Happy Gotcha Day To My Teen and Tween

11 years ago today, Bill and I went from 0-3 children in a matter of minutes!  It is so hard to believe that it has been so  many years.  Yesterday as we went to church I reminded Bill that 11 years ago on a Sunday in Romania we were attending a pentecostal church, which was just a tad charismatic for our tastes back then.  Yesterday I stood in our local church and watched my Latvian daughter, who was holding hands with my Ugandan baby, who was holding hands with her Latvian cousin.  They were dancing, swinging arms, shaking beaded heads to the rhythm of the music (OK, so the Ugandan was the only one with beads in her hair, but she was shaking it enough for all 3 of them).  I thought to myself, "Wow, we've come a long way since that 2 1/2 hour pentecostal service in Romania!"

The following day we traveled about 30 minutes from our guest house to a rural village in Romania where we first met with Dee's foster family. I still remember the foster dad, who had to keep excusing himself from the room so that we couldn't see him tearing up as this sweet baby was placed in my arms. We spent about 30 minutes with them before walking up the street to meet with Grace and Sarah's foster family.  When we arrived, Grace and Sarah were napping (even though it was 10 o'clock in the morning). We all sat in a very small room, which was unbearably hot due to the wood stove which was cranking.  The foster parents insisted on feeding us lunch. I still remember the chicken and the corn on the cob that they served.  The girls finally got up, we played with them for a few minutes before the foster mother whisked them away and presented them to us dressed in the clothes that we had brought to them when we had visited in July.  With the help of our social worker, we finally started to make our way to the van and to say our good-byes.  It was an extremely emotional event!  The foster mother hugged and hugged Grace and we finally had to pry her out of her loving arms.  By this time, the entire village was there watching, saying good-byes and giving us all hugs and kisses.  We finally had to grab the girls, jump in the van and tell the driver to "GO!"

I will never forget that van ride back to the guest house.  I sat holding Dee, who at 20 months of age, was a happy, bubbly little baby content to sit on my lap and watch the scenery as it zoomed by.  Our dear friend, Sarah, held little Sarah in her lap and they sang and talked.  Bill had the hardest assignment of all....he had to hold on to Grace who was sobbing and screaming the entire way!  When we finally arrived "home" she crashed in his arms and he laid her down in her bed to sleep.  Whew!  So many emotions packed into 4 hours.

And that was how it all began for us....11 years ago in a small village in Romania.  We are so grateful for the love and care that our girls received from their foster families.  They have had the privilege of returning to Romania twice now and meeting these special people again.  Grace and Sarah's foster mom died a few  months after we adopted the girls and I rest fully assured that that sweet lady has found sweet Grace and is continuing to love on her in heaven!  She probably pried her out of the arms of Jesus so that she could hug that sweet girl all over again!

 Dee's foster parents and foster sister. Dad is holding Dee.

 Grace and Sarah's foster parents.

Two Weeks!!!!!!

Wow! I'm looking at the calendar and realizing that in 2 short weeks school will be starting up. I think I am still in a bit of denial about that.  I am thankful to Bill, S & D that I was able to get my classroom ready last week and I am "physically" prepared....just not emotionally!

I am trying to savor every last moment of summer. I have been blessed beyond what I could have dreamed with a relaxing summer with my family.  We were able to take three wonderful vacations....yes....THREE.....this summer and I feel so relaxed and blessed at the moment. But I also am a realist. I know that in two short weeks, which will fly by with garden harvesting, canning projects, school preparations, doctor's appointments, physical therapies, and all of the summer "to-do" projects (which I have put off until now) we will be back at the starting gates and will take off running---heads held high, pencils sharpened, soccer cleats by the door, the smell of chlorine permeating my daughters' hair as I kiss them goodnight---and BANG!!! another school year will be underway!!! I am already tired just thinking about it! I already know how weary I will feel come mid-October, when I start counting down days until Christmas break. I can feel the frustration over a dirty house, closets, drawers and entire rooms, which I had painstakingly organized over the summer (ahem...I mean all in the last two weeks of August--remember, because I spent my summer relaxing and put everything off until now?) in complete disarray, routines that have been set in place to keep order in a family of 7 falling apart and me feeling guilty for not having enough time to

.....have quiet time with God
....go to the gym
....go on a date with Bill
....spend one on one time with each girl
....have coffee with a friend
.....___________ ____________ ____________.....

