Fast February

And just like that February is at an end.  Freight is starting to come in at work.  We ended the day with me putting books away from one pallet and Liz starting the next one that arrived.
The little man seems to be settling in pretty well at his new school.  I haven't heard any complaints from him or gotten any more emails or phone calls.
The little woman is loving riding the bus by herself and not having her little brother at her school.

Questions and Questions

The little man is just filled with questions this week.  First he wants to know when he will go back to a first grade classroom.  I explained about behavior and we would have to wait and see.  It depends on him.  I think he got it.
Then the big question came again, but more.  Why does he live with me?  And he gets that Mommy made some bad choices.  I explain the judge said he will live with me.  Then he wants to know how the judge knew she was making bad choices....did he visit her house?  Well that is a tough one.  And I did not explain it all.  I said she was doing drugs and he said "ohhhh." I did not tell him she was homeless when he was born and I did not tell him that because she did drugs, he did drugs and that is how they knew she was making bad choices. 
An onward.  He said Jazzlynn lives with Mommy so she must not be making bad choices anymore.  Oh we did not go into that.  So he wanted to know why he couldn't live with her now.  And I said it was up to a judge and it is a lot of process for that to happen.  And Mommy would have to do that.  I did not tell him that it would mean she would have to come back here and take care of her warrants.  There would be hoops to jump through and money to pay.  None of which involve me. 
What I did tell him, I was happy the judge let him live with me, that I love him and I would be lost without him.  And for now that seems like it was enough.  Sometimes it is hard to know just how much of the story to tell.  How much is helpful, not hurtful or vengeful.  Dealing with all these behaviors that the therapists say comes from the drug use invitro just make me angry at their mother.  That she had over a year after he was born to get her act together and then be a parent, but didn't makes me angry. That she moved 2000 miles away makes me angry.  But it certainly is not this little boy's fault.  He is the one who pays the price all the way around. 

Upcoming Appointments and Plans

Saw our therapist this morning.  We looked at the calendar and have two weeks worth of appointments scheduled.  Including the one with the therapist, the brain doctor and me.  That will be the interesting one.  The therapist said she talked with the home specialist and he seemed to think the little man took his change very well.  And he did when we told him.  Behaviors don't always present right then.  Sometimes some processing has to happen.
Anyway, I signed the little man up for a hip hop fit class.  It runs five weeks.  Naturally one of those falls too close to the appointment with the therapist and the brain doctor.  He will have to miss that one, just because.
I've been watching for something for the little man that he can do and be successful at.  He has been wanting to take a hip hop class for awhile so I thought the timing was great.

First Day

Let me start off by saying there was no snow.  The school district erred on the side of caution and had a two hour late start.  We managed to get every one where they needed to be and I was the only one late.   Very little freight, so it worked out all right to be late.
I was at home when the phone rang.  It was the school and could I come get the little man.  My heart just sank.  And so I went and the school psychologist met me in the office.  She told me he had a great day right up until the lock down drill at the end of the day.  And then he went off the rails.  She told me he destroyed the classroom and was being restrained. 
We walk in the classroom and there is a bit of a mess, but no where near our bar.   He is restrained and cursing like a sailor.  They let him go and he wasn't done, so they caught him and restrained him again.  And then he calmed down.  They got him some water.  The switch had been flipped and he walked out to the car with me just like normal.
They had done everything they needed to do.  No one told me he can't come back tomorrow.  The therapist said he shouldn't be expelled since he is in an SLC room.  Whew.  And so tomorrow is a new day.  They had told me to expect some behavior as he settles in to his new place. 

Lasagna For Dinner

Pat wanted family dinner and then didn't feel well.  He has had a cold for over a week and it was messing with his ears.  So he got some nice vertigo out of that.  NOT.
I put together a lasagna and picked up a salad to go with it.  We did not bring Mom this time as we didn't want her getting sick or bringing a cold into her place. 

