Long week

Ryan left for Chicago bright and early Monday morning and it was just like the good old days when he used to travel and things went awry.  It started a bit early this time with a flat tire on Sunday morning.  Ryan was at the Seahawk/49er game, so I had to solve that one on my own and get out the old air compressor because Ainsley had a gymnastics team party that day and I had my girls night out!  It took forever to get to a drivable state, but it managed to hold air for the rest of the day and night.
My GNO was great as usual.  We went out to dinner at Uncle Yu's, the best chinese restaurant ever and then we headed to church for the Women's Christmas Event.  They brought in a speaker who was fabulous and it was just a great way to kick off the week.  I went to the tire place bright and early Monday morning and they found a screw in my tire (probably from our garage....I wish I could say Ryan put things in their place and picked up after himself, but it is clear where the kids get it!)

I am not sure what was going on with the kids, but I couldn't get any of them to move.  I would ask them to get dressed in the morning or brush their teeth and it was like I wasn't even talking and then when they did acknowledge I said something, they would start to move toward completing whatever it was and never get there!  I watched K and Ainsley wander aimlessly in their own little worlds.  It was amazing and extremely frustrating, but we were managing!  There's a lot of running around when there is only one of us.  Ainsley has gymnastics from 3:30-5:30 in Pleasanton and then Reggie has to be on the other side of Livermore (a good 20 minutes away) at 6 for swimming and somehow we squeeze dinner in there.  That schedule is 2 nights a week and is a bit challenging.
And then came Thursday....I had toffee making day with my girlfriends, while K was at a visit.  Problem is transportation didn't come and the visit didn't happen.  So, poor guy had to come with me, but he did great!  The best part is we didn't have to deal with all the issues he has when he has a visit, so that was a real blessing.  We made our toffee and Moose Munch and it was a nice break in the week.  Until I got home and the social worker decided to schedule 2, 8 hour visits for next week on his school days, one of them being his pajama day.  He has been looking forward to pajama day for several days and was in tears when I told him.  Mama bear came out and I told him I would fix it.  Long story short, after many phone calls to his dad and social worker, I finally got it figured out, phew!  However, the amount of stress put on me and disgust for the lack of regard for K was more than I could stand, so I have escalated things up the chain in hopes that someone will think about this little child for once.  This system is so very broken and I could write pages and pages of terrible things that we have experienced, but I am choosing to see if there is any way I can help fix it.
On to better things....Reggie had his swim party that night and although I didn't feel like going, the kids were super excited for Mountain Mike's pizza.  It turned out it was just what I needed....the coaches he has are great and it was fun to hear their stories about the kids.  I had no idea there were so many talented swimmers on our team!  Reggie got most improved swimmer and he felt really good about it.  That was one of the first things he told Ryan when they talked the next day.  Reggie is funny because he will swim fast when they are doing relays in practice and will swim faster than some of the big kids, but put him in a swim meet and he'll take his sweet time :o).

Thankfully, the week ended much better and we went to Wonderland for the Foster-A-Dream Christmas event.  The kids made cookies, played games, sat with Santa and picked out gifts.  The amount of gifts they get is ridiculous and it initially bothered me, but it has been a long year and my kids have to put up with a lot of extra junk due to the foster process, so I say good for them.  I was looking for the adult present shop....I could really use a spa day or an IPAD, but no dice!  I did get a very small manicure set :o).  I digress.....anyway, they gave Ainsley a new bike and I just couldn't go for that, so I talked to her and she didn't even want it anyway, so we gave it back for someone who really needed it.  Then we went out to lunch, which we never do and they were so very good that day!  Ryan finally flew home (thank goodness he made it out of Chicago, just before the snow really hit) and met us after lunch to take Reggie to a birthday party, while I took Ainsley to her gymnastics/dance performance.

 Santa doesn't look very excited...

Ryan had quite the week in Chicago.  His boss was fired last week and his new boss is interesting to say the least and he had really, really long days.  He was so ready to come home and we were asleep by 9:30.  It was the first good night of sleep I had in a few days.
Today was also fun.  We had a message at church that was tailored to the both of us.....how to have hope in hopeless situations.  It is just awesome when you go to church and feel like the pastor is talking directly to you!  We even visited scripture that I had quoted earlier in the week...Romans 8:28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who[i] have been called according to his purpose :o).
From there I took Ainsley to her gymnastics party where they exchanged gifts and watched a slide show.  The food was terrible and we left absolutely starving, so we came home and ate a bunch of toffee!  After dinner we went to a live walk-through nativity.  It was so impressive.  They build an entire village and have actors, dancers, live animals and village activities from that time period.  It was really busy and I wish we would have had more time to explore the village, but the kids did write their names with feather pens and dipped them in ink and Reggie wrote his name in Greek.  We saw how they made "flashlights" from pinch pots, wick and oil and how they made bread.  We learned about the census and it really felt like we flashed back in time.  Mary came in on a donkey and we saw the story come to life.  It was beautiful and a good reminder of what this season is really about.  I think K thought baby Jesus was really in the hay!

