Nov 25, 2013 3 min read

Baby Emma arrived at the Ritenour household as a foster child Dec. 22, 2010, and she turned 4 months old on Christmas Day.

This year, Emma, now 3, is no longer a foster child but the daughter of Jared and Lee Marie Ritenour, who called the toddler wriggling on her lap “the best Christmas present ever.”

Emma’s was one of 58 adoptions finalized during the past year, and the families gathered Friday in the public meeting room of the Washington County Courthouse Square office building to mark the occasion with a buffet dinner and entertainment by magician David Lawrence.

A typical 3-year-old, the pink-clad Emma could barely contain herself as her father arrived with a plate of food.

“Emma loves The Wiggles,” her mother explained, and the little girl got to see her favorite characters in concert for her birthday.

“And eat birthday cake!” Emma exclaimed as she devoured a thickly-frosted cupcake.

Mrs. Ritenour said people who learn Emma is adopted sometimes remark how lucky she is.

“We’re the lucky ones,” Mrs. Ritenour said of herself and her husband by way of a gentle correction. “I couldn’t imagine, either one of us, our lives, without her in it.”

And Friday’s event might not be the only one like it that Emma attends.

Another foster child living with the Ritenours arrived at a later Christmastime, and they hope to adopt him in the near future.

A check of statistics shows that 58 adoptions is the highest number in Washington County since 2010, when there were 68.

Through the laughter generated by the magician, no one was probably thinking of the gathering as tax dollars at work, but CYS officials said taxpayers, along with adoptive families, play an important role in the process for an agency that has a budget of $18,699,212 for 2014.

A federal adoption law, known as Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act, was signed in 2008 by President George W. Bush.

Adoption subsidies can last until a child turns 18, and if a child is adopted at age 13 or after, the subsidy can extend until the child is 21.

“There is a local match to state and federal dollars,” said Kimberly Rogers, CYS administrator. “They cannot receive more than what they would have received as a foster family, $22 a day.”

The majority of adoptees are very young, but not all.

“We have a 17-year-old who was just adopted last month,” said Dee Dee Blosnich-Gooden, CYS supervisor for adoption. “For this round, she’s probably the oldest.”