Daybreak

My initial reaction was please let the little man go to Tuke's Valley. The little woman went there for kindergarten, so we are familiar with it.  But then I had the weekend to process some more (and I'm still processing).  I emailed Carly and told her I was good with Tuke's or Daybreak.  She was happy about that because Daybreak is where there was room for him. 
So yesterday I met with the team there who will be working with him.  School psychologist, speech teacher, behavior teacher and first grade teacher.  They gave me a good overall of their program and how that looks.  They started teaching me the language....yes there is a language to this.  Basically it is the words to use for various behaviors.  For a minute I lost my words and had to wait it out. 
We decided that the one on one who has been working with the little man will not make the transition with him.  They really wanted a clean break and how things are going to be there. 
I asked to be able to bring him after school to see where his new class is and meet his teachers.  They made that work for us. I picked him up from school and we went.  Saw the rooms, met everyone except the first grade teacher and met the principal.  We also ran into one of Mike's teachers and found out another one of his teachers is at the school.  That just felt too funny. 
The little man seemed to take it all in.  He had tearful good byes at his school from many of the aids.  He was welcomed at his new school.  And yes, he suffers another loss but hopefully the gain will make up for this one. 
We opted not to use busing for now.  My schedule is so crazy it seemed easier to just do parent drop offs and pick ups on the days I don't work. He and I discussed it and at first he wanted the bus, but then he liked the idea of having me to himself for those few minutes every day. 
He wanted to go to bed at 7:30 pm so we did.  He was asleep by 8.  I think that shows how stressful this change is for him. 

Tics

The therapist called today.  We are going to move the little woman up to the level three services also.  And she is going to see the psychiatrist also.  For a good nine months she has had this "tic" where she says "Yes" a  lot.
Now the little man explained it as she said she is playing a game in her head and she says yes when she "wins".  I don't know.  For awhile those "Yes's" diminished greatly.  And then the little squeals started.  And lately, like the last month they are more pronounced again.  The therapist said she hears the yes's.  I don't.  I just hear the squeals.  But I have been listening to them for so long I don't really hear them anymore, unless they interfere with me hearing something else.
Anyway the therapist said it could be nothing or it could be a sign of some more stuff going on with the little woman.  And she has been fighting more than flying lately.  Get one kid calmed down and the other goes off the rails.  Welcome to my life.

Thursday

The little man saw Dr. Borkin again this morning.  The dosage was upped one more time on his meds.  I do see a difference so far.  This is the tweaking. Finding out what is optimal.
After dropping the little man at school I went to work.  All the pallets were wrapped and ready with bills of lading.  Progress.  I played manual laborer and helped Brenda move the travel mugs for ASCC down to their area.  It took five trips.  Then I put books and books and books away.  It is always weird to switch gears and do something different.
The home specialist came over.  He seems to think we are doing so good.  And we are doing a bit better....in some areas.  Other areas, not so much.  I think he is about done.  He scheduled his next visit for two weeks out.  We did tell the little man about switching schools.  I'm not sure it sunk in as he was distracted trying to show the home specialist something else.   

Finishing Up

I am almost done with returns at work.  Only two to go and one of those can't even be requested until the end of next week. Every vendor seems to have different rules on what and when they will accept books back.  I have four pallets ready to be palletized and shipped out.  So I really have done quite a bit this quarter.
The little man finished his testing with the brain doctor.  Now I have to schedule an appt. with her and the therapist and myself to go over the results.  One more thing done though.  Making progress on that front also.

Game Night

The school had their make up Game Night.  The first one was postponed due to our measles outbreak in the county.  Our school became one of the places a contagious child had been.  So there were no extra activities until the end of Jan.  I had a week there when I could have had lunch with the littles, but there is no way I can prove that I had the shot or the measles.  C'est la vie. 
Anyway this time instead of just playing games we were into teams and solved puzzles.  The two boys working with me weren't so much interested in doing the puzzles as they were just being the winners.  And that is okay.  After that part was done the little man grabbed a game they have in his classroom and we played it.  I liked it and think we should try and find it and add it to our game library.  Once we were done with that we played a game of checkers.  And then it was time to go. 
It was a nice break from our usual routine.  The little woman didn't get a break.  She just did the same thing she does....plays on the phone.  Guess she was playing games.  ;p

Cassie's Birthday

The little woman and I picked up the little man right around noon.  We needed to get back home so they could call their mommy and wish her a happy birthday.  After much brouhaha they finally settled down enough to do that.  They called her on the computer so it would be a video chat.  They wished her a happy birthday.  They chatted with Jazzlynn.  And then they were done.  They had other things to do. 
There was no mention of the package for Niklauss for his birthday.  There was no mention of the package the little woman sent with her xmas ornament and books for her siblings.  They were not asked what was new in their lives or about school.  It felt like a really shallow conversation.  But it is not my conversation and as long as the littles were fine, I'm fine.
The call reminded me to check on the printer.  I had tried to scan last week and it wouldn't.  The little man had made a Valentine and told me it was for her.  So today I finally unplugged the printer and started over.  Now it scans, until it doesn't.  I scanned the card and posted it on facebook for her to see. 
Now we are good and won't need to call again until Mother's Day.  The littles are welcome to call whenever they want.  They almost never ask.  I think they are somewhat settled into this life that she really isn't a part of.  And it is her choice.  We made a lot more effort in the beginning.  But when you realize it isn't reciprocated....it kind of becomes less important. 

