I have been shouting it from the mountain tops!!
Although I’m not really sure how I feel about it. My husband and I have just adopted two of our six grandchildren.

We are very happy to know that the children will always be safe and taken care of. We are very happy to no longer have to ask permission to do things that most parents can do for their children. We are very happy that DCF no longer comes to our house every 21 days. We are very happy to begin a new life as a family of 4.

We are sad because of the pain that our daughter feels from legally losing her children. We are sad for what the children have gone through. We are very sad for what our daughter has gone through. We had no control over the events that led us to having custody of the children that we have now adopted. We tried everything that we could do to get through to our daughter.

I’d like to tell you about our adoption day. Our adoption was scheduled in the morning, on the last day of the month of April. We all got up early and ate breakfast. Then we all got dressed up in our cute little clothes, well the kids had on cute little clothes. We grabbed our sign that we made for the children to hold in the photos and out the door we went. We had plenty of time to get to the court house. We got down the road a bit when we remembered that we did not give monkey has medicine. We knew that if there was any time that we had to wait patiently in court monkey was not going to be able to do that without his medication. So we turned around and came home and got the medication. We left the house again and realized how late we were. It seemed that we were hitting every traffic light and everyone in front of us was going 10 miles under the speed limit. Hubs decided that he was going to speed a bit and cut around a couple of cars to get ahead of them, so we wouldn’t be late. I was yelling you’re not gonna make it your not gonna make it! The cars are to close! He made it, …..then the little blue lights started flashing. Hubs had sped around an unmarked police car and cut him off. We pulled over and when the police officer came up to the window hubs was saying,very excitedly, we’re on our way to the courthouse we’re going to adopt our grandchildren today! We’re running late we forgot his medication. Hubs was jumbling up his words I was not sure if he was making sense. The officer told hubs to calm down. He said that if we wanted to continue to raise these children then we needed to get there in one piece. He told hubs to breathe in and out a little and drive his family safely to the courthouse. Then he let us go. He made us promise to drive more carefully. We did!!

When we get to the courthouse and we are trying to get through the metal detectors every one of us kept setting them off. We couldn’t figure out why, we removed belts, we removed shoes, we remove jackets, keys, and cellphones. They finally just let us go. We knew we were not going to make it upstairs to our court room in tiine, but we did! We were outside our court room with exactly 3 minutes to spare.

When they called us into the court room the 4 of us sat at the table with our attorney. We all had to raise our right hands and swear to tell the truth. The judge asked if there was any other cases involving these children that were open and the response was no. The judge asked us if we understood what we were doing and we said yes. I wanted to read vows that we had written for the children using our wedding vows as a guide line. Our attorney had asked ahead of time, the judge agreed it was OK for me to read them quickly. Before the judge finalized our adoption I read these vows to our children.

Adoption vows.
Today We pledge to you both our eternal love, for one life time could never be enough.
We promise to always love you both more and to say it each day. for it’s our game and our rules.
We promise to be your rock we will support, encourage and inspire you both till the end of time.
We promise to celebrate all your triumphs, endure your misfortunes and conquer them together as a family should.
We promise to take the good days and the bad days and love them equally to show you every day, that we know exactly how lucky we are to have you both in our lives, hearts and home.
We promise to never stop loving you both, we will plan and take life’s adventures with you and help you navigate though life.
This is our solemn vow to you both.

After the adoption was finalized we took pictures with the judge and our Sign. We waited downstairs to get our paperwork. We received the copies of the adoption certificates and the court orders. Then we went outside in front of the courthouse and took some photos of the children with the Teddy bears that were given in the court room and our beautiful sign.

We had a friend show up to witness the ceremony with us. She helped us get through the metal detectors as well as take photos of the children. She even managed to video some of me reading the vows. She reminded us that our friends are with us and they’ve been with us throughout this entire Adventure.

We decided to make our adoption day a special day. We went and picked up food and took it down to the park by the lake. We had a nice little family picnic and let the kids play on the playground for a little while. After they were getting tired we decided to try to take some family photos out by the lake and the light house. We got some that look OK. It’s something we probably should have done before they got tired.

After taking photos we returned to our house as a family of 4 legally. Now no one can take these children away, no one can cause these children harm. We can raise them in peace.

Our daughter called from prison later that afternoon. We knew she was sad, she tried to hide it. She talked to the kids and told them how much she loved them. She thanked Ed an I for everything that we have done for them and her. She knew that by voluntarily signing the children over so that we could adopt them was what was best for the children. She did not care how much it hurt her. As long as she knew her children were going to have a better life, a safe life, a life that she at that time could not give to them.

We do plan when she gets out of prison to let her reestablish a relationship with her children. As well as reestablished a relationship with us. The trust has been trampled to the ground. We hope with some tender love and care it can be regrown.

We love our entire family whether they are biological children, stepchildren, or now adopted children. A family can never be to big! There is enough love for everyone.

Our adoption day was full of excitement, drama, lots of emotions, up’s and downs, but most of all our adoption day was filled with love. We would not change it for anything. Even the police officer, he reminded us just how precious our cargo is on this wild adventure of raising our grands.

I hope you enjoyed hearing about our adoption day thank you for reading and continue to follow along as we raised these beautiful souls.

If you’ve adopted your Grands please comment your story below or if you have any questions please ask them here or email us.

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