Dang Parenting!

Riley and Anthony wanted to go to the Boys & Girls Club yesterday. Since it was raining anyway, I figured it would be a good plan for the day. When I picked them up later, Anthony had been written up for talking back to staff three times! Good grief! The only instructions I gave him when I had dropped him off were to do what the teachers told him and not talk back. There are days I would love to just wash his mouth out with soap..........but I don't. I'm guessing he's one of those kids that other people would say, "If I had him in my house for a few days, he wouldn't talk back like that!" They can feel free to live with him full time for a few weeks!

People have the mistaken impression that it's easier to raise an adopted child the earlier that they come into your home. That's not necessarily true. An older child has logic and words. They know what they are missing and it makes them angry and sad. Although they may be angry or have negative behaviors at times, they can verbalize what the issues are, if you let them. With a younger child, they usually don't even realize that they have a huge hole of loss and trauma, so they have no good way to express it. And they feel guilty for even feeling that way. A lot of the time, we expect them NOT to be traumatized because they've been with us for so long.

Anthony's been with us since he was almost two. Whereas Riley and Zeke came to us with severe issues, Anthony looked like a cute little boy with no issues. Riley and Zeke have come a long way, both physically and in discontinuing negative behaviors. So in the public's eye, they are doing really well. By extention, we are perceived as parenting really well.

Anthony, on the other hand, is now seven and his behaviors are continuing to worsen. Although the therapy has helped immensely this year, he still has a really hard time controlling his body, his words and his anger. Although his anger doesn't seem to be directed towards friends. It is mostly towards siblings and authority figures.

For my part, I just didn't have the emotional energy to deal with it in the ways I should have this year. Working with the Head Start kids with special needs took even more out of me than I thought, expecially the behavioral special needs. I'm realizing how much now that I'm not there. I need to regain a lot of intentional parenting with Anthony. One of the biggest things is that he is a very touchy kid and I am not. I need to get back out of my comfort zone and give him what he needs and not what I want.

Dang parenting!
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Yet Another Bathroom Update

Thanks to Amy, who looked at colors and tile in the bathroom, and Nan, who met me at Lowes, we now have a wall color picked out and the first coat on the wall. I'm hoping to get the second coat on later today.

Today I washed my hair with Hello Kitty shampoo and body wash. It was the only thing in the downstairs shower besides Axe and I'd rather smell like a strawberry than smell like a man. Aren't you glad you took the time to read my blog today?
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Another Bathroom Update

Sub-flooring is in and I've primed all the walls. It was a bit complicated with the five youngest all home when I was trying to paint. Now I've got to make the final decision on the wall color. Not today though :)
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Memorial Day

We had so much fun at our noon cookout

that we decided to have another one in the evening

and invite more people!

Steve & I ended the day by putting all the kids to bed

except the oldest and the youngest

(because the oldest can babysit the youngest :)

and then the adults relaxed in the hot tub next door.

Perfect end to a wonderful day!

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Making Fruit Pizza

Bathroom Update

The ceiling is painted and Steve is working on the sub-flooring this morning. Next up will be priming and then painting the walls.
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First Day at the Pool

Anthony loves the sand area

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Zeke does too

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It's a good thing I got a pool pass for Brittney

 because she'd miss out on so much at the pool!

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All the other pictures seem to have Sophia in them

so I can't really post them.

Hopefully in a few months, everyone

will get to see an over abundance of her pictures :)

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Normally I don't stay up late. However, it's 1:07am and here I am. It's because I was very nicely sleeping when Steve wakes me up to ask, "Should we be concerned? It's one o'clock and Brittney and Ashley are in the back yard with two boys?"
I get up, look out our bedroom window and, sure enough, Brittney and Ashley are jumping on the trampoline and there are now four, not two, boys on the deck.
After as much thought as I could muster at this time in the morning, I said it was fine. Here's my reasoning:

1. They're being quiet and aren't disturbing the neighbors or us.
2. After observing them, they're all being very appropriate.
3. It's summer vacation.
4. I'd rather they're in our backyard where I can keep an eye on them then have them somewhere else and not be aware of what's going on.

