Its Official!!

I'm officially a CASA volunteer!! I was sworn in at the courthouse today and I'm almost ready for my first case!! I say almost because although I have been sworn in, I haven't actually finished my training yet, haha. I will be finished a week from today and will hopefully get my first case soon after. I'm SO excited!

Here are a few pictures of the swearing in (I'm SO glad Cupcake went with me! Everyone else had friends and family there, I would have felt like such a loser without her, haha). It was a really great time!

Me and Cupcake! :)Taking the oath!

Me and the judge. She is so supportive of CASA!

My training class. They are such an AWESOME group of people! :)

And finally, here is everyone who was sworn in, along with the judge (in the middle) and the head of the CASA board of directors (to the right of the judge).

I can't wait to get started!

Just an Update

Cornerstone clubs are back in full force this week, so my life has gotten a LOT busier! I am VERY excited (and nervous) to be starting Kids Club up again tonight. I have missed the kids!

Things in my life continue to change, some for the good. My contract with my current realtor runs out this week, and I am hoping to sign with a different one soon. I have really been impressed with the realtors I currently have, but I think I want to try someone who has a little more experience in my neighborhood. I am SO SO ready to move!!

I turned in my resignation to AIM 2 weeks ago and my last day with them will be this Friday. I can't even describe the peace I feel over the idea of only working one job and not having so much of my time divided. I am pretty nervous about the financial aspect of this change (especially since I have several medical bills to pay, and have to go to the dentist soon), but I am really trying to trust in the Lord. I figure, if I have to find a new part time job in 6 months, then that's what I have to do. It'll be a great 6 months! :)

My CASA training is really blowing my mind right now and I'm SLOWLY processing everything. The simple things are even eye opening to me! (I'm not used to going to meetings where there is no prayer!). I am learning a lot about abused and neglected children, and its giving me a lot to think about with...well, with everything.

I am still not sure why God has me doing this at this point in my life. I am really struggling with having hope right now, in so many areas, and learning about so many horrible things, and how little I can do about any of them, is making the struggle a lot more intense. I'm sure He has a plan and a reason, its just really hard right now.

So, that's about it. I know I have been promising to share the things that I am learning, and I really plan to. Right now its just so much and so all over the place, and honestly very raw. I can't even really make sense of it, haha, so I wouldn't want to confuse you!

One thing I can say for sure is that God is so good. He is holding my hand and walking me through a very painful time, not answering my questions when or how I want, but taking me on the path that He has for me; which I can only assume is perfect even though it doesn't feel that way right now.

Please continue to pray for the girls. Their hearts have become so hardened. I literally don't even recognize them.

"Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life." ~ Proverbs 13:12

Leaving for Staff Retreat Soon

We are leaving tomorrow (after church) for our annual winter staff retreat to Keswick, a retreat center in New Jersey. I am so excited to get away and spend some quality time with the staff, I really enjoy everyone!

I am also excited about this retreat because I really feel like we are more united as a staff than we have ever been!! Not that we are generally not united, but God has been doing some awesome things recently that have me so excited about the team of people He has put together to be a part of what He is doing at Cornerstone! For the past 2 weeks at our weekly staff prayer meetings the Lord has really been uniting us under one vision and has us all so excited about the things He is doing. Its such a blessing!!

There are definitely some things I am not so excited about with this retreat, however. One of the best things about staff retreat is that its a family retreat and while we do spend time in meetings, we spend most of our time relaxing and hanging out as families. But I no longer have a family. I used to, but I don't anymore. Linda and Bonita weren't LIKE family to me, they WERE family. And now, they aren't. Of course I still have my parents and my brother, and they are AMAZING and I love them so much, so I am not family-less. But, I have lost a huge part of my family.

A lot of the things I enjoy doing the most, I enjoyed because I got to share them with the girls. Not anymore. The girls have been in my life for over 7 years. Over half of Bonita's life, and exactly half of Linda's. For my entire time in Philly.

I really enjoy every single family on staff (I am now the only single person left). I enjoy the husbands, wives, and all of the kids. There is always so much joy and laughter on these retreats (and occasionally some uncomfortable moments, but we get past those, haha), I know I will have a great time. I will also be mourning the loss of such a big part of my life and heart. Its going to be a bittersweet (I'm getting really tired of that word) time.