Happy Birthday Reggie!

10 is a big birthday…Reggie is now in double digits!  He is 56 ¾ inches tall and weighs a whopping 77 pounds of solid muscle :o).   

Reggie continues to be a sweetheart, the kind of kid you would want your kid to be friends with.  It makes it hard for us because there aren’t too many kids like him and so many of his friends fall short of the bar Reggie has set.  He is such a good friend and has such a kind way about him.  He has grown in lots of ways this year…there seems to be a new level of responsibility.  His teacher expects a lot from him and he is working to take his reading tests and speak up in class and he is doing it on his own :o).  Reggie doesn’t whine and complain much about his homework anymore…he knows he has to do that and piano before he gets to play and he knocks that out pretty quick (because he still loves to play!).  His room is still littered with lego’s and he and K build away and battle with their creations.  Oh how he loves to play!  We have been into board games lately and it is really fun to watch him….our babysitter couldn’t wait for a checkers rematch with him. 
Reggie is becoming a lot more competitive in all things.  He is still on swim team and had a couple meets this year and works to beat the person next to him….the problem with swimming is you can’t see beyond who is right next to you!  He did a triathlon in June and we were impressed that he came in a close second to a really experienced racer.  He continues to talk about the mile race at the end of the year and how he is going to win this time!  More exciting than that is he is enjoying football!!!  He can’t get enough of it and watches most games with us and then plays many days at school and at home with Ryan.  He has quite an arm, but isn’t wanting to play.  He is still comfortable in his little box, but our job is to continue to expand his box and strongly encourage him to try new things.  We are going to do track and field in the early spring and likely flag football sometime next year too!  We are getting less resistance from him in trying new things, so we are making progress.  He didn’t put up a stink about his piano recital recently and I think he might be starting to like it and be more confident in his abilities. 
We celebrated his birthday this weekend.  Reggie chose to invite one friend to the Tech Museum  to enjoy their Star Wars exhibit.  Samantha came to watch the other two, while Ryan, Reggie, Tyler and I drove to San Jose.  This place was amazing and we only had time to see a fraction of it.  We did all the Star Wars activities, built a light saber and worked with magnets and levitation.  They had costumes from the movies and displays of characters and models of flying fighters.  It was pretty impressive and the kids (and Ryan!) really enjoyed learning about the props.  They also had a section on prosthetics and it was fascinating!  What hope for the future :o).

 Our finished project....I guess you can easily build these at home!

 My favorite...YODA

We had a little time to explore the regular part of the museum and I challenged the boys to make a plane fly farther than mine.  In the end I won, but they did a good job of working together and it went pretty far.  We also experienced the 6.8 Seattle earthquake of 2001in their seismology lab and powered an astronaut pod in space.  I wish it were closer because I was very tempted to buy an annual membership.  Definitely a place we’d all like to visit again.

Their plane:

Winning plane...

Inside a tsunami rescue pod:

 Space driving:

From there we headed to Red Robin and we all stuffed ourselves.  Ryan and Tyler have a running bet that he can’t eat an entire burger from Red Robin.  I think if we hadn’t waited for our food so long and Tyler didn’t drink so much before the food came, he might have done it!
Today is his actual birthday and after church, we went to the gym and swam in the warm pool.  We opened presents when we got home and had spaghetti for dinner and movie night!  Monsters University is a really cute one :o).  It was a great weekend and I think Reggie will remember it forever!

 Heaven....

 Working hard on the space needle!

State and Grandma Peggy visit!