Television Time

The little man is having a sleep over at Uncle Pat's house and going out to Giuseppe's for dinner.  The little woman and I spent some lovely quiet time at home.  Josie came over and the girls played and I vegged on the couch catching on my shows.  So nice to watch one all the way through without having to get up to get someone something.
And now she is vegging on the couch and I am drinking my first glass of wine of 2019.

Television

For the past couple of weeks we have been getting error messages on the television.  Tells us to make sure our connections are tight and to reset the box.  Well yesterday it totally froze up and nothing helped.  I did the chat with Comcast and got an appointment with a technician. For today.
The technician came on time.  Checked us out and said our signal was really weak.  He changed out all the connectors and fixed the modem.  Went outside and did the connections at the box with new weatherproof ones.  And we once again have television in the living room.  Whew.
Got to like it when customer service goes the way it should and is easy.  Thanks Comcast.

IEP

I was warned it could take over three months to complete an IEP for the little man.  Well it only took six weeks.  We had our meeting today to go over the evaluation and the IEP. 
They had to break up the testing a lot to get it done.  It is part of the whole.  He did really well on the IQ stuff.  And they said he was NOT working up to potential.  If he got a little frustrated he would not move forward.  If he perceived he had something wrong he would not move forward.  His scores showed average for grade level to way high.  Both the psychologists and the principal said they had not seen scores that high.  Those were math scores.
They did agree that if we don't get a handle on the behavior...the education suffers.  It probably already has to a point, it is just he is smart enough to not fall way back behind.  Yet.
That said....his IEP is not for academics.  He will be pulled out of gen ed and moved to an SLC room where he will work on the behaviors and get small group instruction for academics.  He does seem to work better in that setting.  He has done better the last six weeks having his one on one, so it kind of proves that point. 
The problem is his school does not have an SLC room that meets his needs.  And so he will be transitioning to another school.  And oh he does not do well with change.  But we will get through it.  We will find out next week which school he will be moving too. And how that is going to work with busing and daycare.
While I totally agree it is a good thing, my heart still breaks for him.  He is leaving  his school and all his friends.  Now he is pretty social and makes new friends easily.  So it may not be that hard on  him.  But you know he still talks about his best friends who have moved to different schools and still misses them. 

Valentine's Day

Let me tell you about my window.  Usually the little man is the one who has epic meltdowns that may culminate in broken things.  But this one started with the little woman.  I'm not sure what is up other than she seems to think his way gets a lot of attention.  So about a month ago she threw something at the front window and the outside pane broke.  Lovely.  I've spent a couple of different days picking up glass and wondering how to get the rest out of the frame. 
Move to today.  It was a little thing and I can't even remember what, but they were both melting down a bit.  Nothing major.  But he wanted her to stop and she wanted something else.  So she threw a metal yard decoration at that broken window.  Scared us.  I went out to talk to her about it and to settle down a bit.  I dont' need the whole thing escalating.  When all of a sudden the window went bang.  Yup.  Both panes are now broken.  Oy. 
I left the glass intact and pulled the shade down.  Otherwise all our heat is just going to fly out that window.  Now to figure out how to get it fixed.  And will it happen again?  Normally I don't replace things that get broken.  That way whatever it is doesn't get broken again.  Happy Valentine's Day to me.
So the day started as it usually does.  I get my coffee and I go online to check email and see what is happening on facebook.  Cassie is gushing about eating chocolate covered strawberries and how her children got giant plushies.  Well two of her children got giant plushies and two got nothing.  What amazes me is when she goes on facebook and complains about her relationship with these two and how unfair it is.....and yet she does not go out of her way to foster a relationship.  I'm pretty sure there are cards at a dollar store and stamps don't cost much and yet it is too much effort.  My heart does another little break every time the littles are forgotten. 
I bought a couple little gifts for the littles.  He got a new hoody and some chocolate.  She got a new heart dress, some chokers and candy.  I stopped at the dollar store and got really cute Valentine's Day bags for them and they were happy.  They had great days at school.  Then Mike called to wish them a Happy Valentine's Day.  They had a good Valentine's Day regardless of how mine went. 

