Doings and Goings On

President's Day WEEK is going as vacations do.

The littles quarrel and tattle constantly but still play together all day without pause. Yesterday one of them closed the stopper on the sink and left the water running, flooding the upstairs bathroom. It ran down the vents to drown the downstairs bathroom as well. I put towels down to soak up the mess. The older kids freaked out when they went to wash hands for lunch thinking the flood might have come from a more unsavory source.

Shorty had a doctor appointment this morning which meant a lot of time in the car as we still go to the next county. Tomorrow I will drive him down to a friend's house about an hour away and then head a half hour's drive to pick up one of the kids from a friend's house before making the hour long trip back home. We don't really live in the boonies but it seems like it sometimes. Squeaker has already started rolling her eyes and snorting so we're all kept informed on how put out she is to have to be in the car again.

Lucky brought home an mp3 player belonging to her godfather's seven year old daughter. She asked me to charge it so I did, then promptly confiscated it. I had to explain to her that we don't allow young girls in our home to listen to music filled with profanity and nasty references to cheap, dirty sex. She borrowed that from a seven year old? Good grief.

Squeaker got into several little spats with one of the littles yesterday then yelled at me about how he was acting when I got on her about it. Does she really want her behavior compared with that of a three-year-old?

Today she went a little too far with snarky, rude comments about my messy room after I had spent all day yesterday and part of today on the rest of the house. Actually, way too far. So I made her a detailed list and she is taking over all my household/yard/pet chores so I can have the luxury of tidying my room to her satisfaction. She managed to get through cooking and cleaning up dinner, doing dishes, sweeping, and folding a load of laundry before admitting she was ready to pass out. That was only part of the evening chores. Tomorrow should be fun since she'll be privileged to get up early and put in a full day of it.

I've been having Lucky work a little each day on her science fair project which is due next Monday. It's been going okay but tomorrow she starts working on the report part of it. Writing is a challenge for her but she seems to have a good grasp of the experiment and the result so I'm hoping it will go easily for her.

Stickers finally gets back into her college art classes tomorrow after a long break. That will be good since I think maybe we've given her some sort of creative block. I've commissioned her to paint a new piece to go above our fireplace since she keeps mercilessly criticizing the one that is there now. Yes, she painted that one too.

Scapegoat

The kids are back in school today and I am relieved. It was a rough two weeks. Amazingly, the actual holidays were very nice but all the in-between days were pretty awful right up until the end.

Each of my kids had at least two ranting, angry tantrums. That's two tantrums times three kids in two weeks minus the holidays so twelve days which means on average it was a tantrum every other day.

And I, apparently, am the cause of all that is wrong with their worlds. Among the triggers for said tantrums were saying no to a movie at bedtime, asking someone to put something away, putting something away for someone, correcting rude behavior, and showing irritation when I was irritated.

And for such unconscionable acts I have been cussed at and about; have had to listen to, "I don't like you", "I want to run away", "I wish I was never adopted", "I'm out of here as soon as I turn 18", "I have to do everything myself". I've been accused of not doing enough, giving enough, buying enough, loving enough. According to my kids, I'm the reason why everyone is so angry and rude and the default cause of brattiness in three-year-olds.

Of course, they seem to recover relatively quickly and move on to other things until the next explosion and I'm the one still aggravated. Usually it's another day, another snark...I indulge my annoyance with an after bed-time gripe session with Ana and then I'm fine. But for some reason the barbs are sticking this time around. Maybe it's my annual wistful hope for a warm, fuzzy holiday season with my kids which will likely never happen.

So I'm grateful for the space and quiet this morning. And I'm sure they are glad for the chance to get back to school and away from me too.

The Mouthpiece

Only Drama Boy, The Boss, and Squeaker are home today. They all seemed to be doing pretty well and were getting along fine so we made the colossal mistake of leaving them alone in the living room unsupervised while we were in another room.

