Ooze

Sparky's leg wound got infected and Ana had to take him to the doctor once and back to the emergency room twice to get it checked out. They go back to the doctor on Friday to have it looked at again. The drive to the doctor is a long one since it is in the next county and the emergency room is always a long wait but at least more interesting. He's had an additional injection of antibiotic and today, after he got kicked by a kid at school, they took out every other staple so that it can drain better. Ook.

What would be really nice is if everyone could get on the same page. So far Ana has been told: he can walk and even run around/he needs to stay off of it and keep it elevated, he should keep it uncovered so it gets air/he should keep it wrapped, he can go to school/he needs to stay home, no special care needed/didn't they tell you to put neosporin on it?

It's a wonder anybody survives a trip to the emergency room.

Under the Bus

Squeaker's antics on the school bus continue.

On Thursday I got a call from a mom of another student who told me that Squeaker put gum in her son's hair. She said she almost cried when she saw the bald spot he had from trying to pull out the gum. I don't think she intended it to be vicious (Squeaker, not the mom). She's had a crush on this kid since he started riding the bus (Squeaker, not the mom).

Of course, she denies it and blamed it on another girl saying with a dramatic sigh and eye roll, "The ONE time I'm telling the truth...". Which I guess implies that I didn't believe her which, of course, I did not.

The next day I checked in with the bus driver to see if she was behaving that week and he said no. I asked if he wrote her up and he said he had done it all year but nothing changed so I guess he's given up.

Squeaker's teacher left a message on Friday about the incident and to let me know that she had become verbally abusive when he talked to her about it. Several classmates had reported that she had hit the same kid earlier in the week. She was sent to the counselor's office and they were handling it. He was supposed to call me back and let me know what they were going to do but I haven't heard from him. Maybe he's given up too.

She had a good report from the driver today so she exclaimed loudly for the benefit of all the bus riders (and the neighbors, I guess), "See, Mom, I behave sometimes!" Later in the day she asked me "Did you like the report you got from Mr.---- today?"

Apparently this one good deed is supposed to compensate for her snotsy disrespect this week and her smart-mouth showing off misbehavior on the bus all year.

I don't exactly know how to respond to that. I suppose I should say----great job, keep it up! Too bad I'm not much of a cheerleader. I am glad she made it one day with no problems, but it annoys me that now she's pestering me for strokes because she managed not to assault or insult anybody for half an hour on the bus.

I also know that if I don't give her what she wants I'll pay for it later. More on that later. I'm too tired and it's too tedious for tonight.

Midnight Musings

1. If the dinner dishes aren't done by midnight they probably won't get done until the morning.

2. The only time this house is quiet is in the middle of the night.

3. Mountain Dew in a pink cup looks extremely unappealing. I don't even like Mountain Dew but it's the only thing in the house with fizz.

4. If I set my own work hours why am I coming back downstairs at midnight to finish today's work?

5. The later I stay up the more I think of the things I should have said to the kids in response to events during the day.

6. How can a little bitty four-year-old completely hog a queen-sized bed?

7. By morning, I never remember everything on my mental to do list but I probably still won't write it down.

8. The later I stay up the more I worry about stuff. Why don't I just go to bed early?

9. Ana's decription of Sparky's gash didn't do it justice. It looked like a shark chomped a chunk out of him. Not really. But it was deep and wide and GUH-ROSS and now it looks like a fat-lipped smile that has been stapled shut. Where's the camera?

10. It's difficult to type with a heavily bandaged middle finger. I fear it will have an adverse affect on my weekend Guitar Hero ability as well.

Souffle de Ipod

Today I opened the oven to make croutons and found an iPod.

It wasn't a mystery whose it was or who put it there. It had been indignantly reported missing and the usual suspects had been rounded up and its theft vehemently denied by the young perps. It's a good thing I'm somewhat of a conservationist. Had I bothered to pre-heat the oven we would have had a stinking, smoldering, toxic mess.

We have an impressive number of things go missing, stolen, or broken around here. Just since Christmas we have lost a scooter, a DS or two, two iPods, a skateboard, a skateboard truck, video camera and memory card, four pair of shoes, and....I've lost track now.

I guess that's not too bad considering our record over the last seven years. With hundreds of traumatized kids coming through our home, we're certainly not shocked by sticky fingers any more. We've had stolen from our home a great deal of cash as well as dozens of video games and dvds, books, jewelry and other personal items, a PS2,game system controllers, a laptop, a stereo, cell phones, cd players, hundreds of cds, and the list goes on.

We also have had a lot of kids steal food and our personal toiletry items such as toothbrushes and razors (yuck!) and small things like chapstick and lipstick, hair and skin products even when they are given their own.

And we've also had to deal with shop-lifting incidents with a number of kids. Many have stolen from one another or from school, as well.