I can fill in those blanks with any number of different scenarios.

I know that I will get tired, and frustrated, and begin to doubt why we do what we do, but hopefully I will be able to reflect back on some great family times of late nights and sleeping in, doing puzzles, reading, playing games, hiking, gold panning, roasting countless marshmallows by the fire, swimming, cook-outs with friends, shopping in little Greenville square with my teen and tween, and get up the courage to keep on going one day at a time.

Because before I know it the school year will fly by and we will be right back here, Lord willing, preparing to have a freshman in high school all the way down to a Kindergartener. Time goes by so fast. My prayer is that I can cherish each day and not wish them away as I count down days until the next ______________ break.

My beautiful girls at Fort Popham June 2013

NOT Parenting with grace

Tonight is one of those nights that I am glad I changed the name of my blog from "Parenting with Grace".....because there was certainly NO parenting with grace in this house tonight.  

My oldest twin (they are really 3 months apart) has been naughty ALL. WEEK. LONG!!!!  I am at my wits end with her.  She is a very strong personality and has a "take charge" kind of attitude.  I have been struggling with how to encourage this trait in her while also ensuring that she also learn how to obey directions from authority (ME) and not overstep her boundaries.  

Here are just some examples of her behavior that have driven me to near madness this week:

1. helped herself to a bag of chips after I specifically told her "no snacks". (It was an hour until lunch and I had told her I would get lunch ready in a few minutes). 

2. slammed the door in my face after I asked her to leave it open

3. Played Wii after she had lost the privilege of Wii for the day!

4. After I had asked her to sit in dining room while I made her hot cocoa she gets up and heads into living room to see what baby sister is doing.

5. Left my broom on the deck (in a snow storm) after I had told her to take care of it when she was done.  When I told her to go back out and get it she hollers at the other twin to "GO GET THE BROOM!"  

6. Removes the comb from the bathroom and loses it in play room. (special comb needed for our two African beauties-I was unable to do hair tonight because of this-they all know that this comb is OFF LIMITS!).

7. Repeatedly knocking her drink over at the table because she has an incessant need to touch EVERYTHING in her sight!

8. Hitting her sisters....

Ugh....the list goes on and on.  I have struggled to figure out what exactly it is that she is doing and why it bothers me so much.  I mean, come on, when one child seemingly keeps getting in trouble don't most parents try to figure out what the root cause is?  My conclusion is that she just can't stand to not be in charge.  She has to always know where everyone in the family is and what they are doing.  She is constantly taking things from her younger sisters because "she can do it better."  She is a boss. She is a bully.  And I am at a loss!  

I have taken away privileges, spanked her, used time out, sent her to bed early.....And, I've even tried the opposite....keeping her busy to make her feel like she's contributing to the family (she used to love to help), playing games one on one with her, fixed her hair nice including beads (she loves to feel "pretty"), etc.  NOTHING is working!  

Tonight I snapped!  I sent her to bed in anger, lashing out harsh words one after another, not even listening to myself and how ridiculous I must have sounded, dishing out one command after another about staying in bed until I came and got her in the morning, and taking away all dance privileges for the rest of the year if she didn't "turn it around" in the next few days.  (Now that's a clear order any child can follow, right?)  She was sobbing. I was yelling and slamming doors.  It was ugly! 

Meanwhile, the other twin was laying in bed in shell shock from this ridiculous behavior on the part of her mother.  I'm sure all of the behavioral psychologists out there must be cringing at the damage I have done in our attachment therapy, which has been a slow process since adopting her 6 months ago.   

