Add to That List

Add to my list of things that will be hard as a single and/or foster parent:

12. Handwashing bottles every night. One of the things that I absolutely hate is doing dishes by hand.  I will go through three cycles with the dishwasher in one day if I have a lot of pots to wash.  My mom has china that is "handwash only", and I have always sworn that if I ever get married, there will be nothing that can only be washed by hand on my registry list.  Now I am handwashing bottles, nipples, and all the other various parts and pieces, EVERY. NIGHT.  because we don't go through enough dishes to run the dishwasher every night.  Uggghhhh.

It Happened Again

Tank had a visit with his dad this week, and he brought him a plastic box full of clothes.  Probably twenty or so pieces.  Ranging in size from 3-6 mo, up to 2T.  Just like when Evie came back with clothes in so many different sizes.  At least this might be explained by the fact that I'm not sure dad has even seen the baby in a while, and may have no clue how big he is.  But how much does it take to say, "I want to bring my child some clothes; can you find out what size he is wearing?"  Also, one of the outfits is clearly a girl's outfit:

I guess this also falls in the categories of, "I Just Don't Understand" and "Logic in My World and Your World is Totally Different." 



Four Months with Evie

Evie has been with me for four months now.  She has had a significant increase in crying in the last couple of weeks, especially at school, and usually surrounding naptime.  The crying is almost always her saying that she wants her mommy.  I'm sure at least part of the issue is that she is tired as she only gets an hour nap at school now (compared to maybe two hours at daycare), and she is now taking 2-3 hour naps on the weekends (compared to 1-1 1/2 hours before starting public school). 

We had a meeting with her caseworker a couple of weeks ago.  She said that mom has applied for low-income housing (one of the parts of her case plan) and is waiting on an opening.  She also said that they are still waiting on the psychologist's recommendations for mom, and that she thought they would have had them by now (I believe mom went to that appointment in late June or early July).  They also may be adding some other things to the treatment plan, one thing based on something Evie said at an appointment with the counselor and maybe others based on the psychologist's recommendations.  I said based on what I was told when I first got Evie, I figured she would have been home by now.  I thought mom would have done what she needed to do and have had the kids back.  But she said something that made me realize that these people don't live in the same world that I do.  She said, "DSS's minimum standard is that you keep your kids healthy and safe.  And if you end up in a situation that you can't do that, there is probably some other underlying issues that caused you to get to that point in the first place."  Hmmm, that's true.  She also said, "I'd like to say that they would be back with mom in the next several months, but I don't know..."  Wow.  Especially for a situation where I thought Evie would only be here a month or two. 

Evie's questions have definitely calmed a good bit, but there still continue to be annoying ones.  For example, tonight we had spaghetti for dinner.  She knows what spaghetti is.  We had the same exact meal originally the other night with my mom and sister and that night she exclaimed, "Yay!  Mmmm!  Spaghetti!"  Tonight she said, "I think this looks like spaghetti..... What is it anyway?"  Ummm, spaghetti. 

And last side note: Tank's guardian ad litem called me today to set up a meeting.  I have had him literally four days, and she is calling.  I have had Evie four MONTHS and have not heard a single thing from a guardian ad litem for her.  I don't know if she just doesn't have one assigned, or if they are just slack about contacting me! 

Evie is settling in well with the baby.  She loves him and gives him a kiss in the mornings when she gets out of the car to go to school. 

Changing Rules and a Fire Drill

They sprung on me that Evie and Tank couldn't sleep in the same room - after I already had the baby sitting in my kitchen.  The paperwork from when I was getting licensed last year said, "Children 6 years and above must not be in the same room with children of the opposite sex."  But apparently they have lowered the age to 4.  So Tank ended up sleeping in my room Friday night until I could get space cleared in the third bedroom (Thank goodness for my mom and sister to watch the kids while I got everything somewhat organized!) 

Also, we had a fire drill as we have to do when a new child is placed, or every three months.  When I have done the two previous fire drills with Evie, I have reviewed with her ahead of time what to do in the case of a fire.  This time, I just sprung it on her as I was walking upstairs and she was about to walk downstairs with her shoes in hand.  She FREAKED OUT and started jumping around in place and had no clue to go downstairs to the door.  Once I told her to go downstairs, she was running and fell on her butt and started crying (she was ok).  I told her to go ahead so I could get the baby.  Maybe I sprung it too fast, but that really was closer to what would happen in an actual fire anyway, so I'm kind of glad it happened that way. 

My living room looks like a baby exploded in it... between the new baby gadgets, and all the clothes I have been washing!

Roller Coaster of a Week

It's been a roller coaster of a week, ending in this:

Meet Tank. (Blog name chosen for reasons that may or may not be obvious from this picture... but the child is four months old and weighs 20 pounds!)  Remember the four-month old that I said no to last weekend?  That's him. 

After I got the call last Saturday night, something told me that I should double-check with Evie's daycare to see if they had any unexpected openings for some reason.  And that if they did, I should call the placement worker back to make sure that they had found a permanent place for Tank.  Then Sunday afternoon, I was thinking about the fact that TT had said she would take another baby, and I wanted to check in and see if anyone had checked with her about fostering him.  I texted her and asked if she had gotten a call, and she said, "He's in my backseat as we speak."  I told her about my feeling that I should check with the daycare and then the new feeling that I should check with her. 

