1. This is not a Tale of Fourty-Four Rats. Get over it. It's all about the anticipation.
2. Garrett just finished 2nd grade, Morgan finished Kindergarten, and Kiera finished all the snacks in the house.
3. We have had our dog Bree for a year now. We left her for the first time recently. When the dog sitter (whom she knows) showed up to get her, she refused to get off the couch. All day. We had to call another friend and ask if they could please go to our house and try to get our neurotic dog off the couch and outside to pee. That was an odd conversation. Luckily they were up for the challenge, and she was so happy to see them, they took her home with them. Now she thinks they walk on water.
4. Morgan one "Best in Show" at the science fair. I don't know if she was more excited about the distinguishmend or the fancy blue and purple ribbon.
5. Kiera just turned three which means she'd five which means she can do whatever she wants because she's a big girl. But then, she was born thinking that.
6. I planted all my seeds early this year. Our spring had been so lousy all my little seedlings are dying in their trays because they haven't grown enough to plant in the ground. That makes me sad.
7. I have cultivated a big enough strawberry patch that yesterday I was able to pick a pint and a half of strawberries. That makes me happy.
8. Caterpillars don't actually sprout wings when they become butterflies, they dissolve into a pile of goo and the butterfly grows out of the goo's DNA.
9. I asked Garrett what else I should post here. He said to tell you we have games, and furtniture, and carpets and stuff. Oh, and pets and plants.
10. Now that school is out we get to start having weekly Family Dinners with our friends. Patch Adams has ten rules for a long and happy life, and one of them is to have potluck dinners with your neighbors once a week. They may not live on our street, but they're our peeps, they support us when we need it, and they make killer food. Everybody should be having Family Dinners.
Friday, June 22, 2012
Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
It's been over a year since I posted anything here. So? What?! That's what I thought. Maybe I did it on purpose. Maybe it just made you miss me, and made this post that much more precious to you. SEE? I did it for YOU.
The year between my last real post (Changing Focus) and this last Spring was pretty hard for us. I didn't go into details in that post about what the issues we were having were, as it was really too painful and traumatic to discuss-and still sometimes is-but I think most anyone interested in us enough to read this blog already knows anyway. We were investigated by CPS for child neglect after refusing a Tetatus shot for Kiera (when she really didn't need one, and we could prove it-but CPS doesn't care about proof, they care about their stats and will always take the word of a doctor over a parent's proof. I compiled a report and everything, as far as I know no one even looked at it. Not to mentiont that we have a constitutional right to refuse any medical treatment for our children). We dropped over a grand on an attorney, spent countless hours compiling information and doing research, gathered dozens of letters from friends and family extolling the many and varied glories of our parenting abilities, and none of it mattered. We were given a "choice"-take her in for the shot (on day 21 of a 21 day window), or be found guilty and, as out attorney phrased it, "be thrown into a level of hell you cannot imagine." Given how hellish everything already was, we didn't feel we could subject the kids to any more-so in order to protect the family as a whole, we had to throw our poor baby (who had as of then never had a shot) under the bus. The real kicker is that the shot they required was a TIG (tetanus immunoglobuin), which is supposed to protect an unimmunized person until the Tetanus shot it effective (all vaccines take 3-4 to offer protection, so running in to get a Tetanus shot the day of an injury is not protecting you). The TIG protects you (supposedly) for about 28 days, so given with a Tetanus shot, you're supposed to be covered. That's the standard protocol. I knew this, Troy knew this, our attorney knew this.
They never made us give her a Tetanus shot.
Nothing they did to us had anything to do with her well-being. Nobody checked the medical protocal. I think the doctor was so shocked at how crazy it all got, he just told them she had to have that shot so he didn't have to admit he messed up. If she'd actually been exposed to Tetanus, she'd be dead now (according to the doc-he told us when children get Tetanus, they die. I later found that it's been over 50 years since a child has died from Tetanus in the US--it's a long recovery, but they recover). And WE were the ones being charged with neglect.
I (surprise surprise) am a very sensitive person. Sensitive to all things, good and bad--so sometimes being sensitive is great. An aunt once told me, "You feel things more deeply than most people." How can that be bad, right? I still can't talk about this experience calmly. It is etched in my soul. Seriously folks, the first three times people knocked on our door after the CPS agent came, I made the kids lay down so no one would see us through the windows and prayed they'd just go away. I now have a deep anxiety of medical caregivers--even taking the kids to a naturapathic clinic for well-child checks gave me the shakes and heart palpitations. The first time I talked to our midwife about it in person (two months after), I sobbed the whole time, and told her I was just so tired and devoid of a want to DO anything, and she said, "well of course, you're depressed. It's the worst thing any of our clients has ever been put through" It was the first anyone outside the experience had acknowledged how very very very bad it was (everyone knew it was bad, but it's hard to really understand HOW bad), and the first time I allowed myself to see how deep it had gotten into me.