I know I need to make things right, but for right now I just need to distance myself from her and cool off.  I am praying that tomorrow  will be a new day and that she will miraculously turn it around and start behaving, but somehow I doubt that will be the case.  For now I need to pray that I will be able to "parent with grace" for each instance that I'm faced with.  

  

Ask for Help!

So, many of you know my crazy husband, who is filled with grandeous ideas to save the world....one "at risk" child at a time!  This drive of his leads to many trips around the world.  His latest endeavor has him in India for 10 days.  That may not seem like a long time, but when you have a husband like mine, who is ever so helpful around the house and is actively involved in the day to day care of our children, then his absence is sorely felt by all!

When he first started on these trips I would smile, wave good-bye, then begrudgingly undertake the day to day grind of caring for our family.  I would "suck it up" and pretend like I had it all together, because, after all, isn't that what "good" wives and moms do?

Many years and many tears later I have learned a valuable lesson.....ASK FOR HELP!!!!!  Nobody expects me to manage caring for a household of 5 young ladies all alone. (I was the only one who was holding myself to that standard.)  So, yesterday, I did just that.  I picked up the phone and called my trusty SIL and asked her to take my Monday afternoon carpool duty, which involves dropping D off at 2:30 to piano lessons, picking D up at 3:00, dropping S off at 3:00 for guitar lessons, taking D to math tutor, returning to pick up S at 3:30, then returning to pick up D at 4:30.  And if that doesn't sound crazy enough I still had dance lessons and swim practice, so guess what I did?  Yup....I picked up that trusty phone again and texted my neighbor and asked her to take dance "duty" for the night, and if she would mind dropping S&D at swim on the way (so they were a little early, but it's all in the name of my sanity, right?)

Now when I first started asking for help I felt....wait for it.....GUILTY!!!!!   I am glad to say that I didn't feel a twinge of guilt yesterday. I felt a sense of relief. I knew I was doing myself and my family a great favor by not putting such high expectations on myself that I could never live up to.

By releasing myself from transportation duties for the afternoon I was able to focus my morning on homeschooling my girls, knowing that I would still have time to make dinner for my family, which we were then able to share with SIL and her husband as a thank you for their help.  It also gave me some much needed time together with my little girls, which is sometimes hard to come by in our crazy evening schedules. (My two oldest girls swim 5 nights a week and my husband works evenings, so much of our time together is spent in the car.....not always so much fun.)

I wish that I had learned the art of asking for help much earlier on in my motherhood.  I think many moms fear asking for help.  Society places such high pressures on us to be able to "do it all".  We "should" be able to hold down a full time job, get the kids the best education possible, cart the kids to all of their extracurricular activities, make the family a home cooked meal, and still look good for the hubby when he comes home.  For some reason we still live with the "Leave it to Beaver"  and "Happy Days" mentality of motherhood.  I encourage you to LET. THAT. GO!!!!

I did and my family is ever so grateful that I did!

Name Change

When we got back from Latvia this past summer, I actually thought about changing the name of my blog.  Let's face it....there wasn't always a whole lot of "parenting with grace" going on in our household and I found myself, on more than one occasion, not wanting to share things in fear that it wouldn't exactly be what people were expecting when they logged onto a blog with that name.

When we returned home I was the proud mother of a 12, 11, 5, 5 and 3 year old.  In less than 2 weeks my oldest will turn 13 which has led me to think about what life will be like with a "teenager".  This led to my new title, "Teens, Tweens, Twins & a 3 Year Old".  (I'm still not sure what I'll call it when my youngest turns 4, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.)

I'm in hopes to be better about blogging some of daily life in our household. My goal is to share that I am just a "normal" mom with a crazy schedule, who sometimes blows her top while trying to parent this brood of girls.  

