we're certified, now what?

So we were certified in july of 2008, it was a lot of work but boy were we happy to receive our certification. Now we had to wait for the call, everytime the phone rang...............my stomach would get the butterflies and i was just hoping it was going to be the call we were waiting for. About a month of this and i settled down, the phone went back to being a minor annoyance and a portal for survey takers, pizza orders and telemarketers. We received a couple calls to do some respite care. We watched a five year old for a weekend. It was a fun weekend and he was a cute kid. What a different life this little guy must have experienced to be able to meet us a couple times, and then be able to just spend a whole weekend living with us in our home. I would have a hard time doing that and not having the support and company of at least one person to make me feel connected and safe. It was eye opening to have this little boy in our home, to see how resilient and trusting he was. Our second call was for a 3 year old boy and 1 year old girl. Usually respite care is done in your own home so you can experience children in your home and how you will do in your own environment but these two were already at a home that was doing respite care for them while their regular foster care family was away. So we went to their house to watch them for the evening. They were cute kids. The little boy was very rambunctious and required a lot of attention, the little girl was layed back and was able to play by herself more than the boy. I remembered him more at the time just because of his need for attention and constant supervision. We watched these two for a few hours one evening, who knew this was going to be the beginning of one of the most stunning and fabulous journeys i have ever had the pleasure of experiencing. About 2 weeks after watching these two siblings, we received a call that the little girl we did respite care for needed to be placed in a more permanent foster care home. They were needing to separate the two because of safety reasons and since we had taken care of her, we were being considered first for her placement. Oh wow! I cannot explain the excitement i felt. I must admit that at first i experienced some hesitation, i had always thought i wanted a younger child, a baby that would have all of his/her firsts with us. I soon discovered that all of that wasn't as important as i had made it in my head. I prayed on it and i knew in my heart that the call we received was the call we had been waiting for, God was giving us the child we were meant to have all along. We met our little sweet pea the last week of september.