I recognize it's only like 3:00 in the afternoon, but today has been a giant struggle. For me, for my DW, and for my DD.
DW and I fought over text this morning, which is pretty unusual. We took some space from the conversation and came back appreciative. Good for us, but, shit. Mornings are hard.
DD took a mental health day. I'm sure someone will have something to say about that, cos that's what they do, cluck their tongues, but don't actually offer anything that helps. DD's therapist was sick this week, so she missed that opportunity, but took matters in her own hands to work on some shit today. Good for her, but, shit. Being a person is hard.
We had a "Diversity and Inclusion" meeting at work today, to talk about how my team and my company is doing in terms of, go figure, Diversity and Inclusion. These are topics near and dear to my heart, but, shit. Today was not the day I wanted to pose arguments to my coworkers about why women & minorities are still under-represented and need space at the table. Sure, maybe things are better than they were 30 years ago, white male coworker sir, but that doesn't mean they're good.
I'm home from work early to deal with more professionals in my home, which in foster care, we have a constant stream of. Par for the course, but, shit. I kind of want some some time where I don't have to be "on" today.
Since I'm home early, I'm also spending some time on the Facebook. Looking at memories. And the one that keeps popping up is a year ago, the day after Election Day, when we woke up and the news was true that we were going to have to spend a good long time fighting (again) for rights we thought we secured in the last decade, if not actual generations ago. Shit. Anniversaries are hard. I think my body remembers being this angry. I had a vague idea of how bad things would get, but I really had no idea how bad things would get. Fuck that guy.
Thursday, November 9, 2017
Wednesday, November 8, 2017
In Which a Sagittarius Struggles with Optimism
Hi, there.
Let's not talk about how long it's been.
Let's not talk about all the things you've missed because I haven't been here to talk about them. Maybe I'll back-track at some point. Maybe I won't. But my counselor sent me here, so here I am.
My counselor sent me here because I'm angry. I'm angry and I need to figure out how to fucking cope.
Anger is not my default state. I very rarely visit this state, even. So it's weird to be stuck here in limbo and not know what to do about it, or how long I have to be here. I just want to go home.
We have a darling daughter (DD). She's 14 -- almost 15 -- and bright, funny, complicated, talented, weird, beautiful, sarcastic, and kind. She's a good fit for our family. She's been home a little more than 5 months at this point, and we're all still figuring each other out.
And to be clear, I am not angry at her.
I really enjoy her and I enjoy being her parent.
In the process of her joining our family, we have worked with two different agencies, which I will not name here because we aren't done working with them, and I suppose they could still turn their boats around and finally do right by our daughter. But that all remains to be seen.
These two agencies, I believe, are trying to do right by her and do right by their governing bodies. But red tape gets bound up in red tape, and it's not the agencies that suffer the consequences. It's our daughter that suffers. Here is a kiddo who has been stuck in the foster system for XX number of years, who has had XX number of placements, and who has had XX number of disruptions, and hasn't she been put through the ringer enough? Can't we just let her settle into a family and be a normal kid for once in her life?
As I'm heading to bed tonight, the answer is still no. We (her parents) are working tirelessly to smooth this out for her. Her CASAs are working tirelessly to smooth this out for her. Pardon my French, but everyone else can suck a bag of dicks.
In trying to make a long story, uh, less long, let's say that there was a committee decision to NOT let us adopt her six months ago. But, sure, we could foster her, they said, but it would have to be permanent, but we couldn't tell her it would be permanent, cos then it would sound too much like adoption, which the committee decided was not allowed. Ugh.
So we agree to foster, but at a high level of care because we aren't sure what to expect, and our adoption supports (that we paid for) are now no longer available, because we can't adopt her. With a higher level of care (read: extra supervision & therapy), we can get extra supports. Also, we were promised, we could exit into a lower level of care on a timeline of our choosing.
Which, as soon as we are locked into a contract, we are told, no-no-no-no-no, she has to graduate out of this higher level of care. But they won't give us the criteria for graduation. Or a timeline. Or a rulebook. But you can bet that when we somehow break a mystery rule, they are all over it with stern words and consequences. Ugh.
<<Enter five months of more of the same nonesense. Miscommunication, lies, backstabbing, and general ball-dropping.>>
And after fighting with two agencies, two caseworkers, two case managers, two supervisors, two attornies, a facilitator, and a partridge in a pear tree, for, I don't know, maybe four months? we finally get folks on board with hey maybe she doesn't need a higher level of care because she's doing fucking great. And suddenly things start moving.