Kinda makes me wonder where their parents think they are though. So I will be hanging out in the house and un-officially monitoring the impromptu party going on in our backyard until they go home. I did poke my head out the back door and tell them not to be too loud, mainly just so they know I'm aware that they're there.

And this my friends, is why, from the time they are infants until they are out of the house, parents get very little sleep :)
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Random Pictures

Just another reason I love being home more often;

I can make good stuff to eat  :)

Kabobs on the grill!

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Stromboli

Made kind of like a pizza but then rolled up.

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The bathroom is ready for paint and the sub-flooring.

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Taylor & her friend Alisha at the EMT Rodeo.

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Anthony

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Brittney & Aubrey playing tether ball

while Coby plays his own game in the background.

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Zeke

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My fushia is finally flowering

Riley Says

I helped Riley with his laundry on Thursday by transfering it from the washing machine to the dryer. While doing so, I discovered that in his week's worth of laundry, there was no underwear. When I questioned him further, it turned out he hadn't changed underwear for the whole week!
His only response to my disgusted look was, "So?".
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Really?!!!! So now on my daily to-do list is to remind my 10 year old to put on clean underwear.
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Here's my world right at this moment: I have the computer in the dining room and am peacefully drinking coffee. Wait.......the peacefully is probably a lie, although right at the moment there isn't anyone yelling or tattling.

Sophia has her doll's car seat on the table and is feeding her baby. A few minutes ago, she was standing beside the table screaming at the top of her lungs. It took us a few minutes to convince her to use her words so we could figure out that she wanted the baby on the table.

Tayor is standing behind me braiding my hair. Pippi Longstocking here I come!

Riley is in the kitchen eating breakfast and tattling on Anthony, who is playing the Wii downstairs.

Zeke is also in the kitchen asking to pour his own milk onto his cereal. Do I let him and then have a mess or do I get up and do it for him? Too late. He's done it himself.

It's Steve's Saturday to work at the bank so he's gone until later.

On his way to work, Steve dropped Brittney off at Heather's to babysit today. She's been trying to earn money for her Washington DC trip. They leave in six days.

My dad is coming over sometime today to spray the texture in the bathroom. Looks like I might be able to paint next week!

I also need to plan my menu for next week and then go to Walmart. I hate going to Walmart. I consider it a necessary evil. At least I can wait until Steve gets home later today so I don't have to take all the kids.

It's officially the first day of summer vacation and I have no plan. That wouldn't sound sound like a bad thing but it might be with five kids inside and lots of rain outside.
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I got a good laugh this morning :)
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Taylor's chore was wiping off tables and counters. As she was cleaning with the Clorox wipes, Zeke reminded her she also needed to clean off the top of the stove. She glared at him and replied, "Well you'll never get a wife with that attitude!"
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“The face of a child can say it all,

especially the mouth part of the face.”

Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy

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Yikes! Only today and half of the day tomorrow left of school for the big kids. So much for getting a lot done while they were in school.

I'm going on 48 hours stuck at home. I don't want to take Sophia out because I don't want to expose anyone else. She broke out in little blisters around her mouth, a little bit on her arm and lots on her legs. They looked horrible but didn't seem to bother her much. The ones around her mouth look better today and seem to be going away so I'm hoping the virus runs it's course before too long.
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Yesterday I was completely blindsided by some emotions I didn't think would come up. More on that later. Today I discovered that the baby has hand, foot and mouth virus, leading to an unexpected trip to the doctor this afternoon. I left two of the boys in the care of the 6 teenage girls that were at our house working on a video project.
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Since I'll be home with Sophia all day tomorrow, I guess I'll have lots of time to work on the latest adoption paperwork. More on that later too. Now I've got to go because I have a little one beside me saying, "Up mama! Please mama!"
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Best moment of the evening..........

When we had friends over and all the kids in the backyard starting chanting at the top of their lungs, "Take it off, take it off, take it off!"

