Support worker visit

We had a visit from our support worker today, who came round to see how we're getting on, and to explain how to fill in some of the recording forms we need to do for Jack-Jack. When we told her that he arrived with absolutely nothing and that we've had to completely set him up, she suggested that we send proof of our receipts to Jane and see whether she could authorise a one-off payment to help towards the cost. Apparently this is discretionary and does occasionally happen. Although we don't get paid to foster, we do receive a fortnightly allowance that's supposed to cover Jack-Jack's needs - we've calculated that it will take almost two months of that just to cover what we've spent on him in the last 10 days, and by then he'll be in the next size up of clothes and will need a whole new wardrobe anyway so we'll be back to square one! The support worker also told us about a session that's taking place in a couple of weeks for foster carers to learn more about the matching and placement process which sounds interesting. It will be a good opportunity to meet other local carers anyway!

Jack-Jack has contact planned for tomorrow again, although if it keeps snowing at this rate I don't know whether the sessional worker will be able to get here to pick him up! I hope it does go ahead - it's been almost two weeks now since he saw his mum and it must be so confusing for him. They've told us that contact is due to be three times a week - if this is the case then the sooner it starts the better, so that it can become part of his new routine.

We're all new to this weaning thing, but Jack-Jack's very curious about food (especially if we're eating it at the same time) and is very happy to try anything we give him. He's now tried (aside from baby food) banana, rice cake, spaghetti shapes, toast and margarine, breadsticks, peeled grapes, blueberries, pasta and pesto, baked potato, tomato, cucumber, red pepper, lettuce, bread, a corner of a bourbon biscuit, cauliflower, carrot, broccoli, crumpet, innocent smoothie and weetabix. He's also had some extremely diluted fruit juice, but seems to prefer water (or sips of our smoothie if we're having some - we may have to start hiding in cupboards to drink it so that he doesn't notice - his "sips" are remarkably large for one so small!)

Paperwork

Our social care worker came to visit us on Friday, to go through some paperwork with us and drop off an enormous folder of various policies and procedures for us to read through over Christmas.

Fostering involves a LOT of paperwork.

• To start with, we had to complete an initial application form to apply to become foster carers.
• We then had to return a form, once invited to attend the Skills to Foster training, to confirm that we still wanted to go.
• We completed activities and case studies every week for six weeks, plus filled in our 217-page workbook.
• At the end of the training, we filled in a form about our experiences and what we'd learned.
• We filled in a form about Lady - what training she's had, where she sleeps, when she's exercised etc.
• We drew an eco map detailing our support network.
• We wrote out our family trees.
• We wrote a detailed description of our local area.
• We then spent three months with Jane visiting our home every couple of weeks, talking through  and completing what was to become our "Form F" - this ended up being 91 pages without the references (as we weren't allowed to see them - there were two employer references, one past partner reference, two personal references and two family references, and each of those involved the person filling in a form, speaking to Jane on the phone, and then signing off a summary of the discussion.)
• We filled in an enhanced CRB form, which involved looking up every address we've lived at since birth - for me that was 25 different addresses!
• We completed a "Safer Caring" policy for our home.
• We chased our medical reports from our GP.
• We wrote to our landlords to request a letter confirming they weren't intending to sell the house from under us.
• We filled in a form to confirm our bank details for fostering allowance payments.
• We created various spreadsheets to track purchases we've made, detailing our set-up costs.
• We read through and made notes on two full drafts of the Form F before it was submitted to Panel.

Since we've been approved, we've had to fill in a child-friendly profile sheet about us and our house (including photos!) and we've been sent a form to fill in about our experiences of the assessment process and Panel. We also have to send a template letter to our insurance company to let them know we are now foster carers.

We have to have a meeting with Jane to sign various agreements and charters.

Once a foster placement arrives, the paperwork steps up another notch. For every child or baby who lives with us, for however long that might be, we will need to complete (this is not an exhaustive list):

• A placement plan - this is several pages long and contains all the child's details, times of agreed contact with birth family, likes/dislikes, medications, education etc.
• Care plan
• Child-specific Safer Caring policy
• Daily recording sheets detailing anything significant the child has done, achieved or said that day, or any behaviours they've had.
• Fortnightly expenditure forms.
• Birthday/festival/holiday allowance forms.
• Accident reports.

We will have various meetings, supervision sessions and reviews that we need to prepare for.

During the first year that we foster, we have to complete the Children’s Workforce Development Council (CWDC) induction standards for foster care. This is a 25-page workbook that we fill in with our Social Care Worker - it's essentially to provide evidence of our skills, knowledge and achievement relating to caring for looked after children and is based on a national minimum benchmark.

We also have to file an annual tax return as we're classed as self-employed.

It looks crazy seeing it all written down!

Coming from working in a fairly "paperless" office where the vast majority of data is held electronically, the amount of paperwork we've come across in the last 6 months of this process has been quite shocking!

Esmeralda thinks the Council should have a policy like Velvet toilet tissue, where they plant three trees for every one that's cut down and turned into forms... Now, where's that comment card..?

Waiting

We've been waiting over a week since panel for an independent decision maker to ratify the decision. We were told it would take 1-2 weeks so hopefully we'll hear on Monday or Tuesday, and then our first placement should follow as soon as possible after that, provided they agree with the recommendation.

The waiting at each stage of the process has been hard, especially the unknown element. We've been trying to explain it to people who ask how we're doing by saying that it feels like we're pregnant without a due date, but of course we don't know what age our first placement will be either, so it's not like we can really fully prepare. There's now a cot in our room and bunk beds in the spare room (our preference is 0-8 years), we've bought bits and pieces of equipment, toys and emergency clothes for various ages, and we have a high chair and a buggy downstairs. I'll mention at this point that although we will get a payment back from social services toward the larger items we need to purchase (like furniture, a steriliser, a baby monitor, car seat etc.) they don't go anywhere near covering the cost of one that you would actually buy, so you always need to supplement the cost as well as making the initial outlay. Fostering is definitely not something you go into if you're in it for the money!