Shoud I Blog/Vlog?

I was reading an article on foster care the other day about needing to be careful what you write about your current placement (click here to read article) after reading that my husband and I were very discouraged to continue our Blog/Vlogs.

Do we continue, we aren’t blogging or vlogging about anything personal about Mr. Smiles so why not?

We sat down and talked about it for a while and asked ourselves, “why did we start blogging/vlogging?” Well the answer to that question is we felt that we wanted to bring awareness to fostering. Granted there are lots of blogs out there about fostering if you really look for them so what is one more right? but why are we vlogging? people can actually see us and by seeing us will that be dangerous for us and for baby? I don’t know, but that is exactly how that article made us feel.

We knew from the beginning that we could not share pictures of our placements in social media, or share stories about them in social media. Of course you can talk to your family and share, that is what they are there for, they are our support system through all this as well as eachother.

So we ask ourselves again, “why blog/vlog?” our answer to that question was again, awarness and a way to let our extended friends and family who we don’t see very often into our world of fostering. I don’t see a problem with continueing to blog or vlog as long as we do it right.

It’s not just about fostering it’s about me and my husband as a family going through this journey and sharing it with people we love and people who are interested in knowing more about it.
Every case is different so maybe ours will relate to someone out there and help them along the way.

So thank you for those who are interested in our journey or fostering in general.

I will continue to blog at www.lavidalui.com

Time Flys

I can't believe Mr. Smiles is almost 5 months now, boy does time fly.

He was only 2 weeks old when we were able to bring him home from the hospital.  He was so tiny that I was afraid to pick him up at first, afraid to feed him or even turn him around so he can burp.  Now he laughs, can hold his own head up, and he is trying to sit up all on his own already!

I don't get tired of saying how much I am enjoying time with this little guy, he has brought so much joy to both me and my husband.

I always thought that by the time I was 26 I was going to have my first baby and by the time I was 30 I would already have 2 close to going on our third.  I guess I just wanted to keep popping them out, haha, until I reached 4; yes I said four.  I always wanted to have a big family; all the brothers and sisters getting together for a full house every Sunday, or when they were older and brought their boyfriends/husbands, girlfriends/wife's.  Maybe my family is not growing the way I always imagined it would but that is ok, I feel just as blessed even though this little guy is not legally my son (yet. Fingers crossed) We both feel super blessed he came in to our lives.

There was a court hearing recently...it was postponed for two months due to some paper work issue.  We knew going into this it was going to be a long process but sometimes its hard not to get your hopes up.  For now just enjoying watching Mr. Smiles grow.

Oh almost forgot I "moved" I am no longer going to be blogging on here all blogs/updates will now be on http://fosterlife.tv/ where both me and my hubby can post updates about our thoughts on this and the process.  We are still working on the site so look out for new things along the way.

Thanks for continuing to following me! ;-)

Deciding To Adopt

This last week was my first week back to work after 8 weeks off to bond with Mr. Smiles.  It was bitter sweet.  It actually felt good to go back to work, as much as I was dreading the day, it wasn't so bad and I got to see my co-workers (we need to start hanging out outside of work more often, you know who you are)

I did miss Mr. Smiles a lot, it was weird not being there with him. 
It got me thinking about the time when my hubby first brought up adoption.  I remember telling him "no way, if we can't have any it must be for a reason; besides I'm afraid I wont love him/her like I would my own.  So no, no adoption" Oh my sweet dear husband loves me so much that he did not get mad or said anything negative, he was very patient with me and would bring it up every now and then.  Finally, after years, I started thinking about it and started researching adoption agencies -way too expensive, definitely not in our budget.  It depressed me and I would say to him "So what, if you don't have tons of money and can't give birth to a baby you are not meant to be a parent?"  I would get pretty angry. 

Hubby then started looking into adopting through the foster care system.  I was a bit hesitant because I wasn't sure I would be able to handle taking in a baby/child and then having them taken away if reunification with the birth family happened.  I began to do research on that for about a year, hubby and I talked and decided to go to orientation to see what its all about and if it would be possible to adopt a baby.

 We went to an orientation through an agency that worked with the foster care system.  We had heard a lot of good things about them, but in orientation we were told that babies aren't always up for adoption "you wont be able to adopt a newborn, there really aren't any babies".  My husband and I left the orientation very discouraged to try and adopt through the foster care system.  We felt they were trying to push older kids on us.  We were 26 and 27 at the time, with no children and we felt that a baby would be best for our family.  We decided to go to one more orientation, through the county this time, and got a lot more info.  We decided to go through with it and here we are now on our second placement with a 4 month old little boy (he was placed with us at 2 weeks old) who we are hoping to adopt.  For now enjoying every minute with Mr. Smiles and keeping our fingers crossed that it will all work out.