CASA

No, that isn't referring to my house (and in case you were wondering, its still for sale but no offers yet. We're still praying though!). Anyway, in this case, CASA refers to Court Appointed Special Advocate. And I'm about to become one!!

I have wanted to be involved with CASA for a long time, but working 2 jobs made it basically impossible for me to commit to anything else. However, when I realize about 2 months ago that my time at AIM was winding down, I finally saw an opportunity to become involved. I'm SO excited!

For those of you who are wondering what exactly a CASA does, the best place to learn about it is on their website here (although they have a long way to go with their website, haha). I will try and explain it as well.

In Philadelphia there are over 8000 abused and neglected kids in foster or kinship care. Those kids are going through a long and often painful court process where there are tons of people involved; representing the case, the law, their parents, the city, etc. However, few of them have someone who simply represents them; who speaks in court simply for their needs and what is best for them. That is where CASA comes in.

My job is to be intricately involved in the case: talking to the child(ren), parents, school, therapists, doctors, family, friends, and anyone else involved and then I will speak in court as to what is in the best interest of the child. That's my only concern, the child.

I will also be with the case from the very beginning to the very end. Often times a child will go through several foster homes, social workers (cases get transferred around all the time), even different judges (cases often last over a year, so the child sees a lot of adults). However, they will have ONE CASA worker, a constant face and someone the child can depend on and hopefully grow to trust.

As a CASA, I will only have one case at a time, so unlike pretty much everyone else involved in the case, my time will not be divided. I will be able to devote as much time and energy is necessary to really make sure the child is taken care of and has a voice.

And in Philly, the CASA has a very strong voice. In some cities, every child involved in foster care has a CASA worker. Unfortunately, that's not true in Philly. There are 8000 kids, and less than 200 CASA workers. CASA is pretty new in Philly (only since 2005), so as it grows, hopefully this will change, but it will take time. Since there are so few CASA workers, judges decide which cases they would like to have a CASA involved. So, if we are assigned a case its because the judge really wants to hear what we have to say, which is awesome.

Those of you that know me... doesn't this sound pretty much PERFECT for my personality?!? I'm SO EXCITED!!!

So, I started my training yesterday, and while it is A LOT to learn and I am pretty overwhelmed by some of it, I am even more convinced that the Lord has led me to this. I can't wait to get started! I will be in training until the middle of February and will mostly likely get a case immediately (there is a huge need for CASAs). Actually, I will be sworn in as an officer of the court next week (they only do one swearing in per quarter and it just happens to fall in the middle of the current training, so we get the pleasure of being sworn in before actually finishing out training, haha).

Another thing that I am really excited about is that I will be working with non-christians. I know that sounds crazy, but working for a missions organization or a church for 7 years has kept me pretty segregated from the rest of the world in a lot of ways, and I'm excited to have the chance to work along side people of other faiths and hopefully share the love of Christ with them. In my training class there are 2 other Christians, 2 jewish women, a muslim woman and several others who haven't really talked about their faith. I really enjoyed all of them and I'm SO excited to work with them, and who knows who else!!

Obviously, because of confidentiality issues, I won't be able to talk very specifically about what I do as a CASA on this blog, but as God is already using it in huge ways to draw me closer to Him, I am sure you will be hearing as much as I can share.

As I sat in the training, I just had this overwhelming sense that I was EXACTLY where I was supposed to be. It was a really good feeling...

Weekend Update

I know, once again, its been a while since I updated. This time its because I've been busy, yay! Unfortunately, there is nothing new to report (at least nothing good) with the girls, so I will leave that for now. I AM learning a lot, and once I get a chance to process through some of it, I will update you! In the meantime, I had a really fun weekend (despite the Eagles loss) so that's what I'm going to share.

Friday didn't start great. My roommate's car was broken into the night before, so she spent the morning calling repair places, her insurance company as well as doing her job. Thankfully, her boss let her leave work early, and she found a repair shop that would take her car that day, so we dropped it off and then decided to have a really fun weekend!

