Tweendomhood

I can’t believe so much time has passed between now and my last post. I guess that’s what happens though when life seems to be going full-speed ahead dangerously out of control. And travelling every other weekend, a teething baby and other life wonders and mishaps don’t help any.

I’ve come here today though to discuss Older Boy. He is a hair-pulling, head banging, lovely 11-year-old middleschooler now. And with that comes a motivation for independence, but a lack of responsibility. For some reason he can’t fathom that responsibility will bring independence. In other words … I’d love to pick your brains on what has worked for you on how to motivate a tween to be more responsible when it comes to things like:

• Turning homework in
• Asking teachers for a list of missing homework assignments
• Turning in important things like money for class trips or fundraisers
• Remembering to bring your lunch to school – especially on days that you have basketball practice or a basketball game

Those are probably the things up there on the list.

I cannot offer an allowance. Our money is pinched so tight right now that FH and I have to borrow money from each other to pay bills. I’ve gotten pretty crafty and switching money from one account to another. Although I have told Older Boy that if he can continuously show us he can be responsible I’d be willing to consider some sort of allowance system. However, he just doesn’t seem able to stay motivated.

When I ask him about something he gets this “I forgot” look or excuse. He tells me “OK” and I tell him “Don’t tell me OK. Show me that you can do it.”

I’m not sure if the more regular overnight visits with Jane have anything to do with it. Ever since they’ve started to regularly stay over at her house on the weekends both Older Boy and Younger Boy have taken steps back in their will to thrive in our household. Surprisingly Middle Boy is the only one who has continued to take steps forward.

Anyway, I’m at a loss. Any words of wisdom would be so wonderful and welcomed and much appreciated.

And for your time in reading this here is a little treat for you. Baby J.C. is now a spunky, spit fire, darling 1-year-old. She is more like me every day. I’m in trouble.

Reading me a story

Updates Fall 2011 and a Video

I thought life was chaotic and busy when I moved in with my three instant kids and soon to be hubby. But life with a husband, three instant kids, two cats and a walking almost one year old baby is beyond chaotic. I think “Oh, I’ll sit down to bust out a blog,” or “I should blog about this and this or that.” And then Baby J.C. wakes up, or someone needs help with their homework, or the cats are convinced they are starving and won’t leave me alone until they are fed, or there is always dinner that needs to be cooked too. I feel like everything is an update lately. I guess it’s better than nothing, right?

Let the updates begin…

Jane moved into a two bedroom finally. I haven’t heard any more from her about wanting Middle Boy to go live with her. Nor have I heard any more commotion about whether or not her man is actually hitting their son or not. I’ve yet to see a police report on file or a repeat of Jane running off in the middle of the night. I’m still trying to accept that her priorities are screwy and there’s just no ever “getting her.” Whatever will be, will be, right?

The boys are loving small town life. And by boys I mean F.H too. They have been blossoming even more than I thought possible. Older Boy actually had friends come to the door the other day to see if he could come out and play. It’s so nice to be in a small community. Middle Boy has even decided that he’s found a calling as a farmer one day. I’m going to be going to a 4H meeting this week to find out about getting him started up in our local 4H. And while Younger Boy is currently dealing with the fact that yelling at your brothers isn’t going to get you your way, he seems to be just growing up before my eyes. I still can’t believe that he was only 2 when I moved in three years ago. When did he turn into a first grader?

And of course there is Baby J.C. She will be turning one next month. She has four baby teeth, is walking and climbing up anything and everything, and is a mini me all the way. It is exhausting! I took her with me on my wedding extravaganza the past month where we drove 6 hours to Southern California for a wedding and back. Then we flew to Michigan a week later for a nice, much needed and well deserved, week-long vacation and then my college roommates wedding. Then the next weekend drove up to Washington with my parents (because 6 hours with a baby is insane, I wasn’t about to drive 12 hours alone with her) for my cousin’s wedding. I’m just starting to catch up now.

And with that, I leave you with a fabulous video because who doesn’t love babies?

Follow Up

I wanted to get some more thoughts down. FH gave me more information about Jane asking if Middle Boy could come live with her and it riled me up. I figured I’d sleep on it before regurgitating it.

I found out that Jane’s excuse for wanting Middle Boy is because “He is too emotionally unstable at our house.” Which was sort of true a year or two ago, but that child was emotionally unstable anyway. Do you really blame the poor child? His mother up and left, had a new child of his own, plus he was suddenly thrown into an environment where there were rules and expectations. Since then Middle Boy has really grown and blossomed into a fabulous young man. Don’t get me wrong, he still drives me up the wall now and then with his Middle Boy antics but he has come a really long way from where he was.

