I am sorry, get the hell out

I know that sounds terrible. Let me explain. As if I don't already have 5 billion things to worry about, the court appointed advocate arrived at our house unannounced at 3:30pm. We had just pulled in from running to the gas station. The kids were in play clothes, the house was a total wreck, and I was crying. Well, I cried when I saw him because I thought I had locked my keys in my car. I got a ladder and climbed in my bedroom window only to find out that I had apparently already gone inside the house as soon as we got home and put my keys in their spot. The front door wasn't locked. I wasn't locked out. Enter, Weston having episodes. Dumb CASA man thinking Weston was being ornery. Right buddy, blueness and shaking are clearly signs of a crazy child. He then comes in and yapped a bit about the most random crap I have ever heard. He looked at the house. Then, the kicker, he tells me I should call Abby's father and invite him (crackhead), his girlfriend (crackhead), and her 2 kids that she doesn't have custody of over for a playdate. How freaking stupid are people? I mean, while I am at it, I should just go ahead and take the kids to the local jail and let them have overnight visits. NO THANK YOU! I rarely say anything about Abby's dad but it will be a cold day in hell before he gets her. He has never shown 1 moment of interest except to kidnap her in January.

Adam and I are not bad parents and I just don't understand why the court wants to make our lives terrible. We have jumped through hoops of fire to keep Abby. The court system is so screwed up. Truly, the best thing for Abby would be for us to move as far away from her parents as we can and not leave a forwarding address.

Oranges in my bed

Better yet, kids are eating oranges in my bed. It's been a long day/week/month/year/2 years. We are busy finishing Easton's Kindergarten Philanthropy Project (fancy huh?). There are lots of things I have loved about homeschooling and being able to do our own thing has been number 1. I started with such a plan. God laughed. Easton laughed. Hell, even Adam probably laughed. The year is now winding down. We have been done with school for a couple of weeks. I will do lots different next year but overall, homeschooling has been a blessing.

Our house is, well, coming along I guess. Maybe it is never going to be exactly how I want it. Adam doesn't seem to mind the constant state of "undone-ness". It drives me insane. I try to look at picts from a year ago and remind myself that we have come a long way. The next big project will be to cut down the big pine trees in the front yard. Their are 4 of them and they are insanely huge. They give us privacy but I can't see to back out of the driveway. Adam doesn't seem nervous about cutting them-I wish I felt the same way. The other house is for sale. We have had a few people come and look at it. We are praying that God will send the right buyer. I try to keep reminding myself that the kids and Adam (and hopefully me too one day) are so much happier here. I tell myself that over and over when I want to set the house on fire-probably too much info for you guys but it is the truth. I guess we are making progress in some areas. My friend Lindsay has planted some flowers and has been busy digging up her plants and bringing them over (she recently moved and doesn't trust her inlaws to take care of them). She also has a plan for the front of our house. Currently, the kids make it into a mud pit everyday. Maybe that is just what it is like to have 6 young kids? Oh and there are 400 tomato plants being grown in my living room-or really the room with all of the crap that we just haven't had time to sort.

The animals are all good and alive. I think we are set as far as the animals are concerned right now. Adam did get some fancy chicks the other day. They are supposed to make good mama chickens and will sit on other chickens eggs. I think it would be a neat project for the kids to watch chickens hatch. We have about 40 Rhode Island Reds, 20 Dominickers, 10 Americana's, 15 of some kind I don't remember, 4 of the fancy silkies, 1 rooster, 1 black sexlink, 1 feather footed something, 6 ducks, 3 bunnies, 1 dog, and a pygmy goat. Did I mention animals are not really my thing?

OH-I can't believe I haven't posted this already but here is the best parenting tip ever. Seriously, write it down. It sounds crazy but it is the most GENIUS thing I have ever done. We removed the kids dressers from their bedrooms. I know, it sounds crazy but hear me out-everyday I did laundry constantly. Clothes were everywhere and I never really knew what was clean or dirty-so I just kept washing. Since moving the dressers to the basement, I only really have to do about 2 loads a day. GENIUS! I don't know how I didn't think of it sooner. Once we get a few things moved around, I am taking our dresser downstairs too.

