A day of babysitting...

Josiah, Emily, Ana, and Tracie watching the Strawberry Shortcake movie


Alaina and Melina playing blocks together

My friend, Beth, had surgery on her shoulder today, so we had 2 extra friends to play with today. My littles were so excited. We spent the day playing in the playroom, doing arts and crafts, playing outside on the trampoline (Ana's favorite) and on the swingset, watching Strawberry Shortcake during quiet/nap time which was also Ana's choice, and then we played with play-doh and with the legos. The day went really well and I was thinking to myself how having 7 kids here really wasn't that hard. Then the fussy hour happened around 4:30 and everyone got fussy, bored, and whiny. Dinner helped a little bit and then they played in the playroom and started getting really hyper and they all (well except for Alaina and Melina) earned a time out for not listening and running and jumping on the furniture and so they were mad at me. But that was really the only hard part of the day. Everything else went smoothly. Josiah had a hard time listening all day and kept hitting his sisters and so he earned a lot of time outs and Tracie kept thinking that Alaina was a baby like Melina and kept trying to pick her up and move her which had her in the time out spot a few times, but overall I really enjoyed having them and the kids all had fun. I did realize too that my kids have missed out on a ton of playdates and we need to start doing those. My kids have gotten a lot better around other kids, but the more they play with others the more they will learn. Josiah gets so excited that he gets loud and doesn't always remember about others personal spaces and Emma gets bossy and Tracie just wants to nurture everyone, but she needs to learn that her hands need to stay to herself and that others don't need her picking them up and so forth either. I told Andy that I think this summer is going to mark the end of therapy. They have come so far and are almost caught up anyway. Tracie will probably continue therapy a little while longer as she needs it, but I think Josiah is safe to end at the end of summer. His OT said he's pretty much caught up anyway...just a little behind...but it's his behaviors that are keeping him having to stay in it. I told Andy that I'm ready to just let them be kids and be able to go forward with other things. I want to see them be able to play with their friends, not be prohibited by therapy schedules running when and if we're able to do things. So, not only was today good for the kids, it was good for me too as it allowed me to see some things as well.

What a beautiful day...

It is absolutely gorgeous outside. I babysat this morning and we took the boys to the doctor this morning. Baby J had his 2-year physical (he's 33 lbs and 35 inches tall). He had to get a finger stick to check his hemoglobin and he never even cried. He was such a good patient. Baby D I just needed to make sure he was up-to-date on his immunizations. He just needed a DTAP shot and he was good to go. Went and got Wendy's for lunch and all the boys scarfed down their lunches. Put the boys down for a nap and did a scrapbook page. Then my caseworker called so I ran up to the agency really quick. We talked a bit about Baby J's mom and she's hoping that if there are enough inconveniences for her that she'll relinquish. I just think for someone that just made the statement that they were having issues being separated from her son and needed some therapy to deal with it (no sooner did she say they that they transferred her to another RTC program that was a whole lot closer...so she went from being 6 hours away to about 40 minutes from us)...anyway, I just thought that she would have taken advantage of the time I was willing to give her with him rather than being selfish and wanting what she wanted and since she couldn't take him to the fair, she just wanted me to come get him. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me anyway. She hadn't seen him since February, I guess I just would have thought that as long as she spent time with him it wouldn't have mattered where they went or what they did.

Andy ran and got the girls from school while I gave the boys a snack after they woke up. Then, when he got back with the girls, I ran up to Wal-mart to get some diapers, stuff for Deidra's field trip tomorrow as she needed a sack lunch, and got a few things that we were out of. Came home and had a snack myself and tried to declutter my countertops a bit. Now, I'm blogging while Andy is filing the bills away and I'm trying to keep Baby J out of things. Then, I'm off to get ready for our foster parent appreciation banquet tonight. It'll be fun to have a night out. I get so shy around a bunch of people that I don't know, but I'm slowly getting to know the other foster families, so hopefully it won't be too bad tonight. I really need to come out of my shell some more.

It's so beautiful outside that I may go take the boys for a quick walk around the neighborhood and enjoy the green grass and seeing all the flowers. They love to go down by our pond and see if they can see some duckies.