i want a dog

i already have a dog, but i want another dog, a dog who will like Kody and play with him like the puggle across the street does. i want a rhodesian ridgeback or a basset hound lol i'm not sure which. just wanted to share.

we won again!

http://www.walletpop.com/insurance/safest-states?icid=mainhtmlws-maindl1link3http%3A%2F%2Fwww.walletpop.com%2Finsurance%2Fsafest-states

mystery solved! and my new addiction

in Jackson's closet I found 4 strawberry tubs, full of stems. the tubs were taken at 4 different times, each time resulting in the following conversation between uncle Tim and myself:

"Al, i need to ax(ask) you a question.
"k"
"where are the strawberries?"
" in the fridge."
"i am looking, they aint not(are not) in here."
"(visibly cringing)i think we used them up already"
"no, i boat(bought) 4, used only 3 for the short cakes."
" but you can't count. remember?"
" hot damn, that was mean, ma'am. I's(I is@@) go-nuh(going to) go cry in my pillow now"
" and I, the english major, am going to breath deeply, snap my wrist with a rubber band and recite the phrase, "go to a happy place" over & over in attempt to recover from hearing the term "I's" come out of your mouth.

he merely rolls his eyes.

Texans are funny, i'm just sayin'.

why the food stealing again? is he hungry? just enjoys hearing us discuss the missing item and watching us search?(control)
Yogi just took him to Boston for his regular PID visit and he's also going to see a new shrink down there. they'll be gone all day.


my new obsession/addiction? Yankee candles. It's bad. i SERIOUSLY need an intervention. the new "vineyard" one? smells like grapes? BLISS. you MUST get one! COTTAGE BREEZE is my other new fave. mmmmmmmmmmm. "C" needed a ride home from her job at Claire's in the mall at 9pm, but i left to pick her up right after the little ones went to be so i could walk around and sniff candles first. embarrassing, yes. yet i am powerless to stop.

Yogi bought a new truck a week ago. a 97 ford f250 with very low miles. looked nice, but was a total piece of crap underneath. trying to part it out now. borrowing my Dad's truck for now. long story, i just don't feel up to telling it just yet. UGH.

Jay leaves in 2 days. he seems nervous. doug & ben arrive home in under 4 weeks.

shawn has gained ONE pound since july. that concerns me. i didnt realize it was so little until i looked it up in his book. hes under the 3rd %ile.

shawn is also down to 1 or 2 tantrums a day, from 6-8 last month. yesterday and the day before he didnt have ANY! i am super mom. lol. he has been such a joy to be around.

i better bathe. ken has school. hugs to all!!!!

havent been blogging

sometimes blogging is hard. finding the time, for starters. some days i feel negative or whiney so i dont want to share. nobody wants to read a whiney, complainers blog day after day after day, right?(i have a few on my list that i read regularly, and i'm tempted to delete them) other times, i have so many thoughts swimming in my head that i have trouble even sorting it all out enough to get a complete thought on paper. today is one of those days, due to recent events and because i havent updated in so long. i also dont want every post to be some family update. here goes:

my oldest is 20 this week. holy crap. she is the most awesome kid in the whole wide world. 102 lbs of hell if you mess with her too. one tough cookie. smart as a whip. beautiful. loving to those who make her feel good inside, but if you wrong her or hurt her she will burn that bridge in 2 seconds and NEVER look back, family or not. wish i was that strong. OY. the kid is so goal oriented too. i love that about her. her boyfriend of 3 years is absolutely terrified of her and i think its hilarious LOL

shawn only weighed 20 lbs at his 20 month visit. 4th %ile again. ho hum.
jackson is grounded for stealing CD's from his pseudo brothers. after 5.5 years, he still thinks anything he can touch is for him. why is he not with it enough to put them back when hes done? why does he want to get caught? why does he still sabotage everything?
RAD sucks. have i mentioned that lately????? they never learn from past mistakes, they just make the same ones and over again.

truck shopping continues. after today, without an extension, we have to cover the rental, even though we just got the money from Allstate on thursday. thats TWO days to search for, find, test drive, purchase and drive away a vehicle. gotta love insurance companies full of excuses. we think we found one, not a crew cab like we wanted, but it has a snow plow. crucial. making an offer today.

i never talk about my work in my blog, its a rule i set for myself from the very beginning. but let me just say, the vocation i am ......involved in.... deals in affairs of the heart and sometimes that is a very emotional & stressful thing. i'm feelin' it. enough said.

