Moving

Well we just found out that we are moving back to the United States in October 2008. I called Khun Angkana, our social worker with the DSDW to tell her and she didn't seem too concerned. So I'm not sure if things will work out for us to adopt or not. I guess I need to have more faith that things will. Kary and I are a lot dissappointed that work will not let us stay until December. They are being very "cost" concerned...not concerned for us as a family at all!We finally found a family for Tara and now we may have to leave before her adoption is final. That breaks my heart.

Our Foster Babies...

This little sweetie pie is our foster baby Tara. She is usually such a sweet calm baby, but today she has been quite fussy. I think she may have caught the flu that we have had around here this last week. Let me tell you about Tara. She was brought into our home when she was 1 month old. She has achondroplasia, dwarfism. She is very tiny. She is now almost 4 months old and she doesn't weigh more than 10 lbs. and she probably is only 17" long...if that. She is a very sweet baby though. She LOVES to be held. You could hold her all day and she'd be just fine with that. She sleeps better when you hold her, than when she's all alone in her crib. Her mom has given her up for adoption and I hope she can find a forever family through adoption. Everything else about her is normal...she'll just be short. My little boy Adam just adores babies and he has been so sweet with Tara. I do foster care through Holt Sahathai. They are a good organization. All of their babies that get adopted are cared for in Foster homes first, no orphanages. I got started doing foster care about 1 year ago. I heard about fostering one day when I was volunteering at the Pakkret Orphanage here by my home. After much thought and prayer I decided that I really wanted to help by doing foster care.


Our first baby was a little boy...Chayanut. We got him when he was 6 weeks old and had him for two months. We had to have him go to another foster home because we were going to the United States for home leave for 6 weeks and he could not leave Thailand. He was a doll! He was a crier though. In fact we nicknamed him, "Chayanut cry a lot!" It was very hard to hand him back over to Holt. On my way home from Holt I cried and cried.




Our second foster child was given to us after our home leave in August of 2006. She was a beautiful little girl named Pumiraht. We nicknamed her Lia. She was a real sweetheart. When she turned four months old her mom decided that she wanted her back. I actually got to meet the mom and it was good that she could take her back and raise her. It's always sad when the babies leave. I always seem to go through a bit of a depression...but I keep coming back for more. It is so rewarding to look into these sweet babies faces and know that I am helping to the best of my ability. They sure receive a lot of love in our house.
Posted by Claudean at 8:29 AM 0 comments

My Air Conditioning Finally works!!!!

We have lived in this house for a year and my air conditioning in my bedroom finally works right!! It was crazy! We would call our landlord and she would send out someone to fix the air conditioner, someone that she already has paid money to. Last week these same two guys came to fix the air and they were here for 7 hours! When they left they said the air worked. I went upstairs and did it work? NO! So the next day I called my landlord back and told her that the air was still not working. She sent the guys out again and they came back for another 3 hours. Again...they said it was working. But NO it was not! I've been so frustrated with this situation so I finally had my maid call a handyman from the Nichada office. He has done work for us before and he always can fix anything. So she asked him if he could come and see if he would be able to fix it for us. He came, checked it out and told us that he would be back on Friday (after work) to fix it for us. He came tonight and was here for 2 hours. Does it work? YES! I paid for it myself. It cost 2,500 Baht, which equals about 65 US Dollars. Boy was that worth it! Hot season is going to be upon us soon and I want to be prepared!

At least I'm starting...

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Hello, Our family has lived in Thailand for two years now. People have often told me that I need to write down my experiences while living here. So, at least now I'm starting!Hopefully as time goes on I'll get better at writing these experiences down to share with everyone.I have four boys ages 19, 15, 12 (almost 13) and 6. We have always wanted a little girl and decided that while we live here in Thailand we should adopt our daughter! The Thai people have such a laid back attitude that this adoption is taking longer than I wanted it too. It took me a good 8 months to get all the paperwork done. In October 2006 we turned in our "portfolio" to the Adoption Center in downtown Bangkok. Of course turning in all the papers was an interesting process. Listed in their requirements of things to be done was a fingerprint/criminal check from the Thai Police. In September we went to the Thai Police Headquarters to get the fingerprinting done. We were told at that time that in order to get the fingerprints done we needed a paper from The Adoption Center stating that all of our paperwork was done and we were in need of a criminal check. Of course! It's not easy. It took us all morning to go to the Thai Police, Kary had to take off work for the morning, and all just to find out that we needed a paper from the Adoption Center First! Crazy. You would think that the adoption center would tell us that minor detail...but no, that's too easy! So the Adoption Center told us it would take 2 weeks to get the letter ready to be taken to the Thai Police. After two weeks were over I called the Adoption Center to see if we could pick up the letter yet. It wasn't finished yet! Another two weeks and we finally were able to get the referral letter and take it back to the Thai Police...Kary took yet another morning off work to finish up this step in the process. So it always takes longer than you think to get anything done! My next blog I'll tell you more of the adoption story. Gotta go for now...places to go..things to do!Claudean