Kids Crisis Center

Thanks for the suggestion on the fake name for the center. I want to respect privacy and figure this is the best way to blog about my experiences with the nursery and not risk sharing too much information.

Monday was my second time volunteering for Kids Crisis Center and I am even more sure that this is the right place for me.

Location wise allows me to give more time due to them being a 5 minute drive so that is really nice.

There were three different children there this week. I want to write about the twins that were there. I am going to call them Sam and Sally. I was told that Sam has autism and Sally has some behavior issues and really tries to protect Sam and will bite Sam and others.

I didn't see anything that said autism to me when I seen Sam. Not to say he doesn't have it but the thought did cross my mind as there is nothing wrong with him. Then, I told myself.. Who am I to judge? What do I know after 3 hours? Yes. I see behavior issues but I don't know this kids history. It's a reminder to remember that this is the kind of thoughts I get upset with when it comes to people question my son's DX.

Sally didn't do any biting or hitting but it was known by her calling out for Sam when he was upset that she looks out for him.

At the nursery,after lunch, they have quiet time. They put cots on the floor and put on a movie and the kids are to lay down and hopefully sleep. This next part might make you go awwwww

Sally wasn't wanting to lay down. She was just sitting there and you could tell she wanted to get up. I got down on the floor and layed down near the cot and talked her into laying down. I started rubbing her back. She then got off the cot and layed right up next to me. We were cuddling and I was rubbing her back. It was a little bitter sweet for me. It's the first time that I can recall that I actually layed down and cuddled with a girl.

She went to sleep right next to me. I did grab her pillow so hopefully she was comfortable. Sam was the only child who didn't nap at all and they ended up just laying him play to prevent him from screaming and waking the others.

The more time I spend at Kids Crisis Center the more that I know that this is the place I want to donate my time to. She told me that the twins parents have two other children and they encourage them to drop them off.

I would think "crisis" would mean an emergency or something popped up that they needed care. However, it seems like the workers see that they can help families so much more than that. They can help avoid a true crisis by giving the family a much needed break.

The part that I haven't shared yet is that Kids Crisis Center is actually connected with the adoption agency that gave me the free counseling for adoption loss.

Help me out with a little something

I would like to be able to blog about the nursery that I am volunteering for but have decided it would be best that I give them a fake name on this blog.
This nursery is a safe place for children birth to six years of age.

Anyone have any suggestions on a name to give it. I would like it to still imply that it's a crisis place for kids but not use their real name.

Cooking with chicken

I cheated and used a 3rd book for recipes and I want to share one with you from a Book written by Betty Miranda and it's called Top 20 Delicious chicken recipes.

I actually took last week off from cooking new meals to just being short on groceries and needing to use what we had and not run off to get more food.

So this one we cooked about two weeks ago and it was a hit with my family. It's a great thing to cook especially for young kids.

Baked Chicken nuggets:

You will need 3 skinless and boneless chicken breasts
1 cup Italian bread crumbs (with Italian seasoning
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of thyme
t tablespoon of basil
2 tablespoons of melted butter
3/4 cup of Shredded Parmesan cheese

Preheat oven to 400 F
Cut chicken into nuggets about two inches in length.
Put a bowl and combine crumbs, salt, cheese amd dried herbs

Dip nuggets and bread crumb in melted butter.

Lightly grease a cookie pan, and space nuggets evenly

Bake for about 20 to 25 minutes.

This will make about 30.

Just for the record I found that I only used about half of the breading so when I make it again I will cut the cheese and breading in half to save dollars.

Retreat

If everything went smoothly I will be checking into the retreat center when you read this blog post from me. When I say smoothly I mean that my kids StepMother picks up my boys for the weekend. It's Dad's weekend but Dad has a new job that keeps him away from home so it's the whole debate thing on is she obligated to take care of our sons'

I guess if my husband is obligated then so is she. I don't know if that's the right word to be using though. I think if the stepparents married "us" then they have a moral responsibility to help raise the children up. Their StepMom isn't going to ever be doing a whole lot of raising of them but if she has them for a weekend it gives us a much needed break to be better full time parents.

The whole reason I am writing about the moral or obligation is due to the last time she was suppose to get them she didn't show up and didn't call my husband but texted me and they got the kids the next day.

Stephen has Rec night and my husband plans on having a quiet weekend without children. If she screws up and there was some talk about her being sick I know I will still be checking into the retreat center and my husband will see to it that Stephen gets to REC night and home. It's just the kind of husband he is to me.

He may grumble and bitch and raise hell but he will take care of the kids.