Grandma Peggy flew in on last Thursday and we pulled the kids out early on Friday and headed to Ainsley’s State gymnastics meet!  The drive to Lemoore was roughly 3 hours and the kids were really excited about the hotel and got 2 adjoining rooms which made it even better :o).  They were bouncing off the walls and jumping on and off the beds.  Thankfully, no one got hurt!  Shortly after we checked in, we headed to Walmart so Reggie could pick out his birthday present and then we went to Denny’s.  We don’t eat out very often, so the kids were happy.  When we got back, Reggie decided to build his lego set instead of watch a show and he was consumed by that until bed.  The other 2 watched a show and ate candy and then the kids turned in early.  Since we had 2 rooms, we stayed up and were able to watch t.v. :o).  It was a pretty nice hotel and had a great continental breakfast, but the city of Lemoore smelled like cow poo.  We slept with the window open and I had a dream I was swimming in poo :o(.
We were up bright and early the next morning because Ainsley had to be at the gym at 8:15 for warm-ups at 8:30.  Her coach rolled in at 8:29, so we were getting a bit nervous, but she made it.  I felt bad for ainsley since none of her team mates were competing in her group and she didn't look like she was having much fun.  We could see her coaches were try to loosen her up.  It was good she started on vault and got some of the nervous energy out first.  She did the best vault I’ve ever seen her do, so it was a great start.  She continued to be solid on every event and finished with her personal best all-around score of 35.9!  She placed on every event except beam, 4^th on floor, 6th on vault, 7th on bars and 6^th all-around.  Her coaches were very impressed and said she’ll be moving up to the next level!  I think she was very glad to have it done :o).  

 No action shots turned out...the lighting was really poor and my super photography mom's weren't there, so at least I got one with her coaches afterward.

We made the long drive home and then grandma started preparing desserts for Thanksgiving dinner for Sunday.  The kids love grandma’s Lemon Lush and grandma loves Razzleberry Claim Jumper pie (that you can't get in WA).  Ainsley was in heaven, being able to help in the kitchen.  She LOVES that stuff!  The turkey went in early the next day and the smell was delicious.  We stuffed ourselves…the kids have become quite the potato and gravy eaters…I had to remind them of when they wouldn’t even try them!  A big thank you to grandma for all her hard work in the kitchen….we thoroughly enjoyed our feast.  I froze it and we enjoyed it again on Thanksgiving.  It was the easiest preparation for Thanksgiving ever.  Might be something we do more often, although we learned mashed potato’s don’t freeze well.  The kids had a great time playing board games with grandma and hanging out with her in the Casita :o).  After grandma left, K realized he didn’t thank her for making Lemon Lush and he wanted to send her a card!  

The kids have been on break since then and it has been really nice to have no school and no gymnastics.  The first 3 days were great, but the kids were getting a little irritated with each other and Ainsley has been a little whiney.  We have been trying to keep her active, but she is a creature of habit and gets a little grumpy when schedules change.  K is in heaven, having playmates all day!  There’s been a lot of lego and trampoline action this week and yesterday we decorated for Christmas and that is always a great time.  I love turning on the Christmas music and enjoying the fun of the season.  We did good this year….no ornament casualties!  I have to admit…it doesn’t feel quite cold enough for Christmas-I went running in shorts and a t-shirt yesterday while Reggie biked along with me :o).
The kids love being on the roof!

 Such concentration...

Top 1%

I have to brag about Ryan a little.  He is so gifted in sales and has always been recognized during review time, getting "exceeds expectations," but he had his review a couple weeks ago and when he got home he told me he didn't get exceeds expectations.  I was a bit surprised until he told me there some category above that that isn't really named and only 1% of the people in the company get this status!  I keep asking when the new car is arriving or the big bonus check, but it doesn't sound like that's part of the deal, just bragging rights I guess.  Regardless, it is nice that they agree how much of an asset he is and they let him know it!
Did I tell you he has a pretty cool job?  Not only is he part of the "green" movement, ridding the world of paper towels, but he has visited EMP, Universal Studios, Pixar, Las Vegas Race track school (where they offered to let him drive a corvette around the track), Husky stadium and many other really cool places....and he gets to go in top secret areas and see stuff no normal person gets to! They always invite him to enjoy the places he visits, but he usually doesn't have time.  He needs to plan better to take advantage of their offers!  The kids were pretty jealous when they saw this:

K update

Well, we just keep getting bad news….everything has come to a screeching halt.  The appellate court issued a stay, so this was the worst case scenario in moving toward adoption.  Nothing will happen for several months and if all goes as it should the judge’s decision will be upheld and then we can work toward adoption.  A bonding study has also been requested which usually takes a year, but can’t be started until the appellate court rules.  Hopefully, the recommendation from the bonding study will be adoption, but if the judge goes in that direction it will be appealed and that process is one year, so we are a minimum of 3 years away from adoption, probably closer to 4!  I know it is confusing…many people have explained it to me and I finally get what is going on.  This system and process is something else :o(.

