Fostering's Not For Everyone

When you go through foster care training, they tell you that fostering isn't for everyone. Even if you have an interest and a decent set of skills to deal with kids, it still might not be for you. I think we've come to realize that maybe we're not cut out to be foster parents. Fostering adds an unanticipated strain on a marriage and strain on relationships with your own kids. And if one person is more into it than the other then you're just asking for trouble. Of course three foster kids at one time is stressful. I'm not sure what we were thinking when we took that on. More recently with Dakota, the same issues we had when there were three are popping up with one. I'm thinking that we might give it up after Dakota goes back to his family which could be as soon as next week. We might just do respite care and support other foster parents through that because it is an important job even if we're not the one's doing it. When it comes to fostering I just want to be faithful to God. I want to follow the path He's placed me on. I thought I was doing that, but now I'm not so sure. Maybe our calling is to raise our PKU boys to the best of our ability.

Getting to Know Dakota

So I'm getting to know Dakota a little better. He's eight months old, but he acts more like a five or six month old. I totally get that he was born 5 weeks premature, but I totally think everything about this is wrong. I think if he'd been living with people that cared about him and were knowledgable about babies and their growth, he'd have caught up by now. Five weeks is something that should have been able to be overcome within a couple of months. But here he is - small, no tonge control (spits out baby food), eating only about 2 ounces at a time, not sleeping through the night, not able to sit up on his own or roll from his back to stomach. It's sad really. The Depaul social worker is going to make a referral to Early Intervention, which I'm excited about because I really want some suggestions on how to help him get where he should be. I'm thinking it's going to require lots of tummy time (and crying) and giving him foods so that he can practice eating (which is frustrating and messy for me). I just want to be the best foster parent I can be for him so I'll take the crying and mess and frustration to help give him a better start in life.

In other news, I think Colby is finally starting to feel better. If he wants he can go to school tomorrow. Also, I'm feeling lots better. Carter now has a runny nose and a little cough, but he's resting lots so we'll see how he feels tomorrow. Now we'll just cross our fingers and pray that Dakota doesn't get this nastiness.

New Foster

Yesterday we got a new foster child. He's eight months old and his name is Dakota. I don't know much about his situation other than his parents did not want him living with relatives so now he's in foster care. They seem to have drug and mental health issues that they're work on. They seem hopeful that Dakota will be coming back to them soon. I don't know how long Dakota will be with us and nobody seems to know much of anything about this little boy except he drinks a special formula because he was born 5 weeks early. They didn't even know how much I should give him and didn't give any instructions on his care. For the moment he's attending daycare with Carter and we'll see how things go from there. He could be with us for a day, month, or year, who knows. I'm just going to give him a routine and shower him with love while we have him. At least this time isn't as crazy as last time :-) But now I have instant twins! Unfortunately he's not where he should be developmentally so he's very much like a baby where Carter is more like a toddler these days. It will be fun while it lasts I guess!

Long Week...

It has been a really long week. I'm blaming daylight savings time. I've been very tired. Thursday night I fell asleep at 8:00. At school we're working on research papers which is hellish to begin with and when you're a tired teacher that makes it soooo much worse. Research is my least favorite thing to teach because students have to be able to regulate themselves, which is like herding cats when it comes to ninth graders. Plus I have to hear my name fifty million times a day to answer their questions. Not that I'm against answering questions, but they wouldn't need to ask at least half the questions they ask if they would just listen to what I say. But I might as well turn the moon into cheese. Sigh... At least after research I get to teach Romeo and Juliet and then a novel. Some of you might think it's odd, but Romeo and Juliet is possibly my farvorite thing to teach :-)

In other news, Carter has started crawling this week. It's pretty cool to see him learning to do something new, but now he'll be into everything. I'll have to watch him all the time until his like two. His favorite things to put in his mouth right now are plastic bags and paper, so cleaning up will be the first order of business tomorrow. He's also cutting his top two teeth so he's kind of cranky right now. I hope it passes soon.

