Despite what the title states, there was no crying involved by my part. This past weekend we headed down to St. George (Southern Utah) to visit some kids that we might become the foster parents of for a few months.  I’ve met the kids a few times in my life, but I never really got to know them. The kids belong to my wife’s brother who, he and his wife, are fighting some issues right now. Natalie and I are thinking that we might be able to help by taking the kids into our home while they sort out their issues. This would bump my family up from the 2 kids we have now to 5 kids (4 of which will be under 5 years old). I’m not really excited about this. However, in this case I’m starting to think it’s more important to do what is right for the kids rather than do what is right for me. The other side to that is what it will do to my wife and kids. Natalie will get the opportunity to manage the kids during the day, all day… every day. I’ll be able to escape to work during the week however when I get home I’ll need to manage the kids. This means I’ll never have any free time, any time. This should last for about 6 months. We’re planning to put the kids in preschool and the older brother will be in school for the day. This also means that the kids will be with us for any trips that we might be taking. I really want to head to California to see the Giant Sequoia’s but if I do I’ll have extra kids with me. I think I’ll still make the trip, I really need to get out of Utah again. My last trip was great.

While we were down there this weekend we took them to a park. The smaller kids are too small for the larger equipment, but that didn’t stop them from playing on it. I saved the smaller kid a few times, but only because I happened to be there as he was preparing to fall. We also took them to McDonalds… for three hours. The time passed pretty quickly, especially considering the alternative (watching them ourselves in a non-controlled environment). While there I took a bunch of pictures of the toys that came in the Happy Meals. We survived the weekend and I was confident that we would not be taking the kids due to the complications it will cause. However, I can’t stop feeling like we should take the kids. They don’t deserve to be left behind because of their parents. They need to have a family. I’m sure the foster system is a good system but kids should be with family right? It’s also a major financial impact on us. This will be a major test for our family, but in the end I believe we would grow much further… or die.