Starting to do "Last Things..."

My last trip to the Hannah Anderson Outlet store. News came that they are closing the outlet in January and I had huge fun shopping through the $10 racks. This is the pile for new baby - so far we are leaning 50/50 on gender as far as the things we have for them. (This might seem trivial to some people - but I love quality children's clothing because it lasts through so many of them and having an outlet for my favorite right here in town has been huge fun.)
The last roses from our Minneapolis garden - with a couple of fall strawberry leaves.

Perhaps our last visit to the park this weekend. It was cold, but not nearly as cold as must Thanksgivings are!

Lighting Advent Candle One....

For most fourth graders carrying the Advent Candle in church isn't a big deal. All you have to do is walk down the main aisle, up the steps, place it carefully on the pedestal and walk slowly out the back of the stage. Three minutes of fame and in the group we hang out with sort of a cool right of passage.

Today when Jesse carried that first candle down the aisle and completed the role without complications it was more than a simple task, it was a victory walk. For kids like Jesse who live with hidden disabilities, things that are fun for others are often torture for them. Anxiety, self doubt, paralyzing fear, illness brought one by the stress and untold sleepless nights can be the consequences of volunteering to do something like this. But he did it, we did it, with lots of coaching and the support of Lori the Advent coordinator who heard us when we said that this was a really hard thing for him.

What a beautiful way to kick off our Advent season - by watching this son begin to fit into the person he is. To choose to walk that aisle because he loves Jesus and Sunday morning worship, even knowing that to him the cost was very high. Higher than most people watching would ever guess.

Needed: Light House Keeper.......

Looking at the listing for our house my heart wants to rewrite it like this.........

Needed: Light House Keeper. Single or married, young or old - everyone encouraged to apply. Must have a heart for the lost, the strength to love the unlovely, and the eyes to see hope in hopeless moments. Keepers need to have a good sense of humor and flexibility in daily life - sometimes opportunities knock - other times they blow through the door unannounced. Either way there should always be a ready pot of coffee an extra chair and time to listen.

Position comes with a well loved home. One that has intentionally cast its light on neighbors and strangers for 14 winters. From Missy and Jeff to Robert and Dorothy, and now passing on to a new Keeper - hoping to fill this position soon. Before the light fades and the neighbors stop knocking.

Keeper needed - prayerfully waiting for your reply.

Candid Thanksgiving Photos....

Leah and Joe entertained us all before breakfast with his attempts to say the names of different states- he is really excited about a "Tuk goind du Codorado." (Truck going to Colorado.)
Daniel's Thanksgiving plans changed so he joined us after dinner for a little Othello, some crawling rounds of hot/cold (because then the big kids don't have an advantage)and a brief but happy bout of being the horsey.

The tree is up with twinkle lights and the rest of the house is decorated as well. Looking at the next four weeks I suspect that decorating would have fallen by the wayside with showings/baby/birthdays/moving and all the 'regular' things that happen during the month of December.

Thankful For Gravy.....

At this moment I am so thankful my mommy taught me to make gravy the old fashioned way. So many women in my generation don't know how to make it and I love good gravy.
Thanks mom!

Thanksgiving........

Photos of festivities later - I am just overwhelmingly thankful for Christ's sacrifice at the cross right now. Without His act 2000 years ago my life would be unrecognisable today. I am thankful for the cross.......

Looking Up The Laws in Colorado: Car Seats First...

Two months from today Robert is scheduled to start his new job in Colorado Springs. On one hand it seems like a long time (the last 8 weeks of winter does seem to last forever) but on the other it means that we ONLY have 7 more Sundays left at Bethlehem. Sigh....

Leaving the fellowship after 15 years is a hard thing to consider and I'm not just not ready to blog on it yet. Instead I'm sticking to the lighthearted topic of child vehicle passenger laws in Colorado and the fun I had reading up on them.

After reading through the expected laws regarding toddlers and infants, weights, heights and citations I almost fell off my chair laughing when I read the last sentence which was this one............."Children may ride in pickup truck beds in Colorado as long as the tailgate is closed and the children are sitting down."

Ha! So I can get a citation if my 6 year old isn't in an approved booster seat but it is legal for me to throw the whole pack of them into the bed of a truck (as long as they are sitting and the tailgate us up) and fly down the freeway? I love this type of conflicting law - it reminds me of exactly how our governmental process works.

Current Reading: Important Books that Hurt to Read....