A caseworker said she was going to push for our daughter to be out of a higher level of care by the end of the year. We had hoped sooner, but we're playing the long game, so whatever.
Then the right person talked to the right State Senator who talked to the right person at the right agency and suddenly the adopted decision from May was reversed. Wait, what? Really? We didn't expect that, we had no idea how this would affect anything, so we hung on waiting for more information.
Then last week, the judge ruled that there has been enough fuckery and she needs to be in a lower level of care by Friday. We turned in all our paperwork within three days. If this is going to get held up, it will not be on us.
So this gets us to my counselling session today. I told my counselor that I didn't believe it. He said it's great news, though. And it is, but there has been so much asshattery around this whole situation from the two agencies we are working with that I just don't believe it. I'm angry at the situation, I'm frustrated with all the hoop-jumping, and I'm tense just waiting for the other shoe to fall.
I am usually a silver-lining sort of person. I get teased all the time for being my optimistic self. Some say I'm naive, and I guess that could be true, but I think I'm more realistic than that. I just know, from my forty years of lived experience, that things have a way of working themselves out.
But my heart has been broken so many times in the past six months by this process that I just don't trust it anymore. I'm having trouble keeping my head up. I'm having trouble staying positive even around things that have nothing to do with the foster system (like my job). I'm having trouble taking the smaller joys in life (like DD has an A in Math! and our dog looks really cute in his Christmas sweater! and I have a new car! and I get to go to brunch with my friends!) and letting those good feelings wash over me and buoy me through the tough times. It's not working. I'm not buoyed. I'm still sinking.
Man, if I were outside of myself, I would totally look at this list and be like, THAT'S TOTALLY ENOUGH GOOD STUFF TO BUILD ON! So I get it on an intellectual level. And if I weren't still sinking, I would totally see my point. So this is really hard and I've been hurt really deeply. I feel broken.
And it really doesn't help that later today, after counselling where my counselor told me to give it a chance that things might work out and go according to plan, we got an email that the adoption decision wasn't actually reversed, silly! Who told you that? And in trying to follow up with stepping down to a lower level of care, it appears as though the right people are not talking to the other right people because there are still some important people who do not know what's going on or that the judge really wanted it to happen by Friday. Ugh.
I didn't want to be right this time.
Sure, I have every right to my feelings of anger. Every right. I'm just really tired of being in this angry state. I'm really looking forward to moving back to my regular brain, which I'm hoping still exists somewhere.
Send good thoughts our way if you're so inclined. Complements and chocolate are also appreciated.
Peace -- Mama
Let's not talk about how long it's been.
Let's not talk about all the things you've missed because I haven't been here to talk about them. Maybe I'll back-track at some point. Maybe I won't. But my counselor sent me here, so here I am.
My counselor sent me here because I'm angry. I'm angry and I need to figure out how to fucking cope.
Anger is not my default state. I very rarely visit this state, even. So it's weird to be stuck here in limbo and not know what to do about it, or how long I have to be here. I just want to go home.
We have a darling daughter (DD). She's 14 -- almost 15 -- and bright, funny, complicated, talented, weird, beautiful, sarcastic, and kind. She's a good fit for our family. She's been home a little more than 5 months at this point, and we're all still figuring each other out.
And to be clear, I am not angry at her.
I really enjoy her and I enjoy being her parent.
In the process of her joining our family, we have worked with two different agencies, which I will not name here because we aren't done working with them, and I suppose they could still turn their boats around and finally do right by our daughter. But that all remains to be seen.
These two agencies, I believe, are trying to do right by her and do right by their governing bodies. But red tape gets bound up in red tape, and it's not the agencies that suffer the consequences. It's our daughter that suffers. Here is a kiddo who has been stuck in the foster system for XX number of years, who has had XX number of placements, and who has had XX number of disruptions, and hasn't she been put through the ringer enough? Can't we just let her settle into a family and be a normal kid for once in her life?
As I'm heading to bed tonight, the answer is still no. We (her parents) are working tirelessly to smooth this out for her. Her CASAs are working tirelessly to smooth this out for her. Pardon my French, but everyone else can suck a bag of dicks.
In trying to make a long story, uh, less long, let's say that there was a committee decision to NOT let us adopt her six months ago. But, sure, we could foster her, they said, but it would have to be permanent, but we couldn't tell her it would be permanent, cos then it would sound too much like adoption, which the committee decided was not allowed. Ugh.
