So Long 2010!

Elise's first New Year's Eve! It's 11:45, and of course she's wide awake. Georgia and Henry are sleeping. Elise is always afraid that she'll miss something.

Shots

With the help of my sister, I took Henry and Georgia to the doctor's office today for the required just-put-into-foster-care check ups. Elise came along, of course. It was a big, stressful production. We were there for 3 1/2 hours. Blah.

While we were there, I found out that the only immunization that Georgia had ever received was one shot that she got right after she was born and while she was still in the hospital... I don't even know what it was for... and Henry had NEVER had any immunizations at all. I'm not surprised, but man oh man oh man. How can you have babies and just not take them to the doctor EVER? So Georgia and Henry both got the same immunizations that 2 month old babies get and now we have to play catch up. They'll be going back every month for more shots until they're on schedule.

Still no word from the case manager about whether the kids are moving soon.

No Word

Well, Henry and Georgia's case manager never got back to me today about whether the kids will be leaving soon to live with relatives. I guess nothing was decided yet.

One of the hardest parts of being a foster parent is the constant state of limbo you're in. Everything seems to happen suddenly, and as the foster parent you are always the last to know what's going on. You don't hear about anything until it's near a state of crisis. Sometimes it seems like the case managers forget that what happens with the foster children effects a lot of other peoples' lives, too, and one boring day-to-day decision for the case manager can send a foster family into a state of upheaval.

Ugh.

In her defense, I do really like Henry and Georgia's case manager. So far, anyway.

People have asked lately how we manage having the two foster kids along with Elise. And I say, "The kids are easy. It's the adults that we have to deal with in the foster care system that make it difficult." 100% true.

Will They Stay Or Will They Go?

Met with Georgia and Henry's case manager this evening. Apparently they're investigating possible relatives for the kids to go live with. They kind of have to do that-- family always has the first rights to step forward and claim the kids in foster care. It's best for kids to stay with their own family when possible. And also, it saves the state money because they don't have to provide as many services.

Of course, the case manager needs to make sure that the relatives have a suitable home for Georgia and Henry to live in. I guess we're supposed to find out more tomorrow. Judging from the tone of Case Manager's voice, she doesn't especially like any of these possible placements for the kids. But when it comes to parents and families, they don't have to be GOOD caregivers, just ADEQUATE caregivers. Will the kids starve or die of exposure to the elements while in your care? No? Then since you're related, you can take them.

Although I believe that Case Manager wants the kids to stay with us, it's not about her personal preference. So the kids may very well get moved to a relative's home soon. I'll let you know how it pans out.

Disappearing Act

I thought tonight that I had lost my wedding and engagement rings. I cried. I wouldn't have expected that to be my reaction, but there you have it. I cried.

I called my parents because we stayed at their house recently, and they started looking for the rings. My dad called back after a while and suggested that I look at pictures that we took over the holiday to see when the rings stopped appearing on my hand.

Here's the thing. I don't take my rings of that often. I'm not one of those take-my-rings-off-and-play-with-them people and I don't remove them to do dishes. There are a very limited number of circumstances that lead me to take my rings off. The most common one is to put lotion on the babies. So I felt pretty confident that was the reason WHY my rings were missing... but WHEN did they go missing?

In fact, I noticed that they were missing when I went to put lotion on Henry after his bath this evening. I reached to take my rings off and they weren't there. I was in shock. Then I cried.

Anyhow, Husband looked back at the pictures from yesterday and today and told me that I had the rings on at Sister's baby shower on Sunday but they weren't in the pictures from this afternoon. I decided to check my pants from yesterday and there they were. In the pocket of my jeans. Thank god. How I went from yesterday evening to this evening without noticing that I didn't have my rings on is a mystery.

No it's not. I'm tending to 3 kids under 2 years old. It's a miracle that I haven't left the house without a shirt on yet.

I'm just glad that I have my rings back.

Yeeeeouch!

Did something to my back. Lifting babies??? Oh, it hurts...

Baby's First Christmas

Elise's first Christmas (which actually started yesterday) was very wonderful indeed. Lots of love, lots of food, lots of presents.