I have really been struggling lately with it lately, just wanting to be done with this mess, so your prayers are much appreciated.  I made an appeal to his dad, asking him to think about what is best for K.  He will start kindergarten next year and will be reminded daily that he is different than my kids.  I never understood the importance of him being adopted until this past year made it clear to me that he is very aware of the name issue and doesn’t like it.  To him it is more than that, for me, I am just happy that he won’t be leaving, but it has been very hard knowing that he wants something he’ll likely not get for a really long time.  Thankfully, he has a really good therapist and I feel good that we will be able to help him through all this confusion.  His dad made it clear that he will continue this fight (we can still pray for a miracle that he’ll change his mind!) and knowing that has made me accept this situation and with God’s grace, I am in a much better place than a few days ago!
In the meantime, we will continue to move forward and give him all that we have.  K is really enjoying having his own friends and activities…

He had his soccer team party a couple weeks ago and it was fun to see how far he’s come.  On a side note, it was the most ridiculous soccer party ever…..decorations were amazing, 

gifts for the kids were over the top and they even had a slide-show that we got a copy of! 
K at a birthday party 2 weekends ago:

The good news is he keeps us laughing….tonight at dinner we were all taking turns drawing on the whiteboard and guessing what we drew.  Ryan drew the Dyson tap and the next round, K says, “no more boring drawings dad!”  It is always a surprise what comes out of his little mouth.  He really is super sweet and I hope someday all his dreams come true!
I guess he was hot!

Enjoying quieter weekends!

Last weekend we got a small taste of having a pet...we were dog sitting for little Angel, a Pomeranian :). Ainsley was counting down for two weeks! The kids had so much fun just having her there :). K had pee duty, Ainsley was the pooper scooper and Reggie was the morning helper and walker. She really was a sweet, good dog, only barking when it was appropriate. Thankfully we have hardwood floors or we would never do it again because she peed quite a bit. The kids loved it that she followed me everywhere and spun in circles every time I went near her or talked to her... They would ask me to sit down so we could all sit together with her. I have to say if I was ever going to get a dog I think it would be a small one....their mess is just so easy :). But, we also realized how busy we are and how there's no place for a dog right now. The kids will have to be happy just watching her every month or two. Ryan is getting a little less flexible in his old age and it took him a bit to warm up to having a dog around, but I think by the end of it he came around. 

Reggie had his piano recital this Saturday. He played the theme song from Star Wars and did awesome job!!! There was a boy who played the song he did last time and Star Wars was a lot more complicated with much more hand movement. We were blown away by some of the older kids and I think they may have inspired Reggie a bit. What was even better is that we had Samantha watching the other two :). We took Reggie out to Sweet tomatoes and enjoyed having some time with him. He has been really good lately and helpful so it was nice to do something special for him. Although, he couldn't wait to get home and start building the White House.... He and I went to the thrift store earlier that day and he got a bunch of fun stuff with his money!

Video of his performance:

This was a cardboard puzzle with over 130 pieces that Reggie worked on for a few hours.  He sure loves to create and build.  I am really glad he can do these things on his own because I do not share his gift!

A field trip he went on last week, visiting the state capital....maybe that inspired him to get the puzzle.

We took the kids to the gym the next day, so we could play some basketball and then Ryan's took K home for a nap and the kids and I swam in the indoor warm pool. We have never been in that pool and it was like a hot tub! It's a therapy pool for people with arthritis and they loved it....Reggie asked if we could come every Sunday! We had movie night that night and it was such a nice weekend all around!!!

Looking forward to quieter weekends

Last weekend was CRAZY!  Reggie had scouts Friday night and we took a tour of the quarry in Pleasanton.  It was actually really interesting and we learned and saw how they moved the sand up the conveyer belt to get it to the plant a mile and a half away.  When we drove up to the plant, they taught us about cement, concrete and asphalt and showed us the different types of sand/gravel they have there.  We also learned they test it daily (who knew?) and they have a long term plan for the giant holes they are making.  Turns out it will be where our water is stored eventually.  I thought it was interesting....Reggie thought it was short and I could tell he wanted to hear and see more.
If you look closely, you can see the 3 giant loaders (that look very small).  They are 86 feet down and it has taken them 15 years to get this far.

 Now you can see how giant it is!