Even though the neighbors probably thought we were running a strip club, the kids were actually referring to something completely innocent. Zeke was having a major meltdown and had been sent to his room where he proceeded to scream and slam his door over and over. In the past when that happens, I simply take the door off the hinges. Steve asked me if he should go take the door off and that's when the "take it off" chanting started!
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Indoor Project

The bathroom project is moving along.......slowly.

The plumbing is all moved and the electrical wiring is done.

Steve put in all new insulation and now the sheet rock is up.

Next step is mudding and sanding.

I'm hoping we can finish that today so that Steve can put the new sub-flooring in tomorrow.

That way I can paint this coming week while the kids are still in school.

Outdoor Project

I was tired of the landscaping around our house looking terrible. The blocks were all falling down and there were weeds covering the whole thing. I pulled all the blocks out, we made the entire area smaller, and then I meaasured and put in just one row of blocks.

We need to throw some grass seed in the area in front of it

and then I'll have to decide what's I'm going to plant.

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The hostas I planted last year are doing well.

I still need to put the landscaping plastic and rocks in here

but that probably won't happen for a while since I'm on another spending freeze :)

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The good news is that I have a lot more free time now.
The bad news is that apparently I don't want to spend it on the computer!
But it's now 5am and I need something to do while I drink my morning coffee so here's another update:)

Steve had the day off yesterday so we (mainly he) worked on the upstairs bathroom. I just jumped in to help whenever he needed an extra set of hands. All the new insulation is in and part of the new sheet rock. He's hoping to finish the rest of the sheet rock today and be able to tape and mud it. Then comes the hard part.........deciding on colors for the paint and tile. I'm tempted to just default to the color scheme I used on the downstairs bathroom. We'll see.

We're having some issues with Riley again. I'm not going to post on the specifics but he has to be with an adult at all times right now, for an undetermined amount of time, because of some really bad choices he made. I hope we're not seeing regression because of seeing his birth mom.

We're now finished with Track for Brittney, Special Olympics Track for Zeke and Special Olympics Swimming for Zeke. Anthony still has soccer every Tues & Sat, although I think next week is the last week of spring soccer.  Piano lessons for Riley and Taylor will also end for the summer next week. Riley still has Little League Baseball every Tues and Thurs, which will continue throughout the summer. Brittney and Anthony will probably be going to Sioux Falls one day a week; Brittney for gymnastics training and Anthony for counseling. I anticipate a lot less running around this summer than in summer's past. I want the kids to have time to play and for us to be able to go to the pool. I already got the summer pool passes for everyone but Steve. Even the little one has to have one this year because she's over two now.

The kids will be out of school for the summer at noon on Friday. Then the fun begins!
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Zeke Says

This morning Zeke smiled and said to me, "Hey mom! Guess what my girlfriend said?"
"What did she say Zeke?"
"She told me that after I'm dead, in two months she will kiss me!"

So Zeke's girlfriend is either really demented or, more likely, she's not really his girlfriend and when Zeke wanted to kiss her, she said, "over my dead body!"
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Update on our little one:

1. All parental rights have been terminated.
2. The time frame for all appeals to termination have now expired.
3. The State has cleared Sophia to be adopted.
4. They have identified our family as the only current adoption placement for her.
5. Because laws have changed since our last adoptions, we now have to re-file paperwork before we can adopt, even though we were just re-licensed and aproved for adoption in April. So last night I filled out all the paperwork. Today during Steve's lunch, we'll go get fingerprinted again since the sherriff's office only does fingerprinting certain hours and days. Then I'll turn all of that paperwork into Social Services, who will then send everything to the FBI and DCI (dept of criminal investigations) who will actually do the screening. My results shouldn't take very long to return because I've always lived in the State of South Dakota. Steve's will probably take a while because he's lived in 5 states. Information will have to be sent to all those locations and then they will send back any paperwork they will need Steve to sign in order to screen further in their state.
6. I also have to have a telephone conference with our adoption caseworker and Sophia's Child Care Assistance caseworker. It should be just a formality to change the circumstances of the case to adoption and change my work information. This will hopefully happen on Monday.
7. Steve and I need to go to social services, also on Monday, and look over Sophia's case. Because I've been involved in the case from very early on and have also appeared in court, I already know most of the information. It's really just something on the State's checklist prior to adoption to ensure that an adoptive parent can't come back later and claim that they weren't made aware of certain information in the file.
8. Once all of that has been completed, we wait for the adoption worker to put the file together and write up a report. Then she'll let us know that we can have our lawyer file for a court date to adopt Sophia. Everyone involved is tentitively shooting for a date before the end of July but we'll have to wait and see how fast the paperwork progresses through the red tape :)

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Congrats to Sandy Wilkins on her new job!!!
She starts at the clinic on Monday!