House Rules

We came up with four.  No throwing things. No breaking things.  Be respectful.  And then the little man added being nice about telling someone no.  It falls under the be respectful umbrella.  As soon as I am put on the spot my brain freezes. But I thought my three umbrella rules were good.  Our new assignment was to come up with two more house rules that are tiny and specific.  This is the work we did with the home specialist.
And that is all fine and dandy.  I hate being asked what do you do for punishments.  It is hard to take things away and have it mean anything.  These kids do not care enough about anything for it to matter. The therapist thinks our house rules should include what the consequences/punishments are for breaking the house rules and that they should be handed out pretty darn quickly.  No waiting for a real calm down.  In my head I am not picturing it.  From past experience......he calms down, but its not real....if I say something about what has occurred he immediately amps right back up.
And then it felt pretty condescending tonight.  I was told not to let anyone watch R movies.  Ha.  If only they knew.  I was schooled on hygiene.  Not mine.  The little woman's anxiety does not let her in the bathroom long enough to take a bath.  She does not have an escape route and that bothers her.  So we do the best we can.  I can't take her outside and spray her down with the garden hose for Pete's sake.
There are many things I do not know about raising kids with brains changed from drugs in utero, but there are things I do know about raising kids in general.  I am a long ways from perfect and can use all the help I can get.  This is part of my support system and yet sometimes it doesn't feel supportive.

Annoyed

I hate the phone, I really do.  But I had to call the home specialist back because he left two messages.  Seems he wants to make one of our appointments next week earlier.  I understand that the therapist, who scheduled the appointments for next week, may not have a clue as to what else is going on in his schedule.  But we did the best we could with what showed available.
I didn't return his first call because we see him this week and I figured we could just redo it then. But obviously not.  Now it's not like I actually get to talk to him....just leave voicemail.  So I called and just cancelled it.  No we can't do it earlier when my kids aren't even home from school yet when he wanted it to be.  The little man already misses enough school, so no we can't do earlier.

The Lull is Over

Scheduled to work four days this week.  I had to shift one shift a bit so the little man can make his testing appt. with Dr. Holly. 
Working on returns.  Three full shelves of books this time.  I made a dent today, but just a dent.  I'm never a good judge on numbers.  But it feels like a pretty good return this quarter. 
Got to see Brenda today.  During our lulls we don't see each other much.  We work opposite days.  We weren't working on the same projects today though so we didn't have a lot of time to converse.  I really miss that gal when I don't see her much. 

Black Bean Chili

It has been sounding so good.  Maybe because the weather is cold.  So I asked Pat if he wanted some and he said not on Saturday.  That was fight night.  So today we went to his house and made chili and homemade corn bread.  He asked me to leave the leftover corn bread because he loves it.  We talked about how easy homemade is and how many years I used the boxes first.  The chili was divine. 
The little man got his game on and played and played.  The little woman played on the phone.  That seems to be her big thing right now. 
Pat told the little man he could spend a night next weekend.  It is a four day weekend for us grown-ups and a three day weekend for kids.  ;p

Cookies

The snow melted and we went and collected the girl scout cookies we had ordered.  The little woman has a lofty goal, but we started out small.  Although we did get more than last year.  We came home with 75 boxes of cookies.  Then we set about making that number smaller.  We walked around the block.  We ran out of one flavor and have ordered more.  I believe we have sold half of the boxes. 
And we will sell quite a few tomorrow when we meet up with a few people who let us know they wanted cookies. 
I was so impressed with the little woman.  She got a lot more no's than yes's.  And not a one of them seemed to bother her.  She just kept right on going up to doors and knocking.  Perseverance is the name of the game and she really has it.  I remember last year being impressed with her cookie both sales.  Now I'm impressed with her door to door sales. 

Here is the link to her cookie page.

Homework Assignment

Well this should be interesting.  I have a homework assignment from the therapist. She wants us to make a list of house rules and consequences for breaking them.  Oy.  We shall sit down and try.
Then we don't see her for two weeks.  She was already booked next week and the week after she is on vacation.  So she scheduled us for an extra visit with the home specialist.