One of the coping mechanisms for the current state of unrest in my life is to catch up on my reading list. This weekend I finished Scared by Tom Davis - an excellent novel that captures many of the issues facing orphans in Africa and around the world. Good for older teens and adults as it covers painful and mature subjects.

Next on my list is the book Fields of the Fatherless: Discovering the Joy of Compassionate Living that is also by Davis. I plan on diving into that one while watching the little ones fall asleep tonight.I have also acquired a pile of books on FASD that I want to finish reading and sharing out before we move to Colorado. I am about half way into The Best I Can Be which was written by Liz Kulp a young woman who has FASD and is an excellent resource. I also have Fantastic Antone Succeeds, Long Way to Simple, and Speaking and Learning the FASD Way waiting here for me. None of these are easy or lite reads. but every one is relevant to the life we live.

FASD - 'why can't I get a diagnosis?'

One of the hardest things to hear from a parent is "I am sure my kid has FASD at some level but the doctors say there are not enough indicators to make a diagnosis."

Doctors began diagnosing FASD with it's identification as a disorder in 1973 - but the truth is that even with 35 years of research behind it there still isn't consistency in the diagnosis. More often then not the child (or adult) who is being evaluated ends up with a secondary diagnosis that never gets back to the root of the issue because it's hard to identify the unseen things in a persons past.

Did I lose you there? Several of my children have ADHD diagnosis as well as falling under the FASD umbrella. If we hadn't been serious about educating our Pediatrician about FASD the diagnosis would have ended with the ADHD, ODD, LD, and NOS - but we pushed and fought and did the research to show that the issues went all the way back to something else. And that something is hugely relevant to all the other diagnosis because it's in the wiring of their brain. Something I didn't know until I researched it and contacted the specialist myself is that there is a difference between 'normal' ADHD and ADHD as a secondary effect of FASD. ADHD drugs are not tested (per our psychologist) on kids with FASD and many times they have strange and unwanted effects on them because the problem is different. The kicker is looking at a kids with FASD and trying to figure out if the two diagnosis (or three or four or five!) are related or not.

FASD is really still an unknown and misunderstood diagnosis. It falls under a broad range of medical specialties due to the way it manifests itself and isn't simple to diagnose even by trained practitioners. Until the day that it is we have to be our kids best advocates - the 'specialists' in their particular case because it's our job to raise them and to get them the best care possible. Regardless of the diagnosis or lack of it today.

Grades: a Hidden Anxiety...

Homeschooling has allowed us to develop a different type of learning paradigm for our kids - especially the ones with hidden disabilities. In the lower grades, instead of assignments receiving a grade like A- or 85% we simply check them and then correct whatever is wrong together. Our goal is for them to learn the material and be able to use it - not to create a fear of failure because they don't measure up to a standard which was developed to rank kids in a classroom setting. If we used a traditional system, many of our kids would fail day after day, assignment after assignment - what a horrible way to spend your grade school years.

So we have this 'other' approach which works great to get through the younger grades but somewhere about 4th we start introducing the idea of percentages and letter grades. I did that today with our son who has Aspergers like behaviors and it was a huge issue for him. I intentionally took his best subject (math) and showed him how there was a way to figure out mathematically how many he got right. I then shared that there were corresponding letter grades that matched up with the percentages.

We were fine until he figured out that there was such as thing as a D or an F and then he freaked. He automatically jumped into the deep end of the pool and was overwhelmed with the thought that he could fail and therefore would fail. To the point that he was hinging on a full blown panic attack. Good news was that I was prepared and could talk him through the realities of his last few assignments (a 100% and a 95%) I also had his teen brother bring out his grade records so that we could look at the C's from a particularly bad week last summer - to show that it wasn't the end of the world.

Going through this session I have a new empathy for teachers trying to manage the anxiety and fear of AS kids in a larger school setting and for the kids trying to swim in those unknown waters. Things that just don't phase others send my son into paralyzing emotional distress. It's not rational from our perspective but that doesn't change the reality of where he lives and how his brain processes the world around him. I love him to pieces and am so glad that I can spend enough time with him in a day to begin to understand how he sees the world. Thankful for the freedom to homeschool today and the chance to earn together.

Has Anyone Read the Information on the New 'Revised' Federal First Time Homeowners Credit?