During that time, Squeaker got mad at DB for playing with The Boss and demanded that she gets to play with him because "he's my brother". The Boss still wanted to play with DB so she called them both names. Then she ordered The Boss to take something upstairs to his room and when he said, "I can't. I'm scared" she told him "I don't care. Take it now." So Drama Boy went with him.

Shortly after that she came to tattle that Drama Boy was telling The Boss to call her names. Ana called The Boss into the room and asked him about it. He admitted that Drama Boy told him to say unkind things to Squeaker. When I asked him if he was supposed to say those words he said "No" so I told him that he did not have to listen to DB and Squeaker only to Mommy and Auntie.

He then said that Squeaker had been calling him names and telling him to call Drama Boy names. He repeated all of them. The kid's gonna have as foul a mouth as the rest of them soon.

So we had to confess to the kids that we errored gravely in allowing them to have any unsupervised time together and let them know that it wasn't going to happen again. Somehow they can't figure out why it is so wrong to use a little kid to call each other names and to fight over him like two dogs with a bone. I sent them for showers and made their dinner so they could go up to their rooms early.

Drama Boy cried and Squeaker screamed and cussed at me and they both blamed each other. They're nothing if not predictable.

The Party's Over

Grandma left today and the old snarky Squeaker returned.

Three weeks ago she rearranged her school schedule to join choir. She called me and begged....please, please, please...you know I've always wanted to sing. I agreed hesitantly when she was on the phone. It turned into a bit of a problem because I had some reservations about her joining and when I did not show the proper amount of enthusiasm she turned it into an afternoon scream-fest. Her behavior addressed and sorted out, she started the following Monday. She neglected to tell me she had two performances that week. For one I had to take her early to school (she normally rides the bus) and the other was on a Saturday where we already had plans. She also forgot to mention that before those performances I had to buy her school choir shirt and make sure she had black pants and shoes to wear. Grumble, grumble, grumble....but I did it.

In the midst of this she also decided to join the basketball team at school. I had already said no to this because she is involved in cheer and too many activities for her are not a good thing. That turned into a rip-roaring, multi-day, screaming, door slamming tantrum.

Last week she had to be dropped off early again to be measured for the dress which we will need to buy for more formal concerts. Okay, did it, done. No, I cannot donate sodas for your fundraiser car wash, so sorry.

Then on Friday of last week she announced that she was dropping choir to become an aide in the office. Huh? What's up with that? Screaming, door slamming, F-word spewage, since you ask.

Today the real? truth came out. She had an incident with one of the girls in the class. Squeaker did nothing wrong, the girl just hates her. So she asked to get out of the class so she wouldn't lose it and get suspended. Her counselor really does want her to be an office aide though.

Wait, don't like that one? Well, the plan was to join choir because she needed an elective in order to become office aide. She only took the class so she could drop and become an office aide. Real-ly? So glad I scrambled around (on my birthday!) to get her to all her performances and bought her outfit and endured her tantrums about getting into the class.

Well, what if there's a problem as office aide? There won't be because the only other kid is her best-best friend. REAL-LY? And they get to go around together without a teacher to deliver notices to the classrooms. Oh, so fun.

So of course there won't be a problem. The only problem is that I won't give her a chance. I obviously just want to pick a fight since I am even questioning this move. She is going to trust her kids. I'm giving that the "Snark of the Day" award. So far she's lied and manipulated to get to be office aide and her counselor and resource teacher think it's a good move and I'm the mean, old witch because I'm not on board.

She acted like a horse's patoot all evening, muttered snide comments, told the dog "At least you're loved" and refused meds. SO looking forward to spending the day with her tomorrow because refused meds means no school.

I told her I appreciated her helping me by her actions make the decision about what she's ready for and what she's not. Her reply, "Bite me!"

Yep, so ready to run around campus without adult supervision.

Oh, So Close

For those of you keeping score at home....we did not make it all the way until bedtime without the return of the snark.