We started at the Wachovia center. :) Several of our teens won a basketball tournament in November, hosted by Word of Life. Because they won, they (along with several other teams) were invited to compete in a tournament that was held at the Wachovia Center, ON the Sixers court!! Spectators were allowed to buy tickets to the tournament, and that ticket was also good for the Sixers game that night. That was an offer we couldn't refuse!

The tournament was fun to watch, and I got to walk on the court where the Sixers play! I sat where Allen Iverson sits! It was so exciting (cause I'm a dork!). Unfortunately, our teens didn't win, but they received an automatic bye into next year's tournament, so maybe they'll do better with a year to practice. :)

The teens' tournament was over around 5 and the game didn't start until 7:00, so Ashley, Cupcake and I (along with our friends Dom and Jared) decided to go to Chick Fil A for some dinner, and then walk across the parking lot to Ikea and get a $1 ice cream cone (cause even when its 10 degrees outside, you can't turn down ice cream for a dollar!).



We got back to the Wachovia Center right as the game was starting and had a BLAST watching it! It ended up being a really exciting game! Unfortunately, we lost, but only by 2 points and it came down to literally the last second. Plus, it was really awesome to see AI (Allen Iverson) back in Philly!! (Although my favorite player is Thaddeus Young...mainly cause I like the name Thaddeus, haha).

After the game we went home to rest up for our really awesome Saturday. :)

Saturday was possibly one of the best days I've had in a long time, and mostly because we didn't do much. We started the day with a matinee movie (a chick flick, hehe) and then went to Ikea for lunch (yummy and cheap!). After Ikea we headed to Center City to find a coffee shop and just chill...which we did for several hours. Our original coffee shop destination didn't work out (too crowded) so we ended up at Starbucks. Ashley is studying to take the Social Worker Licensing Exam at the end of the month, and I had a lot of things to work out with the Lord (...understatement...) so we found a table, got our drinks, put our headphones in and didn't talk much for the next few hours. (We're both introverts, which works out nicely sometimes). She was able to get a lot of studying finished (although it was a bit challenging since most of her notes were stolen from her car), and I had an awesome time with the Lord (again, more to come on that).

When our drinks were cold and our eyes were tired, we decided it was time to head home. On our way we picked up some chinese food from our favorite place. When we got home, we immediately got into our pajamas, cuddled under blankets on our respective couches and planned to enjoy the rest of the evening watching football. Sadly, the Eagles were not playing well and after half-time, we couldn't watch anymore, so we just relaxed and watched TV for a while before heading to sleep.

Sunday was even more boring than Saturday, but I loved every second of it. I went to Sunday School and church and then came home to pick Ashley up and head to Target (Gizmo was out of litter, poor guy). I spent the rest of the day planning my schedule and meals for the week (and doing my grocery shopping on line!), and getting a ton of other organizing things done for the week as well as cleaning the house. It felt so nice to actually feel prepared for the week!

And to top off a wonderful weekend, I was able to go back to my spinning class this morning! I haven't been in almost 4 months because I didn't have a car, and it was SO GREAT to be back! It will take a little while to get used to getting up at 5:15 a.m., but its so worth it. YAY!!

The Post I Never thought I would Have to Write

I really hate to start 2010 on a sour note, but I have something I need to share and I can't wait any longer.

Linda and Bonita have moved out of my house, are no longer doing school at my house and at this point have decided that they don't want anything to do with me any more. And in the meantime their grades have fallen drastically and Bonita boasted on her MySpace that she spent a wonderful evening getting drunk on New Year's Eve, and plans to do it again tonight.

Heartbroken doesn't even begin to describe how I feel.

I will do my best to explain how this all happened, although I'm still trying to figure it out myself.

It all started actually a few months ago, a little before Thanksgiving. They had a death in their family and started spending most nights at their mom's house, but coming to my house every morning for school. Of course I understood their need to be with family during a tragedy, so I let them do what they needed to do.

One week turned into 2, then 3, and so on. As time went on, they started showing up later and later for school, even missing classes. It was becoming a challenge for me to motivate them to do their work and I was having to enforce punishment on them for the first time. When they had been living with me they had a regular bed time. However, it was becoming clear that they were not sleeping well at their mom's and were falling asleep a lot during school hours.

