And wiser? Better?

Hmmm. I don’t know.

Yesterday was my birthday. Thank you for all of the face-book messages, text messages and phone calls. It was a great birthday. I worked out. Then Brian fed the kids lunch… Then I took the kids to the pool. And then when we came home Brian grilled some steaks and asparagus for us. I had planned on making brownies and Brian was going to buy a cake, but ice cream won out. He went and picked up Golden Spoon (Yum!) and a romantic comedy (Have you Heard about the Morgans–pretty bad.. ). I had a great day. I loved spending it with the family just relaxing and having fun.

So, getting older has me thinking about what happened this past year. Maybe I should read my blog?!?

Ironically, I remember last year that I was nervous about drinking because we were going through rounds of fertility treatments. Well, last night in the middle of the movie, I had Brian help me with an injection. We haven’t made any progress in that area. I’ve had an HSG done and an SHG done and everything they can check has looked good. Tomorrow I go back again for more blood work. I was at one doctor or another pretty much every day last week.

Last year, I also had just chopped my hair before my birthday. Now, I’m in the process of growing it back. And it’s brown. It’s a fairly dark brown for me, too. I decided to go darker because of a couple reasons. One, I am starting to go grey 🙁 Second, last year when I chopped my hair, I looked into donating it, but I couldn’t find an organization that would take it as it had been highlighted. I learned that if I dye my hair darker, I’ll still be able to donate it. And, another great motivation is the amount of money that I save by going darker on my own. I can stretch the time period between dyes because of the fact that it’s not as obvious and I can usually find coupons for my color, too.

Hmmm.

What else?

Oh, I have an update. At the beginning of the year I set a goal of walking at least a mile a day. So, the goal was 365 miles on the treadmill this year. Well, it started out really well. I was going strong. Then, in March we went on vacation. And I got a little off track. Then, May the kids got out of school. June we were traveling about half of the month. July we went on the road again. So, I am a little behind. So far, I’ve walked 165.7 miles. That leaves me roughly 200 more miles in 159 days, or 1.26 miles per day. I think that this is still doable. Maybe if I work hard, I can get that average back down.

All in all, I guess it was a good year.

I really thought that V would be “ours” this past year. But, all good things to those who wait.. right?

That’s why I post so rarely, you have to wait for the goods. Ha!

Everyday we run the gamut of emotions. There are so many feelings that we experience day in and day out. Some of them we don’t even realize we’re going through.

Now imagine if you’re life had just been turned upside down, if you’d been taken from your home and family and surroundings and plopped in the middle of another culture. Imagine if the new people around you didn’t smell the same, liked different foods, even spoke a different language (or, if they spoke your language, it still sounded different).  Now that you’re in the foster care mindset, imagine the emotions that you’d have flowing through you.That language barrier is real. It’s real even when our foster kids speak the same language with the same accent… because all of a sudden, they’re surrounded by a different vocabulary… foster, adopt, severance, visitation, CFT, GAL, CASA, AD, caseworker, case plan, parent aid, time in care, best interest. There’s a whole vocabulary that comes with being removed from your biological parents. I think it took Brian and I about a year to learn who all the players were and what they all did. There are still times (one very recently) when I have no clue what the people around me are talking about when it comes to cases. And then I think about my kids. They’re young. How are they supposed to understand all that’s going on around them? Do they even want to? Do I want them to?

Understanding the system or not, they still had feelings about it all. Real, raw, huge emotions ran rampant through them.

And it was hard. There are days that it still is.

I strongly believe that one of the things that we must do for our children is give them an emotional vocabulary. We have to teach them to understand their feelings and emotions. If they don’t understand what they’re feeling, they can’t express it in a way that they can get their needs met. I’m sure that I’ve said it before, but behaviors come from feelings. When kids (and adults) are acting out, they’re expressing a need. And if we can’t figure out what that need is, we can’t help them meet it. If we can’t help them communicate their emotions, we can’t help heal the wounds. Seems simple, right?

I think that it’s even harder than it sounds. After all, as an adult, there are more than a few times that I couldn’t begin to express my emotions verbally. How do I expect my three year old to do so?

Well, the answer is that I can’t all of the time. But, I can start helping her where she is. I can start giving my children a vocabulary. I can teach them names for the emotions they feel. I can give them labels for all that stuff that’s churning around inside of them. And that is a first step.

There are a few ways that you can go about doing this. The first that I recommend is books. I love books. And there are so many cool books out there. Look for books about feelings in general, look for books about a specific emotion. We have several board books that are full of babies faces with great emotions. These are killer tools in teaching an emotional vocabulary.

Want to go a little more hands on?