I also found out that Jane does not live in a 2 bedroom apartment as I originally thought. Jane and her man and their son (who will be 3 this year) live in a 1 bedroom apartment. I about blew my lid. I know we’ve squeezed all 5 of us into a two bedroom before but we upgraded to a 3 bedroom as soon as we got a handle on our new life together. And our new house that we’ll be renting is a 5 bedroom, with a large back yard. (That’s all in another post.)

Anyway, I don’t know what suddenly caused Jane to call us up and ask if she could have Middle Boy come lie with her. I don’t know if she’s hoping to get some form of child support, especially since we’ll still have two of the boys and she’s never gave us money or offered any financial support for the boys. The few times she has asked she’s told us how they have no money and could hardly pay rent or bills much less get their own food. I don’t know how she thinks she’s going to be able to support one more growing boy when she tells us this.

Middle Boy is definitely the mommy’s boy who looks forward to seeing her each week. The other two are kind of “eh, whatever. I get to go play video games all day and eat junk food” about it.

Sort of on topic, I also found out that Jane hasn’t said a word to FH about the incident that happened a couple of weeks ago (I first mentioned it in the last post). When he called her up to ask her if she thought it was a good idea to take the boys this week she seemed kind of surprised that he was asking such a question. If I didn’t know better I would assume she had no clue why FH was calling with such a question.

If you ask me it’s quite fishy. There’s usually some sort of motive behind anything Jane does, and it usually isn’t in favor of the boys’ best interest. But I’ll keep you updated on the happenings. As far as I can tell, and after talking with FH about it he’s going to tell her “No.”

It Worries Me Sick

I have two things on my mind tonight. I’ve been meaning to write about one of them but I guess two is better than none. Because none would be me lying in bed trying to sleep but wide awake thinking too much.

Issue One

Two weeks ago before the boys went up to FH’s parent’s house for two weeks they went to Jane’s house. FH got a text at 11:55pm that he should pick the boys up from her mom Jolie’s house the next day because that’s where we were.

We found out that they went to Jolie’s house because allegedly Jane’s man had been hitting their son. Now, before we jump all over this I’m rather torn. Half of me is rather concerned because who wants to expose their child to that type of situation? As a concerned stepparent, certainly not I. The other half of me knows that Jane is a liar and she is the type of person who wants to be abused. In saying that I mean that she used to tell FH, who wouldn’t and hasn’t ever laid a hand upon me or the children, that if he ever hit her she would leave. I’ve never even felt threatened that he would do such a thing and it frustrates me that she wants so badly to be in that situation. Now, not that she is lying as I’m aware that anyone is capable of anything, but I just don’t trust her and her dramatic, lying actions of the past. That in addition to the weird things she’s done like make Younger Boy strip down to check him for cuts and bruises when he has grass cuts on his feet from running in the sprinklers.

Anyway, she told us she might not take them this week for their summer break with her. But after two weeks she decided that it was OK to have them. She didn’t seem too concerned about it, and I honestly can’t tell you if she and FH have talked about it. We go the information second hand from her Aunt who owns the house that Jolie lives in.

I’ve been contemplating to see if she filed a police report or to see if there have been any domestic disturbances filed against them. I want something done about it. I want to see action happen in the event that this is all real. I’ve seen abuse, I’ve experienced abuse and either I’m missing something big or she’s making a mountain out of something that didn’t actually happen. I’m not sure what to do. We can’t NOT let her see them, but who do you contact about an alleged abusive episode that may or may not be on record and may or may not be real?

Issue Two

Today Jane called FH and told him that she’d like to have Middle Boy come live with her. For those that may not remember, Middle Boy is definitely the Mommy’s Boy of the three. He’s also the one who has been asking her if he can live with her over the last couple of years. However, the red flag has been waving loud and clear in our minds that this is not a good idea. To her credit, Jane has been seeing the boys every weekend for the last couple of months. However, when they come back from her house they are in very poor condition. They are like walking zombies and need a full day of sleep and usually a nap the next day just to catch up. I don’t know if it’s from being plugged in all day, from not being supervised or what. They claim that they go to bed at 10pm, but even when we allow them to stay up that late they are never walking zombies like they are when they come home from her place.