So we agree to foster, but at a high level of care because we aren't sure what to expect, and our adoption supports (that we paid for) are now no longer available, because we can't adopt her. With a higher level of care (read: extra supervision & therapy), we can get extra supports. Also, we were promised, we could exit into a lower level of care on a timeline of our choosing.
Which, as soon as we are locked into a contract, we are told, no-no-no-no-no, she has to graduate out of this higher level of care. But they won't give us the criteria for graduation. Or a timeline. Or a rulebook. But you can bet that when we somehow break a mystery rule, they are all over it with stern words and consequences. Ugh.
<<Enter five months of more of the same nonesense. Miscommunication, lies, backstabbing, and general ball-dropping.>>
And after fighting with two agencies, two caseworkers, two case managers, two supervisors, two attornies, a facilitator, and a partridge in a pear tree, for, I don't know, maybe four months? we finally get folks on board with hey maybe she doesn't need a higher level of care because she's doing fucking great. And suddenly things start moving.
A caseworker said she was going to push for our daughter to be out of a higher level of care by the end of the year. We had hoped sooner, but we're playing the long game, so whatever.
Then the right person talked to the right State Senator who talked to the right person at the right agency and suddenly the adopted decision from May was reversed. Wait, what? Really? We didn't expect that, we had no idea how this would affect anything, so we hung on waiting for more information.
Then last week, the judge ruled that there has been enough fuckery and she needs to be in a lower level of care by Friday. We turned in all our paperwork within three days. If this is going to get held up, it will not be on us.
So this gets us to my counselling session today. I told my counselor that I didn't believe it. He said it's great news, though. And it is, but there has been so much asshattery around this whole situation from the two agencies we are working with that I just don't believe it. I'm angry at the situation, I'm frustrated with all the hoop-jumping, and I'm tense just waiting for the other shoe to fall.
I am usually a silver-lining sort of person. I get teased all the time for being my optimistic self. Some say I'm naive, and I guess that could be true, but I think I'm more realistic than that. I just know, from my forty years of lived experience, that things have a way of working themselves out.
But my heart has been broken so many times in the past six months by this process that I just don't trust it anymore. I'm having trouble keeping my head up. I'm having trouble staying positive even around things that have nothing to do with the foster system (like my job). I'm having trouble taking the smaller joys in life (like DD has an A in Math! and our dog looks really cute in his Christmas sweater! and I have a new car! and I get to go to brunch with my friends!) and letting those good feelings wash over me and buoy me through the tough times. It's not working. I'm not buoyed. I'm still sinking.
Man, if I were outside of myself, I would totally look at this list and be like, THAT'S TOTALLY ENOUGH GOOD STUFF TO BUILD ON! So I get it on an intellectual level. And if I weren't still sinking, I would totally see my point. So this is really hard and I've been hurt really deeply. I feel broken.
And it really doesn't help that later today, after counselling where my counselor told me to give it a chance that things might work out and go according to plan, we got an email that the adoption decision wasn't actually reversed, silly! Who told you that? And in trying to follow up with stepping down to a lower level of care, it appears as though the right people are not talking to the other right people because there are still some important people who do not know what's going on or that the judge really wanted it to happen by Friday. Ugh.
I didn't want to be right this time.
Sure, I have every right to my feelings of anger. Every right. I'm just really tired of being in this angry state. I'm really looking forward to moving back to my regular brain, which I'm hoping still exists somewhere.
Send good thoughts our way if you're so inclined. Complements and chocolate are also appreciated.
Peace -- Mama
Saturday, March 26, 2016
One or Two Years
This week -- after being foster parents for one year -- we let our Foster Care License lapse.
Work is getting busier for both DW and I, and we really want to put our attentions toward adoption again. Foster care, while amazing and fulfilling, was just spreading us too thin. I would gladly go back at a different time.
But, the good news is that we are putting our attentions toward adoption!
Two years ago -- almost exactly to the day -- we submitted our application to adopt with Boys & Girls Aid, and that led us down the foster care path. They asked us for six months, we gave them two years.
It took us a year to get certified, so I almost expect the adoption process to be similarly long, so stay tuned for updates.
What did we learn over the past one or two years, with fourteen different kids in our home?
