Riley

There's a boy at Sean's school, Riley. He is very small for his age, has significant speech delays and his teeth are rotten. He's a sad little waif. The kids at school are not very nice to him and he doesn't have many friends. Sean said he wanted to have Riley over to his house to play. I left a note in the sign in book at the school asking if Riley could come and play. (You'd think I'd learn not to do these things) Riley came to play a couple of times. I didn't know when I left the note that Riley is in DCFS custody. He lives with his grandfather. One day when I was driving Riley told Sean his mom was in jail and Sean told him that was OK, his Jenny was in jail too. Listening to a conversation like that between children just makes you sad.

 

Riley's grandfather Jim, called and asked if we would watch Riley two nights a week for four weeks while he took the required foster care classes so he could adopt Riley. I told him we would. DCFS then had to vet us. Seriously, just to watch him for four weeks, they did criminal background checks and sent a social worker to our house to do a walk through. I relayed the conversation between Sean and Riley about jail and Jim said his daughter (Riley's mother) was in jail for fishing without a license. That made me chuckle, sometimes it takes a little denial to get you through the day.

 

I have to keep reminding Sean to be kind to Riley. Sean complains that Riley counts wrong, Riley reads wrong, Riley talks wrong. Riley is seven but he is smaller than Sean and he can't count and he can't read and he can barely talk Jim said until this past year Riley he couldn't understand anything Riley said, it was gibberish.  It's sad. I look at Sean and think you could be Riley! No one has taken the time to reach Riley anything. Thank goodness for the Montessori school.

 

 Last night Don bought crunchy tacos and Riley couldn't eat them because his teeth are all rotten and he can't chew anything crunchy. Don taught Riley to ride a bike yesterday. Despite the fact that Riley is so far behind he is smart. I gave Sean and Riley each a Hershey bar. Sean threw his wrapper on the floor, Riley threw his in the trash. A few minutes later Riley looked at Sean and said "you threw your wrapper on the floor." Sean said "no I didn't that's your wrapper, I traded them." Riley stared at the wrapper for a second, then picked it up walked over to the trash can pulled the wrapper he had thrown in the trash out of the trash and asked Sean "is this one yours?" Sean said "yes." Riley threw it on the floor, threw the one in his hand in the trash and then yelled at Sean "you can't trade." Sean got up picked up the candy wrapper and threw it away. Riley is smarter than Sean thinks.

 

Riley came running in my room yelling "I can't find the mote, I can't find the mote." I asked him what he needed a mote for were they building a castle. Riley starts making hand motions saying mote, mote. Ah, he couldn't find the remote.

 

Saturday we took Sean and Ethan to the lake. While we were there Jim called and asked if we could watch Riley because he had a date. I told him we were at the lake and he drove Riley all the way to Huntsville. Must have been some date. Sometimes Riley wears on my patience but mostly I just feel so bad for him. He is always tired at school because he doesn't go to bed until late. Jim drops him off at school at 7 a.m. and stays there until six. Whenever I cook a meal Riley gobbles it down. Jim is always offering to "take Sean off our hands for a couple of hours." I know he wants to do something for us because we watch Riley for him but honestly, I don't want him watching Sean. We did let him take him to Kangaroo Zoo for a couple of hours but that's about all I'm comfortable with. No one has a problem leaving their kid with me but I sure don't like leaving my kid with anyone. I think it's residual anxiety from when I had to leave Sean with Jennie and Ryan. I just don't want to leave him with at all.

 

Riley, Sean and Ethan at the Oaks in Huntsville. They were LOUD even for an outdoor restaurant. I sure miss having Ethan as our neighbor. His laugh always made me laugh and when he comes to play it makes me miss him all over again.

Tyson and Sean sitting on their throne on the Farmington trail

At the races

Don wanted to go to the races for father's day. On Saturday we went to Rocky Mountain Raceways.

Most of the races were normal race cars but there were some bizarre things. The double decker race car. Who thought of that? They stacked one car on top of another car and welded it together. One driver, I think his name is Billy Bob is in the top car steering. Underneath him is his sister/girlfriend, she controls the brake and gas. What? Really? How many rednecks and how much beer did it take to come up with this? When they announced the midget cars were next I was like "really, is that politically correct?" I was relived when the cars came on the track and they were just go-carts driven by full sized people. We saw a race car spin out and hit the wall, a couple others spun around completely on the track barely missing getting clobbered. It kind of reminded me of hockey, where you wait for the players to beat each other up. Silliness.