Georgia and Henry had a good Christmas, too.

Happy babies.

A Few Random Things

* Double stroller rocks.

* Georgia has two teeth now. Have I mentioned that before?

* All three of the kids now say "Hi!" and wave. Everyone's first word was "hi." :)

* The gap between Elise's front teeth is the cutest space of nothingness that I've ever seen.

* Strangers in public keep saying to us, "Looks like you've got your hands full!" when they see all the kids. Yep. We sure do.

3 Babies is More Than 3 Times the Work for 1 Baby

Tired. I love these little guys, and I'm tired.

Dancing Machine

Elise has started dancing!!!

She's in love with this mechanical dancing Santa that wiggles its butt. Husband's mother showed it to her. She watches the Santa, smiles, and wiggles her butt, too. :)

Lots of New Foods

Elise has eaten lots of new foods lately. She had steamed broccoli the other day. Not a HUGE fan, but when I added a piece of cheese into her mouth she ate it just fine. Then today she had saltine crackers, beets,... and a french fry.

I wasn't planning on giving her fried food anytime in the even remotely near future. But we were at dinner at a restaurant, Husband was feeding Georgia on one side of the table, and I had Henry and Elise on either side of me on the opposite side of the table. As I was helping Henry and was turned away from Elise, she used her go-go-gadget arms to grab a fry off of a plate that I had deliberately pushed to the middle of the table, supposedly out of her reach.

I let her eat the fry. She looked superdy dooperdy cute. I couldn't take it away.

But that's the last french fry she'll get for, like, 12 years. Hope you enjoyed it, Baby Baby.

Lots of New Foods

Elise has eaten lots of new foods lately. She had steamed broccoli the other day. Not a HUGE fan, but when I added a piece of cheese into her mouth she ate it just fine. Then today she had saltine crackers, beets,... and a french fry.

I wasn't planning on giving her fried food anytime in the even remotely near future. But we were at dinner at a restaurant, Husband was feeding Georgia on one side of the table, and I had Henry and Elise on either side of me on the opposite side of the table. As I was helping Henry and was turned away from Elise, she used her go-go-gadget arms to grab a fry off of a plate that I had deliberately pushed to the middle of the table, supposedly out of her reach.

I let her eat the fry. She looked superdy dooperdy cute. I couldn't take it away.

But that's the last french fry she'll get for, like, 12 years. Hope you enjoyed it, Baby Baby.

Lots of New Foods

Elise has eaten lots of new foods lately. She had steamed broccoli the other day. Not a HUGE fan, but when I added a piece of cheese into her mouth she ate it just fine. Then today she had saltine crackers, beets,... and a french fry.

I wasn't planning on giving her fried food anytime in the even remotely near future. But we were at dinner at a restaurant, Husband was feeding Georgia on one side of the table, and I had Henry and Elise on either side of me on the opposite side of the table. As I was helping Henry and was turned away from Elise, she used her go-go-gadget arms to grab a fry off of a plate that I had deliberately pushed to the middle of the table, supposedly out of her reach.

I let her eat the fry. She looked superdy dooperdy cute. I couldn't take it away.

But that's the last french fry she'll get for, like, 12 years. Hope you enjoyed it, Baby Baby.

My Own Personal Double Rainbow

Having three kids under 2 years old can make going out very difficult. We bought a double stroller tonight. I'm giddy.

Hola, Roseola

Elise is getting over a case of what I presume is roseola. She had a fever for a couple of days, her fever broke, then she got a rash on her head and torso. The rash is going away now.

Elise was kind of cranky during her fever. The fever was never very high and I just assumed that it was related to teething. Then her fever went away and I thought she was all better. The afternoon that her fever broke, just as I was finishing up feeding her lunch I noticed a rash on her face. I thought that she must be having a reaction to something she ate (we'd recently given her peach yogurt for the first time), so I called her doctor's office to find out how much antihistamine to give her.

After I gave her the medicine, I noticed that the rash was on her scalp and her back and tummy. Not her arms or legs. Just her head and torso. That's a sign of roseola. Then I read about how with roseola kids get a fever that goes away and then they get the rash. Yep. Elise caught it for sure.