Sometimes, we can't blame the parents. I went into foster care thinking that the kids are in care because the parents messed up somehow. That isn't always the case. A bunch of our kiddos (maybe close to 50% -- yes, I'm serious) were sexual offenders and were removed from the home because they, themselves, were the ones who messed up. (Of course there were plenty of instances where they had been abused and then became abusers, but this, also, is not always the case.) We did our best to talk about boundaries and consent, and also forgiveness.
A bunch of these kiddos aren't operating at their chronological age. We can make assumptions that with love and care and attention, we can catch them up. But sometimes, all the abuse and trauma and neglect just stunts them, or propels them strangely forward. I've played baby dolls with a sixteen-year-old. I've had to remind kids that they aren't the parent, and I will take care of their needs. I've supported a kiddo who, at fifteen, was about to become a dad. And I will tell you that about half the kiddos in our house have needed to sleep with a light on. It's a wacky little combination of young and old souls that you have to address in the moment on an individual basis.
Generally, these kids aren't hoodlums or troublemakers. I made assumptions about this underserved population and what that would mean when these kids come in to my house. I had numerous people warn me and worry for me that I would be in over my head with my property being destroyed, my things being stolen, and heroin being shot up in my living room. Out of the fourteen kiddos, one stole $5 from my wallet (and later tried to pay me back), one hid a couple of DW's valuable sports cards as a joke (these were later found), and one used my brand-new mouthwash without permission. So, yeah. Not troublemakers.
Most times, they are sweet, polite, and helpful. A few times when I brought these kids around to be with my friends, my friends were like, "Wait, THIS is your foster kid? Such good manners!" So, yes, being in care doesn't mean meltdowns and rude behavior 24/7. I've had kids help me in the kitchen or help with meal planning. We've had kids who love love love yardwork and will gladly mow the lawn, plant ferns, water the blueberries, and then come back and ask for more work to do. And then ask if they can ask their regular, full-time foster mom if they can come back and help some more next week. Sometimes I think, you know you're a teenager, right? You know you're supposed to scoff and roll your eyes and whine about having to turn off the TV? Right?
So, in conclusion, let me just say that if you happen to have one or two years that you can foster a handful of teenagers, I would highly recommend it. Valuable for you, valuable for them, valuable for your community.
Work is getting busier for both DW and I, and we really want to put our attentions toward adoption again. Foster care, while amazing and fulfilling, was just spreading us too thin. I would gladly go back at a different time.
But, the good news is that we are putting our attentions toward adoption!
Two years ago -- almost exactly to the day -- we submitted our application to adopt with Boys & Girls Aid, and that led us down the foster care path. They asked us for six months, we gave them two years.
It took us a year to get certified, so I almost expect the adoption process to be similarly long, so stay tuned for updates.
What did we learn over the past one or two years, with fourteen different kids in our home?
Sometimes, we can't blame the parents. I went into foster care thinking that the kids are in care because the parents messed up somehow. That isn't always the case. A bunch of our kiddos (maybe close to 50% -- yes, I'm serious) were sexual offenders and were removed from the home because they, themselves, were the ones who messed up. (Of course there were plenty of instances where they had been abused and then became abusers, but this, also, is not always the case.) We did our best to talk about boundaries and consent, and also forgiveness.
A bunch of these kiddos aren't operating at their chronological age. We can make assumptions that with love and care and attention, we can catch them up. But sometimes, all the abuse and trauma and neglect just stunts them, or propels them strangely forward. I've played baby dolls with a sixteen-year-old. I've had to remind kids that they aren't the parent, and I will take care of their needs. I've supported a kiddo who, at fifteen, was about to become a dad. And I will tell you that about half the kiddos in our house have needed to sleep with a light on. It's a wacky little combination of young and old souls that you have to address in the moment on an individual basis.
Generally, these kids aren't hoodlums or troublemakers. I made assumptions about this underserved population and what that would mean when these kids come in to my house. I had numerous people warn me and worry for me that I would be in over my head with my property being destroyed, my things being stolen, and heroin being shot up in my living room. Out of the fourteen kiddos, one stole $5 from my wallet (and later tried to pay me back), one hid a couple of DW's valuable sports cards as a joke (these were later found), and one used my brand-new mouthwash without permission. So, yeah. Not troublemakers.
Most times, they are sweet, polite, and helpful. A few times when I brought these kids around to be with my friends, my friends were like, "Wait, THIS is your foster kid? Such good manners!" So, yes, being in care doesn't mean meltdowns and rude behavior 24/7. I've had kids help me in the kitchen or help with meal planning. We've had kids who love love love yardwork and will gladly mow the lawn, plant ferns, water the blueberries, and then come back and ask for more work to do. And then ask if they can ask their regular, full-time foster mom if they can come back and help some more next week. Sometimes I think, you know you're a teenager, right? You know you're supposed to scoff and roll your eyes and whine about having to turn off the TV? Right?
