Fostering Voices Podcast

This interview with Jeremy Sharp, an adult adoptee and foster dad, is a great one! Jeremy shares his experience being born to his 16 year old birth mother, and life thereafter. He is a successful financial planner, father to 2 boys, and foster dad to 2 girls. He can also hang doors. Tune in to find out more.

Sometimes you and your spouse are in total agreement, and sometimes you are on polar opposite sides fo a matter. This recently happened to us as we were faced with a life altering opportunity. Tune in to see how we survived months of disagreement.

Grace Sharp is on the podcast this week. She is a new foster mom (3 months in!) but previously worked as a Group Home Manager.  This week she shares her journey on becoming a foster parent, and then to fostering a teenager.

The best symbiotic relationships are full of humility and service, and they require people to be vulnerable, communicative, and not self-centered. We have admittedly struggled with this in the past (especially as brand new foster parents). But we are pleased to admit that we are growing and acting like buttholes less and less! Progress!

Tax season is officially upon us, and so we decided to have the best tax preparer in all the land join us for an interview. We are thankful that Wes Watson (who happens to be Chris' dad) was able to make time for us, so he could share everything related to taxes for foster and adoptive families.

This episode is all about heart change and the times we have seen God move and change hearts. We've experienced lots of examples of God changing hearts in Jihae's parents. Starting with being ok with Jihae and Chris getting married, to being excited to have adopted and foster grandchildren. This is not always something that is easy for everyone, but lots of prayer and patience helps!

Welcome to Season 3 of the Fostering Voices Podcast! Today we talk about goals we achieved (and didn't achieve), and new goals for 2019. More importantly, we share some things that we have learned recently, and they are in the realm of how we talk to veterans, foster and adoptive parents AND kids, and so on. If we can all make a goal to be more mindful and cognizant of others, I think more of us can have an amazing new year.

Having little kids can be hard, especially during the holidays. But we discuss a few tricks and tools to help your family to enjoy the holidays! This certainly includes managing your expectations, as well as your calendar. And as always - talking about feelings, schedules, and everything in between.

This episode is a continuation of last week's episode with Speech Language Pathologist extraordinaire, Christie Priem. We discuss the final 2 (plus a bonus) developmental keys to spot in your children.

Our interview with Christie, she shares 5 Developmental Keys (plus a bonus one!) to help parents, and anyone who works with children, to recognize developmental delays, as well as so many other tools to help children to develop well. Because the interview was so rich with content, we broke it up into 2 parts. So today is part one!

This week we have an interview with Reggie Sheffield, who has worked with the Department of Child Safety for the last 8 years. He shares some wins that Arizona's foster care system has seen in recent years, as well as the hard parts of his job.

This week we talk briefly about three tips for people who are thinking of embarking on their foster care journey, or have just commenced.

This week we interview the lovely Rhonda Labatt of Redemption Market, a stunning ethical boutique that literally changes people's lives. Maybe not so much the customer's, but definitely the artisans behind the products. Rhonda has a huge heart for serving and loving the least of these, which is what led her to adopt her youngest daughter from Peru.

We talk about "How to Raise and Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success" by Julie Lythcott- Haims. It is a wonderful book that really has given us a lot to think about as we are raising all these kids, and what the negative repercussions of overparenting look like.

This week's interview is with Maggie Zehring of pragmaticallymaggie.co . She is a freelance writer, foster mom, pregnant lady, and bio mom. She has 3.5 kids who are 3 and under. (The .5 being the in utero babe.) She shares about her family's beautiful and tiring journey in foster care.