The rash didn't bother her. Not itchy or anything. She didn't seem to notice it at all.

Apparently, most babies get roseola at some point. It's just a little virus. No big deal. And now her rash is going away. She'll never even remember it happened.

Grey Poop-on

I thought that shit-up-the-back only happens to little babies. Tiny babies who are still mastering control of their digestive system.

Nope. It happens to 1 and 1/2 year olds, too, as Henry proved tonight.

It went all the way up to his shoulder blades. It happened while we were eating dinner. At a restaurant. And I didn't have a change of pants for him.

God. Damn. It.

It looked like spicy mustard.

Major Mommy Fail

Elise fell out of the bed last night. I will feel horrible about this for the rest of my natural life.

I had a really, really stressful day yesterday. I took Henry and Elise to get Henry's cast put on. They fussed and fussed. I took them to get some other stuff done for Henry that he needed. He fussed and fussed.

Then I got pulled over on the way home. Speeding. It was one of those stretches of a very busy road that for some godawful reason has a speed limit of 35. I was apparently going 50. Along with everyone else. But whatever. That's no excuse.

Officer Tall-And-Reasonably-Attractive informed me of my speed as the kids were in the back screaming. Screaming! That is why I was not paying attention, I guess. I just wanted to get them home and comfortable and NOT SCREAMING.

Officer Tall-And-Reasonably-Attractive noticed Henry's cast. "Did you break your arm, buddy?" I answered for Henry. "Well, he's my foster son. Somebody broke it for him." Then I realized that the only auto insurance card I had in my glove box was recently expired. By this point, given all of the screaming baby stress of the day, I was about ready to cry. But I didn't.

Anyway, the P.O. took pity on me or something and gave me a very teensy tiny ticket. No points on my license or anything. I just have to go present my current insurance card to the appropriate government office within the next 30 days. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Henry spent the rest of the evening fussing, occasionally scream crying, and being very clingy to me.

So that was my day. Then at night, Elise was crying, crying, crying and not sleeping. I was up so late with her. Teething? I don't know. But I was so tired. So drained, emotionally and physically. And then at 5:30 she fell out of the bed.

I was beside myself. "Help! My baby! Husband! My baby! She fell! It's my fault!" Tears, tears, tears. I think I was as upset as Elise. We have carpet in our bedrooms, so she wasn't hurt badly at all. She didn't fall in some awful way. There were no marks. She wasn't crying a pain cry. Just a what-the-hell-just-happened cry.

Now I'm committed to making sure that Elise doesn't sleep in our bed anymore. She's too mobile. And I'm a rotten mommy. Ugh. I can't believe that happened. I'm just glad she wasn't hurt.

Cast

Henry got a cast put on his arm today. While he was in the hospital, the doctors did a full body scan with x-rays since they suspected he'd been abused. Sure enough, they found he had a broken arm. He had a temporary cast on while he was in the hospital, and today we went and got him a real cast.

I took Elise with us. Me, Henry, and Elise.

Elise and Henry took turns fussing and whining in the waiting room. People were giving me annoyed looks. Whatever. Believe me, if babies came with off buttons, I'd have turned the noise off. Not an option, grumpy old lady who is glaring at me over the rims of her ugly glasses.

Then once we got in the back, Henry was scared of every person he met and everything that was going on. He had to get more x-rays done. Didn't like that. And once the doctor came in, he kind of lost it. The doctor had actually seen him while he was in the hospital and I think Henry remembered that and it stressed him out.

Henry ended up with a red cast. I've never broken an arm or a leg, so that was the first time I've seen a cast put on.

He's pretty annoyed by the cast. He keeps trying to pull it off. He should be getting it off in three weeks, though. I can't wait to see how they cut them off!

My Love

Before Husband and I moved in together, we lived far apart in different states. We could only visit each other on weekends. When I'd go to his apartment, I'd often wait until he was busy and then hide little love notes all over his house for him to find while I was gone. We were talking about this today.

This evening Husband said, "Do you know the most precious way you ever showed me you love me?" I thought he was going to bring the notes up again, but I shook my head no.