Tuesday evening, I got a text from TT asking if I ended up checking with my daycare about openings (I had, for future potential placements, and they said no space).  I asked if she had gotten him into her daycare, and she said that the situation looked like it might turn long-term (I think they had made it sound like it would just be a week or two), and the babies (Tank and Twin) both deserved more attention than she physically could give them as one person.  I said I would love to take him, and would check with the daycare to see WHEN the next spot would be opening up, and maybe she could hang in there until then.  The next morning, I also remembered that there is a daycare LITERALLY next door to Evie's that also takes ABC vouchers, and told her I would check with them to see if they had a spot.  I checked, they did, and by noon on Wednesday the plan was for me to pick him up on Thursday evening.  I went to my storage unit at lunchtime and got all the baby stuff.  Then by 2:00, when I talked to the caseworkers (mine and the child's caseworker who finally got assigned that day), the plan had changed.  Court was Friday (today) and the plan was for Tank to go with his biological dad, pending a negative drug test.  I said, "Wait a minute, I don't think TT would have been initiating a move if she knew this."  And I didn't want him to have to move Thursday night if he was just leaving Friday.  TT agreed it was best for her to keep him one more night.  So the plan changed to: he will either go home with Bio Dad on Friday, or he will come with me on Friday. 

The result - he is not going with Bio Dad (I don't know what happened there), and he is now here with me.  They said there are two other relatives that are wanting him, so it may only be another two or three weeks.  However, I have read enough of other foster parents' blogs to know that when things like that are said, they should be taken with a grain of salt!  So I'm just loving on him for whatever time he happens to be here!  It was kind of eerie, because from shortly after I got the call, something weird just told me that he was going to end up with me anyway. 

We made the transfer (and caseworker visit) before I picked up Evie from school to make things less chaotic.  After the caseworker left, Tank properly broke me in with a poopy diaper that exploded out of the top, getting poop all over the changing pad cover, his clothes, his back, and me!  So bathtime came early today. 



Homick

As we were driving to school this morning, Evie said, "Who is Homick?" 

 

I was thoroughly confused.  "Homick?  I don't know what you're talking about."

 

"You know, Homick Donald had a farm."

 

Bahaha!

 

Four-Month Old

I got a call over the weekend for a four-month old. 

When Evie started her new daycare last month, I specifically asked them if they had any openings in their infant or one-year-old rooms (I am licensed for two, but can only take a child old enough for a bed, and a child young enough for a crib).  They said they wouldn't have any openings until November. 

So I said no to the baby.  If our daycare had space, I totally would have taken him. 

Turns out, TT said yes to him.  In addition to Twin (three months old).  Pray for her.  Poor thing's not going to get any sleep! 

Meet Your New VP

After the craziness of the last Foster Parent Association meeting, we got a letter in the mail saying that there had been some changes in leadership and GoodOlBoy President and his wife (the treasurer) were no longer in office, that the VP was now the president, and that elections for a new VP and Treasurer would be held at the next meeting. 

Well, that meeting was today.  (I went into that meeting saying to myself that I would not get caught up in the craziness.)  And one of the DSS workers nominated me for the VP position, and no one else would take it, so I accepted the nomination.  (Of course I would!  *sarcasm*).  And TT seconded.  So I turned around and nominated her for Treasurer.  And she accepted. 

And we are now the new VP and Treasurer.  Great.

The end.

Emotions (cont)

I got a voice message from Evie's 4k teacher yesterday afternoon saying that Evie left the classroom in tears because she didn't want to go to her daycare, but wanted me to get her.  I felt guilty because I don't normally work on Fridays but I had to go into work in the afternoon to catch up on some paperwork so there was no way I could go get her until about 4:00.  But when I picked her up from daycare, she offered the information that she was crying at school (before I even asked) because she wanted her mom, and "I haven't even gone back with her yet."  So it had nothing to do with me picking her up, she just wants to go "home" to bio mom.  I guess she is having reality hit her that this is more than just a brief situation.  From what the caseworker has said, it will probably be several more months at least.  Anyone have any suggestions on how to help her get through this?

Emotions

Oh, boy, the emotions are running high here in the last couple of days.  Well, I guess just the crying emotion.  Evie has been crying a lot in the last couple of days, which is pretty out of character for her.  She went through a period of a couple of weeks back in late June/early July when she would cry at the drop of a hat, but she's been pretty emotionally stable since then. 

But yesterday... yesterday... she bawled twice because my nephew wouldn't play with her.  I reminded her that sometimes people don't want to play the same thing (like when she didn't want to play princesses with my goddaughter, causing the goddaughter to cry/pout).  Then she fell asleep on the way home.  I could tell she was really tired when I got her out of the car because she was pretty disoriented so I walked her up to her room to finish her nap.  When she laid down, she started crying and saying that she wanted her mom.  I knew she was tired, so I sat there and rubbed her back until she stopped crying and could go back to sleep.  But then when she woke up, (she usually just walks downstairs when she wakes up) I heard her bawling in her bed that she wanted her mom.  Then this morning I was combing her hair out in the bathtub, and she suddenly started crying that it hurt (it was a little more tangled than usual but not much). 

Maybe it's because she's due a visit with mom (one is scheduled for tomorrow).  Maybe it's because she's out of sorts because she has been home with me for 4 1/2 of the last 6 days (home sick a day and a half last week and three day weekend now).  Maybe my patience is thinner because I have been home with her for 4 1/2 of the last 6 days.  I'm hoping it's one of those things, and that having a visit with mom tomorrow and getting back on a regular school/work schedule for both of us tomorrow will help get things back to normal around here.