So, in conclusion, let me just say that if you happen to have one or two years that you can foster a handful of teenagers, I would highly recommend it. Valuable for you, valuable for them, valuable for your community.
Sunday, February 7, 2016
Lucky Sevens
This morning I realized that today is our 7-month wedding anniversary! Seven is DW's lucky number, so we got married on July 7 (7/7). Still love that spouse of mine! She bought me four bouquets of flowers this week, so I'm pretty sure she still loves me, too. :)
We've got another kiddo this week: another girl! DW said something at one of the foster meetings recently that we'd had a lot of boys, and while boys are great, she has a really good connection with the girls. "Oh!" one of the staff said. "Let's see if we can get you some girls!" And so here we are at kid 14, a girl, our second one in a row!
Fourteenth Kid? Rad. She's really easy-going and funny. We've been making jokes with each other, which makes me happier than I can express. I got to meet her mom for a few minutes and Mom commented how well we got along cos we're similarly silly. We had a lazy Saturday, mostly in our pajamas and binge-watching Netflix. We might go out for a while today... it's supposed to get up to 60° this afternoon!
Sixty degrees in February, with a fantastic silly kiddo? We really are lucky!
We've got another kiddo this week: another girl! DW said something at one of the foster meetings recently that we'd had a lot of boys, and while boys are great, she has a really good connection with the girls. "Oh!" one of the staff said. "Let's see if we can get you some girls!" And so here we are at kid 14, a girl, our second one in a row!
Fourteenth Kid? Rad. She's really easy-going and funny. We've been making jokes with each other, which makes me happier than I can express. I got to meet her mom for a few minutes and Mom commented how well we got along cos we're similarly silly. We had a lazy Saturday, mostly in our pajamas and binge-watching Netflix. We might go out for a while today... it's supposed to get up to 60° this afternoon!
Sixty degrees in February, with a fantastic silly kiddo? We really are lucky!
Monday, February 1, 2016
Lucky 12 and Lucky 13
We're back in the swing with Respite Care again. I like it for the short stints, but I don't like it cos the stints are short. Can't win. Just keep swimming.
Twelfth Kid? Same as TenthKid. Rad. Still smooth, which is cute of course. How can you get mad at the cute?
Thirteenth Kid? Rad. Our first girl since.... June, maybe? And she was twelve. Just a baby. It's interesting how different 12 is from 14 (the typical age of our kiddos). We played baby dolls and watched cartoons and ate chicken strips. She told me she didn't like PG-13 movies cos she "didn't get them." Awww, more cute!
I don't know if we're going to have kids in the next two weeks, but in mid-February we're set to have a 17-year-old for a whole two weeks. She has different privileges, so it'll be interesting to be able to have a bit more freedom with her care. Can't wait!
Twelfth Kid? Same as TenthKid. Rad. Still smooth, which is cute of course. How can you get mad at the cute?
Thirteenth Kid? Rad. Our first girl since.... June, maybe? And she was twelve. Just a baby. It's interesting how different 12 is from 14 (the typical age of our kiddos). We played baby dolls and watched cartoons and ate chicken strips. She told me she didn't like PG-13 movies cos she "didn't get them." Awww, more cute!
I don't know if we're going to have kids in the next two weeks, but in mid-February we're set to have a 17-year-old for a whole two weeks. She has different privileges, so it'll be interesting to be able to have a bit more freedom with her care. Can't wait!
Tuesday, December 22, 2015
Out of Town
I promised I would take DW out of town once Eleventh kid moved on, and here were are. Very few people know where we actually are.
We arrived last night, by train. The train was delayed by 4 hours because the weather is bad and trees kept falling on the tracks! But what did we care? We were on a train!
Getting stuck on a train is way better than getting stuck on a plane. You can walk around, there's a dining car with a bar, you can keep yourself fairly occupied and happy if you've a mind to. Someone behind us on the train was relaying the delays to someone else on her phone. "It's been HELL," she told her phone companion. DW and I giggled. So NOT hell.
Our hotel room is small and comfortable and the staff is easy-going, friendly, and helpful. DW is still asleep, of course, so I'm up doing my thing until we can head to breakfast. Maybe I'll get up and take a walk before she gets going. The town we are in is small with lots of little shops on our street.