He smiled. "Elise!"

Under the Baby Weather

Elise has been sick today. Sleeping a lot. Fever. Poor little lady. She doesn't even want to play. Just wants me to hold her. I feel yucky, too. At least we're in it together.

Teeth and More Teeth

Georgia's first tooth popped through today. Henry has teeth coming in. I think Elise might be working on her 5th tooth, but I'm not sure.

Lordy lordy lordy. Three teething babies.

Elise's First Tofu

Elise had tofu for the first time yesterday. I think that she was a bit weirded out by the texture at first. Squishy and crumbly at the same time. She ate it, though. I mixed it with butternut squash and diced, steamed apples. Yummy!

Transracial Family

We've fostered black, white, and multi-racial children. Our family definitely gets a lot of double-take looks when we have children that are of a different race than Husband, Elise, and I.

Mostly I try to not notice people noticing us. Not because I think they're thinking anything bad. On the contrary-- when I do make eye contact, I often see sappy, sympathetic looks. And it makes me feel weird. I know that people are making all sorts of assumptions and even if those assumptions are spot on, I don't like that an assumption was made in the first place.

I've had people look at our family and then ask me, "Are you a foster parent?" I know that no one means anything by it, so I'm always polite... but I do feel like it's a kind of rude question for a stranger to ask. What makes them think that these aren't my adopted kids? My best friend's kids that I'm babysitting? My step kids and Husband is really my friend or my relative?

One thing that being a foster parent has taught me is that you shouldn't make assumptions about people.

It's 3 to 2 Again

Georgia's brother came home from the hospital today. So today was very busy. I'll tell you all about "Henry" some other time. Right now I need to rest.

Another Foster Brother

Looks like we'll be getting Georgia's brother placed in our home very soon. He's about a year and a half old. Three babies under two years old! Yowza!

Brother is in the hospital right now. Suspicious injuries, which the doctors believe are due to trauma. Georgia was removed from her parents' care because of her brother's injuries, even though they don't think anything bad has happened to her.

When I was so busy the other day, one of the things I had to do was take Georgia to get x-rays of her whole body to make sure that she didn't have any broken bones. She was fine.

Husband and the babies and I have been visiting Brother in the hospital. He's doing well, he's just very quiet and depressed looking. Scared of men. And once he decides to like you, he's very clingy. Poor little guy. I can't even imagine what he's been through.

All of the nurses at the hospital adore Brother. In fact, during our first visit, nurses from different areas of the pediatric wing of the hospital who had spent time with Brother went out of their way to come and meet our family and tell us how grateful they felt that we would be taking care of him. It was very nice.

Brother should be released from the hospital soon, and then we can bring him home. I'll let you know when that happens.

Happy 9 Months Elise!

9 months old!?!? Oh, Elise! You're growing so fast!

I've now officially been un-pregnant for as long as I was pregnant. How is it that this time with Elise has gone by so fast, but my pregnancy seemed to drag on FOREVEEEEEEeeEERRRrrrr?

9 months. Oh, Elise!

Yesterday's Missing Post

Dammit. I wrote a post yesterday and thought it published, but I just noticed that what I wrote isn't there.

Well, to summarize, I said that I had a very busy day. Lots of things happened yesterday, but I only talked about yesterday morning in my post. I took Elise and Georgia out by myself and brought them to back-to-back doctor's appointments with two different doctors at two different locations. It was a loooooong morning, but I managed it. And the babies managed it. We survived. And I'm very proud of myself, because you know what? It was hard work.

Also, I can't remember the measurements, but Elise was in the 30th percentile for height, 30th percentile for weight, and 55th percentile for noggin size.

Foster Friend

We saw Aurelius's old foster mom today. Apparently she uses the same day care where we've enrolled Georgia. A's Foster Mom has two little girls now. The girls are part of a bigger sibling group that got split up. Sad.

A's Foster Mom said she got a picture of Aurelius emailed to her just the other day by the relative that Aurelius went to live with permanently. She said he looks so big now. The last time we saw Aurelius was just about this time last year. I'm sure he looks completely different by now.

Babies grow up so fast.