Add all of that to the tremendous pile of s@#* Troy was being pushed through at work, and it really took us about a year to get back to feeling any kind of normal. I can't tell you how many times I opened Blogger, stared at it pondering all the things I could write, and then just closed it because I couldn't find it in me to care. But now his six-day work weeks and 12 hour days are behind him, his uber-evil boss had to leave the company, he's working less than five minutes from home, and he comes home for lunch almost every day. The kids are thriving, our pet population gives us all someone to pet and cuddle, and summer is taunting us from behind the rain clouds. (Seriously summer, you're very funny, but it's time to come out now. Now.) I feel like last year's experiences were like a wall between me and my creativity, and now that I've gotten this off my chest I can return to a blog filled with humorous antics and adorable pictures-because really, if all my posts were like this, none of ya's would want to keep reading it.
Stay tuned for next time, when I tell the Tale of Fourty-Four Rats. Though I should probably post some pictures of Kiera's birthday first. Somehow I don't think I can wind the two into one post....but it might be fun to try.....
The year between my last real post (Changing Focus) and this last Spring was pretty hard for us. I didn't go into details in that post about what the issues we were having were, as it was really too painful and traumatic to discuss-and still sometimes is-but I think most anyone interested in us enough to read this blog already knows anyway. We were investigated by CPS for child neglect after refusing a Tetatus shot for Kiera (when she really didn't need one, and we could prove it-but CPS doesn't care about proof, they care about their stats and will always take the word of a doctor over a parent's proof. I compiled a report and everything, as far as I know no one even looked at it. Not to mentiont that we have a constitutional right to refuse any medical treatment for our children). We dropped over a grand on an attorney, spent countless hours compiling information and doing research, gathered dozens of letters from friends and family extolling the many and varied glories of our parenting abilities, and none of it mattered. We were given a "choice"-take her in for the shot (on day 21 of a 21 day window), or be found guilty and, as out attorney phrased it, "be thrown into a level of hell you cannot imagine." Given how hellish everything already was, we didn't feel we could subject the kids to any more-so in order to protect the family as a whole, we had to throw our poor baby (who had as of then never had a shot) under the bus. The real kicker is that the shot they required was a TIG (tetanus immunoglobuin), which is supposed to protect an unimmunized person until the Tetanus shot it effective (all vaccines take 3-4 to offer protection, so running in to get a Tetanus shot the day of an injury is not protecting you). The TIG protects you (supposedly) for about 28 days, so given with a Tetanus shot, you're supposed to be covered. That's the standard protocol. I knew this, Troy knew this, our attorney knew this.
They never made us give her a Tetanus shot.
Nothing they did to us had anything to do with her well-being. Nobody checked the medical protocal. I think the doctor was so shocked at how crazy it all got, he just told them she had to have that shot so he didn't have to admit he messed up. If she'd actually been exposed to Tetanus, she'd be dead now (according to the doc-he told us when children get Tetanus, they die. I later found that it's been over 50 years since a child has died from Tetanus in the US--it's a long recovery, but they recover). And WE were the ones being charged with neglect.
I (surprise surprise) am a very sensitive person. Sensitive to all things, good and bad--so sometimes being sensitive is great. An aunt once told me, "You feel things more deeply than most people." How can that be bad, right? I still can't talk about this experience calmly. It is etched in my soul. Seriously folks, the first three times people knocked on our door after the CPS agent came, I made the kids lay down so no one would see us through the windows and prayed they'd just go away. I now have a deep anxiety of medical caregivers--even taking the kids to a naturapathic clinic for well-child checks gave me the shakes and heart palpitations. The first time I talked to our midwife about it in person (two months after), I sobbed the whole time, and told her I was just so tired and devoid of a want to DO anything, and she said, "well of course, you're depressed. It's the worst thing any of our clients has ever been put through" It was the first anyone outside the experience had acknowledged how very very very bad it was (everyone knew it was bad, but it's hard to really understand HOW bad), and the first time I allowed myself to see how deep it had gotten into me.
Add all of that to the tremendous pile of s@#* Troy was being pushed through at work, and it really took us about a year to get back to feeling any kind of normal. I can't tell you how many times I opened Blogger, stared at it pondering all the things I could write, and then just closed it because I couldn't find it in me to care. But now his six-day work weeks and 12 hour days are behind him, his uber-evil boss had to leave the company, he's working less than five minutes from home, and he comes home for lunch almost every day. The kids are thriving, our pet population gives us all someone to pet and cuddle, and summer is taunting us from behind the rain clouds. (Seriously summer, you're very funny, but it's time to come out now. Now.) I feel like last year's experiences were like a wall between me and my creativity, and now that I've gotten this off my chest I can return to a blog filled with humorous antics and adorable pictures-because really, if all my posts were like this, none of ya's would want to keep reading it.
