Daily Drama

So we try around here to do our part to be more green and energy conscience, we dry our clothes on the line for as long as we possibly can without me losing a digit to frostbite. I am happy to dry my clothes on the line, happy to do a load or 2 each day and walk them to the back of the house and hang them up. Happy to do it as long and the damn clothes pins stop self destructing! Okay I can appreciate that they are inexpensive to begin with and that really there is probably no quality control inspector at the clothes pin factory but seriously to lose that many ( out of a brand new package) in one day all because of a little wind is a bit extreme as far as I am concerned. I will save my rant about my inability to buy more bamboo clothes pins for another day

Upon retrieving the boy from school today the first words out of his mouth...
C: Mom, I got hurt today
Me: I see that, what happened
C: Well I was playing water buffalo's (Water buffalo's what happened to dino's and tigers) at recess and I didn't see N. and I ran into his head with my head.
Me: oh my, is he ok?
C: Yeah I got the worst of it because I was the bigger water buffalo.
This would be the same boy who narrowly and I mean narrowly missed getting his eye poked out by his brother with a stick a few weeks ago, same eye. Good thing Children's Aid knows us already!

and just cause he is so darn cute and was having so much fun.

Helpless

My day has been consumed by something that I must speak of cryptically and as much as I want to make it better it is something that I can do nothing about.

A foster child in my town is in crisis and I want to make it all better. I want to explain to all the people involved that child is acting out because she feels as though she is not being heard. She is trying to get the adults who control her life to say that they will not abandon her. She is screaming at them to leave her and yet that is the last thing that she needs at this point. she is tryign to get people to listen and they are not really listening, well they are listening but just to the wrong things.

She needs those adults to hold her and love her and tell her no matter what she does they will not leave her. They aren't saying that. They are tired and worn out by her behaviour. They love her but are spent by the constant pushing away, she is afraid of attachment, afraid of being loved and they are at the end of their rope. Like most kids with attachment issues she is a master manipulator and is doing an excellent job at winning over people outside her home and convincing them that she is poor and mistreated.

Tragically they (the guardians) are controlled by the system and the system has to investigate the situation. I am unsure as how it will turn out, I know what is in the child's best interest may get over looked because there is only so much people can handle.

I want to make it all better but I am helpless in the situation. I have said my piece to those who would listen and now I have to sit back and watch.... it is very hard to do!

I never do this

I almost never add stuff to my blog from TV or YouTube, it's just not something I do. But I was reading at Woolyheaded this morning and she posted this, I was intrigued

Susan Boyle on Britain Got Talent
by dwarthy

It was amazing, it's always nice to see Simon try to cover his butt. Make sure you have some Kleenex nearby and then show it to your kids - what a lesson!

Spring has Sprung

It has taken awhile but spring is finally here out in the country! We had a great Easter weekend, this is from church on Sunday, Fudge is going through that "can't not make a face stage" - I'll embarrass him with them later in life.

We spent most of Sunday celebrating with friends in the city, it was a great day with tons of great food! Being Ukrainian is always a good thing during the holidays. It was inters ting to watch the boys work out what Easter meant in our house. Fudge had a hard time wrapping his head around the fact that we go church for Easter, a lot of church. He kept talking about the chocolate and the Easter bunny. P and I decided to keep the chocolate to a minimum and filled eggs with lego instead. They each got only as much chocolate as they could eat in a day without getting sick and that was the deal, it all had to be gone or it was mine. It also meant that they had to get really early if
they wanted to look for eggs before church - they did and it went well. They were hyper but it was all good and they had a lot of fun.

Calvin discovered that there is no Easter bunny, which is fine with me. He caught me filling eggs one day and the gig was up. We did have to make him stop teasing Fudge though because Calvin just couldn't not tell Fudge that he was naive to believe in such a thing! He did not want to be reminded that just a few short weeks ago he still did. That being said they enjoyed the treats and now that it is over we are back to no white sugar and no candy - life is better that way.

Now that spring is here we are heading in to the garden season. I have things growing in the window upstairs and am dreaming of days in the garden. There are a few things that are already on their way. This is our asparagus patch, I started it last year from seed so we can't harvest from it till next year but I am excited. We are also going to add some more crowns to it this year so that next year we can really enjoy it! ( I had to put my hand in the pic so that you could actually see the plant) We also have some Egyptian walking onions that came from JoVE's house last year, they are well on their as well.

Oh and I didn't even tell you about the narrow misses on Friday, the boys are working on the theory of nine lives - I am sure of it.

The boys came thumping in to the house on Friday afternoon sobbing. Fudge fell and hurt his ankle. Fudge... how did you hurt your ankle? Jumping out of the barn windows he says calmly. The barn "windows" are the second story doors where one would throw the hay out into the barnyard below, it's about 10 feet up. Let's not talk about the fact that they are not allowed in the barn without an adult. Full of sympathy for the poor child I sent him back outside once I made sure he hadn't broken it. Not 10 minutes later Calvin comes in screaming about how Fudge poked him in the eye with a stick. I know what your thinking, not really in the eye, Calvin is just being dramatic. That's what I thought too, but no it actually did happen. Luckily for everyone Calvin closed his eye and Fudge hit his eyelid.

I think that childhood should be described as series of near misses.

up.

It's early here on the farm, I have been up for some time, someone was snoring... must of been the dogs. Right.

Things around here are okay, busy, exhausting at moments but we are all doing well in the general scheme of things. School seems to be going a little better, there have been some meetings with staff about behaviour and emotional verses chronological age. It seems to of helped. We have an IEP meeting this afternoon, I may feel less positive after that,
but perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised.

We are all eagerly awaiting the reappearance of spring, it was spring and then it started snowing the other day, we have had more snow in April then we did in all of March! It makes for wet kids and sad tulip bulbs. The weather is supposed to turn for the weekend and I have all my fingers crossed that it does.

I hear footsteps upstairs, it is almost as if Calvin has an internal alarm that lets him know the mornings that I am up early, he always seems to wake long before the regular time if I am awake. On that I should be off but before I go there are some pictures for ya'll.

Last weekend JoVE and Tigger came of to make pysanka, it was a lot of fun and the kids really enjoyed it. I am hoping that we can make some more before the end of the week.

ohhh, ohhh I almost forgot, if you come here because you are an adoptive parent or are interested in how adoption effects parents or you feel as though you are the only adoptive parent in the world who has wanted to strangle your sweet children you need to go and read this journal article, then you need to pass it on so that others realise that they are not the only ones. It is also available on the JSW website but you need to member or sign up to be a member and it is free from authors site. While you there read up on Beyond Consequences... it's brilliant.

Here are the pictures

It's official now!
with the california cousins

making memories

It was a lot of fun

We went bowling with friends

Some of us were not so good at rolling the ball

They loved the drum at the museum

and the puppets
and the tractors


and I loved the day old lamb, I need one or two or half a dozen

Done

Thank you for all you kind words and good wishes as we celebrated last week. It was a good day and fabulous weekend with my sister and her kids. It is quiet here this morning, very quiet and I am enjoying a latte and some silence. Here are some pictures from our weekend to entertain you while I enjoy the quiet for a few more hours.

* ETA*
Never mind, blogger doesn't seem to want to play with me today, I would have to upload the pics one at a time and I do not have the time or the patience for that. I will make it to the coffee shop tomorrow afternoona and spend some time uploading them there.