I love reading taxes and laws - I just have a strange part of my mind that gets a kick out of trying to untangle the complicated reasoning that such things are based on. This weekend I have been trying to wrap my mind around the 'new' (11/6/09) revisions to the Federal First Time Home Buyer Credit. Here are the funny things I have picked up so far (note- they might not be correct as I am piecing this together from several sources as the 'official' forms won't be done until December.)
1. You don't have to be a first time home buyer to be eligible. If you have lived in your house for 5 of the last 8 years (and meet the other requirements) then you are eligible.
2. You don't have to repay the credit under the new guidelines (but everyone who used it before 11/6/09 did have to?! Wait - it says that they can file an amended return and reverse the earlier credit and get the new one. That sure sounds like fun doesn't it?)
3. You don't have to sell your old house to get the credit. (Hu? So you can keep the old one and get the credit as long as the new one is your primary residence?)
4. There is some clause that seems to read that you can claim a purchase in early 2010 backward to 12/31/09 and get the credit on your 2009 taxes for a house you purchase in say...2/2010. That's some fancy accounting! I can't wait to see the new form in December so I can figure out the formula on that one.

There is more but I suspect that most of you don't find this as entertaining as I do so I will resist the temptation to share the rest of the fun.

Baby, Fundraising, Moving and Everything Else....

I have always enjoyed the counters that friends post on their blogs to keep us updated on the progression of their pregnancy/adoption, the amount raised toward said adoption expenses or the countdown to major life events. I have been toying with adding one to Urbanservant but the hysterical reality is that even though we have any number of big things occurring in the next 60 days none of them actually has a date connected with it. Here is the update so far as I know.

Baby #11: All quiet on that front. Waiting for our Adam Walsh so that our homestudy can be approved and we can get the grant applications written. Still no due date - holding onto the December/January time frame though November/February isn't out of the question as there has not been any date set. No news on gender. Still expecting expenses to be about $17,000 because of the extra legal complications that our move causes - but that is based on experience not any actual information.

Leaving MN: The house has been on the market for 8 days and we have a second showing today. (Yeah God!) We have no idea when we will leave MN except that it will be after the new baby is born and whatever legal work is completed. Robert marked his last day working here as January 15 because it's the end of the pay period. But that's flexible also.

Arriving in Colorado: Same as leaving. Sometime after the baby is born. He set his start date (I think) as January 26th. Flexible though as we have no idea where we are living or when the baby's birthday is. I'm headed down to power shop for houses over December 3rd and 4th - hopefully that will be a very clear trip. (How can it not be? I'm going without the team so 90% of my workload will be reduced.)

So that's it. Maybe I will put a counter up counting down to January 20th. That's the day we moved into this home and community 10 years ago.....though I sure hope it's warmer this time around. If I am remembering correctly it was below zero that day in 2000 and we were all still recovering from the Y2K stress.

Let Me Clarify....the HOUSE is for Sale...

It is a house in which 10 homeschool children live - not a house+ 10 homeschool children for sale!
Perhaps that is why yesterdays walk through wasn't impressed. It would take a pretty special buyer to want our home plus our kids. Here is a link to the listing in case any one knows anyone who would is looking for a 5 bedroom North East Minneapolis home. I would love to sell it to a friend - that's how it became ours in the first place.

How Do You Sell a House With 10 Homeschool Kids?

Tomorrow we have the first showing scheduled for the house and I am investing my nap time thinking through how the preparation process should proceed, both this time and for as many other times as necessary. So far I have come to the decision that most of the work needs to happen tomorrow. With 12 of us in the house 24/7 there is no way for anything that is 'clean' to stay that way for more than a few hours - it's just unreasonable to expect it to.

Understanding that, I have packed two large rubbermaid bins - one for each floor - with all of the items we need on hand to prepare for a showing and into which the every day personal items can be dumped. I am planning a normal school day (please pray that I can find Jesse's new Teaching Text Books math 4 set- I lost it somehow which is really not me!) a hot lunch and then once the little ones are settled down for naps the big kids and I are going to fly and get the house up to par. At least that is the plan I have.....God's plans may be different but I have to start somewhere.

People -First Language: A Blog Post By John Knight....

(I imported this from The Works of God site that John Knight writes and manages as part of the Disability Ministry at BBC. In the past I have attempted to write a similar post and it is the only one I ever deleted entirely. Johns comment here is on disability and theological books, but I feel it applies to other situations where the language becomes more important than the person we are talking about, the heart of the one speaking, or the God that created them all. Thanks John - for finding the words!)