Stay tuned for next time, when I tell the Tale of Fourty-Four Rats. Though I should probably post some pictures of Kiera's birthday first. Somehow I don't think I can wind the two into one post....but it might be fun to try.....
Random Things
*Yup, also a year old. Aged for better flavor.*
- We kept the entire house clean for almost a month. That, my friends, it a record. Unfortunately the house is fighting back.
- Fruit flies only love blackberry mojitos when you are drinking them, not when you use the mojito as a trap.
- We took the side of Kiera's crib, magically creating a "big girl bed." This is day two, and she's realized not only can she get in and out when she wants, she can do it any TIME she wants. Just caught her sneaking down the hallway with two snackbars in hand (one for Morgan, I presume, as that's the door she was headed for).
- We got a dog. She's very sweet, and very well behaved, and came to us from a family who moved to England and could not take her with them. Her name is Bree, and she runs so fast we've knicknamed her "Rocketdog."
- I haven't attended a birth for several months for a number of reasons-and now am waiting on a momma who's 5 days "overdue." I hope she goes before they want to induce her.
- I gave Troy a month of fencing lessons (as a refreshser) for his birthday, which he just finished. He's covered in bruises. Last night I dreamt I got to go with him, and ended up fencing our old instructor in my mother's living room. I was terrible. He beat me defeated me soundly, and then wouldn't speak to me as he was too dissappointed in my atrophied fencing abilities. And I somehow bent my blade into an "s."
- I had to do a two week gluten trial in preparation for blood tests for Celiac disease. I have been sick for three weeks as a result. If the test comes back negative and I have to do another gluten trial for a different test, I may punch my ND in the face. Which is too bad, because he's a nice guy.
- Morgan wants to try tap dancing. She would like the instructor to show her how to do a flip in the air and land on her taps. I say go for it.
- Garrett has finally mastered his new big bike. He looks too small to be riding it, but by gum, he can do it!
- Morgan finally figured out how to swim.
- We have been camping twice this summer, both times with wonderful friends in cool places. I really love camping.
- We have a new front porch. It's very pretty and has the added benefit of not being on the verge of collapse.
We're still here.
*Yes, this post is a year old.Yes it has typos. I don't care-I enjoyed re-reading it and thought it unfair to condemn it to a lifetime of being a "draft".*
I think of things to post here all the time. I think about how I'd like to write them, what pictures to attach, who might read them, and then I think about how long it would take.....and I wander away to do something else. Hopefully I'll be able to convince myself to do more spontaeous posting, and remind myself that no one really cares how polished my posts are (right?).
I think of things to post here all the time. I think about how I'd like to write them, what pictures to attach, who might read them, and then I think about how long it would take.....and I wander away to do something else. Hopefully I'll be able to convince myself to do more spontaeous posting, and remind myself that no one really cares how polished my posts are (right?).
We've been having a very active summer, as usual, though not necessarily in the ways we'd like. Thus far we've crested the 80 degree mark maybe, um, twice? Not cool. Well, actually, too cool. We haven't been able to get much of a garden planted, and haven't started working on the playhouse we're going to build out of the scrap wood from the front porch. We DID tear down our old front porch (don't worry, we replaced it with a new one). Thanks mostly to my father, we now have a lovely, slightly larger, lovely, not tottering, lovely, nobody has to worry about putting their foot through a step porch. It's lovely. It's not stained yet, which is a problem, but we're getting there-we bought the stain and everything. I took lots of progess shots, but I can't find them. Imagine a rotten, falling apart porch. Then imagine a fresly built not falling apart porch.
Kier turned two in June, and wants to make sure everyone knows it-if she survives to be three we should all be awarded medals. She's fantastic, and incredibley smart, but I'm convinced she is going to kill one of us with her antics. Yesterday she dissappeared from the blanket next to me at the park (she can teleport)-we went on full alert, many grownups and children scouring the area for her. We found her, shoes off, nonshallantly climbing into Lake Washington. She was going to visit the duck-ducks. She can also walk into the kitchen at any given time and return with a bag of raisins. Even if we don't have any.
Morgan and Garrett just completed their season for track and field (the Renton city team), and have so many ribbons we could reshingle the house with them. They get ribbons for every event, not matter what. At their last meet Morgan won the covetted pink ribbon-she has not a care for the number on it. She hadn't won a pink one yet.
