Good Signs

Elaine emailed me earlier today.  Oscar's grandparents want to have him over for a family dinner next Friday.  I called her back to talk about it and she said that they would like to be a relative placement for him, but they live in the next state over (not really that far), so our agency will have to work things out with their state.

I also learned that they have been at both of the visits that he has had with his dad and very much want to be a part of Oscar's life.  We're very happy for him and hope that things really get set in motion soon, so he can be raised by his own family.  It turns out that Oscar's mom isn't doing a whole lot in the way of working her caseplan, other than showing up for visits from time to time, so the best situation, as far as The Wife and I are concerned, is for him to go live with his dad and/or his dad's family.

He's Gone Mobile

Today at daycare, Oscar started crawling.  Of course, it's just army crawling on his elbows... but the kid has gone mobile.  He isn't sitting up on his own yet, but hopefully once he does, he will be much happier, since he'll be able to see everything going on around him.  He is also working on getting at least one tooth.  Last night was a rough one.  Oscar was not ready to sleep at any point.  I think the longest streak of consecutive sleep was about two hours.  The rest was alternating between screaming and just wanting to play.

We took all of the kids to the zoo in their costumes, for the annual Halloween event.  They got a little bit of candy and it turned out to be nice weather for the zoo.  Oscar was dressed as a lion and just hung out in the stroller for most of the trip, while Raggedy Ann (Penny) and Batman (Leonard) walked along.  Part of the rough night was because Oscar fell asleep while we were walking around the zoo, then slept all the way home in the car.  We came home less than two hours before bedtime, so he really just wasn't ready after a super late afternoon nap.  Tonight seems to be going better, but it's also not even 9pm... so it could still go either way.

The Boyz

Leonard and Oscar are off to a great start in their friendship... nevermind that Oscar is seven months old and has no real opinion on the matter.  They sit next to each other in the car and just laugh at each other.  We have no idea what is going through either of their heads, but it keeps Leonard from talking incessantly and it keeps Oscar happy, so it works for us.

Tonight when we got home, I gave the doorway jumper a second shot.  Last night, I put Oscar in it and he just fell over asleep.  Tonight, he was a little more awake and liked it for a while.  Leonard stood over by him and talked to him and was just kind of nearby for a few minutes and Oscar was loving life.  Then Leonard walked away to talk to me and it all went downhill.  The way Oscar screamed and cried, you would think he had fallen out of the thing entirely.  Once I lifted him out, he was good again... I guess he just didn't want to be left alone.. which is kind of his thing.

Leonard was very concerned with
why Oscar was so upset

Two Out of Three

Leonard and Penny's parents both showed up for visits today, no big shock, as they have not missed nor even tried to reschedule a single visit.  Oscar's mom, however, was a no show.  This isn't the first time that she has missed a visit and surely won't be the last time.  His great grandma was there and she spent the full two hours with him.  She is a super nice lady, but is just too old to be able to take him in and care for him.  The older two had a regular visit with each parent... not a ton of food this week, but still more than they need in the span of two hours.  Maybe Marty has mentioned that the amount of food has been ridiculous, so they cut back... but somehow we doubt that the trend will continue.  Marty will be gone in a week and the new person probably won't realize that their dad didn't just bring his groceries inside with him, but that the idea is that they will eat everything he brought.  That will be something to put an immediate stop to on our part, because I'm still not carting bags and bags of food back and forth.

We'll see what the fall-out of the visit is in a few hours when we get home, but according to their mom, they had a good visit without incident from either of the kids (tantrums, etc).  Oscar is a baby, so I'm pretty sure he's just happy to have someone hold him... and he was in a super happy mood the entire time and even postponed his nap to spend time with great grandma.

Oscar

Oscar got his blogname from "The Office".  He's half Latino and half Caucasian and, to be honest, that was the first television character that came to mind that fit anywhere near that description.

He's a baby.  There isn't a ton to say about him at this point.  He just turned seven months old a couple of days ago and he would really like to be able to crawl.  He isn't sitting up on his own yet, but we're pretty sure that's coming soon.  His preference is to be able to see everything that's going on around him and laying on the floor is not working in his favor.

The first day he was at our house was rough... because all he did was cry.  He is a much happier baby now and his daycare thinks that it was just the change to our house.  His previous foster home had some tense moments at the end and that is one of the reasons that he was moved to our home.  He coos and makes baby noises and is happy most of the time now.  We had thought that maybe it was a mistake to take in a baby, especially as a third child in our care, but, thanks to his turnaround, it has been fun to have him.  We don't know a lot about what's going on with his case, but it looks like there isn't another court date set until the end of January, so we'll get to have him for his first Christmas.

Things Oscar likes:
Baths
Eating
Being outside
Looking outside
Fresh, clean diapers
His feet

Things Oscar doesn't like:
Not being fed in a timely manner
Not being able to use his hands as chew toys
Being strapped into a carseat

Penny

Penny's blogname came from "The Big Bang Theory".  It's really one of the best shows on television and it was the only thing we had to watch during the summer television break.  Plus, I needed two names that would go together, since our first placement was two kids.

Since coming to live at our house, Penny has started going to daycare, begun gymnastics classes, and had a birthday.  She is a super smart kid... especially for her age.  The Wife taught her how to spell and write her name over the course of about two weeks.  Most of the time, Penny is a very sweet little girl who likes to take care of her little brother.  Other times, she is too much of a parent to her brother and gets told to leave things alone or not to bring them up again, by us.  And even other times, she throws tantrums like a two year old... kicking, screaming and hitting.  The tantrums generally come when something doesn't go her way, as with most kids, but she really commits to the tantrums.  We definitely can't say she's phoning in the effort.

In a lot of ways, Penny is more of a kid after being with us over three months than she was when she arrived.  While she's the older sister, she doesn't always need to be protective of her brother and that is what we have tried to convey to her.... we have it under control.

Things Penny likes:

Daycare

Gymnastics

Her brother

The Kid

Being given responsibility (cleaning, helping out around the house)

Books

Cartoons

Things Penny doesn't like:

Correcting of her behavior

Losing cartoons for the night

Cheese (but only sometimes)

Leonard

Leonard's blogname, like Penny's, came from "The Big Bang Theory".  That was the first pair of names that I thought of when I started the blog, plus they came to our house on a Thursday, which happens to be the night that the show airs.

Since coming to live at our house, Leonard has started going to daycare, along with his sister.  Leonard, like Penny, is super smart also.  In the last couple of weeks, he has started spelling his name with the foam letters that they play with in the tub.  Leonard used to cry quite a bit, at bedtime, at bathtime, at other random times, but that has really stopped of late.  In the last five weeks or so, I can't recall a single time that he cried at bedtime or woke up in the night crying.  

Leonard has matured quite a bit since coming to our house.  When he arrived, he acted pretty much helpless.  He wouldn't take his clothes off, put his clothes on, put his shoes on, or anything that was a matter of self-care.

Things Leonard likes:

Daycare

His sister

Baseball & football

Slippers
Footie PJs

Cartoons
Dirt

Things Leonard doesn't like:

Correcting of his behavior

Going to sleep
Being told to hurry... no matter the situation