OK, so my computer is fixed and has been working fine but I haven't had the strength to post. No I am not sick...at least not physical but mentally I guess you could say I have been under the weather. I was sitting here on the computer tonight and figured it was time to finally share some of those "thoughts out loud" I seem to advertise in my title but haven't dished out. I have been completely lost lately but slowly finding my way back.
Back in January, Jason started a new job which of course is an amazing blessing, but he was training on a shift that totally did not work for our family. He had to be at work at 6a and I work in the office 6:30a-930a so that meant I had a 3 hour block were someone needed to stay with Olena. You would think that 3 hours would be no big deal but when all of your family and friends live at least 30 minutes from your home and work, it is a problem. After several trial and error situations we ended up having my MIL stay with us during the week. We of course love having grammie around, but having a house guest for 5 weeks tends to put a kink in your daily routine. As of today he is finally on his normal afternoon schedule and things are finally looking a bit sunnier.
So are ready now? all because of this weak link in our chain the domino effect started and our whole family seemed to start falling apart.
Olena started acting out and acting out like a sassy 6 year old - daddy is not around as much grammie was here a lot, and mommy was stressed, so she made sure to try her best and take full advantage of the situation.
I was already struggling with her curriculum because the one I bought for this year was kindergarten but it ended up being too easy for her. For the last 3 months I have been using that curriculum as a guide while sitting on the Internet night after night digging for the first grade equivalents. My goal was to just wing it for a few weeks while I researched and purchased a 1st grade curriculum but due to the chaos and changes in our schedule I never had the motivation to look into it. Which ultimately made me stress out even more! We usually have school 4 days a week and because I was so drained we ended up decreasing to 3 days, which made me feel guilty, and did nothing more than put us that much further behind!!! :(
Before anyone yells at me, I finally bought a new one over the weekend and it should be here tomorrow!! YEAH!
On a good note, she loves to read and is pretty darn good at it. However, she has lost complete interest in spelling! She loves math, as long as it doesn't have anything to do with numbers. Math without numbers meaning she likes working with shapes, patterns, measurements, etc. Adding and subtracting and even the number line are of no interest to her. She loves science especially animal science. She is very inquisitive about the world around her. She will have you talk forever about how something is made or done. One thing that we have the biggest issue with is that she absolutely hates handwriting. She would be 100% content if all of her school work was done on the computer. I have tried everything from the magnadoddle, A salt trays, markers, crayons, pencils all different shapes and sizes, chalk, the dry erase...you name it - I tried it. She gets so dramatic when I ask her to practice her writing. A pen pal letter to Lyra or Angelina will take her a week to do because I have to fight with her to write more than one word.
Another elephant in the room is growing our family. It seems every direction we have turned there is a road block stopping us from going any further. We tried some basic fertility, neither one of us are real comfortable with the idea of heavy treatments or invitro. We decided to go the foster care route but it required almost 6months of classes that we could not attend because Jason now works afternoons. All classes are held in the evening, and both parent are required to attend. We recently looked into domestic infant adoption but I almost fell out of the desk chair from sticker shock. After hanging up the phone with the 5th agency and not hearing a number lower than $25k I was tore up inside trying to figure out what we were going to do. Last night I made my final attempt and only good thing I can say is that we are so far only encountering hurdles and not road blocks. My final attempt was contacting Cathy Harris from Ukrainian Angels. She is the one who guided us to Ukraine the first time and possibly now for a second time. Price wise, we are not looking at much more than what we spent 4 years ago. Do we have that money now? NO! but we didn't have it when we started our first adoption either. Jason and I talked about a plan and we think we can make it work but we are still a little hesitant. I never in my mind or heart thought I would be going back so mentally I am not prepared. And this time around the situation in Ukraine is a bit scarier. We adopted Olena under a "brand new" system, we walked into the SDA only weeks after reopening in 9 months...there were a back load of available children. For those of you who don't remember we were shown 5 profiles, all little girls under the age of 3, all "healthy". That was a rarity and not a typical appointment, but now a days it is even rarer...possibly even unheard of. Not to mention that they are adopting out and pushing sibling groups. From what I've heard lately, finding a single child under the age of 10 is tough.
Sadly through these rough 3 months I have veered away from the faith that I have so strongly been trying to build. I stopped reading the Bible, I stopped thinking about God (at least didn't think about him enough) and I very rarely prayed. That is very embarrassing to admit because this should have been the time that I relied on my faith the most. So I am back on the wagon and like I said at the beginning of the post I am slowly finding my way back. I started the Book of John over the weekend and much to my delight the scriptures are much more meaningful and "clearer" to me this time around.
Well I hope I didn't bombard you with too many negative thoughts, but I am back on the up swing and hope to start journaling/blogging more. It feels good to vent at the end of the day!
