It's finally SUMMER!

Sorry its been so long since I updated you all :)  It is finally summer!

The kids did Vacation Bible School last week and had a blast.  Are the VBS's in your area charging?  I was floored when looking for VBS's for the kids to go to that almost all of them were charging 25-35 bucks per kid.  The one I sent them to last week was the only free one I could find.  To me that is just crazy, "Hey we would love to tell your kids about Jesus....it will cost you though!".  Oh well, it all worked out anyway because I found out our city has a playground camp the whole month of July, I thought it was 10 dollars a day BUT this morning when I went to register James, Joel, and Alex I found out it was 10 dollars for the WHOLE month! It is M-F 9-12 for Joel and James and 9-12 and 1-3 for Alex, Matthew will go in the afternoons.  They go on trips like swimming, bowling, etc occasionally. Matthew goes to ESY for the month of July. 8-1 Monday through Thursday.

Buttercup has been doing great, she is SO close to walking, it will be any day now!  Mom has shown up to the visits each week and Buttercup gets so excited seeing her walk in the door.

Alex has visits with mom once a month at the jail, she has been telling him he is coming home this summer. Apparently she is up for parole soon.  Alex is having a hard time understanding that this is probably not the case.  Even if she is released on parole, he wouldn't be able to go home right away.

We had R1 back for respite this weekend, 6 kids almost pushed me over the edge, LOL!  I don't think it would be so bad if they were not all so close in age...and boys (except my Buttercup).  Between R1, Matthew and Alex they are constantly in a control battle.  R1 brought a bunch of toys and of course when it was time to go everyone argued over whose Bey Blade pieces were whose....which I warned them would happen.  Then we couldn't find two of R1's Nintendo DS games.  We spent hours looking everywhere and ended up not being able to go to the Aquarium like I had wanted to.  We could not find them, I thought Matthew had hid them somewhere so I gave R1 one of our games that was the same and told him Id find the other and give it to his caseworker.  About 10 minutes after we dropped him off R1's foster mom called and said they were in his pocket! Grrrrrr......she is supposed to drop off our game at the agency this week, we will see if that actually happens.

We went to the beach for a couple days last week.  The boys woke me up at 5 am to look for shells and we found this little guy.....we named him "Hermie".  The boys took care of him all day and then released him back into his habitat, but only after I promised to buy them each a hermit crab this weekend when we go back!  Ahhhhhh that's a lot of hermit crabs :)

So there is my update for today!

Medical Drama for Buttercup

So there have been tons of phone calls back and forth regarding Buttercup's medical issues that need to be taken care of.  First the nurse from DHS called me and told me a social worker from the hospital would be calling with more information about scheduling her needed surgery.  Yesterday I got a call while we were at Chuck E Cheese for Alex's birthday from the hospital social worker.  She gave me the name and number to the specialized clinic at the hospital that would be handling things and told me I needed to call ASAP.  The team only meets once a month and I needed to get her on the schedule quickly.  This surgery should have been done months ago but there were three no shows previously.  I called this morning and got on the teams schedule for June.  Before that she needs to get in to see the pediatrician for a physical.  Remember how DHS scheduled that for today without checking with me first, and remember how I told them I was not available, and remember how they said they would transport.....yeah that didn't happen.  I had left several messages this week with the DHS caseworker trying to find out what was going on.  No return call. This morning I called the doctor's office to let them know she was probably not coming since no one had called about scheduling transportation and asked if I could reschedule.  They told me they couldn't get her in till June and they were nasty about it.  Its not my fault, I communicated with everyone! I told the lady that would not work since the child was in need of surgery as soon as possible, I told her Id have DHS call her back to reschedule. Left another message with DHS.  DHS lady called back while I was at an IEP meeting for Matthew, BUT her message mentioned NOTHING about the doctor appointment, ugh!  When I got home I called my agency worker who told me DHS lady had called her and said she forgot to schedule the transport but would reschedule the appointment.  My agency worker is also trying to schedule a visit with Mom for next week.  Not sure how that will work since as far as I know Mom is still in the hospital. 

Agency Caseworker Visit for Buttercup

Buttercup's caseworker with my Agency came out to visit on Monday.  It was pretty uneventful as there isn't any new news.  I told her what DHS had told me regarding court and the doctor appointment that was scheduled. She brought out the placement paperwork and medical information, did a quick check of where Buttercup was sleeping.  She then had me fill out two "Ages & Stages" questionnaires which are basically to get an idea of where the child is developmentally.  She went ahead and scored them and everything was on track for Buttercup developmentally.

