No longer a foster parent, temporarily we hope!
Hi everybody, Again, thank you all for the support that so many of you expressed while we had our foster son, Tommy. As I'd mentioned in a post late last week, a cousin of Tommy's birth mother expressed a desire to take hi in, they passed all of Maine DHHS's criteria for a kinship placement, and Maria (my wife) and I took him to the Augusta office yesterday where his new foster family took him home. When we said goodbye to him I wished him a long, happy, healthy and successful life. I know that he doesn't understand that yet, but I certainly felt good about saying it to my little man. 
We had the opportunity to meet his new foster mother and we can say that she is a lovely lady and we're very confident that he will be in a very loving and nurturing environment with a blood relative. We are very happy for him and for his new family.
That being said, we will MISS this little jelly bean. 15 years ago, when we adopted our son, he was almost 4 months old. When we accepted Tommy's placement, he was 4 days old. While we are experienced (and I believe successful) parents, we had no experience with a baby THAT young. We were pleasantly surprised to see that even at his young age, he was developing a very fun and fascinating personality. He loves being held, belly bounced, cuddled and being sung to, especially "The Wheels On the Bus" and "Sing a Song" from Sesame Street. That's nice because we, including our son, enjoyed doing all of those things with him. If he has the spirit & spunk as an adult that he has as a newborn, than NOBODY will trifle with him or give him a lot of unnecessary BS!
While I don't think it would be positive to make any serious predictions about his future, here are some fun speculations!
He may grow up to be an architect, because he is certainly skilled at building mountains in his diapers. He may become a movie director, because as he was learning to use his hands, he would reach into my shirt and pull on my chest hairs and I'd see STARS...Yikes! He may become a professional wrestler because as he learned how to move his little noggin, he'd frequently head butt us.
He may become a thief, because he certainly stole our HEARTS! 
So, farewell, Tommy! Much happiness is wished for you in a LONG life! We hope that DHHS will place another baby with us ASAP and we will love THAT little peanut as much as we do Tommy. It is a baby's RIGHT to be loved by the people caring for him or her, and we consider then ALL to be little princes and princesses!
So, yesterday we said goodbye to our little man. We love him and really miss him...even the middle of the night feedings
Again, thank you all for reading and for your kind words of support and encouragement!
PEACE! 
= new reply since forum marked as read
PEACE!
...I LOVE being a daddy! 
PEACE!
I was very touched yesterday when my son was saying goodbye and told Tommy how he was going to grow up to be big and strong. I am very proud of the man he is becoming!
I know that Tommy can't define love yet, but I'm sure he felt it coming from us.
PEACE!
PEACE!
Please accept my best wishes for your little princess!
PEACE!
I can't wait for your next foster story!!! I have a feeling it won't be long til you have another.
May that go from your lips to God's ear!
PEACE!
That little man gave us at least as much as we gave him!
PEACE!
We suspect that the biggest lesson that our son is learning is that he knows where to get free babysitting when HE becomes a daddy! 
PEACE!
Strong, independent children do that sometimes.
..." OH NOOO!"
Possibly he won't, because he LUVS Maine!
PEACE!
...the things that the state paid for had to go with Tommy but there are a lot of things we got on our own that we still have. Of course, we remember the song, stories and how to cuddle & hug & spoil rotten! 
PEACE!
You guys are amassing HUGE "Good Human" points. Oh, if we had millions more like you.
...I think our cats give us those when we do what they want us to do!
Thank you, and we hope for another little jelly bean real soon! 
PEACE!