This is almost a rule

November 13, 2009 by John Knight

"When I read a book about disability and the Bible or religion or church or theology, and an emphasis is made on using ‘people-first’ language (for example, saying ‘a boy with autism’ rather than ‘an autistic boy’) in the opening pages, I can almost guarantee it will not be God-centered.

Using people-first language is a fine thing. But I haven’t found it to be an indicator of much with regards to whether or not someone will treat my son with love and respect.

Books on disability or suffering that start with God and his authority and the centrality of the cross of Jesus Christ in dealing with sin, however, usually end up talking about people with disabilities in honoring, dignified ways."

Adopting Still Isn't Easy......

I am surprised to find that even though this is our 8th adoption (in 10 years) there are still more hurdles to resolve and emotions to experience. The overwhelming panic of earlier adoptions is missing, there is zero concern over the finances (though I am guessing we will have costs adding up to roughly $17,000 between now and February which has usual we don't have) and the home study and social worker visit didn't even inspire me to dust. Even the exhausting reality of a newborn isn't the issue - after all we are not sleeping great at night any way so we might as well be up with a tiny one also.

No this time the issues are more similar to Jerry's adoption a year ago. More of the - I can't believe the hoops, strange looks and distrust some people automatically assign to large families in adoption. Sort of a battle call to stand up and fight for our family (and others) because we are emotionally healthy, physically able and most important feel called to receive this newborn sibling into our home with joy.

I am not posting details here on the blog at this point but please trust that it is nothing to do with New Horizons (gracious no!) and in no way is going to endanger the placement - but man did it get my back up and mommy lion radar started when it surfaced this week. Grrr.....

A Few Photos of the Transformation.....

Scampering to get the house cleaned out, cleaned up and onto the market last week took a lot of energy. Patty and Weldon invested most of Saturday helping us get the exterior tidied up and the maintenance pieces done and the Tuesday Night Women's Prayer team took us over that last hump of cleaning the first and second floor beautifully on Tuesday night. Thanks Pam, Rosa, Emily, Karen and Mary. (Thanks for Monday also Pam and Rosa.)

Everything landed on the kitchen table until it had a place..

Of course the vacuum got plugged - and Pam laughed her way through cleaning it out.Final result on the porch...from kids toys and old piano to adult reading sanctuary.

And the living room looks great too.....warm and welcoming (and dust free for the first time in years!) And by Friday the house is on the market, sign up and everyone ready for a quiet weekend. Leah and the little girls made Lily this birthday cake with parasols. She was thrilled.

Another Window Into Aspergers.....Anxiety.

Anxiety isn't a necessary part of Asperger's but it is a reality at some point for many of the people I know who live under this umbrella. My friend E wrote a great post this week about her sons (and ours) struggles with understanding a world that is a constant mystery to them.

"Asperger's is more than a disability. It is who these kids are, ingrained in the very fiber of their confused souls, and I can only imagine the longings they feel to be like everyone else, even though they may have no idea what that might be. "

Link here to read the rest of the post....worth the time - I promise.

Who Was I Talking To..?

Sunday at church I was talking with someone at the MICAH/NHAA table and for the life of my I can't remember who. Here are the hints: Mom to several kids (3 or 4?), husband is a lawyer, starting the adoption process, hoping to adopt a child with NA heritage. Ring a bell for anyone? If so please email, call or hunt me down on Sunday - we may need to talk to that same lawyer your husband spoke to over lunch. :) Vague but you know who you are!

Moving Day 6: It's on the Market

Phew, it has been a whirlwind 6 days. Taking our 109 year old house from happily cluttered and comfortable to ready to show has taken most of the waking and many sleeping hours over the past week. Tomorrow morning the house will be on the market and I am ready to start thinking about the 'next' things. Moving choices, new house, medical needs, budgets and always in the back of my mind the anticipated arrival of new baby.

In an effort to move together at the end of January we have priced the house to sell quickly (Lord willing) at $199,000 - if anyone is interested please let us know. I would love to see another family move in here and enjoy the fruits of our labor - the house is in really good shape and as hard as it is to live with some neighbors ,there are even more who are overwhelmingly precious.

Help Needed: Friends Dropping Like Flys!

