Lake Ridge Academy often sends out emails to its student families about needing host families for children that would like to spend a semester or school year at Lake Ridge from other countries. We read them and click delete - knowing that the timing isn't just right for us to bring on another person to be responsible for into our home.
A month ago, we received such an email from the school looking for 7 host families. Two things that sort of made me read deeper into the email were:
- Every morning when I dropped Norah off at the bus stop - another high school age student from Asia always waved to me as he walked from his host family's car to the bus. I never spoke to him personally but I felt he was really a sincere and friendly human being. This made me think about hosting a foreign student in the simplest form of "thinking about it".
- I was desperately seeking a nanny/child sitter for my kids this summer to cover 3-4 weeks when camp was over. All I could think of was how I wish we had an AuPair.
I was stuck in traffic on my way home from work. This is unusual because my commute is really easy at 15-20 minutes tops. So I opened this email and read it and read the brief bios of the students and my brain/heart immediately was captured by a young lady from Germany. I read her bio thinking to myself, if I was going to bring on a foreign exchange student, she would be the perfect student.
I was really running late by this time, so I called Jon on the phone to let him know and to see if he could maybe get Donovan from his pre-K/daycare, and I asked him if he had gotten the email about the need for host families for 7 of these foreign students. He said, "Yes, I sent you an email about it!" Given that I was driving, I asked him what his email was about. He said, "There was a student he felt would be a perfect fit for our family, if we were ever considering hosting." I asked him who it was, and it turns out it was the exact same person I was thinking.
We chatted longer and decided that we'd discuss it at the dinner table with Norah and Donovan and see if they would be willing to make some sacrifices to allow this student to stay with us for the school year. They both thought it was cool and realized that it meant they had to give up their play/tv room, that they would probably need to look through toys and offer some to Goodwill or other charity to make room in the house to accommodate another person.
These were all signs that bringing on the young teenager from Germany was the right thing to do. Even though some think we are crazy, we gave this lots of thought and consideration and feel that, we as a family, could gain so much from this experience. We know the road won't always be smooth and that there will be good days and not so good days - but in the end, all the positives out-weighed any negatives that we could think of.
So we made an inquiry and low and behold, we started the process to become a host family.
Yesterday, on the 4th of July, we received our first correspondence from our student. I will leave her name private, but I was so impressed with her email. She sounds so grown-up, a child of almost 15 with a good head on her shoulders, well-spoken and seemingly charming. Just like when I found out I was pregnant with Norah and Donovan, and I couldn't wait to meet them - I feel the same way about our German adoptive-for-a-year daughter. I am eagerly awaiting our first Skype on Sunday morning.
This will be what I am hoping is a fun-filled year with lots of new adventures, and that we all learn from this wonderful opportunity.
We thank her parents for putting their trust in us to make sure their daughter has a wonderful experience. Jon and I will do everything we can to make sure she is safe, cared for, loved and embraced fully as a member of our family while she is under our roof. That we hope to gain as much from this experience as she will by staying with us.
Our adventure begins soon …. (stay tuned)
That will be super super fun! Good luck!
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