Merry Christmas from the Legeres

Photo Card

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One Step at a Time

It's hard to believe that we have been home for almost 2 months now with Allison.  We have received our USCIS clearance to return to Latvia to finalize the adoption. Of course, on the same day that we received our I-797 in the mail, we also received an e-mail from Latvia stating that one piece of paperwork had her name spelled wrong and had to be redone before the courts would accept it.  They gave us 20 days, which may seem like a long time, but the document has to be notarized, apostilled, mailed to Latvia and then translated into Latvian. Oh, yeah...and Bill was in California all week.  So, he got home Thursday night, we had the documents (because you need to send a bazillion copies of everything) notarized Friday morning by a good friend (we owe him big!), I made a flying trip to Augusta so the Secretary of State's office could apostille the documents (a process which basically just states that the notary is indeed a notary certified by the state of Maine-for the soft price of $10 PER DOCUMENT!), back to Auburn to photo copy and scan the documents, then to have them mailed.  The documents are now in the hands of DHL!  I sent them off with a prayer and a kiss that they would make it swiftly to Latvia.  Once our attorney can resubmit to the courts then we will hopefully know when Bill will be returning to Latvia for the final court date.

We are very grateful that Allison has been able to be home with us during this care and supervision period.  In most countries, we would have had to leave her in the orphanage while returning home to await the final court date.  Latvia and the US have a special agreement to allow the children to stay in the homes of the prospective adoptive parents while the paperwork is being finalized.

She has made some great strides and is definitely part of the family now!  She still has some major hurdles to overcome, but I have to keep reminding myself that it's only been 2 months and we have completely disrupted her world as she had known it for the past 5 years of her life.  She is doing less rocking and finger sucking.  We find that if we put a glove on her right hand at bedtime it is enough of a deterrent that she doesn't suck.  Easy fix!  She still rocks to comfort herself when she is upset but those episodes are getting much less and she can usually put herself to sleep now without rocking.

She definitely does not like to be disciplined (what kid does, right?).   That is one of our most challenging areas right now.  She can be quite destructive at times and we have to remind her not to be so rough.  If we even think about raising our voice at her she goes into an almost catatonic like trance and it's like she's looking right through you.  I then have to wonder if she is hearing anything that I am saying.  Somehow I doubt it.

It takes several times for her to grasp a concept, but once she does she finds comfort in knowing what is expected of her.  Example, we have a bench at our dining room table.  Well, every meal time she would happily come and plant herself right on the end of the bench.  It didn't matter that she was always the first one at the table and then everyone else had to climb over her.  I tried to explain to her to "scooch" down towards the center so that the other girls didn't have to climb in.  I bet we had this "conversation" 20 times (no exaggeration). I had almost given up hope when one night last week I called them to dinner and I heard Allison saying "scooch, scooch, scooch to the middle" while happily moving to the center of the bench.  That is now where she happily sits during most  meals (as she is always the first one to the table).

The kid loves to eat. Oh my word!  Every 5 minutes you will hear, "Eat?  Eat?"  Oh my stinking word!  You'd think we were starving her!  When we spoke to the orphanage staff they said that she would overeat if they would let her.  We did not see that phenomena when we first had her, but within the past month we can now definitely see what they meant.  She routinely asks for seconds and thirds at meals, and is constantly asking for snacks throughout the day.  I'm wondering if it is partly due to her language development and her comfort with us as her "caregivers" now.  We keep lots of fruit on hand and she is usually happy if we send her off with a banana, so that works for now.

Her speech is a tricky area.  We had been told by our dentist that she had relocated her jaw due to her severe finger sucking.  We are now wondering if this has impacted her speech as she can be very difficult to understand.  Plus, she is very soft spoken so that makes it even harder.  It doesn't make much sense to take her to a speech therapist yet as she doesn't have enough of the English language, but I definitely see that in our future.  (Not to mention some severe orthodontia!)

The rest of us are settling in as well. The fall school schedule always comes with a bang and we start out running.  Add to that a new school curriculum this year and we have barely been  muddling our way through, but I think we are now getting into a routine.  I am hesitant to say that all is "well" as I am  much too keenly aware that the first year is the most difficult.  We have just had our 2 year anniversary with Hannah and Anita, and I vividly remember how depressed and miserable I felt for the first 10 months with them.  I know that the road ahead is long and hard and paved with many tears. But I also know, from experience, that we will make it through....one step at a time.