Bigger Families for the Holidays

Bonnie Hinrichs swears that Christa is the last one.

The Lucerne Valley mother has helped raise 204 foster kids in need of emergency care and adopted two children over the last 15 years. On Friday afternoon, she expanded her family again, adopting 2-year-old Christa Lynn, whom Hinrichs has cared for since she was 10 weeks old.

“When you take in a baby, you really can’t get rid of ‘em,” said Hinrichs, 55. “You get attached.” Her husband died six years ago, and Hinrichs said she doesn’t like it quiet: “I can sleep better if the kids are in the house making noise.”

Hinrichs and Christa were among the hundreds of people at the Ontario Convention Center on Friday afternoon celebrating their newly formed families at San Bernardino County’s eighth annual Adoption Finalization Event.

More than 50 children, many of whom had been living with their foster families for years, formally found permanent homes as three judges and two legal officers conducted adoption ceremonies in time for the holidays.

Toddlers fidgeted and mewled as officials from the county Department of Children’s Services and the Board of Supervisors and the city of Ontario addressed the families.

The county conducts about 500 adoptions a year, but the December celebration is the largest single adoption event, said county social service practitioner Tamara Scott.

With holiday lights twinkling, parents and kids mugged for photos in front of a balloon snowman family before adjourning into makeshift courtrooms one family at a time.

Rebecca and Lance Knudson sat anxiously before Presiding Judge Peter H. Norell as their son Jaiden, 3, squirmed in her arms and their newest child, 8-month-old Faith Elizabeth, wiggled in his. A teddy bear and Faith’s shiny pink blanket rested beside the stack of documents as Rebecca Knudson, 30, signed her name.

“The record will reflect both parents signed the consent of adoption form,” Norell said, as Rebecca Knudson grinned.

“It’s almost like getting married,” said Lance Knudson, 28, a Marine staff sergeant.

The Knudsons’ new daughter, dressed in a pink-and-black dress, will join two brothers and a sister in Twentynine Palms. The Knudsons have raised Faith since she was 6 weeks old; she was abandoned at Arrowhead Regional Medical Center.

“Today is huge,” Rebecca Knudson said. “It means I can start answering the phone again. There won’t be any calls saying I have to give her back.”

Legalizing the children’s loving, stable homes is one of the most important services of the juvenile court, said Presiding Judge James C. McGuire. “All the happy families -- the joy in the room -- is something you don’t see very much.”

James Silcock, 43, and his wife, Ann Belles, 42, of Huntington Beach adopted their 35th son, Shawn, 4, who has cerebral palsy, kidney disease and other ailments. All of their children are disabled, and nearly 10 aides go to their home each day to help.

“Every morning that I wake up, I feel good about what’s going to happen that day,” said Silcock. “I know I’m going to make a big difference in people’s lives.”

The Knudsons will be moving to a Marine base in Cherry Point, N.C., soon, and Lance Knudson will probably be deployed to Iraq. Knowing Faith is a permanent part of the family will “make this move a little bit better emotionally,” his wife said. “Biological birth isn’t the only way to make your family a family.”