FriendL was trying to find my blog and couldn't, even after a couple of suggestions from me, so I poked around a little on blogspot and found that I can't figure out how to find other blogs. Only mine. There is no 'search for other blogs' or 'search blogspot.' Am I missing it? Where is it? It appears that I can't access blogspot's help center without first negotiating their entire indecipherable mess of thousands upon thousands of different topics. What a pain in the neck. Why does the site not let me see the titles of other blogs? Or at least search for a particular blog? I do not understand. Fortunately, I'm used to the sensation; I so rarely understand anything that goes on beyond my four walls here that it won't cause me much distress.
Yesterday the twins' parents brought the whole family over for a visit and to iron out the details of our arrangement. KidThree held BabyTwo while I held BabyOne, and MissN explored. The babies are non-identical twin girls. Their faces have very slightly different shapes and BabyTwo has the darker hair, but as that hair is only visible from the back, it will take a little while for KidThree and me to learn to tell them apart as well as their parents do. MissN is just turned three; the babies are three months. They were premature, so their adjusted age is about six weeks.
It was lovely to hold BabyOne; she felt so good in my arms. KidThree was enchanted with BabyTwo and so at her most captivating on this, her initial meeting with the parents. This has the potential to be a very good arrangement for all. I am giving the parents an excellent deal on price, and they are giving me an excellent deal on flexibility, allowing me to take the babies along to all of KidThree's various appointments and such. They will pay me when the babies are not here (over Christmas break, for example), and I won't charge them extra when MissN comes along. She will come here when she has a bug and thus can't go to her regular daycare center. And of course the babies will get the most loving care they could get anywhere outside their own home. I am looking forward to all of that. We won't be rich, won't be able to buy big-ticket items, but we should be able to meet our monthly expenses and have enough left over for pizza and a movie occasionally.
The big drawback will be that I won't be immediately available to KidThree should she need help, for instance, if she runs into trouble at school. On the other hand, that could be a good thing, encouraging her independence and pushing her to figure things out for herself. It will be a very tricky dance--I hope it works.
This morning I watch LadyP from eight until noon, then come home to get KidThree and go to an IEP at her school (the continuation high school) to see if we can get her back to the main high school. KidThree can't so much as sneeze at school without an IEP because of her various disabilities. She has emotional and behavioral issues from her bio-mother's prenatal drug use and her own chaotic early life, as well as the physical issue of her paralysis. She gets better almost by the day, physically and emotionally, but she does have to work much harder at some things than the more ordinary kid. Of course the payoff is that she is so much more complex and fascinating the more ordinary kid, and has so much more to offer the world because of her extreme experiences.
I don't start watching the babies until the end of September, so we will have a good four weeks to get KidThree transitioned to the routine of school and to work our way through any problems that develop. The vice principal at the high school who was the biggest bane of our previous experience there has retired, to be replaced by a young man of a very different background. I have already been in contact with this new vice principal about KidThree, as have some other people, so he is ready for us and says he will do everything he can to facilitate things for us. I think he was a little concerned at first that I wanted KidThree coddled, which is most definitely not the case; he did seem relieved when I made that clear.
I explained to our new vice principal that our issues were not of wanting special privileges, just the necessary accommodation so that KidThree gets no special attention or causes no special problems when she arrives at a classroom. When KidThree attempted to return to this school after her months of hospitalization, the school failed her miserably. Things like not having the handicapped bathroom ready for her, even after I had checked it out and pointed out what she needed, and classrooms not having an accessible desk or table for her to use, one teacher handing her a clipboard in lieu of a desk, or a teacher trying to put her on the wrong side of the room (in addition to everything else, KidThree is legally blind in one eye and so needs that eye towards the wall and her good eye towards the teacher). I will probably go to school with her the first several days to ride shotgun for her, as it is still easier for me to tell adults that KidThree can't maneuver around a classroom easily enough than it is for her.
I don't mean that to sound as though KidThree is not able to stand up for herself or to state what she needs. She can. It is just that sometimes she has trouble controlling her temper when faced with bureaucratic thoughtlessness (as do I, but I have years more of practice) and other times the issue might be something that is just too embarrassing for her to bring up in public. As KidThree put it when explaining something to me, she is trying to present herself to the other kids as no different from them except that she never stands up, so she doesn't want anyone to present a litany of her disabilities in front of them. I think KidThree will only need help at the beginning and then should be fine on her own.
Thank goodness KidThree has her appointment with the pastor after that. She'll need it.
The kerfluffle in the 'hood continues. KidThree's bio-mother and uncle appear to be trying to have KidThree's sister's babydaddy/boyfriend killed for ostensibly robbing the bio-mother (he probably did, he is a lazy, amoral rat) and the sister wants to press charges against the bio-mother for assault and against the bio-mother's wife for shooting at her. What a family. The sister and boyfriend and their baby are hiding out at the home of one of his relatives and KidThree continues to try by phone to get all to calm down and see the long-term consequences of all of this stupidity. And on top of all this, the trial should be starting any day. If KidThree has a stroke from all this anxiety, I won't be at all surprised, just seriously put out.
Thank goodness KidThree has her appointment with the pastor. She needs it.
More Tomorrow, Same Blog Time, Same Blog Channel. . . .
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