Sean loved it. He ran around a lot and coughed himself into a tizzy. We didn't bring an inhaler. We left at 8. The races went until 10. We plan to go back another night and stay for the whole thing. Good times!

Cute kids and ceiling fans

We are keeping Don busy this summer. Sean is always hot. I have a fan in his room but thought he might like a ceiling fan. He was excited. Don found a fancy one at Home Depot with planets on it.
Not related to planets but rather North America. Sean was taking a bath tonight and he pointed out that the suds in the bath tub were in the shape of the United States. He was correct!

I've been wanting to made a video of Sean reading. I made one tonight but I had just given him albuterol so he is wired and quite distracted. He's had a cold this week and it has really aggravated his asthma.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=tbSxeU2_uUI
I had forgotten how fascinating it is to watch a child learn to read. It's like watching them learn to talk. How does it happen? Sean is reading things he sees on television or at the store so he knows how to use the skill of reading in every day life. I remember when Carter learned to read and I was just amazed. How does the brain assimilate letters into words? Fascinating. I used to read with the kids in Carter's special ed class. There was a little girl named Cathy who couldn't read. I would try to get her to read words like stop and go. She couldn't do it. It was like that part of her brain did not function. I wonder if she ever learned to read.

Sean also learned to ride his bike without training wheels. Now if we could teach him to tie his shoes and  stay dry at night we'd be set for kindergarten in the fall. When I took him to the doctor for his kindergarten physical the doctor asked if I wanted him to do test to determine why he wasn't staying dry at night. Hm, NO! He's not dry because he's wet! Eventually, he will quit wetting the bed. I'm grateful for pull ups.

Just can't get enough of adorable Khloe. Here she is watching my ceiling fan. She really liked watching Sean's new one.

Sean wanted to have Kids day. I bought a cake at Dairy Queen. (They are $10 off on Tuesdays). When I told the lady I wanted it to say "Happy Kids Day" she said "I didn't know it was Kids day." Well, now you do! We put five and a half candles in it. I made a banner and Sean was happy. Sean's friend Rylie was there. He's been staying at our house on Tuesday and Wednesday's after school. His grandfather has to take the foster care classes so he can adopt him.

If Khloe wants to go spelunking or if she just wants to read a book without turning on the lights she is ready. Sean decided Khloe needed a Baby's Day and picked out a couple of outfits for her. That baby doesn't need any more clothes but I am powerless to resist. 

Getting ready to put the fan up.

Sean is pleased with the end result.

Laying on the bed watching the fan go round and round. Excitement at the Lindsay house.

Good thing Don is handy.

Loving me some Khloe!

On the topic of adoption

Sean has always known he's adopted. He knows his birth sisters and brother and birth parents. We have books with their pictures and he saw them lots the first few years of his life until Jennie went to jail. For the past few months Sean has talked a lot about whose tummy he grew in. He would get really upset if I said he grew in Jennie's. Once he even asked me how he got from Jennie's tummy to mine. I told him it must have been magic and I didn't know. He asked me if he grew in someone else tummy would I love him just as much. I told him yes. I decided I would just let him lead how and when he wanted information.

A couple of weeks ago Sean asked who named him first. His middle name is the same as Don's and his first name rhymes with Don. So we just said you have a name that is very close to daddy's. We were driving home from school Sean said "I don't want you to ever lie to me." I said "OK, what do you want to talk about?" He said that the other kids at school believe in Santa but I had told him Santa wasn't real so the other kids parents had lied to them. I asked him again if he wanted to talk about anything and he said no.

I knew it was coming.... I was laying down in his room with him and he asked "whose tummy did I grow in?" I said you grew in Jennie's tummy, so did Kylie and Brie and Ryder and that's why they are your sisters and brother's too. He wanted to know if he ever lived with them and I told him not really that he had been with us since he was 11 days old but he used to see them. He wanted to know if I was at the hospital when he was born and when I first saw him and I told him I saw him the day he was born. He wanted to know why he didn't live with Jennie and Ryan and I told them they made bad choices and that's why they had all been adopted.  Then he wanted to know the choices they made. He was talking about adoption a lot. Several times a day. "You are my second mom, Jennie is my first. I want to see her." I told him I didn't know where she lived because I don't. It's tough though because I don't want him to see her. He asked who named him first and I told him Jennie and Ryan.