Stealing is a very common problem when working with traumatized kiddos. A lot of this stems from them arriving to us in survival mode. It takes a long time for such kids to feel safe enough for these behaviors to stop. That's a whole other post though.

At least for right now it seems that some of the kids are having fun stealing and hiding other's belongings and then accusing the victim of doing it to get them into trouble.

So the vigilance and buttoning up continue and the little thieveses continue to deny and cry foul.

By the way, the croutons were delicious.

Scolding

Squeaker rides a special education bus that comes right to our front door. Only today it didn't come.

She came back in the house shortly after 9:00am, so I finished loading the dishwasher and ran upstairs to find some shoes. It's a ten minute drive and I got her to school at 9:13am.

After letting her out of the car, I was stopped by a woman in the parking lot where I was given a very one-sided "talking to" that went like this:

Her: "We're doing testing for the next three weeks." (holding up the requisite number of fingers in case I was dense, I guess)
Me: "I know."
Her: "Now I have to pull her test. You need to have her here on time."
Me: "I'm sorry. The bus didn't come this morning."
Her: "It's very important that everyone is here on time."
Me: "Yes, but the bus didn't come."
Her: "9:05 is really the cut-off."
Me: "Well, sorry. The. Bus. Didn't. Come."

If I had written it down she would have stamped it with a frowny face and written meany things in insensitive red ink. Zero tolerance for circumstances-beyond-our-control at this school. This was not a taking-turns kind of converstation either. She just plowed right on through.

Sorry, Lady. More bad news. She'll miss testing tomorrow too. I've had an appointment set with her new psychiatrist for months before I even heard about the testing. No way we're missing it for testing which really has nothing to do with my child's actual progress and education anyway.

Natural Consequences

Sparky and I spent 8 hours in the Emergency Room yesterday (and into early this morning) getting an extraordinarily ugly gash in his leg stapled up. Actually, the stapling part only took about 10 minutes, the rest was spent waiting for the doctor, the nurse, the x-ray technician, etc. Always good to have an opportunity to practice patience.

Here's what happened:

Sparky asked to go to his friend's house and beat me to my first question by telling me that his friend's mom was home. Since the boys have very limited neighborhood privileges right now, I told him he could go for 45 minutes. I also told him not to go anywhere else. "I won't," he said. Yeah, right.

An hour later, Drama boy called my cell phone crying and saying that Sparky had fallen and cut his leg open. When I asked where they were, he couldn't tell me, wasn't really sure but gave some directions I couldn't understand. Finally, he said, "They'll just take us," and hung up. Who? Where? Yikes.

I found them in the back of some strangers truck with their friend and some teenage boy I've told them to stay away from, no shoes, smelling like a sewer, a dirty towel wrapped around Sparky's leg . Apparently, they were playing near a deep storm drain full of green, slimey water and their "friend" told Sparky to push Drama Boy in. Drama Boy, tired of being called weak by this kid, decided he was going to prove something so he pushed Sparky instead.

So, now Sparky has staples in his leg and lots of pain and Drama Boy has lots of guilt. They told me that they learned their lesson and they are never going to play there again. Not exactly the most critical lesson here but I guess it's a start.

More about our emergency room fun later.

No New Nickname

Drama Boy wanted his nickname changed to "Performing Monkey". We were willing to accommodate but on Friday in the car coming home from a restaurant, he blubbered nearly the entire way because Squeaker wouldn't stop singing along to the radio.

Drama Boy it is.

Performing Monkey

Drama Boy has requested a name change. At dinner tonight he was asking if there was another word to replace drama. After entertaining suggestions from nearly everyone (and vehemently rejecting Thespian Boy), he decided on Performing Monkey.

How Did That Happen?

Okay, I admit it. I am a freak who does not watch television. I only know what goes on when somebody tells me about it. I got this from the blog of one of my old work buddies. Hard to believe but it must be true if it's on YouTube. Kidding. Calm Down.

"Shout to the Lord" on American Idol. I've never actually seen that show (although I listen to enough radio to know who wins each year). This is pretty cool though.

How Brown Was My Valley

I've become a slave to my lawn.

Recently we paid a lot of money to have the lawn fertilized and seeded to revive it for spring. I feel like I now have a huge investment in my grass of all things. Our sprinklers are on the skids so I've been hand-watering in the morning and evening and checking it frequently to make sure those dang little grass seeds are going to take. They had better.

After renting a house at a Christian campground for a few years, I kinda got used to having a lot of dirt and wide open space. Now, although I feel squished into our culdesac, we have a pretty sizeable front yard which we constantly coddle to stay green in our desert-like climate. I can't help but think how many veggies we could grow there. I doubt the neighbors would appreciate it much. But at least when I'm out there trying to keep it alive I could feel like it was giving something back to us.

