Charlotte

Charlotte is growing so fast! She is learning the ropes being the youngest child here. She has also learned to scream when some takes something from her or if she doesn't get her way. That child has some lungs on her! It's not the blood curdling scream you'd expect from a little sweet girl, but a screeching type scream which I think is even worse, lol. She's snatchy now too. She's learned that from Ben. She snatched his cookie from him one day and took off! Of course Ben threw a fit and I told him to go after it and then him and Charlotte had a screaming fest while they both pulled the cookie back and forth. Finally after I could take the screaming anymore, I intervened and made Charlotte give the cookie back since it was Ben's after all. And to my suprise when Ben pulled the cookie apart to eat the inside, he shared the other half with Charlotte and she went on her merely way. LOL. She is finally getting teeth. She has both her eye teeth in and has her two bottom ones coming in. I think her two front teeth are next to follow. Right now I call her "Miss Snaggletooth" since she just has those two eye teeth sticking out, lol. It's cute to see her smile. Here some recents of her:

I bought Charlotte this cute headband on Etsy and she will not keep it on. Here I am holding her hands down so I can get a picture and as you can see, she is pulling back, lol:

Ok, got a good decent one, but that lasted about 2 seconds and she ripped it off:Charlotte the thumbsucker #2. Oh boy!:Charlotte with cousin Nick. We were camping so she's got a big mosquito bite on her forehead and she's just wearing a diaper since it's so dirty out there, she's better off with no clothes on, lol:Cake anyone?:

Benjamin

Ben is being the booger he always is. He's our wild child and completely all boy! We were trying to potty train him since he is definitely ready, but we've just been so busy and haven't been home long enough to train him properly, so we are just waiting for some time off work to put him on potty training boot camp time! Next week Mark or I are suppose to get laid off for the week, so that is when one of us plans on training him. Boy will it be nice to only have one in diapers. It would be even better to have none in diapers, lol! Oh those days are coming and I can't wait!!!!! Ben is talking a lot more. Some of his sayings are "Right here" when asked "Where's Ben?" and "Ricky get up!!" when getting Ricky up for school, "Peekle" for "Pickle", "I'm wet" as in change my diaper now! and that's all I can think of for now. Oh and he says "I don't like it" when he has to eat something he doesn't like. He learned how to ride his bike too. With training wheels of course. I had him ride his bike up to the bus stop to get Markie and Ricky and he did pretty good, of course it took us forever to get up there, but he had fun and that's what really matters! Here's some recent pics:
Here is Ben sitting in a bin, playing in Markie and Charlotte's room:

Here is a dirty face Ben (as usual) look a little chinese in this picture with Markie's tights on his head, don't ask me why, lol.:Put 'em up buster! Ben loves to play with dad's power drill. I think he's going to take after daddy!:

Here he's playing in a rusty old wagon that Mark took apart so he can make a newer one. Ben was helping daddy with the building process:And here is the finished product. Pretty good, huh? Of course Ben had to try it out and he likes it!

Markie

Markie is doing good. She just had her 6th birthday and got lots of toys! It was such a nice fall day too. I just love fall! She is doing good in school. She has a few problems with math, but I think she's mainly just not paying attention. We'll be working on that! Since she is 6 now we are working on her thumbsucking habit. I am hoping she'll kick the habit at least during the day like when she's on the computer, watching TV, or riding in the car. I'll let her slide at night time since most of the time she's sleeping and can't help it. Here are a couple of recents of her:

This is her first day of school (1st grade):

And this is one of her friends from Kindergarten:

And here is a bad hair day picture, lol:
Here she is being goofy, as always, lol:And here is her 6th birthday party, just this past Sunday:

After much searching....

I am finally going to post pictures!!! I had to search all over the place for my USB cord, but I finally found it. So I am going to post some pictures along with updates on each of the kids. Thanks for looking!!

It's been awhile!

I have been so busy lately, I haven't had time to make any updates. Doesn't really matter anyways since nobody has visited since my last update, lol.

All is going good around here. The kids are getting along fine. Ricky has started school and is doing ok. He is cognitive impaired which means he has a hard time learning and thinking. It's pretty evident when I ask him questions like "What did you do in school today". He says he can never remember and he can't think of anything. Hopefully we can help him improve in that area. I've been working with him and Markie every night before bed on their writing, reading, and spelling. I am going to add Math in the mix pretty soon. I also need to add bible verses. I've been slacking on that and I don't like it! I have some first day of school pics that I will post soon, but not right now because I am just too lazy, lol. Plus I feel like I might be coming down with something. I sure hope not, but that seems to be the way it is lately. I was really hoping to get my lawn mowed since it hasn't been mowed in a couple of weeks (like 4, I think, lol). Thankfully it's not looking too shaggy yet. I really hope I don't some down with something. I had also planned on taking the kids to the back to school bash city hall was having tomorrow. It's free fun, and with 4 kids now, free is my middle name!!

