A Cleaning Frenzy...

I got up and took the kids to school, came home for our fire inspection...we passed with flying colors, ran up some paperwork to my foster agency, took the littles their lunch that I forgot...they told me that the gas station by there sold lunchables...so I went and got 3. Holy cow! They wanted $4.99 a piece. Wow!! I almost put them back, but I didn't feel like going back in to Wal-mart for stuff and then going home to make lunch, and then going back out to run them their lunches, so I just paid the stupid $4.99 for 3 of them and took them to them. I grabbed a philly steak sub from Subway, came home and cleaned for a bit. Cleaned the kitchen the rest of the way (Andy had a headstart on it last night, did some spot cleaning in the living room, I still need to vacuum and mop the kitchen floor, but I had to go get the kids from school. Got the littles and then went to Miss B's to get State Fair tickets from her (Thanks SO muhc, Beth!!) so we can go to the State Fair tomorrow with my father-in-law. Then, we ran and got Deidra from school. Came home and Deidra asked to go play for a bit. We were going to go to the homecoming parade, but they all want to go to the airport to go get Grampy more. So, we're going to go meet Daddy at work and then go to the airport together to get Grampy. I'm hoping to at least be able to clean the guest bathroom, vacuum downstairs, and mop the kitchen floor all in the next hour. Then, I promised the kids that I'd get them some candy since we're missing the parade, I need some money for parking at the airport, and then we'll be off to meet Andy in Dallas. The house is presentable and looks nice, I just need to finish decluttering my foster counter later today as well.

So PMSy...

I missed September's cycle and so far this month I haven't gotten it yet. I've had moments where it feels like it's coming, but nada. My hormones are going crazy and today I just feel like sitting in a corner and crying for awhile. My chest hurts, my abdomen is bloated and crampy, I could use a nap, and I'm just emotional.

Josiah has been a handful and a half this past week. His meds have totally quit working. I keep giving them to him as I don't want to see what he'd be like without them totally, but for the most part I see a lot of his old behaviors returning and he's been very hard to handle some days. I just keep praying a lot. Baby T has been throwing some extreme fits...she whines, cries, and screams over everything. Yesterday, I think she spent 3/4ths of her day in her room screaming. I give her a warning and if she doesn't stop or she starts screaming at me, then I just pick her up and put her in her room and tell her when she can calm down, she can come out. A lot of times, I go and get her and no sooner is she out of her room and she is whining again by the time she gets to the stairs...I issue another warning and if she doesn't stop, I have to put her right back in. Even our OT got on her about her fits while she was here. And of course, she hates to be redirected or scolded and that only makes her cry and scream more, so she started crying at the OT. She's talking more though, so that is a good thing, but I just wish everything wouldn't make her so upset. She really is a sweet little thing and the whining doesn't get her her way, so I would have thought she would have diminished her fits by now...instead they only seem to be escalating. Little E started meds today for ADHD. They made her a bit drowsy. I guess we'll see how she does on them.

I'm going to go drink a cup of coffee while I try to get Josiah to nap and see if I can get some time in The Word. I have paperwork to finish, adoption paperwork to do, a house to clean, laundry to do...and did I mention that I have a fire inspection to do on Friday, a health inspection on Tuesday...a caseworker visit tomorrow morning...oh and Andy's Dad will be in for 5 days on Friday as well. I feel like I have so much going on right now and I am just exhausted.

Well...we passed!

I was so nervous...but the lady was really nice. She was here for 2 1/2 hours just asking us questions and checking our logs and where we keep everything. But, things went well...the only thing we have to do is buy another fire extinguisher for our 2nd level. We had one before, but the fire dept said they only required one so we returned it. We never realized that minimum standards required one for each level. Oh well. Then, we just have to buy a bag with 2 zippers that we can lock together to keep any refrigerated medications inside.

Now, since I finally have some time to do stuff without having to worry about people coming over or anything, I'm going to go work on our Christmas cards.

Great!

We received a letter in the mail yesterday saying that Child-Care Licensing will be visiting our home soon. They select random homes to inspect to make sure that all the minimum standards are being met and that all of our paperwork and training is current. They also talk to the children and so forth to make sure that we're following the rules. Talk about something I didn't want to worry about over the holidays... I guess I keep our house inspection ready at all times so that if they call and say that they'll be here within the hour...we're ready to go. UGH. Say a prayer that when we have ours, it will all go smoothly and we'll be fine in our inspection. I'm just worried that I'll forget something in the stress of it all.

Fire Inspection

Well, the fire inspector called. He's coming out tomorrow at 11...so that's one thing out of the way. Hopefully, we can get off of being on hold sooner that way and Miss J can come next week.

We passed our health inspection...

I was stressing out making sure everything was in it's place, that we remembered all the little things that we had to do, and that everything remained clean for our inspection. We passed....and I turned in most of the forms that she gave me on Friday. Our home study is being scheduled this week more than likely. I think we found out how to get our criminal checks from MI...now to just figure out IL. I feel a lot better now.

Our health inspection is today...

there's still a bunch of little things to do. I pray that work will let me leave an hour early so that I can buzz home and get them done. If not, I'll have to hope and that between Andy and I we can get it all done in the half an hour we'll have before she gets here to do the inspection. We both have to work today. I just want everything to be really clean. I pray that I'll be able to leave early and I pray that our inspection goes well. Thank you, Abba.

All that nervousness and for naught...

We passed our fire inspection with flying colors yesterday...and he was here all but maybe 5 minutes. He just needed to look at our appliances, central heat/air, checked the outlets for safety plugs, tested our smoke detectors and made sure we had the appropriate number, and checked our carbon monoxide detector and then asked to see our fire extinguisher and made sure that we had the appropriate one. Then, he signed off on his inspection and we were done.

Thank you, Abba, for letting things go smoothly...