We're working on a garden plot in the backyard but I've decided we'll be having a lot of picnics on our emerald green front lawn this summer. We're going to get our money's worth, by golly.

Ana Rocks (kinda)

While waiting for shot at the doctor's yesterday, Drama Boy worked himself into a fit of nervous giggling, whining and squirming. The nurse repeatedly told him not to look at the needle and to relax. Finally, she laughingly asked if he wanted me to hold his hand. "No! Oh...wait...yes!" I held his hand, the nurse gave him the shot and he said, "That tickled."

I laughed and said, "All that drama for that?" That pleased him since he loves to entertain people and lives for, well...drama.

Later, we stopped at 7-11 for Slurpees. Sparky was excited to find Iron Man cups and straws so I let them get those. Back in the car he was telling us that he had the best cup (I guess Drama Boy's was second best --Sparky always gets there first so often gets first pick at everything) and exclaimed, "My cup is so cool. I rock! Ana kinda rocks cuz she bought them for us."

"What?" I said, "I only 'kinda' rock? I make it possible for you to rock so that means I TOTALLY ROCK."

Vacation for Them Means More Work for Us

We didn't find snow in the mountains but we had fun anyway checking out the museum and shops and eating Mexican food and shaved ice. Everyone continues to be pleasant and cooperative for the most part.

Today is the first day of Spring Break and already the kids must think we are their entertainment directors. They can't seem to find one single fun thing to do unless we figure it out for them. It'll be a long week as we will mostly be hanging out at home with trips to parks and maybe the beach. The rest of the time we'll be fixing the stuff they've broken and getting ready for our garage sale next week where we hope to off-load a ton of stuff we are tired of picking up and maintaining.

I have banned the kids from asking me to buy them anything or to use the computer this week. We only have one and I need it for my work.

Since I work from home, Ana will have to keep the kids somewhat quiet and entertained in the mornings which is never easy. So far they've hula-hooped, walked the dogs, and are now in the front yard running around yelling while waiting for Ana to finish watering so they can go the library.

Uh oh, just heard Squeaker get busted for yelling at the Boss. She's now snottily making an explanation. Like I said...long week ahead.

Reprieve

We've had a quiet week. In a startling shift of events, all of the middles have been reasonably well-behaved (no suspensions, running away, harassing the neighbors, destruction; smartmouths downgraded to mild) and it's the Boss who has been a bit of a stinker.

It's a nice change of pace. Since the police paid a visit to Sparky, he has been pretty much coming straight home and remaining here as he is supposed to. This is a relief since he was hanging out with some much older kids. Not a good situation. Since none of the middle kids are allowed in the front yard unattended, we have not had any neighbor problems this week. The mailbox boy said his dad told him not to play with our kids anymore. Too bad, but understandable. They have even been getting along fairly well even though nearly every conversation turns into an argument sooner or later. Squeaker nearly missed the bus this morning so she could finish an argument over whether we would find snow in the mountains when we go.

The only downside of everyone being home when they are supposed to is that I am certain we have heard every Guitar Hero 3 song about a million and half times. That might be a slight overstatement. But only slight.

Now we have Spring Break to look forward to next week and I'm sure that will induce some cries of boredom but the boys will be doing a lot of patching and painting where they have damaged the walls.

Tomorrow, we are heading to the mountains in search of the snow which can no longer be seen from our house. We've had to wait a long time for this trip because everybody's behavior was so questionable so it will be nice for them if we do find some snow. Ana had to drive out to Palm Springs yesterday and said there is a bit more on the other side so the boys are hopeful.

Meanwhile, we're enjoying the peace for as long as it lasts.

Tattlers

Our kids are a bunch of snitches and tattle-tales. This is a good way to find out what is going on but they seem shocked to find out that we often know even before the tattling begins. Maybe we're just suspicious by nature or maybe it's because the kids have shown themselves to be pretty untrustworthy.

Recently, one of the boys called out Squeaker on something. She then tried to deny what happened. Drama Boy said "Then how come you said not to tell your mom?" It was not a big thing but something she had asked to do that I said no to and she went ahead and did it anyway.

She continued to deny so Ana said, "Oh come on, you did it." She responded, "We don't have to tell mom do we?" and, of course, Ana told her that I already knew which, of course based on the evidence, I did. Squeaker was surprised. Peaches said, "Do you really think they don't know everything that goes on around here?"

I wish that were true. But I do have my suspicions.

April Fools

Given the date, we decided it would be a perfect evening for Christmas caroling. Our teenage niece and nephew drove up to join in the festivities. We bundled up in hats, mittens, and scarves, put the littles in the wagon and the dogs on leashes and set out.

The results were somewhat disappointing. Maybe it's just our neighborhood, but we didn't find a very receptive audience.

To be honest, a few of them looked petrified.