Blessed

My phone rang in my pocket.  New phone and I'm not totally used to how it sounds yet.  But I realized it was ringing and then it stopped.  Pulled it out and looked at it.  My friend, Doug had called.  I immediately thought it must have been a mistake since it only rang twice.  No voicemail.  No biggie.  I have had phones that call people. 
Then I got his text message.  He wanted to know I was interested in seeing Lynyrd Skynyrd.  Absolutely.  So he went online for the pre-sale and bought tickets.  Now I have the fun job of figuring out babysitting. 
It was kind of funny because I had just been thinking recently about whether Doug was going to any concerts this year.  ;p If it wasn't for my friend, Doug and my brother, I would not have any social life. 

He's Smart

The little man is in the middle of some psychological testing.  Basically it is to see if he qualifies for a program they have at the Children's Center.  So today was the first day of actual testing.  Dr. Holly seemed a bit apprehensive as to whether he would cooperate.  Sometimes he does not.
When the time was up they came up.  He did wonderfully for her.  She said he liked the challenges of the testing and that he is very smart.  I said "Oh I know".  She totally got it.  He is smart, very smart.  That is not our issue.  But it is nice to get confirmation of something I know in my heart.
As she explained on our first meeting in a car analogy.  The engine is the smarts.  The brakes are the behaviors.  If the brakes fail it doesn't matter how good the engine is....the car still crashes.  It is easier to retrain the brain now as opposed to teenage years.  And that is why we are there.

Learning Curve

I bought a new phone. And then I needed to download the pictures I had taken on to my computer.  Oh my goodness.  It took me so long to figure it out.  And I'm not sure I did it right, but it worked.  I ended up having to upload to google drive and then go to google drive on the computer and download them.  Just feels wrong.
So today at work I was talking with Jacob.  He is a young tech savvy man.  He showed me what to do so I can just do it from my phone direct to my computer.  He also let me know that where he sent me to do that....if I didn't know what any of the other stuff did....to leave it alone. I agreed.  No ID ten T here.
The day will come when he doesn't work with me anymore and I will miss having some one not technology challenged to run things by.  For now I will just appreciate him. 

Migraine?

We were up and out of the house almost on time.  Dropped kids at daycare and went to work.  About 11 the school called me.  The little man was not feeling well.  Well crap.  I had most of the work done for the day so I went and got him. 
He spent the afternoon on the couch.  Not feeling well but not feeling horrible.  Like he had the beginning of a migraine.  He said his head hurt but he didn't want a pill for it.  I don't know....guess we just needed a down day. 

Sunday

The little woman had a sleepover at Pat's house.  I'm sure that made her happy.  So we went to pick her up late morning and ended up staying through the Superbowl.  We had pizza delivered.  Watched the game.  Pat said we were rooting for the rams.  And they lost. 
It was kind of nice just having a lazy day and the littles mostly behaved. 

Silly Disappearances

I decided I needed to use the Burt's Bees chapstick I received for Christmas.  I'm not fond of Burt's Bees, but it will fit nicely in my pocket or my purse.  So I go to get it and it is gone.  The other two things that it came with were right there still all wrapped up by the ribbon.  Hmmm.
A couple of weeks ago I realized I was missing some travel mugs.  Went on a search...because I tend to leave them places.  I did find one of the missing two.  And naturally it is one of my newer ones.  Hmmm.
I've had a couple of gift cards disappear....which is why I tend to put them right away in my purse.  Hmmm. 
We don't have people over.  We don't have parties.  So it makes it very interesting.  In the last year there have only been a few people inside our house.  Makes you wonder.  Hmmm.  Yeah. I'm not stupid.  I know who decided they needed the stuff more than us.  And at least it is small.  Some day I am going to learn.

Keurig

Yesterday morning I had my first cup of coffee.  Made the second cup, got it from the Keurig and the cup was almost empty.  I had descaled last week, so that is not the issue.  Then I realize there is water all over the counter.  Stupid thing died.  The positive was I did have a cup of coffee first. 
Working long days means taking kids shopping and it just isn't fun.  So I did not go shopping for a new coffee maker.  And I was debating....a new Keurig or just a normal coffee maker.  Again I have a brand new box of k-cups which play in my decision.  You can see where I am leaning.  But I was not looking forward to spending another $100 for a coffee maker. 
All appliances have a lifespan so it really wasn't too bad.  This one has lasted since we lived in the apartment.  And we have been here for three years. 
So this morning I doctored my cup and took it and a k-cup to work.  We have a Keurig there.  So I did get a cup of coffee, just hours after I was up. 
After work I dropped by Walmart.  And there on the endcap was a nice $100 machine.  But before I grabbed it I went around the corner and see that Keurig is making a cheaper model.  $59 and that is the one I bought.  And it is red.