Yogi's buddy Tim has now lived with us full time for 5 weeks. at times i love that hes here. i love the company(he isnt working yet) and the help he offers me with kids, shopping, cooking and laundry. at times i want him to go away and stop asking me questions and reminding me of things i need to do. i wanna just.... BE. know what i mean? he's also quite the drinker, but a happy drunk so i dont say anything. by the time hes good & sloshed the kids are all asleep. they have no idea.(the 3 young ones anyway).

the mom of that boy jackson teased last month (and in sept.) finally agreed to a 30 minute meeting. for what? i dont know. she came in ranting and raving & holding a detailed notebook of documentation of any word ever spoken to her son.. called my son a monster 5 times and her son a victim 9 times. i counted. she wanted to discuss jackson teasing her son in 2005. they told her to they were not interested in what happened 4 years ago. i stayed quiet mostly, but tried to convey that jackson is no more "typical" than her son.(she claims her son is "cured") i brought up some private things in attempt to let her see how immature and challenged my son is. i dont want anyone to pity jackson, but i also felt she(and others at the meeting) needed to know that he is 3-6 years old in many ways, not a typical 6th grader teasing a special needs 5th grader. i didnt use a bunch of RAD hang terms but mentioned abuse, neglect, abandonment and starvation. hes NOT a regular kid just being mean. i asked her to try to see us as the people working hard to heal him, fix him, change him, help him mature instead of the people RESPONSIBLE for who and what he is. he still hasnt been here as long as he was there, and this all takes time. we didnt make him this way. our other kids arent bullies. doug has his issues with peers, but was never a bully.
anyway, the admin. made it clear that nobody is going to isolate anybody over a VERBAL exchange at a bus stop and she will not be getting her way. she claims she is going to sue the district for CHILD ENDANGERMENT. she never brought up the HIV thing, but i touched on it and when i told everyone at the table that there was NO RISK she mentioned jackson taking part in a spit ball incident on the bus in 2006. i told her "again, NO RISK. READ A BOOK WITH WORDS IN IT, DOTTIE!" that was the only time i was rude or fired up. sorry, but shes ignorant. the bus guy chuckled under his breath, which made everyone laugh except her. she walked out so pissed off. she is used to bullying admin. to get what she wants, but wont let her son have an IEP. i really tried. i'm not good at bible verses, but i read one the other day about meeting evil with kindness or some stuff like that. help me out leslie lol. so i did that. we all talked after she left and they think shes a fruit loop, pretty much. they set up a plan to have the 2 boys meet with staff every week to talk about respect, ways to get along with people who are different than you, give them tools to help them deal with things like this... and all that crap. not enough for her. she made it very clear that she will call police every time jack speaks to her son(which he no longer does, but her son approaches jackson constantly, which the principal says needs to stop. the kid cant help it though, i dont think.) when she stated that i wanted to ask her, ARE YOU THREATENING ME????? but i shut my mouth.
i am also giving jackson his Concerta earlier in the morning, so it will be helping him with impulse control at the bus stop and on the bus, instead of just at school. she LAUGHED when i mentioned this. screw her.
i will NEVER speak to her again. she acted mean, judgemental & nasty. my committment is to my son, not her.

i often think about all my kids, even the 2 extras(ben & jay) and how they came to us and i still have no regrets. i love them all for who they are, even though i get frustrated and angry. i miss doug & ben so much. theyll both be home by april 30th. jay leaves april 1st. i love being their mom. doug is calling me now!

more drivel later.......................................and pics!