Man, I love my wife. She's a fantastic travelling companion, as we discovered on our honeymoon adventure and it just gets confirmed on little trips like this. She's hilarious and sweet, she's weird, and she puts up with my shenanigans. I am so lucky.
We're probably going to need to take a tiny little trip like this sometime in the Spring. Where should we go?
We arrived last night, by train. The train was delayed by 4 hours because the weather is bad and trees kept falling on the tracks! But what did we care? We were on a train!
Getting stuck on a train is way better than getting stuck on a plane. You can walk around, there's a dining car with a bar, you can keep yourself fairly occupied and happy if you've a mind to. Someone behind us on the train was relaying the delays to someone else on her phone. "It's been HELL," she told her phone companion. DW and I giggled. So NOT hell.
Our hotel room is small and comfortable and the staff is easy-going, friendly, and helpful. DW is still asleep, of course, so I'm up doing my thing until we can head to breakfast. Maybe I'll get up and take a walk before she gets going. The town we are in is small with lots of little shops on our street.
Man, I love my wife. She's a fantastic travelling companion, as we discovered on our honeymoon adventure and it just gets confirmed on little trips like this. She's hilarious and sweet, she's weird, and she puts up with my shenanigans. I am so lucky.
We're probably going to need to take a tiny little trip like this sometime in the Spring. Where should we go?
Saturday, November 28, 2015
60 Days...
60 days are up and there still isn't a plan in place for where Eleventh Kid goes next. He's super nervous about it, and he gets agitated about it when he thinks about it. But I need to remind him, that it is partially due to the choices HE ALONE made. There was an opening in another program and he was offered a screening and he refused to go. Now he wants into that same program and is having trouble getting a screening. I feel bad, but, man, you made your own bed on that one.
He continues to eat like a champ. He says he's put on 40 pounds (I don't quite believe that), but he's also gained some inches since being here. Nothing like nutrition to support a growth spurt! He never quite got around to helping me in the kitchen, preferring to otherwise occupy himself with episodes of "Saved by the Bell" and "Gossip Girl."
He also never quite got around to playing video games. We have rules about how much reading you have to do make up your time playing video games. Somehow, even though he's a reader, he is never quite up to doing it. Huh.
He is super-helpful around the house, or at least has been for the past couple of weeks. He's good about checking his chore chart for things to do and ways to earn allowance. It's really great when he's on it. Yesterday we got a ton of work done around the yard in about an hour-and-a-half, just because we had so many hands working. Backyard is finally all cleaned up from the wedding in July! Ha!
I guess we are a little nervous about his next placement, also. DW is still in her first year of teaching, and doesn't get any breaks or sick days or anything. She's been sick three different times in the past seven weeks and she's running on empty. Reserves are all tapped out. So I'm doing a lot of solo-parenting, which is mostly fine, but I really like it (and he really likes it) when we can all do things together.
When Eleventh Kid moves on, I'm taking DW out of town somewhere where nobody can find us and we can just chill out for a few days and not worry about a damned thing. Can't wait.
Anyway, blessings and love for the Holidays!
He continues to eat like a champ. He says he's put on 40 pounds (I don't quite believe that), but he's also gained some inches since being here. Nothing like nutrition to support a growth spurt! He never quite got around to helping me in the kitchen, preferring to otherwise occupy himself with episodes of "Saved by the Bell" and "Gossip Girl."
He also never quite got around to playing video games. We have rules about how much reading you have to do make up your time playing video games. Somehow, even though he's a reader, he is never quite up to doing it. Huh.
He is super-helpful around the house, or at least has been for the past couple of weeks. He's good about checking his chore chart for things to do and ways to earn allowance. It's really great when he's on it. Yesterday we got a ton of work done around the yard in about an hour-and-a-half, just because we had so many hands working. Backyard is finally all cleaned up from the wedding in July! Ha!
I guess we are a little nervous about his next placement, also. DW is still in her first year of teaching, and doesn't get any breaks or sick days or anything. She's been sick three different times in the past seven weeks and she's running on empty. Reserves are all tapped out. So I'm doing a lot of solo-parenting, which is mostly fine, but I really like it (and he really likes it) when we can all do things together.
When Eleventh Kid moves on, I'm taking DW out of town somewhere where nobody can find us and we can just chill out for a few days and not worry about a damned thing. Can't wait.
Anyway, blessings and love for the Holidays!
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