A LONG 24 Hours

My girl is home! Yippee! Yesterday at about 04:30, Mr. Clean drove to "Metropolis" to meet her 06:15 flight and bring her home from the airport. He stopped to grab some breakfast on the way back, stopping about 5 minutes from our house, and to not further torture me he decided to get "take out" for all of us to eat together. Except when he went to leave, the battery had died in the mini-van.

Unfortunately since he had the van, there was no way I could pick them up with the Volvo. A family of 6 does not easily (nor legally) fit into a Volvo designed to seat 5. After trying with two different people, Mr. Clean got the van jumped and running and came home. I could finally hug my girl and just breathe in her presence.

After replacing the battery, which needed to be done anyway, we were satisfied that would solve the problem. We were wrong. I drove the van and had no problems, but later when Mr. Clean decided to take the kidlets to the pool, the van was dead again. We jump started it and took it to our local auto shop. Four hundred dollars later, we know we have another problem, but nothing that has to do with the battery. For that diagnosis we have to go to the dreaded dealer. The dollar signs are piling up in the pit of my stomach.

The day went on as usual and we spent A LOT of time just being with the kids and enjoying Xena being home. The "crash" I expected from her never occurred during the day, even though she confided that she never slept on the red-eye from Oregon. She gladly went to bed on East Coast time and slept in until West Coast time this morning. The girl was exhausted! No matter, she is home and that's the best part. Van or no van.

Doing A Happy Dance!

Early tomorrow morning my princess will be home. It has been a LONG month without her and I am a ball of energy just waiting for the morning. I just hope I can sleep tonight!

Xena and her cousin - both 6 year old beauties, all dolled up!

The Young And The Listless

Mr. Clean and I have been using cash for a lot of things lately and trying not to "go nuts" in budgeted categories which do not have "go nuts" balances, like dining out. So last week we decided that once our respite baby went home to her foster parents we would take the children out to lunch after church to enjoy some family time.

The plan was to leave at about 16:00 and eat with all the "early birds", after coming home to relax for a while and let Iggy take a nap. At around 15:55 C'sa fell asleep on the family room floor. It had been a long week for everyone! No matter, we would wake her and head out.

I knelt by her and kissed her forehead to wake her gently. She was not budging, not even an eye lash flutter and she felt a little warm. So I kissed her again to see how warm she really felt. After all, she was snuggled in a blanket and sleep always makes my babies warm to the touch. She was warm. Very warm.

I got the ear thermometer, which although is never very accurate, it will get you in the ballpark. Three different readings put her temperature above 103 degrees (about 39 degrees Celsius for all my metric friends). Even taking her temperature did not wake her. She was zonked.

I transferred her to the couch with her pillow and a better blanket remembering how earlier while snuggling with me she insisted she was "freezing". Indulging her, I wrapped her up in a couch blanket and chuckled, "only this child could be cold on an 80 degree day". I'll bet that was when her temperature was coming on. Needless to say, our dining out was not going to happen today.

Mr. Clean and K.Z. decided to go geocaching instead and pick up dinner on the way back while C'sa snoozed. Instead of dining out at a nice family restaurant, we ate Subway subs. Not quite what I was hoping for, but at least I did not have to cook!!

After a looong nap, a dose of Tylenol and a movie C'sa was almost back to her normal self. And hungry. She asked when we were going to go out to eat. She got part of a sub instead.

Changes On The Horizon

Although I cannot elaborate much publicly due to privacy issues, I can say that there is a wind of change coming down Iggy's path in life. He will still be in our care during this time and hopefully the "change" will make things permanent.

Pray that we handle all of it well and that it goes smoothly, and I will give more details when I can.

On My iPod

This is my FAVORITE Rocakapella song and version of this song hands down. I also loved this particular line up; Rockapella has since changed it's members.

Oh.. the mighty 90's, check out the kickin' mullets! But enjoy the amazing talent...

The Twins

Xena, our amazing 6 year old daughter is on a trip of a lifetime with my in-laws and will not be home for another few days yet, right after "Tia", the little one we are watching for the week has gone back to her foster family. Xena is bummed that she will miss playing with another little baby and asked to see a picture of her on the blog. Being Xena's biggest fan, I must oblige!

So here are the "twins" together. The funny part is someone at Sam's Club today thought they really were twins. In majorly dim lighting perhaps...

Two Babies, Two Carts and Ten Boxes of Cereal...

K.Z. had his piano lesson today so the "twins", C'sa, and I dropped him off and made a mad dash for Sam's Club to get petrol (I just can't type "get gas" without giggling; I am so immature) and a couple loaves of bread. Due to the fact that Sam's has enormous carts I could easily fit both infant carriers, my purse and 6 loaves of bread within.

