Reality of the hurt adoptee

A local magazine, Family Times, interviewed me in September about older child adoption. One of the issues I spoke about was when people tell my children that they “have a new life now” or that what happened to them is “in the past”. I couldn’t disagree more. It’s still the same life, just a new chapter in it.What happened in their earlier years are part of who they are today, not just in...

the experts speak

What do the experts think of homeschooling/unschooling?I decided to ask three of them and share their thoughts. The first one is Cimion, age 13. After 7 years of being in public school, he has been enjoying homeschooling for the last 10 months. I questioned him while he was on his way outside to jump on the trampoline. and this is what he had to say about why he likes being home. 1. I don’t have to do homework after...

Day Eighteen

Buono Natale! (Merry Christmas!) Last night we had family over for Christmas Eve. It’s become a tradition, we go there for Thanksgiving and they come here for Christmas Eve. We exchanged gifts, hung out and ate. + My friend gave me a really nice water fountain with a spinning ball on it. I’ve already decided how I’m going to put in in the living room. The holidays are getting better and better each year as...

Day Seventeen

Jacqueline went to Brownies last night. I actually forgot all about it and she reminded me 10 minutes before she had to be there! Good thing it’s only 2 minutes away. The whole troop went caroling around the neighborhood. Jacqueline of course loves it! She loves singing and is really quite good! After that they had a Christmas party. I made an appointment for Cimion to be looked at by a modeling agency. I happen to see...

Links we like

A bunch of sites we like to visit: Jacqueline (7 years old)artpad.comBetween the LionsstorylineGame GooBarbie Shawna (10 years old)CyberchaseMy SceneSpiritHarry Potter Cimion (age 13)Yu-Gi-OhFunologyNeed For Spped Game GuideYuckiest Sites on the InternetOverhaulin’ Joanne (mom)GodsmackHard RadioSpirituality & Health Billy (dad)NascarHoward Stern Share...

Shawna’s med change

Part One: It’s been 3 weeks since we took Shawna off Adderall and we’re so happy with the way things have been going. When we adopted her she was on 4 different medications (for ADHD, depression, allergies & asthma) and we now have her down to two (wellbutrin for depression/anger and advair for asthma) I think we’ll be taking her off the advair soon also. When she was in foster care, one of the parents...

Day Fourteen

We’ve been really busy getting ready for Christmas! Billy decorated the outside the other day and it looks so nice! We actually have more outside lights that he didn’t put on because he didn’t have time. Our tree is up and this is the little guy’s last Christmas. We need a bigger tree! We decided to use this tree outside next year and string popcorn for the birds on it. I think I finished all the...

Christmas get together

We had a Christmas get together today with my childrens former foster parents, their current four foster children family, their former foster brother (from the same foster house) and his parents. We’ve been doing this since our children came home to us. This was my childrens longest (3 years) and last foster home right before we adopted them. They’re very nice people and we enjoy seeing them. They loved and cared...

Racial stereotyping

Something happened the other day that really angered me… In the past, I’ve noticed that black women tend to…how can I put this…try and align themselves with Jacqueline…try to show some sort of connection to her just because of her skin color. I’m not sure if I’m explaining it right. The reason I notice it is because they don’t do it with Cimion (also biracial). It’s...

Star Banner article

Back in July, I was interviewed by a newspaper about adoption. It was set up by the agency we adopted them. They needed a “feel good” article. Article published Jul 10, 2005Three adopted children enjoy new life, parents Joanne and her husband Billy wanted children, but Joanne was in her 30s when they married and did not want to go through a slew of immediate pregnancies.So, they began looking into adopting. When...