Foundation For Large Families
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Eight isn't enough for Preston couple
Keep adoption options open after taking on siblings
BY KATHY PLUM
July 26, 2003
The Dominion Post
They're not heralding newborn octuplets, but it is a new family. The Shreves adopted eight siblings last month, ranging in age from 6 to 16.
"If anyone asks me where they came from, I say they're from heaven," Katy Shreve said.
Garrett Seth, 16; Erin Elizabeth, 14; Kyle Alexander, 13; Zachary Scott, 12; Jeremy Blake, 11; Alyssa Brianna, 8; Hunter Ray, 7; and Bryce Wesley, 6, were in foster care, when the Shreves took Garrett as a foster child on Sept. 20, 2001.
"We took him because no one wanted a 14-year-old boy. We said 'sure,'" Katy Shreve recalled.
Garrett told them about his brothers and sisters. All share the same mother, an Upshur County woman. The eldest five were born during her first marriage, the youngest three during a second marriage. The state assumed custody of the children.
"They usually don't move foster kids this far from their original county, but they ran out of foster homes in their home county," Katy Shreve explained.
Gary and Katy Shreve, both 41, knew soon after their marriage May 26, 1990, that they couldn't have children, and their first marriages had been infertile as well.
The Shreves talked with the state Division of Human Resources, which said they could adopt as many of the children as they wanted, because parental rights had been terminated. A few at a time, the children came to live with the Shreves as foster children.
In the end, they saw only one choice. On June 16, Preston Circuit Judge Lawrance Miller Jr. finalized the Shreves' adoption of all eight.
"He let me sit in his judge chair," Alyssa noted.
The kids have been through a lot. At a former foster home, Bryce and Hunter switched identities, and Hunter enrolled in kindergarten instead of his brother. The ruse worked for two days before anyone noticed.
Kyle had run away from other foster homes and a shelter, and 11 months ago he and Zach ran from the Shreve household too, though they only went as far as the neighboring field. Now Kyle says he likes "everything" at his new home.
"I never ran away from here, but a couple times I got upset," Garrett said.
The eldest daughter, 14-year-old Erin, had mothered "the babies" and her alcoholic mother for years. She recalled when her mother would have her and Garrett put sheets on their heads and scare the young ones by saying if they didn't go to sleep, the Boogey Man would get them.
When Erin and Alyssa arrived three days before Christmas 2002, "I wanted to take Alyssa and leave." She's changed her mind. Now she shares the chores and has a chance to be an eighth-grader and play softball. And she uses her baby-sitting knowledge to earn some extra cash.
"I like school," Erin said. "It's fun."
When the whole family went on vacation to Idlewild Park and Six Flags, they wore lime green T-shirts, to keep track of one another. On the shirts it says "What once was a dream is now reality. The Shreve Family."
The Cape Cod-style house on Preston County's Zinn Chapel Road is alive with children's voices and laughter, along with their pets: Chunk the poodle, Spot the Dalmatian, Ricky the ferret, and several cats and kittens.
"It's just a group effort. I don't do it all. I don't claim to do it all. My biggest goal is to keep them together," Katy Shreve said. "I feel bad for their mom for her loss, but the way I look at it, she was just having my children for me."
Gary and Katy have to stay organized. Everyone has chores assigned, but they run into some unexpected obstacles.
"The problem here is when you do a recipe, you have to do it like four times, so you have to do a lot of math," Katy said. "When we make pizza, it's a big group effort."
All the children were baptized in the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints, in Masontown, and all played baseball this summer.
An instant family of eight also requires some changes in the household. The five-bedroom home is large enough for everyone, but now has two freezers, two refrigerators, two washers and two dryers. Two filing cabinets are needed for homework. Out front is a seven-passenger van, "Mom's Taxi."
Others have helped too. The attorney who handled the adoption gave each child $50, Mylan Pharmaceutical employees sent welcome gifts, and Jackson and Kelly law firm employees filled a "wish list" for the children.
With all pitching in, everything goes smoothly.
"It doesn't seem like eight," Zach observed.
And they certainly aren't ready to say eight is enough. When the family attended a conference on adoption at Stonewall Jackson Resort last weekend, they loved the babies.
"If we ever expand again, we'll have to add on again," Katy Shreve observed.
"We will," her husband assured her.
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