PS I am tired and don't feel like proof reading tonight so hopefully there were not too many rambling mistakes :)
Back in January, Jason started a new job which of course is an amazing blessing, but he was training on a shift that totally did not work for our family. He had to be at work at 6a and I work in the office 6:30a-930a so that meant I had a 3 hour block were someone needed to stay with Olena. You would think that 3 hours would be no big deal but when all of your family and friends live at least 30 minutes from your home and work, it is a problem. After several trial and error situations we ended up having my MIL stay with us during the week. We of course love having grammie around, but having a house guest for 5 weeks tends to put a kink in your daily routine. As of today he is finally on his normal afternoon schedule and things are finally looking a bit sunnier.
So are ready now? all because of this weak link in our chain the domino effect started and our whole family seemed to start falling apart.
Olena started acting out and acting out like a sassy 6 year old - daddy is not around as much grammie was here a lot, and mommy was stressed, so she made sure to try her best and take full advantage of the situation.
I was already struggling with her curriculum because the one I bought for this year was kindergarten but it ended up being too easy for her. For the last 3 months I have been using that curriculum as a guide while sitting on the Internet night after night digging for the first grade equivalents. My goal was to just wing it for a few weeks while I researched and purchased a 1st grade curriculum but due to the chaos and changes in our schedule I never had the motivation to look into it. Which ultimately made me stress out even more! We usually have school 4 days a week and because I was so drained we ended up decreasing to 3 days, which made me feel guilty, and did nothing more than put us that much further behind!!! :(
Before anyone yells at me, I finally bought a new one over the weekend and it should be here tomorrow!! YEAH!
On a good note, she loves to read and is pretty darn good at it. However, she has lost complete interest in spelling! She loves math, as long as it doesn't have anything to do with numbers. Math without numbers meaning she likes working with shapes, patterns, measurements, etc. Adding and subtracting and even the number line are of no interest to her. She loves science especially animal science. She is very inquisitive about the world around her. She will have you talk forever about how something is made or done. One thing that we have the biggest issue with is that she absolutely hates handwriting. She would be 100% content if all of her school work was done on the computer. I have tried everything from the magnadoddle, A salt trays, markers, crayons, pencils all different shapes and sizes, chalk, the dry erase...you name it - I tried it. She gets so dramatic when I ask her to practice her writing. A pen pal letter to Lyra or Angelina will take her a week to do because I have to fight with her to write more than one word.
Another elephant in the room is growing our family. It seems every direction we have turned there is a road block stopping us from going any further. We tried some basic fertility, neither one of us are real comfortable with the idea of heavy treatments or invitro. We decided to go the foster care route but it required almost 6months of classes that we could not attend because Jason now works afternoons. All classes are held in the evening, and both parent are required to attend. We recently looked into domestic infant adoption but I almost fell out of the desk chair from sticker shock. After hanging up the phone with the 5th agency and not hearing a number lower than $25k I was tore up inside trying to figure out what we were going to do. Last night I made my final attempt and only good thing I can say is that we are so far only encountering hurdles and not road blocks. My final attempt was contacting Cathy Harris from Ukrainian Angels. She is the one who guided us to Ukraine the first time and possibly now for a second time. Price wise, we are not looking at much more than what we spent 4 years ago. Do we have that money now? NO! but we didn't have it when we started our first adoption either. Jason and I talked about a plan and we think we can make it work but we are still a little hesitant. I never in my mind or heart thought I would be going back so mentally I am not prepared. And this time around the situation in Ukraine is a bit scarier. We adopted Olena under a "brand new" system, we walked into the SDA only weeks after reopening in 9 months...there were a back load of available children. For those of you who don't remember we were shown 5 profiles, all little girls under the age of 3, all "healthy". That was a rarity and not a typical appointment, but now a days it is even rarer...possibly even unheard of. Not to mention that they are adopting out and pushing sibling groups. From what I've heard lately, finding a single child under the age of 10 is tough.
Sadly through these rough 3 months I have veered away from the faith that I have so strongly been trying to build. I stopped reading the Bible, I stopped thinking about God (at least didn't think about him enough) and I very rarely prayed. That is very embarrassing to admit because this should have been the time that I relied on my faith the most. So I am back on the wagon and like I said at the beginning of the post I am slowly finding my way back. I started the Book of John over the weekend and much to my delight the scriptures are much more meaningful and "clearer" to me this time around.
Well I hope I didn't bombard you with too many negative thoughts, but I am back on the up swing and hope to start journaling/blogging more. It feels good to vent at the end of the day!
PS I am tired and don't feel like proof reading tonight so hopefully there were not too many rambling mistakes :)
Comments
Miss you guys so much and can't wait to see you!
We need to properly catch up soon!
Praying that things get easier....
Love ya!
Hang in there, Sister:).