Mission accomplished, I was back to get K.Z. at the piano teachers house with just minutes to spare. Feeling cocky about my effortless Sam's run with two six month olds I decided to up the ante. I was heading to Target. Since Target carts are of normal size I was only able to fit the babies in one. No place for food, purse, or the like. Thankfully K.Z. is a tall 8 year old and can maneuver a cart with ease, without running into displays and various people. So off went the cart caravan.

My sole reason for going to Target was the amazing cereal sale they had last week and I was hoping it was still going on. While there previously, they had 4 boxes of General Mills cereal on sale for a mere 7 bucks! That's $1.75 a box! The cheapskate in me could not pass it up before but kicked myself for only buying the 4 boxes. This week I was going to stock up. My fear was realized however, when I saw that that particular sale had ended.

The new sale was 3 boxes for 8 bucks on General Mills. Not as appealing. But wait! There was another sign on the shelf. Four boxes of Kellogg's for 7 dollars! Hey, I am not loyal to one brand. You can shamelessly fight for my business and I will switch loyalties as fast as Elizabeth Taylor changed husbands. So I load up the cart, grab a couple of other things and dance to the register. Except at the register my cereal is NOT ringing up at $1.75 a box. I pounce immediately.

"Excuse me, but those are supposed to be $1.75 a box."

18 year old check out boy, "Oh, they are?"

"Yes, there is a sign on the cereal isle shelf indicating that Kellogg's cereal is 4 boxes for 7 dollars."

18 year old check out boy, "Um, oh. Um, well they are not ringing up that way" (you don't say...)

Me, eyeballing two sleepy babies who have been amazing thus far but could explode any minute, "Can you check?"

This dance continued until another clerk, too lazy to actually go look at the cereal isle, had to involve a third clerk to go and check the sign. And he had to repeat the request into the Target issued, secret service walkie talkie ear piece three times. I was about ready to march myself, two babies, two carts and ten boxes of cereal back to the cereal isle personally, grab the sign and staple it to the clerk's forehead.

Clerk with Target issued, secret service walkie talkie ear piece, "They say it is only on Raisin Bran".

Me, smiling as politely as I could at the time and frantically trying to see the sign in my mind, "I am fairly certain it was on all Kellogg's cereals" (after all, why would I have a cart full of blasted cereal if not!).

Clerk with Target issued, secret service walkie talkie ear piece was not budging and at this point, I was not willing to take everyone back to the cereal isle to re-read the sign myself to prove my point. I had to concede or prove my case, so I told the 18 year old check out boy to take all the cereal off my bill. I would not buy even one, I am way too prideful (and cheap) that way.

So home I went, cereal-less and slightly deflated, but I had bought marshmallows on sale so I guess I will survive. Until the next great adventure (or bargain)...

Where Did He Come From?

The other day at dinner I scratched at a bug bite and made it bleed. As tiny bites tend to do, it would not stop bleeding, a fact I pointed out to my family in an attempt to gain sympathy, chocolate or the evening off. None of this happened.

Mr. Clean responded with a helpful, "Mommy's leaking."

K.Z. did not hesitate a second and replied, "She needs an oil pan."

The males in my house thought this was hysterical. I am still waiting for chocolate.

Is Your Room Clean?

As a child I had a chronically messy room. If I asked my mother any question ("can I go outside?", "can so and so come over?", "can I pick my nose?", etc.), she would simply ask, "Is your room clean?".

Inevitable the answer would be "no", to which she would reply, "Well then, there is your answer".

The once or twice I actually said, "yes" we had to break out the defibrillator as my mother clutched her chest in shock. It was an ugly scene. Fortunately, "yes" was not the norm.

After I got married a strange thing happened which made both my mother and mother-in-law start to stutter in confusion and plan our painful deaths (Mr. Clean was a messy child as well). We became anal about our house. We cleaned it a lot and when it started to get cluttered, we would simply take care of it. Seems logical, right? Then the children came.

We are still picky about the way our house looks, but now we have to settle for dreaming about the way it should look all the time, not just for the 2.8 seconds after we are done until it explodes again. We have started training the children to take on more responsibilities and they are doing well, but there is one room not on the children's chore chart. Mine.

I get up in the morning, shower, get dressed and then leave my room, not to see it again until bedtime. In theory, it should always be perfect as we are never in it. Just like the theory of evolution, this "clean room theory" is laughable. Things just seem to appear in my room. Momma's room is the proverbial "dumping ground". The last thing I want to do after a long day of domestic bliss is to fold and put away the load of towels dumped on my bed, so they get thrown on the chair, not to be heard from again until we run out of clean towels and scramble looking for them.

The girls' Barbies and Polly Pockets get skillfully shoved out of the way by my foot to make a path to walk from the door to the bed, lest I get a Barbie shoe pierced into the bottom of my foot. We still have no clue why the girls' toys are in our room half the time as they never really venture in there (unless I tell them to "put this, that or the other thing on Momma's bed" for me to take care of later, like the towels). I suspect Mr. Clean is secretly playing Polly Pockets, but he will not admit it.