Today's agenda:

• Early Headstart @ 8:30am
• Sophia's Adoption worker @ 11:15am
• Zeke's Special Olympics Track practice @ 5:30pm
• Anthony's soccer @ 6pm
• Brittney's BHS Varsity Ceremony @ 7pm

It appears that I'd better get busy! Although I do have some time in the middle of the day for a bit of reading or organizing. I'm trying to get a little "me" time in during the day so that I can be more attentive to my kids when they get home from school.
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For the first time in months, I feel like my house is clean!!!

A few extra hours at home while the kids

are still in school does wonders.

I'm not wasting any more time on the computer this morning!

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Anthony's Soccer Practice

 

It's Steve's morning to work at the bank so I'm taking 5 kids to Anthony's soccer practice.
Wish me well!
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YAY!!!!! My brother is coming for Memorial weekend! 

Boo!!! I have to print something for my 9am meeting and I just discovered the kids used all the printer ink! Guess who's making a 5am trip to Walmart?
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Update from their aunt Jolene:

"God is good. He is watching over Doyle, Jodi, Jason, Justin, and Joshua. Jason and Joshua are at Avera in SFalls. Jason has two bruises on his brain and is sedated. Joshua has a sinus fracture and stitches. Thanks for your prayers for healing, rest, minimal pain, safe travel, etc. All the Moberg's and Johnson's really appreciate it!"
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Urgent Prayer Request

Two of my friend Jodi's young boys were in a 4 wheeler accident tonight. One (age 11) was airlifted to Sioux Falls and the other (age 4) is still at the hospital in Brookings.
Please keep their family in your prayers tonight and in the following days.
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Today is my last day at Head Start!!!! I can't believe I actually made it through this year. Trying to meet the needs of my family and then working 32+ hours a week with children who need a lot of physical and emotional attention left me with nothing at the end of the day.
I have until May 25th to accomplish my giant list of things I've had to put off. That's when my kids get out of school!
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For those of you asking how the bathroom project is going, new insulation and sheetrock is up on the west wall and has been mudded and taped.
The new tub/shower is installed on the north wall.
The cabinets and sheetrock have all been torn out from the east wall. The plumbing is being moved over next week so that the new vanity will fit correctly. The new vanity has been ordered (I think) but won't be here for a month and the new toilet is sitting in it's box in our garage. We still need to move the electric box for the light fixture, hopefully this week. Once that is done and the plumbing is moved, we can sheetrock the east wall. Then the painting and tiling can begin. I can't wait until we have two working toilets in our house again!
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Riley dressed up for Fancy Day at school.

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Riley thought it was awesome that we could eat the peanuts and throw the shells on the floor.

I had a hard time doing so myself.

Not in my nature to deliberately make a mess!

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Riley and his birth mom.

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Here's Anthony eating the latest exotic fruit - passion fruit.

I cut through the hard outer skin and then he would scoop out the inside and eat it.

The inside was the consistancy of a pommegranite except really slimy and a bit sour.

I wasn't a fan but Anthony loved it!

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Here's Taylor eating the Ugli fruit.

It looked like a big odd-shaped orange, both inside and out.

It tasted like one too.

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Zeke getting on the bus to head

to Sioux Falls for the Special Olympics Regional Swim Meet.

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Brittney in the new zero gravity chair at Grandma & Grandpa's.

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The picture Zeke made me take and then insisted I post on FaceBook!