A couple of days ago Jennie texted me. She said she wanted to talk about Ryan, she said he was having a hard time and he's back on drugs and drinking. I thought the "back on" was interesting because I never knew he was off drugs. His girlfriends parents put her in rehab as she is back on drugs too but she left rehab and went back to Ryan. Jennie still has $35000 in bench warrants. I just dont' want Sean exposed to their lifestyle.

On Friday Ryder came over to play. I told Sean that Ryder grew in Jennie's tummy and he was his brother. He asked why I didn't adopt him too since he's his brother. Ouch, that's a tough question. I always thought he would ask that question in relations to his sisters and not Ryder. I told him we just didn't feel like we could adopt all of them and we loved him because we had him in our home since he was so little and we would make sure he had a relationship with Ryder and his sisters. I told him that Heather really needed Ryder to be her son.

It's got to be so confusing for a child to sort all of that out. All the articles I read say that if kids are talking about adoption they are thinking about it even more. It makes me wonder how often he thinks about it because he is talking about it every day. Yesterday we were at the movies and he said "I'm glad I'm in this family and not my other family." I told him I was glad that he was in this family too." I know when he gets older and has a cell phone and Internet access he will be able to contact Jennie and Ryan when he wants and won't even know. I just don't like to think of them asking him for money and exposing him to a lifestyle that is not healthy. If I had it my way he would limit his relationship to his sisters and his brother but that will be his choice when he grows up. It's just so easy for teenagers and young adults to make bad choices and we are doing everything we can to help Sean make good choices.

Sean and Ryder eating some freezer pops in the hot tub. Sean's ice fell into the hot tub and he was trying to pick it up and it kept melting. Funny kids.

Summer School

Sean is going to summer school. He gets bored and wants to be busy all the time. We play hooky when we have something we'd rather do. He gets up in the morning and if I don't get ready fast enough he says "I've got to go to school. I NEED TO LEARN!" Seriously, who says that? He is doing so well with reading. I am amazed and he hasn't even started public kindergarten. Max's mom is trying to test him into first grade and skip kindergarten at the public school since he (like Sean) has already completed kindergarten at the Montessori school. I'm not interested in putting Sean a year ahead. There are lots of opportunities in school now, like learning Chinese.

They have field trips every Friday. Being the neurotic mother I have become I go the field trips because I don't trust other people. Field trips have always made me nervous. So many kids, so few teachers. Don came too.

Waiting to go into Red Butte Gardens. I love Vanessa's bonnet. I need to get Khloe one like that.

Sean and Max.

Sean and Rylie in the water fountain. It was hot!

The kids wanted to look at the fish and Marta told them they had to lay on their stomachs so they wouldn't fall in.

My favorite picture and no one fell in.

The kids from the school are taking swim lessons too. Marta takes them in the van. Again, I'm too paranoid to send Sean to swim lessons in a van with 12 other kids and one adult. I take him to the rec center and read while he takes his lesson. Today he wanted to ride back to the school in the van so I let him. The van doesn't have air conditioning and it was already 90 degrees at 9:30. When I asked him how the ride was he said "warm."

Playing

Ethan came to visit. When he and Sean get together, it's no time lost they just start playing. He stayed for nine hours and was still not ready to go home. We miss having him as a neighbor. I forgot what a mess that kid makes. He managed to spill stuff in three different rooms and the garage. Yep, that's our Ethan.

I'd also forgotten Ethan's laugh. When he laughs it makes me laugh.



We decided to replace our fish tank. We've had the same one for 13 years. The glass was scratched. The top was broken so the cover would fall down into the tank. Sean caught six of our ten remaining fish. A couple of them jumped out of the pots we kept them in while we put the new tank up. The stupid shark jumped out four times. One of them slimed me when I picked him up. He's lucky I didn't fillet him.



Don getting the new tank ready.

Fishing.

Mission complete. Sean and I bought some new fish to go in our new thank.

A couple of my favorite pictures

All the pictures are cute but here's my favorites from Khloe's photo shoot. It was funny to watch how they get a baby in those poses. Warm room, placenta sound track and lots of time.