Our dressers seem to be the magnet for everything without a home or purpose in the universe and as much as I love every time C'sa hands me a piece of printer paper with nothing but a misshapen "C" on it and says, "I made this for you", I cannot keep them all. But if I am busted throwing one of her masterpieces away, she looks as if I ripped the head off of her favorite doll (which is probably somewhere under my bed anyway).

So now I feel ten years old again and simply run like a mad woman to shut and padlock my door every time my mother comes over. Or I will not be able to play outside. Or pick my nose. Or whatever.

Does this cycle ever end? Will my master suite (sounds fancier, doesn't it?) ever be the enviable retreat that it is supposed to be according to the snobby designers on HGTV? Will Mr. Clean ever paint it? Will Lassie get help in time to save Timmy from peril in the old abandoned mine? Will Timmy ever get spanked for playing in that stupid mine in the first place? Has Angel lost her mind?

All this and more, next time on, "As the Foster Mommy Pulls Out Her Hair"...

Oye!

Today was Iggy's weekly visit with his mother and brothers. Thankfully it was also Tia's day for her visit at the same time (don't you just love when you can see God's planning revealed in the details?). So a good friend of ours watched K.Z. and C'sa for me and the "twins" and I were off.

We have visitation at the county courthouse. In a connected building is the Family Services Center, so you are not having to deal with hardened criminals and hardened attorneys in the same hallways as little frightened foster children. There is a four level underground parking garage, which is extremely convenient, as foster parents are allowed to park there.

Today pulling in I saw a sign that said, "Garage elevators are out of order". I was not even sure how to process that information in my brain as I found a spot to park. Two 6 month olds, two diaper bags, one stroller and no elevator. Stairs were obviously out of the question, yet the easiest solution. I had to simply walk out of the garage.

It would not have been that difficult of a task if I wasn't parked on the lowest level (four levels below ground) and the garage did not have a ridiculously steep decline at the entrance to get down into it. I had to walk up that behemoth pushing the stroller. Tack on a 90 degree day and you can just imagine my beet red face and labored breathing. The garage was like a sauna. No cool underground parking in this building; just hot, stuffy concrete.

After sweating through security and dropping off the babies I finally got to sit down and cool off. Praise God for county funded air conditioning. I probably should not complain about my county taxes so much now.

I Am Supposed To Be An Adult, But...

I really want to try this. Maybe in much smaller scale though. And in someone else's yard neighborhood...

So Far, So Good

Right now I am listening to a very tired "Tia" (respite baby) fuss herself to sleep, since my beloved son thought it would be fun to play with the baby monitor and set it up in the kitchen. I am "anti-monitor" since we have always lived in a house that allows you to hear if there is a screaming baby in another room. If the baby is just fussy, I usually cannot hear said child. Screaming bloody murder, no problem. So I usually do not use monitors or I get stressed with every sleepless whimper.

Tia came last night and her foster mom fed her and put her to bed to try and help the transition from her house to ours for the week. She is a little behind Iggy in development (only simple things like growth and sleeping, nothing mental or serious), but seems to be adapting well to a new schedule and household. She is a very pleasant baby.

So far she and Iggy have been fascinated with one another as they sit playing in dueling Exersaucers and hang out on the floor together. She did not sleep very well last night, but it was nothing horrible and I got a good 5 hour stretch of sleep (of course when you go to bed at 2 am on your own accord, it's hard to blame it entirely on the baby). Tonight I plan to cuddle in my bad after the kidlets are all tucked in and see when she wakes next. Maybe this week I can get her on a good enough routine to have her sleeping through the night before her foster parents get back. Hmmmm.... a challenge.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It is now 4 hours later and the babies took a 3 hour afternoon nap simultaneously! Hopefully I can keep them up and occupied until bedtime and forgo Iggy's normal early evening snooze. He would go right back to sleep at bedtime, but I am not sure about Tia.

Looks positive!

Respite

In foster care in our county we have what is called "respite". It is just what is sounds like, a way for foster parents to take a break. What happens is that you (foster parent) find another county foster parent to provide care for your foster child for a specific amount of time you both agree upon. For some it is a way to get some family time in with natural children or get a break from a difficult placement.

I have never been able to do this. If my kids are going to be farmed out because I need to do something or in case of an emergency, they are going together. All, or in groups of two if need be. I want to treat each child in my house equally, so if I need time with a natural child, then that child and I will get out together and leave the rest of the clan.

There are real reasons to use respite however, I do not want to make it sound bad. It is a good system. So we will be offering respite to another foster family at the end of the week. They have two teenage sons whom they want to take to South Carolina and a foster daughter who hates being in the car, even on short trips. So she is coming to hang out with us.

Here is the catch. She is two days younger than Iggy making her also 6 months old, so if I fall off the face of the earth you will know what happened. The babies took over and I petered out from exhaustion! I will have the older kids send out an S.O.S.

Pray for us, I think I have officially lost my mind...