Friday, August 22, 2014

Family Traditions

When one begins the foster and/or adoptive home study process, there are many (hundreds, maybe?) questions asked.

One thing that always seemed awkward was family traditions.  When you create your home life, most habits & traditions happen so naturally, that you never even think of them as "traditions".

Even so, you have to rack your brain to make it sound like some tasks are traditions... even though it seems odd.

For example, praying before eating a meal can be considered a tradition.  Reading a story or having a routine at bedtime can be considered a tradition.  Reading the nativity scene on Christmas Eve as a family.  Attending the local Pumpkin Festival each fall as a family.  You get the picture!

One of the traditions we created after becoming a foster home was Friday Family Fun Night.  If you know me, you know I like to have silly and/or obnoxious names for things.  But, it sticks, right?  About a year ago, my husband & I decided to keep every Friday night a family night for just us three.  Sometimes, we are invited to eat dinner or share another activity with someone else & we will modify our FFF Night, but we always try to honor family time whatever we end up doing on Friday evenings.

Recently, a few things made me think that maybe the Family Fun Night wasn't so silly.

Our nephews live in a small town about 1.5hrs away from us.  Because they are also home schooled, we get to see them on occasion during the weekdays.  A few months ago, we spent a Friday afternoon with them.  When the afternoon ended, I was chatting with Little Bit & his Daddy about what we should do that night.  It was our first FFF Night since J joined our family so it meant an extra special celebration.  That night, the nephews couldn't join us, but we loved spending the time with them earlier.  Now, fast forward to just a few weeks ago.  We, again, saw them on a Friday afternoon & they had been asking their parents about joining us for Family Fun Night!  I thought it was very sweet.  So, last week, we were able to visit them in THEIR home & had a crazy evening of all five kids RUNNING around shooting Nerf guns at each other, singing, you name it!

The second "event" was the phone call when I met our daughter.  She doesn't speak much on the phone & because I was also a stranger, it became a one-sided conversation!  When I'm especially nervous (which I was), I can speak way too fast.  And ramble.  And, my husband will slightly roll his eyes & point out something that was completely un-related or weird in my tone/action.  LOL.  There were several adults on the conference call with K, so they prompted me with questions.  One thing I felt silly about saying was that we have Friday Family Fun Night & explained that we sometimes watch movies at home, or go for a walk at the park, or whatever.  I chatted about swimming in our local Springs, that we loved to hang outside as much as we could, I even mentioned Downtown Getdown.  I still chuckle at all the stuff I was mentioning to explain our family life & traditions.

But...

But...

Family Fun Night stuck out to her!

When we met her & then she decided to come live with us not even 48 hours later, we began slowly getting to know each other.  It was awkward, but wonderful.  Knowing that we had chosen her & that she had chosen us gave us all a sense of comfort.  When we returned to our home, she began making comments about Family Fun Night.  Excited about what we'd do.  Excited about spending time with Dad.  She wanted to make sure to remind us that she wanted us to celebrate her entry into the family, too.  I thought it was very cute & sweet & made me happy we made this silly-named tradition.

Now, we couldn't break Family Fun Night even if we wanted to!  Our eldest son knows it's a scheduled activity so he doesn't complain much about it; our daughter looks forward it; & our youngest just enjoys it.  (He doesn't really have the concept down yet about the days of the weeks & all, but I always remind him on Friday.)

Tonight is Family Fun Night.  I'm not sure what we are doing, but I do know we'll be together.  We will probably rent a movie & buy a few pizzas.  But, we can officially add this to our family traditions when we renew our foster license in a few months.  ;)

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!  We are spending tomorrow afternoon celebrating the birthday of a sweet baby girl we brought home from the hospital last year.  She's adopted & thriving with her mama & daddy & I'm so honored to have been a part of their adoption journey.

{I do hope to update throughout the next few days about the challenges & joys we've experienced thus far with the placement of our sibling group J & K.  It has been hard.  There's been lots of tears, lots of laughs, lots of fear, lots of love.  And, we're just starting...}

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