We were up bright and early the next morning for Reggie's swim meet in Hayward.  Ryan stayed back with K because he had his last soccer game and a visit with his family :o).  We missed swim warm ups which was o.k.. because I didn't want him to get all wet and then have to wait and hour and a half for his first event.  That sounds more damaging than good to me.  Anyway, I have never seen anything quite like it.....People everywhere camped out for the day.  There were 1000 swimmers!!!  It was hard to hear the announcer, so we never knew which event was going....thank goodness for other parents!  After his first 2 events, we were out of there.  Seemed silly to sit for another 2 hours for one more swim.  He did good, but I forgot to tell him he was supposed to go fast!  He did fine, but I have seen him motor much faster in practice.  Our previous respite provider, Kelly, lives just down the street, so she came to watch and it was fun to visit and catch up :o).

From there Ainsley and I went to visit some friends in Pleasanton.  We don't usually have playdates on the weekends, but it worked out nicely.  Ryan and Reggie got some one on one time and went to Boomer's to miniature golf and ride go carts.

The next day we went to church and then headed to Sacramento for Ainsley's gymnastics meet.  It started at 3 and she was a bit off.  I am hoping for an earlier start at state.  Her coach said it is good she is strong because she muscled a lot to avoid falling and she ran out of time on the beam.  We watched her floor routine and she was fighting to go over on her handstand and she held it for way too long and we could see the judge laughing in the background!  Surprisingly, she scored her highest score ever on floor (9.125) and bars (9.05-she had to muscle that too).  Maybe the judges like to see that??  Her all around score improved again, but the competition was crazy!  The girls didn't get too many medals which was good preparation for the state meet that is coming up.

We didn't get home until 7:45, which was really 8:45 with the time change and we were all wiped out.  Ainsley got home later because she went to eat with her teammates.  

I am very glad swim meets are over, soccer is over and we only have one gymnastics meet left...yeehaw!

Fall is in the air

We officially turned on our heat this morning!  We had the pellet stove on a couple times last week, but it is just getting too chilly at night.  I am pretty sure there was frost on the neighbors roof this morning.
It has been such a beautiful fall so far and I just went for a run on Saturday in a tank top and shorts, so it is still getting quite warm during the day, but there's a new chill in the air.   I think it is time to pack up the shorts and get out the pants....seems crazy that it is already Nov. Our fruit trees have also noticed the weather change and our oranges are turning orange and our lemons yellow, so they should be ready in the next month or two.
I am loving our new house because the sun beams in the kitchen in the morning and the living room in the afternoon and it just makes everything feel a little warmer :o).  This time of year it is so nice to have some natural sunlight, especially since daylight savings is now upon us.  Yesterday seemed like the longest day ever and the evening even longer (it probably didn't help that we went to Sacramento for a gymnastics meet!).

Halloween!

Well the Halloween festivities this season kept us quite busy! K and Ainsley had field trips to the pumpkin patch, but poor Reggie was bummed he didn't get to go.  It is good he has friends because he ended up going with Caleb the day before Halloween and he was just happy to leave with a pumpkin (I had gone to Safeway, Grocery Outlet and CVS and no one had any big pumpkins left!).  

All the kids had parties and then the usual parade and assembly :). It was really surprising that Reggie was the only minion. He was done with his costume after the parade...too bulky and it hurt his head, so he decided to be Darth Vader for trick-or-treating around our neighborhood. Of course if Reggie wasn't going to be a minion, Khalif wasn't either, so he decided to be SpongeBob! 

We had the Houghtaling's and Caldiera's over and it might have been the quietest, best group of 9 kids ever. Their rooms weren't even messy!!! It was nice to actually sit and visit during dinner without any interruption. I'm still not sure how that even happened :). We made pulled pork in the crockpot and that was the easiest dinner and super delicious. Ryan found a recipe online and that was his baby. I am thinking he should do that more often :)!!! 
After dinner we went trick-or-treating around our neighborhood and ran into K's soccer coach and his preschool teacher. Rachel and Shannon dressed up as jellybeans and they had balloons that kept falling out of their costume so it created a little bit of entertainment when the kids would stomp and pop. By the end of our loop they were completely out of balloons...brilliant planning by Diana!

When we got home they all spread out and checked out their loot. They were excited to get a couple full size candy bars! I got a few of my favorites too. On Saturday I decided I was done with candy. We still have to go through the kids and figure out what we're going to keep and what we're going to send off to the troops :). 
We really had a fabulous time!!!