6:00am....anyone want to help clean today? Our goal (need,desperate desire?) is to have the house ready to be inspected tomorrow at 10:00am, pictures taken by our agent and then onto the market later in the day. No problem...except that 80% of the house hasn't been cleaned yet. I have been focused on the things only I can do - the sort, file, organize and remove 50% part of the project. Today was designated as dump and clean day except that most of the helpers now have the same crud my kids have....so anyone want to come join the fun? Maybe only the sick already should apply. :)

Please keep praying - especially that I can keep the crew of kiddos steady and care for illness as well as keep making progress on the house.

2:30am Mommy Moving Time...

The specter of moving has rattled my normally predictable routines and shifted my priorities 180 degrees. This week I am counting the quiet watches of the night not as sleep time, but as perfect slots to get work done without 10 kids 'helping.' Noel had a bad dread which had her serve as my alarm this morning. 5 hours of sleep feels adequate this week - though I am looking forward to a more normal routine after we get this house on the market Weds or Thursday and a nap! Off to work on the basement now.....2:45am.

Four Days 'Into' The Move......

Before we made the decision to relocate the family this was a busy weekend - with that added component life went into overdrive. Here are a few highlights...

Jesse, Leah and Miranda worked together Thursday and prepared pumpkin bars to help celebrate Jesse's 10th birthday. It was a huge blessing as I had no mental margin to add baking into my schedule!

Since Jesse's day was Thursday, that makes today Lily's birthday.

Four years ago Phoebe and I were talking on the phone and she asked if she could take our old profile with her to the hospital where she was making a first contact with a woman who was thinking about placing her newborn for adoption. I said sure, we finished our conversation and didn't think much of it as our file is often used as an example for birthmoms when they are exploring options. Three days later our social worker left a surprise message on our answering machine which started out: "Looks like a go...." Go? What is a go?! 'What' was our precious #8 child Lily Grace and she was home and in our arms by Thanksgiving. Happy Birthday Lil!

On the move: Things are pulling together and we are hoping to put the house on the market by this Thursday. Patty and Weldon invested their Saturday helping us do some of the delayed maintenance projects on the exterior of the house and putting a few of those little irritating details to rest on the interior. Nothing like a little pressure to get my hyper-organization mind in high gear, though it is taking a good dose of coffee to keep it processing since sleep is illusive with sick family around me. (It was strange to be sitting on my bathroom floor at 1am while Noel took a hot shower to calm her spasmodic coughing - especially since I was running on about 2 hours of sleep in the past 36. Not by choice but by mommy to 10 reality.)

It is starting to pull together but there are still miles to go before we are done. Feel free to come on over anytime this week - there is work for everyone!

Though most isn't as much fun as this project....the older boys took care of demolishing the deceased piano from our porch on Friday and I could have sold tickets....neighbor kids galore hung over the fence to watch the action.

On Orphan Sunday - or more appropriately Orphan Saturday Night. Last night I kicked off the weekend with the Gift of Adoption fundraising/awareness raising party here in the cities. I had the exciting opportunity to share my heart for adoption before the larger group and talk with many of the attendees one-to-one. (yeah! My voice lasted.) It was wonderful to spend time with people who share our heart for hurting children all over the world and well worth pushing sleep back a few more hours.

Part of the evening was a silent auction where I won a set of jewelry designed by the event coordinator and was surprised when The GOA committee outbid me on this beautiful basket of hand made scarves and hats - and then presented it me as a gift.

Today is Orphan Sunday. We have commitments at church to represent the MICAH Fund and New Horizons Adoption and then later in the day I plan on taking any healthy ones to the live broadcast at the Downtown site. (4-6pm at BBC downtown - email me if you want details or directions.) Other than that all I think we need to do is tackle the boys bedroom and finish painting the foundation of the house and the shed. Funny how it all seems manageable when I take it one step at a time.

Crews awake now - more later.

One More Thing On My Christmas List This Year....Joy in The Relocation!

It looks like 2009 is going to end with more than the usual excitement of a new baby. Yesterday our family committed to moving to Colorado Springs as part of Robert accepting a new position at the state unversity.

I'm not exactly sure what it means to move our tribe 1000 miles in the dead of winter but we are about to find out. How many boxes will the lives of 13 people fill? How many details to sort and how many tears to shed? Today I will start gearing up with phone calls and the slow beginning's of the moving process.

So....does any one want to buy our house? A phrase which brings us full circle to 10 years ago when Missy asked me that question at a 'Pass the Baby" party to celebrate our very first adopted son - Jesse. Who happens to turn 10 today! Happy Birthday Jesse!