Giant Poo

** Talking about poo here. Consider yourself warned.**

Today I was home with Elise and Georgia. They were playing on the floor together when all of a sudden Georgia let out this loud, screeching scream cry. Not "wah wah" baby cry. More like "something is terribly wrong" cry.

I tried to comfort her. I figured that maybe she just got scared for some reason. New people, new noises, new smells... who knows. But she was inconsolable. So I started going through the mommy check list of possible reasons for a baby to cry. I pinched the front of her diaper. Not wet. Fever? Not warm. Hungry? Just ate. Anyway, eventually I checked inside her diaper.

Oh. My. God.

She was pooping a MASSIVE poo. A baby's little hiney hole should never have to endure what was going on inside Georgia's diaper. I was totally, totally shocked.

I started little leg exercises, hoping to help her with pushing it out. No luck. I rubbed her tummy. That didn't help. She's still scream crying, by the way. I rubbed her back while she curled up on the changing table and cried.

Finally, after quite a while, I did what I felt had to be done. I grabbed a baby wipe, covered my hand, and helped her get the world's biggest baby poo out of her butt. I was gentle, but I helped the process along.

Once the giant poo was out, Georgia INSTANTLY fell asleep on the changing table. Instantly.

Poor baby.

She's been fine ever since. We got some apple-prune juice just in case we need it, but I think that she's alright for now.

I, however, am traumatized.

Georgia's First Day

Well, last night was rough. Georgia was awake a lot. I'm tired.

She's really sweet, though. A peach. Georgia is an easy baby for the most part. And she and Elise seem to enjoy playing together.

Each time we get a new foster care placement, Husband and I have to stop and rearrange our lives. Everything changes.

Hello again bottles. Hello formula. Hello double diaper duty. Hello twice as many cuddles. Hello kissable baby toes times two. Hello goodbye.

New Foster Baby

Got a new foster care placement. A little girl, a bit younger than Elise. Bloggy name: "Georgia."

Don't know much about her yet. She's been sleeping since she got here. I wonder if Elise will enjoy having a new playmate.

Virtual twins again. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Sorry About Your Socks

Yesterday, I had some holiday-themed socks on Elise and someone complimented them.

Which got me thinking about how she'll only ever get to wear them for a month or two. She'll outgrow them soon, so there's no packing them up for next year. This is it. Cute socks, your days are numbered.

Which got me thinking about how I am constantly wearing holes in the toes of my socks. I don't know how it happens. I keep my toenails cut very short, but my toes are shaped funny or something. I get holes in the big toe spot of my socks after a month or two.

So, if Elise inherits my messed up toe shape, she will never be able to pack up her socks for next year. Her holiday socks will barely make it through the holidays. And if she turns out to be a runner, then she'll need new socks every few weeks.

I hope Elise likes to wear flip flops or sandals. I hope she likes warm climates. Otherwise, she'll spend a fortune on socks during her life. IF she gets my toe shape, that is.

This is the kind of thing that goes through my head when someone says, "What cute socks!"

Like A Baby

"Toy Story 3" made me cry.

I admitted this to Husband, and he said, "Me too. Twice."

I love that man.

Snot Nosed Baby

Elise has caught a runny nose from one of her baby friends. Last night was awful. She kept waking up because she couldn't breathe well. And when she'd eat she would try to breathe through her nose as she breastfed-- it sounded like someone was trying to suction mud off of the bottom of a deep, wet lake. Her poor little nosey.

Elise has been such a healthy baby. I know that this one little cold isn't a big deal. It just sucks to see your little one feeling so crummy.

Fangs

Elise's biting is getting out of hand.

She hardly bites anyone but me. I think she bit my sister once, but other than that, I'm her only victim. HOWEVER, she bites me like crazy. She bites when she's mad, she bites when she's happy, she bites when she's bored.

I tell her "no." I sit her down away from me and/or stop the feeding session if I'm feeding her. She doesn't care about any of it. She goes right on like nothing happened. How do you discipline an 8 month old?!

Ugh.

This has got to stop. It really hurts. Especially now that she has four teeth. The pinching has calmed down a bit and now she's on to biting.

:(