discrimination

well.... it finally happened after 5.5 years. talk about a slap in the face.
there is special needs 5th grade boy, a year behind jackson, at the bus stop and of course, on the bus. a few years ago jack needled him a bit(called him robert when he knows he likes to be called robby, this caused the kid to wig out, which jack knew he would) the mom came to my door really angry, i invited her in and we talked. she was surprised i was white and i filled her in about jacksons life. she seemed understanding and told me her son had "a speech impediment".
then i heard so many people in town-and not because i asked-that he's way more special needs than a speech issue and that the parents were in denial and would accept NO services for him whatsoever-not even an IEP. they also will not allow him to be picked up at the house or ride a different bus with his peers, but are upset when he comes home with tales. i talked to jackson and tried to explain that he needed his support-not teasing. unfortunately, in Haiti even adults point and tease anybody with any physical difference. we try very hard, but you can only change a person so much. the bus driver and the lady that lives at the bus stop location have both told me that jack has been very nice to this kid. he's damned if he does and damned if he doesnt, it seems.
so...no issues until this past month or 2. apparently there was some light teasing, jack & Kye told the kid he was immature when he was eating valentine candy at the bus stop, another kid is in on it too. they ask him questions because he asks 100 questions, they know he likes to ask them but hates answering them, so they drive him nuts. the kid finally physically attacked jackson a few weeks ago, a neighbor mom pulled him off, and then the kid refused to exit the bus at school and 3 adults had to come out and remove him. i only know this because the bus driver's daughter goes to kendyls school and we chat. she states that jackson is NOT the problem, its just that robby only mentions HIS name. i told him that i want him to not speak to the kid AT ALL. JUST STOP TALKING. i expected the mom at my door but she never came(which was a very smart decision for her)
now she's all angry that jack ignores her son. he goes home bawling that the "Ni##er kid" won't talk to him. the bus coordinator guy(who has known me since i was 2 and was my neighbor my whole childhood) called me out of the blue on Monday to tell me she is upset about her kid not being spoken to( i hadnt heard a thing) and a big meeting happened on friday without my knowledge and that "they" have decided to move jackson to another bus stop-alone- and leave the other 3 boys at the corner. he was calling just to "fill me in and get my quick approval".
um...... are you smoking funny cigarettes mr. dumont????????????
i absolutely flipped out(quietly). he kept saying there was another issue, but that he couldn't tell me what her big issue is because it violates HER PRIVACY. confidentiality rules. he kept using the word privacy and all of a sudden it clicked. i said "wait... is this an HIV thing???"
he answered "you said it, i didn't. i didn't tell you, you figured it out."
apparently she is afraid of another physical confrontation and that her son will contract HIV. i heard he bites, but i have no way of knowing if thats true, not that it matters anyway. so they had a meeting and to "make this unstable woman go away" (his words)they thought they'd move jacky to a bus stop 500 feet away, where he'd be able to WATCH everybody play football without him. PROBLEM SOLVED huh???????
i told him OVER MY DEAD BODY. after talking to me for a bit we were disconnected(Shawn unplugged us LOLOL) and when he called back i told him he may want to educate himself and his committee, and then fill this woman in, about school policy and state law. he said "i just did and we cant do anything that she wants us to." GEE! REALLY????? he really seemed to think about things and realized i was right. i asked him if he would EVER let this happen to his NOT physically aggressive kid and he said NO WAY. don't get me wrong, if jack was hitting kids i would be thrilled with this idea. i'd welcome it! the fact is, hes right. this would make the whole thing "go away" but its just not right. isolating him isnt fair. Kye makes fun of the kid constantly and admits it, yet hes not being threatened. hes white and HIV negative.
he wanted me to come in and meet with the other mom. i stamped my feet and whined, "i knew you were gonna ask me to do thaaaaaaaaat" but then accepted. she accepted, but then refused a few hours later, after we had it all set up.

my favorite part was when jack came home from school, he reported that the driver had told him "your mom is moving your bus stop as of wed." (i am???)so not only did they meet without consulting me and make a decision, but they notified the driver!!!! i called and left him a message, he called me back thismorning and apologized for jumping the gun.
he also stated that he did some researching online last night and "you were right. theres just NO risk!" um.... why didn't you do the research BEFORE you decided to let this woman run the place???????
and to think NH has the highest IQ & SAT scores in the country. THAT SCARES ME.
DUH

just some pictures