I might also let Nick spend the night tomorrow again. He spent the night last week and really liked it here. He cried himself to sleep at my mom's because he wanted to come back here. He just likes having all the kids around. He's use to chaos and at my mom's he doesn't have that. He sees it here, lol. He is such a sweet heart. He called me twice this week. He told me the first time he called that he wanted me to pray for him to stop having nightmares and to pray for his mom because everytime he talks to her she complains about how sick she feels. He said he keeps praying to God and nothing changes and that he feels God isn't hearing him. I just wanted to give him a big hug. I reassured him that God does hear him, it's just that our prayers aren't always going to be answered the way we want them to because God knows better than we do. I told him that this might be God's way of letting him live up here and getting to know all of us. I didn't really want to tell him that God has him living up here so he can have a better life. He thinks his life was just fine down there. So I guess we'll just let him keep thinking that. Just show him a better life up here. Then the next day he called me back all excited to say that he didn't have any nightmares and when he talked to his mom, she said she was feeling better! I was so glad to hear that. And he was so happy. Then he said that when he goes to bed he is going to do 50 push-ups then he's going to pray. I thought that was cute and funny! He's a good kid, I hope he stays that way!!

Well, I guess that's all for now. I'll update soon (or at least I will try). I want to get some recent pics on here to, so I can share my cute kids with you all, lol. So take care, thanks for reading, and God Bless!!

Update on our new situation

Well, as I said in my last entry that I was going to trust in God that the last 2 boys got good homes...God has came through, just like I knew He would. My mom and Brother and SIL took in the last 2, so now they are all together, but living separately. I am so glad that all of us have them so they can stay in close contact with each other. We just got to spend the holiday weekend with all 4 boys and it was chaos, but it was great. Ricky was really excited to see his brothers and they all played together. There were a few mishaps, but we all got through them. It was nice.

Our new situation

I got a call last week from my mom asking if I can take in a child. He is my cousin and his mother is dying of cancer. His father (my uncle) passed away last year from a drug overdose. I immediately said yes. I was always willing to help out family, even if we are not close...they are still family. Mark and I decided to take the youngest (there are 6 in all, 5 that needed homes) since he would be closer to our childrens age. 3 days after my mom asked if we could take him in...we had him. That happened a lot faster than we expected. He only had a grocery bag of clothes and in that bag there was only 1 decent shirt and 1 decent pair of pants. The rest were stained up shirts and shorts that looked like they were his older brothers. The lady that takes care of their finances gave me some money to get him some clothes and shoes and stuff for school. I went out and got him tons of stuff, so he is all set! His name is Ricky and he is a very well behaved kid. He does what we ask him to with no problem. It has been an easy transition. Hopefully it will stay that way...but this could just be the "honeymoon" period. He thinks he's still going to go back home, but I don't think he is. I have to figure out how at some point to tell him that he won't be. I will wait until I know for sure what is going on. I bought some "get well soon" cards for Ricky to send to his mother. I plan on letting him stay in close contact with his mother and his brothers. Thankfully my mom has 2 of his brothers, so he will get to see them often. Unfortunately 2 of his brothers had to go to foster care. I am feeling extremely guilty about that. Especially after my mom said that they were left on the porch late at night, scared and alone. It sounds like they were placed with a family that only cares about the paycheck that comes with them. I sure hope not. I couldn't stop crying last night. My heart is wrenching for those boys. They need a home. A stable-well adjusted home. I don't want them thinking that we didn't care enough about them to take them too. I hate sitting here thinking that they feel unloved, uncared for, forgotten...when 3 of their brothers got to go with family and here they are placed with people who they don't know and don't care. I just can't take it!! Especially since I got to meet them. They seemed like good kids, just raised in a dysfunctional family. We know some people that foster...so we are going to see if they will take them in. I have great friends that are willing to take them as well, but since they are not family and do not foster...they can't have them. I know that it's a scary and unpredictable situation taking in another child that you have no clue about...but I trust in God that through Him all things are possible. I am trusting God to help out Ricky's older brothers. I would just hate for these boys to grow up, hating the world, because nobody cared enough to do anything for them.

My mom was wondering how people like the ones that got Ricky's brothers are even able to foster when they treat the kids like they do (she heard some pretty bad stories from the boys that she has when they were in foster care before). I had to explain to her that we live in a corrupt world. Where family passes off the responsiblity of taken in kinship off onto the state. And then the state is overwhelmed with children and families that they cannot properly access situations like they need to. It's just all about getting them placed...because that's all they have time for. Everybody, please pray for these boys...that they find homes that will love and care for them, like they deserve. Here is a picture of them all before they got split up:


Hopefully this won't be the last time they get to see each other.