She tried on a tone when I asked her after school if her room had been picked up this morning. Annoying but not too bad.

She caught up on chores when I told her that was prerequisite to tonight's pumpkin carving.

She took a shower and went off to bed when I asked her to. So far so good.

Then she came back downstairs for water when I headed into my room to check email. When she dropped ice all over the floor no one said a thing. So she talked back anyway. "I KNOW!" Lucky said, "No one said anything." She replied, "I'm just heading it off. The word that begins with 'L' and ends with 'E'". (I'm assuming lecture?). Then she picked up the ice cubes and threw them at the sink sending ice splinters everywhere. What a strange world she must live in where she argues with herself and then blames it on others.

As she left the kitchen, she swiped Peaches' camera off the counter. Ana called her back. She shouted, "WHAT?" (I heard her all the way upstairs). She claimed to be taking it upstairs to Peaches. Ri-ght. When told to put the camera back because it wasn't hers she complained about getting in trouble for "doing something nice for someone" then slammed the camera onto the counter and snarked herself off to bed. Yeah, that's real nice.

Almost made it....but not quite.

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.

Dress Rehearsal

We are rearranging rooms again so Ana was cleaning up piles of trash in Drama Boy's room. She came across a script that Drama Boy had written called "Plan to Get Out!!!". Yes there really were three exclamation points. It listed my name and his and Squeaker's and had lines for each of us.

A few weeks ago I had sent he and Squeaker up to their rooms for some snarky argument. It usually is pretty loud and pretty mean if I send kids to their rooms. Later they both came down together and asked if they could talk to me because it had all been a big misunderstanding so could they please come out.

It went down word for word as it was written in the script. Hilarious.

Except that I didn't really buy it at the time and sent them back upstairs.

Snark of the Day

It was a tough call because we've had a snarkful, snitty, hot, irritable weekend. But, of course, we went with the ones that made us laugh. All decisions of the judges are final.


Second Runner-Up: Sparky

Context: Four hour self-pity party. We're getting a new girl tomorrow who will be sharing a room with Squeaker. I bought new bedding, a rug, and a mirror for their room. Sparky always gets upset when someone gets something he doesn't. Never mind the fact that he received new bedding and room decorations when he first moved in and again from his grandma when we moved into our new home. He now wants Ana to take back everything she ever gave to him. Ana told me that if she does that all he will have left is a collapsable hamper, some broken toys, two t-shirts, and a comforter.

Snark: "You think you know how to take care of kids. Yeah, right!"

Zing! Ow, that one really hurt. Yeah, right.
*********
First Runner-Up: Squeaker

Context: Mini-tantrum at lunch. The mexican restaurant we went to gave us free refillable kids drinks. Free stuff? No argument from me. Squeaker took one look at the small size of the cup and picked it up, moved it away, and turned away from it with her arms crossed huffily. Since Ana and I were sharing a drink I happily took the little discarded cup and got myself a soda from the fountain. A while later she got thirsty and realized her cup and was gone then proceeded to have a snitty fit although I told her to feel free to ask for a water cup ("Yeah, right"). Okay whatever... contentedly sipping my tiny little soda. She muttered snotty comments almost continuously for next 20 minutes. Finally, I told her there would be no soda next time either to which she responded:

Snark: "Like I would come back here again anyway.....the food is GAHross." While still shoveling it in.

Okay, I admit that Ana and I laughed out loud at that one (and I don't mind packing her PB&J for next time).
********
The Winner: Sparky

Context: Sparky and Drama Boy were wrestling upstairs when we were supposed to be walking out the door to go to church. Ana called them repeatedly. Finally they came down but Sparky stopped on the stairs and refused to come. Ana told him "People are waiting in the hot car. You need to come now and stop being selfish."

Snark: I am NOT selfish. Besides I don't care if they are waiting in the car!"

Snark you very much.