Clock Watchers

That's what we are every weekday morning. Is it 8 o'clock yet? How long before they're out the door?

I was thinking about how nearly every post is about a negative episode although most such episodes have a humorous twist (or our twisted humor allows us to see it that way). So I have been considering what might be posted that is entirely positive.



{cricket sounds}



Nope. Got nothin'.
It is called Snark Bait for a reason.

While our kids are great people and have many positive qualities, I can't think of a day that included all of our kids which did not have some snarky, oppositional overtone. That's not to say that we don't enjoy them and enjoy most of our days but it is what it is. We don't have nearly the stress, turmoil, and heartache as many of our fellow adoption bloggers who we read daily, but it is there. Older adopted/foster children bring in all the hurts, injustice, confusion, and pain of their pasts and dump it everywhere nearly every day. Because of their traumatic backgrounds, lack of consistent parenting over the years, emotional immaturity, and a combination of emotional and brain disorders, we just deal with a lot of stuff relentlessly (they do sleep sometimes!).

This morning was no different.
They woke up arguing with one another and it went on from there.

Squeaker came out in an article of clothing that belonged to Lucky and then lied in my face when I asked her about it. When I told her to change, she came out in something that doesn't pass dress code. When I told her to change, she snarled, slammed, and stomped her way upstairs after arguing with me that it was acceptable. That's the "lite" version. Her rudeness and snarky asides continued until she walked out the door.

Drama Boy responded to her snarky attitude with one of his own and when I told him to knock it off he told me to tell her......you get the idea. Then he whined, grunted, grimaced, and sighed because he didn't like what was served for breakfast. How can all these kids have gotten to their ripe old ages without learning how to "wash it down" with some water? That's a crucial life skill. He also put a half chewed sausage back on the serving plate and then lied in my face when I asked him about it.

Lucky had a pretty good morning after I asked her and Squeaker to bag their early morning gossip-fest. She forgot her hairbrush at her mom's house and had to borrow mine and asked me repeatedly what time it was and said over and over "I can't believe you changed your hair color".

I let The Boss sleep in to minimize interactions. Since I've gotten him up, the littles have quarreled without coming up for air.

And yet, for us that's a pretty okay morning so I guess that's the positive. Despite their rough backgrounds and the fact that we all came together under less than ideal circumstances and the oppositional, destructive behavior, we manage to have mostly okay days and plenty of pretty good ones too.