All of the weirdos

The title really says it all. Recently I have come into contact with the craziest people. I know that people think that we are crazy for having so many kids but our craziness doesn't even hold a candle to the craziness I have encountered recently. First, you have the generalized groups of odd people-people with only 1 child who act like our kids are terrorists because they come in a bunch-I guess a "gang"-a friendly, well dressed gang, people with no children who act like kids shouldn't go out in public, and people who just don't get "it" (hence the man with a sword at walmart a few years ago). Those people speak for themselves and I can usually steer clear of them.

The second group of weird people we regularly encounter are those that are just dumbfounded that we have so many children. They act like we are solely responsible for the hole in the ozone, gas prices rising, and anything else you can possibly think of. It is our fault. Feel free to blame all of the big families out there. I will personally tell you that we have used paper plates since we got married. I don't plan to stop and I hate recycling. OK-well, I hate the recycling stuff that sits around. I don't like trash sitting around and calling it "recyclables" only puts a fancy name on trash-then factor in Sutton's love for getting into the trash and it is all over forme. Sorry, I will take credit for making the hole in the ozone a bit bigger.

I encountered the 3rd group yesterday. I am not exactly sure what to call them-Wacko Moms comes to mind. Yesterday, the kids and I spent 2 hours at a Kindergarten Graduation practice. In my head, I thought 30 minutes max teaching the kids how to walk in and out. OH NO, OH NO. The head wacko complained about everything. Things I never even thought about-things no one would ever care about. She complained about wanting only classical music played during the graduation (as her child was shoving 2 of his fingers up 1 nostril). She complained about how they should sing 5 verses of a song with sign language. I have never seen anything like it. It is Kindergarten-who the heck cares??? Who has time to sit around and think of all of those things to complain about? Then, what really killed me was at the end, each child ready a little line of a poem-nothing hard. Come to find out-she hadn't even taught him how to read. What the heck has she been doing all year? It was nothing hard and nothing that he couldn't have even memorized (we all had the script!) Thankfully, there were a few sane moms in the bunch who sat in the back and laughed when she got all worked up over whether the kids should leave to Pomp and Circumstance or Linus and Snoopy. You would have thought we were doing something sacreligious by thinking the Snoopy song would be cute.

Animals and more animals, oh my

I know I have said it before but I don't really like animals (go ahead and GASP). I would be perfectly content with zero-not even a fish. I feel like keeping 6 little people alive, fed, and well dressed is enough for me to handle. Thankfully, Adam makes sure the kids get a pet to have while growing up-or should I say a whole bunch of pets. We started with 12 chickens then 10 got eaten by the hawk. Adam was very sad. He loved his chickens and I was tired to listening to him complain so we got some chicks-like 50 chicks. Then, the rooster arrived (thanks Lindsay). The chicks have now grown into small chickens. So, along came the dog. Apparently, you need a dog if you have a bunch of chickens to scare of the foxes. So far, our dog doesn't care about the chickens really but does enjoy herding the kids. Adam then got more chicks. He wanted Domickers to go with our Rhode Island Reds. Along came 30 little dom chicks. So, take count of 82 chickens (2 from the batch that the hawk didn't eat), a rooster named Dinner, and the dog named Elvis. Then, this weekend, we went to the feed store. They had ducks and the ducks were so cute (plus I knew I wanted something for Easter picts). They were too cute to pass up so we got 6. On Sunday, Adam called and had found the perfect white goat. We have been wanting a few goats for awhile because there is lots of brush and such for them to munch on. After work on Sunday, he went to pickup out goat (his name is Blue). For those who are good at math, we went from me not wanting any pets to having 82 chickens, a rooster, 6 ducks, 1 dog, and a goat. I will try to post picts of the bunch soon.

Kindergarten Graduation!!!!!

My heart just breaks. Our baby is growing up. Not just growing a little-but a lot! He weighed 50 pounds at the doctor today. That is half of a hundred and I can't calculate how much of me but one day he will weigh more than me! While all of our kids have their own story, Easton was our first. He showed us that we could have children and opened our hearts to wanting more. He is so smart. He reads giant, encyclopedia like books. He knows lots about everything. He is the best big brother ever. He nurses Weston back to health in a way that I can't explain. He says he wants 12 kids and I pray for his future wife. Not just because of the kids, but I pray for all of the kids future wives and husbands. He loves babies and can feed, change, put clothes on, and put a baby in their carseat. Maybe that comes from having so many brothers and sisters. He says he wants more-who knows?

