Just a quick update for now on the kids...

Things are busy. Some days go better than others. However, I pray alot and am learning to put things in God's hands instead of always trying to figure things out for myself.

Deidra--she celebrated her golden birthday on November 11, 2011 and turned 11. She had a birthday party here at the house with friends and family and she had 2 friends spend the night. Whoever wanted to was invited to go ice skating with us the next day at the mall. We had some drama there as Deidra felt like nobody was waiting for her and that she wasn't skating well enough, but for the most part things went well and they all had fun. She's getting quite the little attitude lately, so I've been praying about that. It comes with the age, but I'm not liking it much.

Josiah--He's doing well in kindergarten. The teacher said that he's already met the spring goals for the state testing that they've done and that he knows a lot of sight words already compared to his class. I think he picks it up when I try to teach Emma. Anyway, he's got a lot of behavior problems in class that we're trying to work on, but otherwise he's doing well. If only he could learn to channel some of the energy that he has and practice some self-control I think we'd be doing better, God has my prayers on that one as well.

Emma--she's working hard at school. It's not coming super easy for her this year and she's having to work HARD and she's not liking it much. She's also getting in her bossy stage and thinks she doesn't have to DO anything, she just has to tell everyone else what to do. So, that's been fun. She's been working with a reading recovery teacher for a couple of months now. Still not making much progress, but she's trying really hard. She started the school year at a level 3 in reading and is currently only at a level 4. Teacher says she should be at a level 10-12 by Christmas. They started pulling her out for some speech intervention to work on basic letter sounds, blending, that type of thing to help with reading as well this week. And then, I got a letter from her teacher that she's also struggling with math, but she doesn't want to use the charts that she has available to use. I think I figured out why when she brought them home...she is strugglign with number recognition in the higher digits or she's getting them backwards. So, we need to work more on that too.

Tracie--She is always wanting to be entertained. It's like she can't figure out how to play or do something by herself. Our attachment therapist told me to tell her to go play and give her 20 minutes to do it...she'll either figure it out or she'll sit and be mad for 20 minutes. I don't understand why I even give her toys sometimes...she doesn't want to play with them, she'd rather sit at the table and cut paper in a zillion pieces. She is sweet and nurturing with Melina most of the time, but she hates having to share. She's doing really well in school and talks a lot about the friends that she's made there. I'm glad that she is doing well.

Melina--she is my big helper! It's crazy to me what she can do for only being 19 months. She helps to unload the dishwasher, and the dryer, and she'll wash the table off too. One day, I was putting the laundry away upstairs and she had taken one of the kid's white clothes and put them in the dryer all by herself. Granted, I told her we had to wash them first, but I thought that was pretty darn good for only being 19 months old. She knows a lot of animal sounds...bird, dog, kitty, duck, chicken, cow, snake, and she does the hand over her nose for the skunk. It's too cute! Nothing gets by her...she watches someone do something once or twice and she's got it. Unfortunately, we learned this the hard way too. At church, she saw a little boy hit his mom when she told him "no." and so we're having to teach her that we are "nice" and we don't hit. It's still a learning thing in progress. Animal books are favorite and a big board book with 100 first words in it is quickly becoming another one of her favorites. She is a little sponge and is SO smart!