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Downsizing #5 and Scare Concerning Riley

I have a lot I want to do around the house today and really shouldn't be on the computer but here I am anyway because there are two important things to note and it's always nice to put off cleaning and laundry for a while!
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1.  Downsizing #5
 I've been thinking a lot lately about whether or not I would go back to work with Head Start in the fall. There are many factors involved, but especially the fact that I feel like I haven't had the physical or emotional energy left for my own family. I finally (should have done this first, I know :) asked God to please make it clear to me what is the best plan for my life concerning my job.

Right away some things came up that have made it perfectly clear to me that I need to be with my family in the fall. This week, an issue came up at work, which I can't be specific about because of work confidentiality, but I felt it needed to be addressed and was putting others at risk. I followed the proper chain of authority but all everyone wanted to do was play the blame game. So instead of figuring out a helpful solution, everyone seems to be trying to absolve themselves of responsibility by blaming each other, which not only doesn't help resolve the issue, it also causes tension between people. I've done as much as I can to try to help but I don't have the time or the energy to fight on this one, so I won't. They all have the information and what they choose to do with it is up to them.

The other interesting thing that happened this week concerning my decision was that I attended a short parenting seminar put on by the Early Head Start program. The presenter discussed that the best investment we can make is our children. One of the facts she shared is that, on average, we only spend 23 minutes a week in meaningful conversation with our children. That hit me hard because I know the facts about the success rate of children who's parents were very intentional about their parenting and I feel like I haven't been able to do that very successfully this school year. I've just been getting by and that's not good enough for my family.

So because of that and a few other things, I've decided I won't be going back to Head Start in the fall. I will still be working with Dawnna at Berndt Produce for two days a week in the fall since that seems to work well for myself and my family. I'm excited to be able to parent intentionally again and have more time to devote to my family and friends!

2. Scare Concerning Riley

I received a phone call at work on Thursday afternoon from the principal at Riley's school. They had been at a field trip to DeSmet to see the Laura Ingalls Wilder homestead and right before they got on the bus to come back, the left side of Riley's neck started to swell. He said he hadn't been stung by anything but they didn't know for sure. They tried to call me at that point but of course, I had left my phone in the van that day instead of taking it into work. They got on the bus and by the time they made it back to the school, Riley's neck and side of his face were so swollen that they couldn't see his jaw bone. By then, they had finally reached me at Head Start on the office phone and I left work immediately and went to pick him up. They said he hadn't had any trouble breathing yet but the swelling continued.

He and I went right from his school to see his doctor at the clinic.
She got him right away and it turned out that the quick swelling was caused by a chain of events. He had an incredibly bad ear infection in his left ear. The infection had spread to his tonsils and the left lymph node in his neck. The doctor thinks what happened is that after he was running around on the field trip and got hot and sweaty, he drank cold water. The infection reacted to the cold water and immediately started to swell.

She put him on some high-powered antibiotics and some ear drops. That would lead into the story of my second epic parent fail in 24 hours........but that will have to be a story for another day. I've already spent too much time typing this story already!

Riley is feeling much better now and the swelling is almost gone.
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I know I left everyone hanging about Riley's trip the other day. I haven't felt like writing about it because I haven't really processed it myself yet. But to satisfy curiosity, I'll just give the basics for now.

Riley, Sara and I drove the two hours to his mom's house. We stayed at her house an hour and a half and then went to lunch with her. Riley's initial greeting when he got out of the car was fairly cautious. He didn't run and jump into her arms or anything. He got out of the car and slowly walked over to her. She held out her arms and they hugged for a minute. When we went inside, Riley didn't really say much unless prompted and he always came back to sit by me on the couch. I had to continually ask him questions to get him to talk.

He finally started opening up a bit more while we were at lunch but was still very reserved for Riley's normal personality.

He met his half brother (5yrs) and sister (almost 2). They interacted briefly and Riley went with him whenever his brother wanted to show him something but Riley was usually right back by my side within a few minutes.

Riley's birthmom still takes no responsibility for anything that happened to the boys.

Before we got there, I told Riley what time we would get there and what time we would leave and that I planned to eat in Sioux Falls after the visit. He didn't have any problem when it was time to leave and jumped right in the car. On the way home I asked him if he wanted to go back again sometime and he said yes but he hasn't talked about it since.
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