Update on Court for Buttercup

Court was this morning for Buttercup at 9:00.  At 4:30 I got a call from my agency worker, I assumed it would be about court, but she just wanted to know if I had scheduled the physical yet. Which NO I have not scheduled since no one has given me any medical or insurance information yet, nor do I even have the official placement paper yet that I would need to take her to the doctor.  After we sorted that all out I asked about Court.  My agency worker didn't even know there was court?! I explained that there was a hearing this morning and she may be leaving to go to a kinship placement.  I then told her that the child advocate had told me she was not recommending the placement due to an extensive criminal background on one of the adults in the home as well as an issue with some teenage relatives that were living in the house.  The agency worker was going to try and call the child advocate.  After I got off the phone with her I decided to call myself and left messages with the county case worker and the child advocate. 
Around 6 the county case worker called me back.  She says that she is waiting on getting the criminal records back on the kinship placement, apparently the child advocate had run her own reports and DHS had not run any reports?  How do you go to a court hearing about placing a child with a relative and NOT run the report beforehand?  Ugh.  Anyway she should have those back in the morning.  She said the child advocate wanted clarification about a child endangerment charge that had been dropped on one of the adults to make sure it "wasn't anything crazy".  Once she had that info she would present it to the child advocate and see if she will approve the move or not.
The DHS worker then tells me some medical information she learned and that they scheduled her for a physical on Thursday....um, well I cant di this Thursday cause I already have two appointments.  Whatever, I told her we'd worry about it next week once we see if she is staying.  She will also need a cardiology appointment before the surgery she needs can be scheduled.  So we are back to the waiting game.
It is utterly irritating how there are SO many people involved in these cases but nobody is on the same page or knows what is going on.  I decided to go ahead and schedule some portraits to be taken tomorrow morning, which will be Buttercup's 1 year old birthday!  Who knows what will happen, but she deserves those and I deserve to dress her up in pretty dresses :)

Buttercup's Child Advocate

Buttercup's Child Advocate came by yesterday morning.  She seemed really on it and let me know she is NOT recommending Buttercup be moved to the kinship placement at court tomorrow.  She told me she is uncomfortable with the length of the kinship relatives criminal record, even though none of the things on it are prohibitive offenses.  She also let me know that the kinship placement has two teenagers who they are guardians of from other family members and one is already in an out of home placement due to behaviors.  She and her supervisor do not feel comfortable placing a baby in that situation.  Court was this morning, haven't heard anything yet.

PINK!

For those of you that don't follow me over on facebook, you may have missed some big news....stop what you are doing right now and follow:
https://www.facebook.com/YoungSingleAndAdopting?ref=hl

Ok now that that's taken care of, let me fill you in!

A few weeks ago I had called my agency and left a message with placement that I still had a crib available if any baby girls came their way.  Last week on Wednesday placement finally called me back to confirm that they had me on the list for a girl 0-2 and asked if I only had a crib or could I go up higher on the age limit. I said I could make a bed available but it would require some shuffling of rooms, so I would prefer under two but would be willing to take five and under, girls only.  I was pretty proud of myself for sticking with my girl requirement at least.
Several hours later the lady from placement called me back form her car after hours and said, "Remember that conversation we had a few hours ago......".  She had an 11 month old healthy girl who had just been taken into care by DHS and needed a place to go.  Mom was admitted to the hospital.  That was all the information they had. Of course I said yes!  We all frantically cleaned the house which was a disaster and ran up to Walgreens to pick up some formula and diapers. 
The little girl got here that night with nothing but the clothes on her back and is just the happiest little thing.  Ill be calling her 'Buttercup' for the blog.
Friday one of my agency workers came out to do the safety check and let me know who her caseworker would be through my agency, but she didn't have any new information.  I still didn't have any information about her going into the weekend.  I tried feeding her some real food and she did great with it.  I did notice that she was having a lot of milk/food coming out her nose.  She also had a really bad cold, full on snot machine!  Sunday evening it seemed like she might have an ear infection that was bothering her, but she was still as happy as can be.  I didn't have any medical or insurance information yet, so was waiting till today (Monday) to see if anyone had tracked it down.  This afternoon the DHS worker came by and filled me in on what she knew.  It looks like Mom will be in the hospital for at least twenty days if not more.  Two relative placements have been identified.  One is a family member who will be out of town for the next two months, so that probably will not work.  The other was an Aunt and Uncle who want Buttercup, however the Uncle had something come back on his record.  It was not a prohibitive offense (list of offenses that would make it an immediate no-go for placement) but DHS is still not recommending them to the Judge.  Their will be court on Thursday and the Judge will determine if the Aunt and Uncle can get placement.  Meanwhile, it turns out the baby has a cleft palate that was never corrected, which is why the stuff was coming out her nose.  She is also supposed to be on Soy milk, so the cold/ear infection may be from allergies.  The DHS Nurse was trying to get more information and get me her pediatricians information so I can schedule something.
I on the other hand have been thoroughly enjoying tutus and dressed, even if its only for a little while :)