Did I mention how smart he is? While I like to think Adam and I are pretty smart, Easton is amazingly smart. Like in the weird way and you wonder how can he possibly know that? Yeah, he is like that. He has taught himself to read and write and add and subtract and all kinds of science stuff. He wants me to buy him a chemistry set but I am scared he will build a bomb-just for fun. He is currently on 2nd grade reading since Nana let him read all of the books for 1st grade reading while Adam and I went to lunch. It was a huge surprise for us to come back and him to tell me he was done with 1st grade. He shakes all of Weston's doctors hands and tells them to take good care of him. What a giving little guy.

I always joke that if I ever die, he will be in charge. Adam will be busy working. Easton will run the house and organize Easton's medicine. He is one of my best friends. We have this funny thing where we write notes to each other everyday. Mainly, we write about loving each other and fun things we have done. He is such a little treasure.

Rain, rain, go away

I finally updated Weston's caringbridge with the latest news from the cardiologist. For those who don't follow, it is www.caringbridge.com/visit/westonkeeton We appreciate all of the thoughts and prayers. And, not to sound overly preachy, I do not believe that it is Weston's time to go. God isn't ready for Weston yet. Nor (that is a sentence starter that I don't get to use often), do I think that time will be in the next few months or even in the next few years. I don't care what those doctors say and I don't care how many kids they have seen. We have had many, many emails and the thoughts and prayers have meant so much to us. So, where do we go from here? We aren't just sitting around waiting on something to happen to Weston-that is for sure. He has way, way, way too much left to do. Today, he is playing tball. The doctors are frowning 500 miles away but we don't care. He wants to play tball and he enjoys it. He has a base runner and really great coaches who will watch out for him. Monday, we are being referred to the Make A Wish. I talked with them some on Friday and we talked to Weston a little. He said he wants a playhouse and to go to Disney World. I would type more but we have got to get ready. It's going to be a wonderful day-as long as it doesn't rain.

thoughts of the day

The funny thing about hospitals and doctors is that they "claim" to want you to get better but there is no way to get better in a hospital where they wake up you all night long and poke and prod you all day. CHOP took great care of Weston and minus the shared room that, still to this day, makes me want to take a bath in hand sanitizer, we were happy with everyone. Also, minus the cocky nurse who told me I was "just" a mom and that they didn't like parents to spend the night in shared rooms-again, clearly this man was out of his mind. Adam and I don't leave the kids and I am certainly not going to leave our 4 year old alone in one of the most dangerous cities in America. No sir-I saw those securtiy guards. I am way scarier than any of those folks. Plus, there is no way that a little IV is going to keep Weston from hopping out of bed and leaving!

Since coming home, it feels like we are just trying to stay above water. Weston's new around the clock medicine routine has been an adjustment. He hates his oxygen so we sneak in, when he is sleeping, and put his space helmet oxygen blower thingy back on. Around 4am, he has an episode or 2. These stopped in the hospital but have come back now that we are home-VERY BAD NEWS. Then, throughout the day, Accredo calls me, not once, not twice, but 3 times. Yesterday, I spent over an hour on the phone with them and then had a nurse come visit for an hour. They have yet to tell us anything we don't already know so I am wondering what all I am really getting for the 55,000 dollars the insurance paid for him to be on the meds for the month. We are trying to keep life normal but they seem to be standing in the way. Last night, Adam got so frustrated, he said he didn't even want to do a garden. That is a huge thing for Adam and I was sad that really, it has gotten to the point where we feel like we can't live our lives because of all of these people. It's not even giving the meds that gets in the way-it's that I am constantly on the telephone. I hear you all saying "don't answer the phone". Well, my friends, they don't take the hint. They continue to call over and over and when you answer, they reprimand you for not answering earlier. It is like being on call 18 hours a day. I don't get to talk to people I like on the phone and I definitely don't want to talk to people I don't know on the phone either-especially people that aren't giving me helpful information.