Thursday, February 25, 2010

Appointment, Visit, Disney

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(S) had an appointment with the therapist yesterday. We are still trying to concentrate on the sleeping issue and getting her to stay an entire night in her own room. I guess we are going to start moving her a foot at a time from where she is sleeping closer to her room. I don't know if we are betting she doesn't notice, or thinking she will notice and it just won't bother her anymore. As long as it works, I really don't care. We are now going to see the therapist every other week instead of every week.

(S)s case worker came by yesterday for her monthly visit. I am still out of state so I didn't get to talk with her, but DW did. When asked about the case and if anyone knew what was happening, the answer, of course, was that they don't know anything. She said she had talked with the DA and he had no idea where it was. The CW also added that she had one case that had taken a year. We don't know if that was start of TPR proceedings to end of appeal, or just the appeal process. If it was just the appeal process, it is time to scream with frustration. If it was from start to finsih, then it shouldn't be long before we scream with excitement. The start of the TPR process was just about this time last year. We will keep our fingers crossed.

We also have all the permissions in place to take (S) to Disney World. We have been talking it up with her and making sure she knows that there are many characters there. She says she is fine with that. I guess Chuck E Cheese is more of a rat while Mickey of course is a mouse. I don't know, but she likes Mickey. In any event, we have made our plane reservations and also have made reservations for:

Bibiddi Bobiddi Boutiue where she will get all dolled up like a Princess. (Hair, Nails, Makeup)

After the boutique, we are having dinner with Cinderella in the castle.

We are also going to have lunch one day with Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, and Eeyore.

The above are all at the Magic Kingdom.

We have reservations for Breakfast with Donald Duck in Animal Kingdom

We are still deciding what, if any, character meal we will do in Epcot.

We are only 6 weeks away from leaving for Florida, so we are getting REAL excited!!! Can't wait. If anyone has any ideas, suggestions, things not to miss etc, please let us know.
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Thursday, February 18, 2010

I Remain Worried

Foster parents are needed. and there is an article from Cleveland today that shows why. There are way too many children going back to biological parents before they should. This article talks about a number of different cases.

Unfortunately, while it is Departments of Children Services around the country that are lamenting the lack of foster parents available, they are the very ones who don't listen to what foster parents have to say.

The main reason for this article is the murder of a child returned to the biological parent AFTER the foster parents adamently opposed the reunion of this family. They felt the mother was not yet in a position to care for children.

Case Workers: You can't have it both ways!

If you want foster parents, you have to believe in what you are told. In most cases you are overworked and the foster parents have a much better idea of what is happening with the children then you do. I know you don't like to admit this, but admitting you have a problem is the first step to resolving your issues.

So.........(S)s bio-parents are back in town. They have not made any attempt to contact DHHS or their children and apparently don't care to find out how they are doing, but the court still has not decided on the appeal of the TPR. Put that together with the attached article, and you can understand why I will remain worried until I hear that the appeal has been denied. At this point, any other outcome is unacceptable.

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/02/county_officials_defend_decisi.html

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Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Missing my Girls

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I miss DW and (S). They came down last Thursday and stayed until Monday and will be back again on Friday until Tuesday, but I still miss them. Last weekend they were each sick a day so we didn't exactly have a great time other than the horses and Chuck E's.

This weekend we are planning a trip to Glow Bowling, and of course I will be taking my two girls out for dinner on Sunday for Valentine's Day. Mostly, I just enjoy spending time with them. It really doesn't matter what we do.

While some people have recommended that we delay the Disney trip another year, we have decided a different course of action. We are going to do our best to prepare (S) for the trip. Tell her everything we can. Show her pictures from a past trip there and try our best to assure her that this is fun and nothing to be afraid of.

So I plan on talking about and doing more planning for our trip. Exactly when, where and how. We are also going to visit Nanny, Papa, and Grandpa who all live in Florida. We don't get to see them much, so any opportunity is a good one. We also have another trip to talk about, but I haven't said anything to DW yet. This blog entry will kind of be a test to see how often she checks the blog and calls to find out about this other trip. I am not sure we can do it, but I am not even going to try if she isn't interested.

Of course, I am still planning our regular February trip that we have missed the last two years for February 2011. That will be a trip that we certainly hope will be with (S) as our adopted daughter, not our foster daughter. A trip we won't need to get approval for from anyone else.

Anyway, it will be nice to see them both this weekend. We will have lots of fun together, and I hope no one gets sick. Can't wait to see you both sweetie!

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Sunday, February 7, 2010

Horses and Costumes

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I think we have a problem.

We have been planning a trip to Disney in april. Yesterday we did two things that are causing us to rethink this trip.

We went to the Budweiser brewery where you can have your picture taken with one of the worlds famous clydesdale horses. When we got close to the horse, (S) wanted nothing to do with it. I had to pick her up and then hold on tight or she would have crawled out of my arms. She wanted absolutely nothing to do with the animal. Granted, theya re very large horses, but they are also very gentle.

Later on yesterday we went to Chuck E Cheese's to have pizza and play games and go on some of the little kids rides there. (S) had a blast......except when she saw Chuck E Cheese. It was just a guy in a costume (or maybe a gal) but she didn't want to go anywhere near him. When I tried to get her to go to the other end of the games, she refused to go. Somehow she felt that Chuck E was scary and he went after little children and took them away. I have no idea where she got this idea from. No matter how hard we tried, she refused to believe that Chuck E would not do her any harm. So now what do we do?

She is 4 1/2 years old. Do we forget our trip to Disney, or keep working on her and hope she gets over this fear......This past Christmas she screamed bloody murder when she saw someone dressed up as the Grinch. I don't know where this comes from, but it is real to (S) and that is all that matters I guess.

Any ideas?