John and Kristi Oakey have provided their children with a multitude of adventures.
“Our big thing is having experiences, so we like to go on trips,” said John, who readers might recognize as the First News anchor on KETV NewsWatch 7. “Alivia came home one day and said ‘can you believe [a classmate] has never been on a cruise?’ She thinks everyone does that.”
When not traveling, the children stay busy. Daughters Trinity, age 13; Alivia, age 12; and Kinley, age 9; play soccer. Son Kaleb, age 11, plays baseball and football. Trinity and Alivia play in band at school.
These children became part of the Oakey family through a wild adventure. John and Kristi were thrilled when son Blake (not pictured) was born in March 1991, and again when son Brady (also not pictured) was born two years later, but as the millennium approached, there were no more children. Kristi eventually discovered it was not meant to be. The couple put their names in for adoption through their church, but for four years, nothing happened.
In the mid-2000s, Kristi took a work trip that changed their lives when she met someone who told her about fostering children. John was skeptical that his wife could handle being emotionally attached to a foster child, only to have to give that child back to a birth parent, but they decided to try. The process of applying to be a foster family was tough.
“They don’t sugar-coat it. They want to make sure you know the kids may be coming from a bad domestic life,” John said. “I felt like we had a lot to offer.”
In early July 2009, the couple were accepted as foster parents, and were almost immediately offered two little boys age 2. The Oakeys, who wanted one foster child, turned them down.
A week later, on July 10, DHHS called them back and said they had a little girl. Kristi and John were thrilled, and went to Project Harmony, where the little girl was being kept safe.
“This is Trinity,” said Child Saving Institute employee Kelly Schick, their friend and wife of then-KETV sports reporter Matt Schick. Project Harmony partners with Child Saving Institute to provide immediate care. The Oakeys looked at the brown-haired, brown eyed girl, and realized she was right for them.
“I held her,” said Kristi, who immediately loved the nine-month old girl. “John said, ‘we can do this.’”
Kelly also knew they could do this, and was happy this special youngster was going to a remarkable place.
“[At Project Harmony] I could have up to 30 children in my charge, but Trinity was the only baby I had that day,” said Kelly, who now lives in North Carolina with Matt. “I knew the Oakeys were going to provide her with a great home.”
John and Kristi, then parents of two teenage boys, quickly created a space for a baby girl. “We had nothing,” Kristi said. “They gave us a gift card to Target, but it wasn’t nearly enough.”
She continued, “It was kind of funny. I headed for dresses and frilly things, John was more practical. He headed for diapers. We spent a lot more than they give you.”
A week after caring for the baby, however, the Oakeys received unexpected news. Trinity’s birth mother, who was in jail, was pregnant. DHHS did not want to split up the family, and the baby would need to go to foster care when it was born.
More than one foster child was not in their plans, but without hesitation, John said, “We’ll take the baby.” Five months later, Alivia was born.
The parents held full-time jobs (Kristi owns a home health care service) and raised four children in two different, often difficult, age ranges.
The two girls called John “Daddy” and Kristi “Mommy,” and visited their birth mother. After 18 months, the courts decided the birth mother could raise her children. This included a newborn boy named Kaleb, who the birth mother took home from the hospital.
“It’s sad what the system…they are always going to favor birth families even though that isn’t always the best situation for the kids,” Kelly said. “The birth mom never shut the Oakeys out...The Oakeys provided such a stable home, which is exactly what those kids needed.”
John and Kristi took the girls on the weekends. They kept the girls going to the Goddard School (a preschool), and bought clothes and shoes for them.
“We caught on after a while,” John said. “We would send them to [mom] in nice clothes, and when they returned, they were in different clothes.”
John and Kristi began keeping the clothes and toys at their house. Eventually, the Oakeys went to pick up the children and realized they were living in a filthy home. Then, the Oakeys lost contact with them.
One week later, John and Kristi received a phone call. “They’re asking for you,” the girls’ biological grandmother said.
As required by law, DHHS maintained ties with the Oakeys as a foster family for 15 months following the return of the children to their birth mother. The day the birth mother’s family reported her to the authorities was the 15-month date. The Oakeys picked up the two girls again, along with Kaleb, who knew few people outside of his sisters.
“DHHS said ‘They go together, or they stay together,’” Kristi explained. The agency did not want to run the risk of having the family take the little boy only to later separate him from his sisters.
The family acquired a new set of baby items. The toddler latched onto John within the first two weeks, calling him “Mom.” During visitations, the foster parents noticed the birth mother was growing. She denied being pregnant, but her condition became undeniable.
The fourth baby was born with drugs in her system and thus surrendered to foster care. A newborn baby is easy to place; however, the ideal situation is still to keep the biological siblings together. The Oakeys were given first notification when the newborn was ready to be released into foster care, and had 30 minutes to decide whether or not to take the baby. They had talked about this coming child all summer and had determined they could not foster another little one.
“The social worker called me and said ‘she looks just like Trinity,’” Kristi said. “I said I had to call John.”
John prayed as he headed to get a haircut, and felt overwhelmed with the idea that they should have this baby.
“What am I going to say in 18 years when this girl comes looking for her siblings?” John said.
The Oakeys took baby Kinley in 2012. One year later, the birth mother relinquished her rights to the children, and the two fathers also relinquished their rights. John and Kristi legally adopted all four children Dec. 23, 2013.
These days, the children live a quality life with their parents and bernedoodle dogs.
“What I realized because our children have a lot of baggage, I want them to learn to attach to something and love,” Kristi said.
The family now declares each Dec. 23 as “Oakey Day.” They spend the day together, participating in fun activities such as their trip to Urban Air Adventure Park in 2021.
Each day is an adventure, some good, others difficult, but the Oakeys would not have it any other way.
This article originally appeared in the 2022 edition of Family Guide.