I am really looking forward to this retreat. I had such a great time last year and met a lot of nice women who can relate to special needs children. It gave me some things to think about and I think it changed my outlook on life. Yes. My child is special needs with autism and add and let's admit it obsessive traits that drive me silly. However, my child has a normal life expectancy and their were Mother's who children had beat their life expectancy.

follow me

Do I have anyone that pops in from time to time but hasn't committed to following my blog? What are you waiting for? Push the button and help me get to 180 followers. I promise I won't lead you to jump off the bridge or cliff. Leave me a comment so I can check out your blog if your a blogger too.

What to do??

What do you do when your teen is spending all his time with friends, girlfriend or work and barely coming home to sleep. We have had to put our foot down and threaten to lock him out of the house if he isn't home by midnight.

what do you do when they lose or break everything they own? My son has lost his IPOD, Kindle. He had a nice xbox but it's gone with a shady story. He somehow got a cheapy IPOD and dropped it on the stairs and it shattered.

This is a lot of things we bought him or family has gotten him and it's all gone.

Now he is breaking our crap. We forgave him for breaking the screen door and the railing to the downstairs. We repaired it out of our money.

He hasn't been coming home for dinner and sometimes he is at work but other times he just always has a "perfect" excuse as why he didn't make it. Most days he doesn't even ask for food unless he knows we have gotten pizza out or something. We have refused to let him eat it when we have given him a specific time to be home for dinner.

We are wasting a lot of food because we cook for four and he isn't eating. Sometimes, we actually cook for more than that based on the recipe and that sometimes gives me lunch for work.

The latest thing he has "broke" is that he asked to use my husband 25 feet cord for outside when he had a few friends over for a bon fire. The cord magically was set down by the bunny cage and they chewed it up. We explained to my son that he has to replace it and he swears he didn't put it there but admits he left it in the back yard. It's possible my black lab dragged it to the sun porch but I really don't think so.

We are just so frustrated. It's all the little things that add up big time. I handed him a trash bag to take out and where did it end up? Would you guess in his brother's room? Yep! isn't that the place you take trash?

The truth is that I think my son is afraid to be alone. If he isn't working he is looking for people to hang with. He rarely sits with us anymore. My husband doesn't care for kids in the living room all day but nothing says he can't sit with us and there is always dinner time together as a family and out outings ect.

Just for the record, I am talking about my son who will be 18 in less than two months.

He is still working but the early morning shifts if we don't wake him up he won't get up. Up until about two weeks ago, my husband seen to it that he got up and I don't think it's fair that we have to sleep less for him to go.

So, twice in a matter of a couple weeks he was late for work twice. We noticed that he isn't getting the early morning shifts and he has less hours.

We haven't charged him rent yet. The plan is to start once he is 18 years of age. I am not going to pay his way in life so he can "party"

He is being cheap. He has yet to buy himself a stitch of clothing for work or otherwise. He needs things and for once I agree with one of my Mother's parenting styles. I am not buying clothes for him when he has a job.

If you read all this. Thanks for reading my major vent.

The last couple weeks I have been finding myself missing my daughter a little bit more than normal. I often find myself jealous of the interactions between her and her Mom and wondering why I don't pester her all the time to make sure she is safe.

The last couple times, I have tried to connect with Izzy on facebook she hasn't responded. Recently, I posted a picture of her scrapbook open and put it on her wall. Nothing. Today, I wrote her that I missed her and so far she hasn't wrote back. I know she is working a lot but I still miss her.

I guess the answer would be that Izzy isn't trying very hard to talk to me so I won't be sending texts daily to check on her. I breathe easier when I see her posting on FB because I know for that moment in time she was breathing. If I had to put a number on how often I text her I would say about twice a month.

I am trying to get working on her scrapbook more often. I didn't stick to my goal of spending ten a week on supplies and photos. However, we created space in the living room with a table for me to have a place to work on scrapbooking. I am happy to finally have a spot to sit that doesn't involve the kitchen table or me sitting on the living room floor at the level of a coffee table. I did spend almost twenty bucks on prints and want to try to get a few new things for scrapbook paper.

I might bring scrapbook supplies to my retreat but not sure. I don't want to spend too much time on my own as this is a great event for hanging with other Mom's.

Tomorrow, I am taking the day off from work. I asked nicely if they could try and cover my shift because my best friend is really sick in the hospital. She is sick and scared and cries a lot. I didn't want her being alone all day.

I can't offer much and it's only one day. Most of her stays in the hospital are at least a week long but it's something.

I hope she can manage to sleep while I am there. I know she has a hard time sleeping when alone. This illness has been so hard on her family and her husband doesn't really stay by her side as much as I think he should.