So far I haven't seen anything growing out in the garden, but I guess it's too soon :-) What can I say, I'm impatient :-)

Cold Frame!

I was thinking about our garden today an lamenting the fact that we'd need to get some lumber in order to make a cold frame. But then I got to thinking that I didn't really need lumber...what about hay bales? So I googled it and apparently this is a doable option. I mean, we already have the plexiglass, we just need something to set it on and that something needs to be portable because when the weather warms we're going to have to move it for the warm weather plants. When I drove to Walmart I peaked over at Lowes and saw that their tractor trailers with hay bales were still there...yay! I'm thinking next weekend when the weather warms up, I'll till a spot on one side of the garden and make a few Lowes trips to get the hay bales I need and get some lettuce, spinach and broccoli started in my hay bale cold frame! Yay! Here's the link to a website that inspired me: http://www.appalachianfeet.com/2012/03/02/how-to-build-an-inexpensive-cold-frame-in-under-30-minutes-with-no-tools/

Pressed for Time

Yesterday I got a frantic phone call during my fourth block class. The foster care agency we work with wanted to know if we would take a six year old girl foster child and they wanted to know in 10 minutes if we would do it. I didn't panic, but I felt a little stressed because I had students in the classroom and I needed to talk to Brandon. I got my students started on something and then called Brandon. We made a quick decision that we could do it. It turned out that social services probably found a relative for her to stay with, which is good because that means she probably knows the people instead of staying with total strangers (even if we have a good heart!). I got just a slight bit irritated about them rushing us for a decision when it turned out that they didn't even need us. Anyway that means we get a nice calm weekend and I don't have to worry about three school drop-offs on Monday.

The seeds I planted finally sprouted so I fixed my gardening lights last night. I hope I get some great plants this year!

Musings on Cleaning and Other Stuff

I don't know how our house becomes so messy, but it seems like it just never stays clean. It's definately not as bad as it could be since we've kept it moderately clean these last couple of weeks, but I look around and just sigh because it always needs more work. I guess I'm burning calories as I clean! The worst part is laundry. I never realized how much I hate folding it and putting it away. Sure it's satisfying to see your closet all nice and neat with all your clothes hung and ready to go, but it is so depressing to know you'll need to do it again in a week. Is it acceptable to just live out of your laundry basket? No, you say....okay.... I ran across an internet article about 10 things that will make you love your house more - maybe I'll try a couple like making my bed and taking three minutes to make a room ready to use before I leave it. Well, then that brings me back to laundry because I need to wash my sheets...arg!

Anyway, we had parent-teacher conferences on Thursday. I was nervous about meeting with one parent so I dressed as professionally as I could for that day - my thought was I'm not going to give her any more ammo to make me look like a bad person. It turned out fine when my parent who was adamant the The Road was a terrible, awful book finally just told me that she'd rather her daughter read another book. That's certainly fine with me, but I'm still ticked that she made it personal and tried to make me seem like a bad person and teacher because of my book and tv show choices. Why have all this drama!? This still might not be the end of the story because my principal told me that she might be going to the school board. We'll see.

In other news, Carter is almost crawling. It's just as well that the house is clean because Carter is EVERYWHERE! He just rolls across the floor to where he wants to be. He can get on his hands and knees and kind of slide himself forward so it's just a matter of time before he starts following me everywhere and putting anything and everything in his mouth. Colby is having a fun day with his daddy today. Brandon took him to Roanoke to be part of an activity that the PD is doing. They're filming new scenarios for their virtual reality simulator on a couple of air planes so Colby is going to be a passenger I guess while police officers take down some "bad guys". It's all pretend. He'll probably love it because he gets to get on air planes AND watch some "bad guys" get arrested. Cleary this is something only a little boy could appreciate. This afternoon Colby gets to go to a birthday party, so I'm sure he'll be pooped by the time he gets home.