I love this toy! http://www.target.com/gp/detail.html/ref=s?asin=B001QVAWRS

I have one of my own that I bought through www.uncommongoods.com. Basically, it just has cool little dudes that have facial expressions to match feelings that are written on the back. How cute and fun are those? I’m sure they could be home-made, too.

My favorite tool, however, is a game that the Bean and I invented. One of us will close our eyes, the other will make a facial expression. Then the one who has closed eyes will open up and try to guess the emotion that is being displayed. I love this game because it gives us one on one time really looking at each other and it’s teaching her emotional vocabulary words.

The final tool that I’ve used with my kiddos is an emotion chart. Basically, it’s a scale from very upset to very happy. And I let the kiddo tell me how they’re feeling that day/minute/activity. It’s a chance for them to stop and think about their emotions. It’s not my favorite tool because there are so many emotions that don’t really fall on that scale, but it is another tool. And in this commando parenting adventure, I like to have as many things to try as possible.

I hope that this finds you feeling emotionally fulfilled 🙂

Well, sort of.

I tried to tie dye. I thought it was this great idea. I’ve been planning it since before school got out. I bought white sheets and under-shirts for the boys. I bought a plain white t shirt for the Bean.

The results, obviously, were less than I’d hoped…

I have no clue what I did wrong, but the colors were all just washed out. The good news is that the kids had fun (I think) and it wasn’t a huge investment. Besides, they’re still sleeping on the washed-out-colored sheets.

On the other hand, I had a little crafting success, too.

Last year both boys went through two backpacks each and were both on their third when school got out. So, this year I wasn’t looking forward to shelling out more cash (and more and more and more) on backpacks. I think that if I bought high end backpacks, they’d hold up longer, but I really don’t want to spend that much up front either. So, I had an idea–to personalize a basic messenger bag.

I ordered a couple messenger bags that I found from an army surplus store via Amazon. And then I had fun finding patches on E-Bay. So, now for about $25 a kiddo, my boys now have personalized, sturdy bags to start school. I have no clue if they’ll hold up, but they didn’t cost much. And I am hopeful!

I enjoyed my time alone. I *really* enjoyed my time alone.

And, I think that I have about the nicest husband ever.

But, it was nice to have them all come back.

And here’s a Bean funny from the other night… I’m getting ready to go out with Brian on our date night so she’s putting on her makeup, too…

Bean: I won’t cry, Mommy.

Me: Why? Were you crying before?

Bean: No, I don’t want to make my makeup come off.

Well I did it.  I never intended to but I did.  I hijacked my wife’s blog.  It’s only for this one post, and no I didn’t “steal” a password – for the record I built the site and established the password to her liking.  I am, however, creating this one post to talk about my wife and my plans for the weekend.  Those of you who read this blog know little about me judging from the posts I read, except to say that I’m part of some of the functions we do with the kids, etc.  I don’t make the headlines of Amanda’s blog, and that’s fine with me.  Some of you also know that she took the kids (all four, yes by herself) to Colorado Springs to see my parents about two weeks ago – not because I refused, just because she knew I was working and knew my parents love seeing the kids.  I enjoyed every minute of the silence, but I missed the kids and Amanda a lot. 

Amanda’s birthday is also a week away and I still haven’t completely locked down her birthday gift (of course).  I spent about an hour late last week milling around a simple idea that every husband who can do, should do.  I decided to take the kids away for a weekend at the beach!  I think this was accidental, actually; I was considering how much fun we had about two months ago when we took the kids to Disneyland, taking one day out of the schedule for a trip to Newport Beach.  I loved it, the kids loved it, and I remember not being able to wait to do it again.  So after really trying to wrap my head around me taking on all four kids for 2+ days, I said it out loud to Amanda.  And I don’t think I’ve seen her more eager to help me leave!

Now, I know she loves the kids, and I was sure that a solo getaway would have been great for her as an alternative, but I remember the peace and quiet in my own house for hours and hours, not having to wake up and commit to anything I wasn’t mentally or physically prepared for – that’s the thing you long for when you have kids.  Single adults can decide to spend a weekend sleeping, or watching TV for hours! I also hear some of those same single people do stuff like reading books and exercising, but I can’t relate.

Anyway, for a wonderful mom of four, here’s to you – relax, know I love you more than these or any words can express, and I hope that you enjoy the weekend.  You’re amazing, and I don’t tell you enough.

Oh, and as strange as this may sound to you, thanks for “letting” me take the kids for the weekend!

And thank you guys out there who read my wife’s blog.  She’s one of the most interesting women I know.

Brian

Don’t get too excited.. I’m not pregnant. Ha!

O.K. Go ahead and get excited! We’re one step closer to adopting the little guy.