They started missing church events and several times didn't show up to help out at Kids Club (where they are supposed to be leaders). They were failing in a lot of responsibilities, saying they would be somewhere to help out, and then not coming. They were asked to be in a drama for Teen Club, but came late to every practice, if they even came at all. I started checking their cell phone usage (their phones are under my plan) and saw phone calls and text messages being sent at 2, 3, 4 and even 5 a.m. I set blocks on their phone so it couldn't be used then, hoping that would mean they would get more sleep.

They didn't, and as each week went by, we fought more and more. Their grades were still okay, but that was mostly because I was becoming more and more involved trying to keep them from making things worse, all the while praying that this was just a phase.

I did have a few conversations with their mom, especially when they started missing classes because they weren't getting to my house on time. I told her she was welcome to oversee their schooling, but she made it clear that she didn't want to do that (much to the disappointment of the girls).

Everything finally came to a head the week before Christmas. I don't want to go into all the details, but Linda and I had one big fight (revolving around a combination of her falling asleep during class and her not so respectful words and attitude toward me).

In the middle of a school day, Linda called her mom and asked if she could move back home, to which her mom responded no, but told her to ask her sister if she could move in with her.

So, within about 20 minutes it was decided that she was moving in with her sister and her sister would oversee her in school. I knew I couldn't do anything if I didn't have their mom backing me up, so if she was willing to let them move in with the sister, it would be best for me to let it happen.

Bonita wasn't going to to with her at first, mainly because I said that if they were not living with me AND not doing school at my house, I wasn't going to let them have cell phones under my name. Bonita actually took a few days to decide, but eventually decided to move too.

So, they are now living with their 21 year old sister and her 3 small children. And this same sister, who dropped out of school in 9th grade, is overseeing their school work. In just 2 weeks, Bonita went from honor roll to D's and F's, and Linda went from straight A's, to C's, D's and F's.

And they blame me for all of it. They claim that I am acting different and treating them different and they don't want to be around it anymore.

All the while, their grades are dropping and I barely even recognize them. They are even boasting on MySpace about a 3 day party full of drinking that they have been enjoying. In fact, one quote is that they are "drinking my a** off".

I apologize for not sharing any of this sooner, I wasn't really sure what was going on and I have been praying hard that something would turn all of this around. There have been several ups and downs over the last few months. Everything came to a head just after I sent out my Christmas card, and I thought it was best to just spend time praying and talking to the Lord about all of it before I shared everything. I kept hoping things would get better, but they just got worse.

I have been spending A LOT of time praying, reading, and learning. And a lot of time crying. Do I feel like a failure? Yep. Do I trust completely in the Lord, no matter what the circumstances? Absolutely. That's about where I am. Sad. So very sad.

I will share in other posts some of the things that I am learning and things that God is showing me. I don't regret even one second of time that I have spent with the girls, and I don't blame myself for what is happening. Of course I have been going over everything over and over again, asking a lot of "what if's" and God has been so faithful to me during those times. He is very near to me, and has constantly reminded me that He is VERY near to the girls as well. He loves them even more than I do, and will NEVER leave them. They can push me away, but He won't be going anywhere. :)

I would VERY much appreciate your prayers for the girls. The prodigal son came home, and I am praying the girls will do the same (and by home I don't necessarily mean my house, but seeking and following the Lord). And I hope this doesn't sound harsh, but please don't tell me that this is just a phase and they will grow out of it. EVEN if that's true (and honestly only the Lord knows if it is), it doesn't make me feel any better and doesn't provide any doesn't really serve any purpose. Even if it a phase, this phase will come with consequences that the girls will have to face, and that makes me sad.

How's that for the first entry of 2010? I'm hoping this means that the year can only get better. I will update again soon as I seek the Lord through all of this. And of course, there is still a lot of other stuff going on (Kids Club preparation, leaving my part time job, still trying to sell my house, etc). I have never thought that I was only here for Bonita and Linda, and I want to make sure I continue to seek and follow the Lord in whatever He calls me to do.

It just not always easy. Not easy at all.