Last week my neice came and stayed with us for the first time independent of her family. She's twelve, and wants badly to be 7 and 17 simultaneously. We thorougly enjoyed having her-and now I have a stronger case as I try to persuade Troy to adopt a teenager. A responsible one. With a driver's license.
Last week we also had our 2nd annual camping trip to Moran State Park with dear friends. And deer friends. Moran is on Orcas Island, in the San Juans. It's a magical place. Seriously, the minute I get off the ferry, I feel better--even if I wasn't feeling bad to begin with. Maybe it just resonates with the island girl trapped inside me, yearning for the laid-back friendly life of those surrounded by the ocean.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Changing Focus
It is so easy to become overtaken by a particular thing and in the process loose focus on what we really want to be looking at. This last week I was forced to loose my focus. I was forced to send my energy away from my family, away from my community, away from my daughter's fifth birthday. I was forced to be completely overtaken by something I'd rather have never experienced, something that will be with me the remainder of my days-tainting my vision and interfering with my ability to focus on the things that actually matter.
Morgan turned five yesterday. She is an amazing person, with a gentle spirit and overzealous self-expression--she contradicts herself and discovers some pretty interesting things through the course of trying to be two ways at once. She is smart and very imaginative, and is realizing that she actually enjoys the dancing part of her ballet classes as much as the playing part so is beginning to show some excellent self-control and discipline in practicing her movements (at least as much as a five year old can control herself). Today she got to be in charge of opening the door at the end of class as a reward for her hard work. This was a BIG deal. We cut her hair a couple of weeks ago, and her new shorter style only accentuates her advancing age. She loves to entertain (as she's been showing us since infancy) and has embraced her big sister role in the care she shows Kiera-always initiating games with her, tailoring them to Kiera's interests and abilities.
Today I have a five year old, and I am choosing to change my focus. I refuse to continue to waste it on something ugly when I have something so beautiful and so very, very much more deserving.
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Kiera's Birth Story
For anyone who's interested, I finally wrote Kiera's birth story. I posted it on her birthdate, so if you go back to June 15th, 2009, there it'll be. It's very long, but pretty cool. I enjoyed writing it, and really encourage all mothers to do the same-regardless of how long it has been. You remember things, and realize things, and it's neat for them to read when they're older. Anyway, enjoy.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Little Witchlet
Halloween was a little hectic this year, due partially to my tendency to procrastinate and partially to my dearest bestest friend deciding to have her first baby that weekend (which we will forgive her for, because it was super-exciting). That made an impact on Halloween because I was her doula, and so was with her from 1 AM Sat morning until about noon on Sunday (see the pic above? That's how my face looked in every picture. The longer I'm at a birth, the harder it is to change my expression). Luckily I had enough warning to put the finishing touches on the kids' costumes Friday evening, so they were ready to hit the pavement Sat afternoon for the annual Olde Time Trick-or-treat in downtown Renton.
My husband can be a real stick-in-the-mud. He is a homebody, and comfortable with that, but bless him, when I am at a birth he really tries to kick it up a notch for the kids. When I knew I would be gone Saturday, I really thought that the kids would just have to miss the Halloween pre-funk this year. Sometimes I really don't give him enough credit. He didn't make it to the Boo carnival that morning, mainly because the kids were a little rowdy (that happens when they wake up to find me gone unexpectedly), but he pulled it together, despite it being close to lunchtime, despite the need for naps, and despite the POURING rain, he got everyone dressed up, buckets in hand, and a'-treating they did go!
All three of the kids looked great (no pics of the pre-funk, the camera was with me), and I am particularly proud of Kiera's costume. It was simple, leggings and a short she already had, and a tutu and cape I made (and of course a broom and hat), but she OWNED it. Goodness me, that girl can strut. With bucket in hand she marched straight into each establishment (and the next night, each house), hand outstretched, commanding, "aaaannnddd!!" Lord forbid if the giver of candy tried to put it in her bucket instead of her hand.
Halloween night (after getting home at 2:30 and sleeping until 5), we piled into costumes again and headed to our friends' house for their wicked awesome haunted house (their neighborhood is better for treating, to). Kiera knew what we were about before we were even fully out of the car-we had to chase her out of someone's yard on the way to the Schlegel's. She was READY. And just you try to take her pumpkin bucket away-so what if it weighs 8 pounds? That's her CANDY Jack, MITTS OFF!
Garrett loves to help scare at the Schlegel's
Morgan even got in on the House-she hosted a touch box game and managed to look mighty creepy doing it, pristine bridal attire and all (and can I just say, I really thought it would be awhile before I had to make her a veil).
SOOOO CUTE! Of course, I don't yet have a pic of her with all her parts, but you get the idea.
Little Witchlet
That's my handsome husband going after the ankles of passers-by. He LOVES doing this.
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