Also, Middle Boy has completely blossomed over the last couple of years since I moved in. I’m rather concerned that it’s not in his best physical and mental interest to live with her full time. Plus, I really wonder where he would sleep. From my knowledge the boys sleep on either the pull out couch bed or on the floor when they go to her house. Would he be expected to share a room with her youngest son who is going to be 3 years old this year? In my mind 8 years old and 3 years old is a big age difference to be sharing a room. Not impossible, as I’m sure there are many who do is. Plus we had the three boys sharing a room for the first two years while we saved up enough to move into a bigger house. I also don’t know if he’s actually considered that if he left our home he wouldn’t be with his brothers every day. Those three boys are thick as thieves. Considering all the emotional drama they’ve been put through it really concerns me at the thought of uprooting him from his brotherly support like that and putting him in an unstable living situation.

Plus, jump back to Issue One. IF her guy is hitting their son I sure as heck don’t want Middle Boy living in that situation. Is an alleged abuser enough grounds to say “No, he cannot live with you?” FH has full physical custody of all three boys and they have joint legal custody of them. If that makes sense – in other words they physically live with us, but they’re supposed to see her part of the time.

I’m not going to lie. It all has me stressed out and sick to my stomach. And honestly, it seems there isn’t a damn thing I can do about it. I feel like we’re feeding them to the wolves when we send them over there.

On the way

I've been trying to work on a new update for you. However, I'm currently fighting over the keyboard with Baby J. She is cruising, and is very, very successful as assisted standing. She also wants to help me write this blog entry because short of buckling her down into her rocker she keeps ending up over at my lap top. Her tiny fingers trying to mimic mine and type away. Except she just managed to pull of the "Delete" key button and I somehow magically got it to stick on.

Her and a lack of sleep are some of the main reasons I've not posted in a while. And summer vacation. Nasty Cat wanted to make sure I included that. Cross your fingers that I can post an update tomorrow and can get some good sleep tonight.

Survived Week 1 of Summer Vacation

Summer Vacation is here. This year we didn’t put the boys in the Summer Program at their school because in July (the middle of the program):

1. They’re going up to FH’s parents house for two weeks.

2. They’re going to Jane’s house for the week after that

3. We’re moving

4. Enrolling into the program you kind of have to guarantee that your kid isn’t going to miss a ton of days so we decided to not take up three spots so that three other children might get the chance to enjoy the fabulous program.

If you counted correctly that is three weeks that the boys are not going to be at home with us. I’m not quite sure what to think of it. Part of me is relieved that I’m not going to go absolutely hair-pulling crazy having them home all day. Part of me is going to miss them because 1) that’s a long time to not have them around and 2) who is going to do all those chores that they do? And part of me is a little concerned for Baby J who will not see her brothers for three weeks.

Normally when they are gone FH will show her their photos. The longest they’ve ever been away for though is three days. Three days is a whole lot different from three weeks. I guess it will just be a part of life though that she too will have to eventually get used to.

And with it being Monday already, here we go with Week 2 of Summer Vacation. I think I may require one of those beer helmets with the straw … except with wine bottles … or maybe martini shakers. I guess it really depends on what kind of day we are having.

Small Town Bound

I was raised in the hood because that’s where my dad’s family house was. The neighborhood went to shit around us. I went to sleep with the sound of bullets flying, and recognized a drug deal when it was happening right out in front of my house. My parents had about had it when a kid at my sister’s elementary school was caught with a baggie of coke. Then we moved to a small farming town because my parents wanted us to experience the safety and community of a small town.

We moved just in time for my 8th grade year. I vowed I would leave as soon as I turned 18. And I did, to go to college, but I keep going back. It’s a love-hate relationship, but it is home. My parents have since moved to another city but my sister and I keep going back whenever we get a chance. I’ve since then brought my new family out there and have submerged them as much as I can into my small town family.

FH and I have talked casually about moving there someday and with Older Boy about to start middle school we’ve decided we’d like to move there. I have an idea now about why my parents moved us there. Although it’s not the exact same reasons that my parents moved us.

Middle Boy and Older Boy have had a really hard time it seems. They’re really drawn in and seem to be big fish lost in a lake with little fishes. In other words, they do well in class and often get pushed aside so teachers can deal with the children who are not doing as hot. Also, they just closed two elementary schools in our town so their elementary school that already has large class sizes is getting an influx of new students.

We’ve asked Older Boy what he thought about moving to the small town and he was really excited. Older Boy asked for a tour of where all the schools were at. If he had been reluctant I think we might have reconsidered, but since he has a lot of enthusiasm and excitement I think we’re going to go for it.

We’re really hoping that being in a small community will help them to flourish as individuals … Especially with sports, new friends and a sense of security with the town. I’m genuinely hoping that they’ll feel the same way I do about the small town … that its home.