me know.  I also let him know that I was still working for a couple of hours but would be available if he needed something.  Then I explained that we typically go walking as soon as I am done working and he would be joining us.  Afterwards we would return home and fix dinner.  The plan was get to know him more and break the ice while we went walking.

Unfortunately, it began to rain as soon as we got there so we only walked a little bit.  But in that short time I found out he liked basketball and some of the games he enjoyed playing.  On the way home I stopped by Wendy's and got us a frosty.  He greatly enjoyed that, even if it did ruin dinner a little for us.  Then we fixed some pizza, which is one of his favorite foods.  For the evening I asked if he wanted to get into anything such as play a board game or watch a movie together.  We played on the PlayStation for a few minutes but I could tell he wasn't enjoying it.  He likes to watch other people play games on youtube rather than play them himself.  "Wow", I thought, "I new level of vicarious living."  Before we played games and would not interact with reality.  Now, we watch other people play games, escaping reality, in real life instead of taking on the challenge ourself to win the game.  Well, whatever floats your boat.

After our playstation game he retreated to his room and basically remained there rest of the night.  I checked in on him before I went to bed and said, "Good Night".

Saturday, August 22

This morning I began the day in my usual routine which is  coffee, first, then sit on the back deck sipping on my coffee in meditation and prayer while listening to some of the top news headlines.  Then I began waking everyone up and start breakfast.  We typically don't do much for breakfast, especially during the week.  Often times I don't eat a breakfast. But cooking on the weekend, I don't mind.  The consensus was eggs, bacon, and pancakes.  So pulled out the griddle and the cast iron cookware from my grandparents and threw on the bacon which was delegated to the wife.  Then started the eggs.  My wife likes hers sunny side up and apparently so does Mr. D.  Well, I've never been great at that but I thought I would try.  On the last family camping trip I got some pointers from my Dad and so this was as good a time as any to give it a try.  To my surprise it came out perfect, according to the wife and Mr. D. So that was great encouragement to provide him with something he enjoyed.  Next were the pancakes.  This time I taught Mr. D how to do those.  We actually had more pancake mix than anticipated so after we ate our breakfast I made the rest up for breakfast on Sunday, with a little twist.  I decided to make Mr. D. a Mickey Mouse Pancake.  He had never had one and I remember my Dad making those for us and now his grand-kids.  So, why not for Mr. D?  He was pretty excited and gave me a "High-Five" for it.  Oh, and I added chocolate chips in the mix as well.

The rest of the morning and afternoon I spent with my "penguin crew", a set of triplets that come over and help me with yard work and oil changes, while Mr. D. hung out talking with his friends.  For the evening I invited my sister-in-law over for dinner with her kids and we had a family dinner together.  The plan afterwards was to go play Putt-Putt but soon realized how much Mr.D. wanted to play basketball.  So we decided to go spend the evening at the church so he could play and the neice and nephew could ride their bikes and play too.

During our time their I ran into several young men that I had established connections with previously, including my "penguin crew".  It was really good to see some of them as I had not seen them in several months.  Overall it was a great evening.  Mr. D's basketball apparently gave out on him during his play so we made a decision to take him out on Sunday after church so he could get a new one.

Sunday, August 23

Morning came and we began scurry around the house getting dressed.  Heated up leftover pancakes and made a few fresh eggs for breakfast.  Then off to church for  a special outdoor service.  But first, I needed to grab some camp chairs so we would have a seat.  Unfortunately, while doing so I inadvertently set off the alarm in our shed and had to disarm and rearm the security system before the call was placed to police.  At least I know it works!!

Church service was great and Mr. D was good.  While in the service my parents went over to check the house because they also got a call and text message concerning the security system and had sent me several messages if everything was okay.  However, I had left my phone in my vehicle during church so I received none of those messages.  Which then prompted them, as concerned loving parents knowing I had a new child in our home, to go to our house and make sure everything was in order.  Unfortunately, in doing so, they set off the alarm again.  It also unfortunate that in the haste to setup our security system I failed to give them the passcodes to the system.  So this prompted the police to be called out.  All while we were in church of course!  Ah man, what a morning.

After smoothing that over we could finally continue the rest of our planned day; which was shopping for a new basketball for Mr. D and also hunt down some more model paint I needed.  We visited a couple of stores and Mr. D was able to find the one that he liked, I , on the other hand, could find my paint nowhere.

We returned home after picking up Mr. D's favorite item for lunch, Zaxby's.  Then, as predicted, he wanted to go play at the church again with his new basketball.  I could go because Dad was coming over to help me with the A/C so the wife generously agreed to take him.  Turns out, my brother and sister-in-law, who are much more sports fans than myself, came over and he had someone to play with. I am glad that worked out.  He really enjoyed himself.  Seems so much he had to come back home to get more water and then went back.

We finally got the A/C working back and now it was time for Mr. D to return to his foster family.  It was a pretty good weekend and good first experience for us.  We were glad that he really began opening up to us about his time in foster care and his family along with his thoughts on everything.  We hope and pray the best for him in his journey to reunite with his family.  For us, we were tired, more than we thought, and celebrated by going out to dinner to kind of process our experience of the weekend.