Today we signed the petition to adopt. Because he’s been in foster care for so long, he qualifies for an expedited court date. We were told around 60 days from now. So, hopefully in the middle of September we will be having a big old party!

Happy Dance!!!

Car issues are no fun. They stress me out. They cost tons. And they leave us with very few options. I’m sure that if we lived in a more metropolitan city there’d be more options. But, in Phoenix, you just have to have a car. There’s no other option. And with four kids, you have to have a *big* car. We bought the Suburban almost exactly three years ago. Right before we adopted D & d we knew we’d need a bigger car. It was right around this time three years ago that we got the call about our V. We had pretty much given up on any chance of our boys having a relationship with each other when we got the call from his lawyer asking us if we knew he was in care and asking if she should pass our information onto the caseworker.

We immediately started making calls trying to change our license–we were only licensed for up to three foster kids and D & d’s adoption was still a few weeks away. We started looking at bigger cars–all of a sudden we’d need room for four carseats. That meant it was either a huge SUV or a minivan. And the huge SUV won out.

But, now here we are again. The Suburban is having issues. There’s the window that won’t move. The gas gauge isn’t working. The wipers have issues. It needs a new catalytic converter and it needs a new tire. All of these things cost money. And a lot of it. More money than we want to put into an already 8 year old car.

So, we went back to looking at minivans.

But…

I did *not* buy one!

As of today, I am the proud owner of a Taurus X. I’d never heard of it, but it was what worked best for us. We bought a 2009 with only 10K miles on it. It’s about the size of a minivan… smaller and more narrow and shorter than my big old Suburban, but it will also get about double the gas mileage. I think it’s a good change. I’ll post photos in the next week or so…

A little funny from our travels.

When we were in New Mexico on the way the kids were watching t.v. and there was a promo for “The Perfect Storm”.

The next day we’re hiking in CO and David comments that it’s not raining there, but, “In Mexico, there’s going to be a Perfect Storm”… He told me that he saw it on the news.

I talked him into the fact that The Perfect Storm is a movie, but I still don’t think that he’s figured out that there’s a difference between New Mexico and Mexico.

So, we’re nearing the end of our next adventure. And this is the second trip that I’ve had my computer, but not managed a blog entry… This time, at least, I have somewhat of an excuse… I didn’t have web access on my netbook and I hate tying up other people’s computers (mostly because I live and die by mine & I don’t like to share).

So, here we are. Right now I’m sitting by the pool while the kids play. I suppose I’m gathering my energy for the drive ahead.

We left over a week ago on this trip. We overnight-ed in Albuquerque on the way to Grandma & Grandpa’s house in Divide, CO. The kids did a great job in the car, although, I have to say that it looks like several bombs have gone off inside my car.

While we were with Grandma & Grandpa we went and saw Toy Story 3 (cute), picked up crystal’s on Crystal Mountain, went on a train ride in Cripple Creek, fed chickens, and just played and hiked around a ton. It was so nice to be somewhere that wasn’t like an oven! My kids are Arizonans through and through and complained several times about the fact that it was “too cold”.

On the fourth, we tried to go to see fireworks, but Mother Nature had her own show in mind. There was rain and hail and thunder and lightening and more rain and more hail! Once we supplied the kids with glow sticks and candy and assured them that they still got to stay up well past their bedtime, they didn’t mind too much.

Yesterday we started the journey home, but we didn’t make it far. About half an hour from the house, I rolled down Bean’s window and it wouldn’t go back up. After a few tears (mine), Grandpa David saved the day. Right now the door is without a panel and there’s wood holding up the window, but we should safely make it home (knock on wood). So, we ended up getting in late to Santa Fe last night. For some reason, they didn’t have my reservation either, but the clerk knocked a few dollars off our room & we had beds (beds was all that I really cared about at that point anyhow).

I adore my children, but I have to say that it’s pretty exhausting taking them all *anywhere* let alone on a road trip like we’ve done. My big boys have done a great job helping with snacks and drinks and calming down the Bean. And Grandma and Grandpa took on a ton of the burden when we were there.

So, in the end… We did it! Well, I guess that’s a little premature, but we’ve done everything up to this point!

Yea!

What’s that show called… 8 is Enough??

Well, I have to say that for us (or, more specifically, me) five is enough.

This week we have extra little ones at our house. We are doing respite (fancy word for babysitting) for a couple of foster kiddos from our agency. I’ve been open to doing respite since our last kiddos left. But, this was the first time that it worked out. I think it will be the last as well. Six kids is just too many. There are too many snacks, dishes, accidents… and even getting out of the house doesn’t calm it down anymore.