"I can't talk about it, but I can tell you all I'm a happy girl. I'm a happy girl right now," she said to reporters gathered outside the Izard County courtroom of Judge Lee Harrod.
"I love Judge Harrod, I'll tell you that. I love that man. He's a good man," she said before being driven away from the courthouse. Though McCready stayed mum at the courthouse, she later sent a text message to news channel HLN that read, "WE WON!!! ZAN STAYS..."
Details on when the singer may be able to take Zander back home to Nashville, and whether McCready will get permanent custody of her son remain unclear.
"The next step would be for the judge to decide," Amy Webb, director of communications for the Arkansas Department of Human Services, told ABC News.
Florida Department of Children and Families officials had been expected to request in the hearing that Zander be sent back to Cape Coral, Fla., where McCready's mother, Gayle Inge, is his legal guardian.
"We will not discuss details of this case per the judge's order. Of course we continue to work with all involved parties to ensure this child's safety and well-being," a Florida DCF spokeswoman told ABCNews.com. McCready's rep offered no information either. "All proceedings and documentation surrounding the hearing are sealed," Kat Atwood said in a statement to ABCNews.com. "No further information is available at this time."
McCready and her son were found by Arkansas police Friday hiding in the closet of an unoccupied summer home days after the pair were first reported missing. "I understand when a Mom wants her kid, and a mom would do anything for her kid, but she is not excused from the law just because her name is Mindy McCready," her younger half-brother, Sky Phelan, wrote on a Facebook fan page Sunday. "The extreme that Mindy went to was completely unnecessary."
The boy's father and McCready's ex-boyfriend, Billy McKnight, revealed Monday that he had allowed the singer an extended visit with their son after the Thanksgiving weekend. "She called me up before Thanksgiving and said, 'Hey, look Billy, I'm going back home and I'm going to have these kids [McCready is expecting twins]. I'm not going to be able to be down here. Could I keep the baby this weekend?' And I offered that to her, and when I did that she took him," McKnight told the website Taste of Country.
Under the current custody agreement, McCready's mother, Gayle Inge, is Zander's guardian. McKnight told Taste of Country that he has unsupervised visits with his son four nights a week, and the boy stays with his grandparents the other nights of the week. McCready's visits are supervised by her parents, he said.
But the singer claimed that her son was in danger "both physically and emotionally" while living with her mother, and she was willing to risk jail to protect Zander.
"I'm a mom first," she told The Associated Press last Thursday from Nashville. "No matter what happens, I'm going to protect my kid. If I have to go to jail, so be it."
Both Inge and Phelan deny the abuse allegations.
"If anyone wants to message me, and ask me if I am abused, you are welcome to. I will give you the answer NO, ABSOLUTELY NOT AND NEITHER IS ZANDER," Phelan wrote, using capital letters for emphasis. "All that boy gets is lots of love. My mom is not and never was an abusive person."
"She is looking for the easy way out when she could work the programs provided to her by the court system," Phelan added.
McKnight, who hopes to have full custody of Zander by early 2012, echoed Phelan. "Instead of complying, she did what she did, which is going to set her back probably a pretty good bit," he said.
McCready defied a Florida judge's order last week when she refused to return her son to his grandmother's house. She revealed at the time that she was pregnant with twins and would be unable to travel.
McCready spokeswoman Kat Atwood told ABCNews.com that the singer is entering her sixth month of pregnancy.
"She and the twins' father have been enjoying time spent out of the spotlight," she said. "Although they are excited in the baby news, they would 'like' to continue to do so in private at this time (as much as they can)."
The father is believed to be David Wilson, the man who spoke to police at an unoccupied lake home in Heber Springs, Ark., while the multi-platinum-selling recording artist was hiding in a closet with her son.
Even for McCready, who has struggled with addiction, depression, brushes with the law and a long custody battle over Zander, her latest troubles seemed to be a new low.
I cried and felt terrible for my sister when I found out that she had been hiding in a closet in someone else's home," Phelan said. "Although I don't agree with the things that she does, I will always love my sister, Mindy."
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