A Family Adds One More at the Municipal Center

Something special happened at the Municipal Center on Thursday. A quiet ceremony, celebrated with immediate family, flowers and photos, welcomed seven year old Shay into the Springer family of Ridgefield. The adoption was held in Bethel because of the court districting.

 “We have known Shay since he was seven months old. He has been with different foster families, but now he is going to stay with us,” Linda Springer, mother of five, said.

 One of Springer's children is Shay's biological sister, Ava, 10. “We brought Ava home from the hospital when she was two weeks old,” Springer said. “Ava and Shay have always known each other.”

 Springer was not comfortable making any delineation between her adopted children and her own biological children. “We are a family,” she said.

 Over the years, Springer and her now ex-husband have raised this steadily growing family, with their oldest child being 31 years old. Over the years, Springer has taken in foster children, which she said was more difficult. “They've been through a lot, a broken family. It is easier when you have had them as babies.”

 Now a single mother, she doesn't seem to break stride with the addition of a seven year old boy. As the children ran around the green in front of the Municipal Center, playing tag, smiling and laughing, Shay looked as if he had been a part of this family forever.

 “It has been a journey,” she said. “People say I am a saint, but I wouldn't do it if I didn't get so much out of it. It doesn't matter where they came from. This is my family.”