Sarah Joy Wright

How gorgeous is that? WOW!!! So our baby girl came at the same time as Joshua did....2 weeks before staff training started....crazy timing. So our baby girl, unlike Joshua who pretty much as soon as we mentioned a rule followed it (of course not perfectly!), challenged everything we said or did! Bless her cotton socks....she was making sure we wouldn't ever get so comfortable with parenting that we thought it even could be easy.

I remember that when we would try to read a book to the other kids....we would have to stop at least a dozen times to say no to her about something. We joked that she polished our fireplace during all of her thousands of time outs. But, she was so cute!!!!! I think God did that on purpose.

During the 3 year case she had to face....she had so much hurt inside of her. I truly am amazed at the resilience of children. She had a hard time bonding to us. She did and still does quickly bond to anyone she sees...which is of course hard to deal with. There was a time when she screamed at the top of her lungs for over 30 minutes at a time! WOW that took the cake. I would do the same I did for Joshua in the beginning....sit, pray, sit, pray, sit, pray......and finally it would end. I would go in....scoop her tired body up.....and keep praying....and talk to her. When we showed our therapist (for Joshua- he had some anger issues...that have now gone away as soon as visits stopped!!) she said praise God she is not in the abusive home right now. Just made me stop and think about what could have been. It drove us bananas...but we also knew it was something she needed God's healing for. Something that happened because her young mind did not comprehend all the things that had taken place.

So....about volunteers who were involved in our children's case. That is another story. They decided to assign this volunteer after the case had gone on for 2 whole years!!!! This is longer than the federal law even allows!!!! Anyway, this should have helped our case move quicker, but instead......nope- made it much longer!

You see....although we know that many out there look at our family rather strangely because of our man made term- race.....we have never really had any real issues. Until our volunteer- who did not think the children should be with us because we were the wrong skin color! Now not to put too fine of a point on it, but as our oldest Abigail said, "So you mean that just because we have more melanin in our skin they want to separate us?" My reply "Yes, sweet angel...isn't that sad." WOW I am so glad our children have a firm reality in Christ and not in stupidity!!!! So at every court case the volunteer would say how horrible we were as parents and that we are brainwashing the children because they called us mom and dad (you know they had only been with us for 2 YEARS! and that is what the other children in our home called us). That we were out to get the biological family.....which will never be and never has been the case. In fact the biological family always loved us- they talked to us at every court date, talked to us before or after visits, let us hold Elizabeth (before she was removed and placed with us)...etc. In fact our social workers were always amazed at how well we got along. I always said the thing is...I am not the bad guy- you are- My job is to love these children to the best of my ability for however long they are in my home. So...a little more of our book long story of our beautiful babes......

Praise God we have our little cutie pie! She is full of life, spirit, and plenty of laughter. There are still many, many, many days when I want to pull out all of my hair because she is so.....set in her ways, but I am reminded of our Creator and how He must feel about me. She has a beautiful voice, and loves to gives hugs! Her eyes captivate anyone who looks at her. She loves to read...and daily asks me to read books to her. She is sooo smart! Blows me away with how quickly she can pick up on things. I am excited that this next year...she will officially start homeschooling...she will do so wonderful!

I am so thankful....although the timing was not anything close to perfect... this baby angel who had just turned one...came to us!!!! She is a blessing and a joy!!!!! I am privileged to be her mom and can't wait for God to show us more about each other...even if it is hard at times!