Fortunately no tornadoes on us. Phew.
The college has an old air-raid siren they blow for severe weather. We can hear it from our house. How cool is that?
I was working on a post about what we did a couple weeks ago now when the first round of tornadoes came through. The power was out for over a day, so we went shopping in that town across the state line that we haven't had time to check out before. Y'know, Tuscaloosa? Turns out everyone else in all the little towns in that part of Alabama and Mississippi who's power was out also went there. And the Crimson Tide was hosting A-Day, a free end-of-spring-practice football game for their diehard fans, and they have a multitude of diehard fans. So the town was choked with people and we never made it to either mall, although we did check out some antique and thrift stores on Skyline Boulevard.
We didn't go to Tuscaloosa after this round of storms. The tornadoes got their first. One tornado flattened one mall, another tornado flattened the other mall. IDK what happened to Skyline Boulevard yet.
Our friends seem to be all right, except an elderly lady we know broke her hip trying to assist at a house fire during the first set of storms. She was just being wheeled out of surgery and back to her rooms when the second set of storms knocked out the power at her hospital.
There's whole swathes of land around us that's been clear-cut by tornadoes, and a lot of houses missing roofs. Dh is worried people will leave rather than rebuild. I think it depends on whether the businesses rebuild first. No job + no house = no reason to stay. We'll see.
Friday, April 29, 2011
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Tonight for supper I made a sandwich of fresh hot meatloaf and King Arthur Onion Buns. Wasn't sure how they would come out. Took one bite and
oh
my
word.
BEST SANDWICH EVER! Y'know that "one bite and you're transported to a state of bliss" experience? I've never had that with a savory before tonight. I'll definitely make those again. In fact, I may be lynched if I don't.
oh
my
word.
BEST SANDWICH EVER! Y'know that "one bite and you're transported to a state of bliss" experience? I've never had that with a savory before tonight. I'll definitely make those again. In fact, I may be lynched if I don't.
Monday, April 11, 2011
The New House
The realtor sighed glumly. "I won't lie to you. The location is wonderful. The site is wonderful. But the house is horrible." He didn't add, "And the seller is erratic." He didn't need to, that's why he was there.
After three months of searching five counties for a house, it was clear that this 1920s cottage for sale by owner was the best for us. It was near the campus. Years ago it had been a private day care center, so it had once been child-friendly. But the current owners had painted it atrocious colors inside and out, tore down the second story off the two-story garage, planted cacti around the house, and collected vicious feral dogs that terrorized the neighborhood until the neighbors bought them an electric fence. The roof was sagging, the cabinets were falling off the walls, the trim work was less than half done (and in some cases had been stopped in the middle of a door) and mad-dog-chewed, and the owner broke the floor by stepping in the middle of the kitchen while showing us the house. For this the owner wanted 50% above the market value, as is, no inspections, no appraisals, we wouldn't even get to see the backyard because of the dogs. Or maybe she wouldn't sell it to us, she kept changing her story. After a few weeks of going nowhere we brought in our own realtor to handle the negotiations.
And all this while we were in the middle of dealing with the harassment issues.
The realtor walked the seller through the inspection and appraisal process, where we found out that the wiring and the plumbing had been messed up but the foundation and the walls were sound. Magically the price dropped to just over market value, although she tried to leave us us the feral dogs.
The worst of the repairs are done, and we've started on the renovations. Normally in regard to houses we're pretty laid back, "we'll just live with it" kind of people. We don't tear out carpets just because we dislike the color or some such, but in this case there's been so much half-done DIY and bad DIY we feel the need to replace it with good DIY. We're working on the kitchen cabinets now, with more to come.
After three months of searching five counties for a house, it was clear that this 1920s cottage for sale by owner was the best for us. It was near the campus. Years ago it had been a private day care center, so it had once been child-friendly. But the current owners had painted it atrocious colors inside and out, tore down the second story off the two-story garage, planted cacti around the house, and collected vicious feral dogs that terrorized the neighborhood until the neighbors bought them an electric fence. The roof was sagging, the cabinets were falling off the walls, the trim work was less than half done (and in some cases had been stopped in the middle of a door) and mad-dog-chewed, and the owner broke the floor by stepping in the middle of the kitchen while showing us the house. For this the owner wanted 50% above the market value, as is, no inspections, no appraisals, we wouldn't even get to see the backyard because of the dogs. Or maybe she wouldn't sell it to us, she kept changing her story. After a few weeks of going nowhere we brought in our own realtor to handle the negotiations.
And all this while we were in the middle of dealing with the harassment issues.
The realtor walked the seller through the inspection and appraisal process, where we found out that the wiring and the plumbing had been messed up but the foundation and the walls were sound. Magically the price dropped to just over market value, although she tried to leave us us the feral dogs.
The worst of the repairs are done, and we've started on the renovations. Normally in regard to houses we're pretty laid back, "we'll just live with it" kind of people. We don't tear out carpets just because we dislike the color or some such, but in this case there's been so much half-done DIY and bad DIY we feel the need to replace it with good DIY. We're working on the kitchen cabinets now, with more to come.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Why Don't These Things Come With Locks? Or Even Doors?
Open plan kitchen vs. toddler.
The toddler always wins.
Always.
The toddler always wins.
Always.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
When Hell Came to Our Home Update February 26
Master Post
Sorry to be late. We've been busy getting moved.
After we met with Choctaw County DHS on Wednesday, December 15 we prepared to move into the new house. Unfortunately the sellers had "issues" that we were still dealing with (Good grief, the post I'll write on them when I get the time!), one of those issues being a pack of huge, vicious attack dogs even they couldn't handle anymore that they were trying to leave behind for us to deal with. Long story short, we were almost another week getting moved in. During that time something or someone killed our chickens and ducks where they were being temporarily held. So out of around 30 animals we had when this mess started, we were down to one dog.
Also during that week we got revised forms from Chickasaw County DHS (not Choctaw County DHS). I'd quote from our copies of them but they got misplaced during the move so I'll have to paraphrase off the top of my head. The only parts that were changed were the descriptions of us. Post-psychological evaluation, everything negative had been stripped from my copy, but they had added in that I "refused to acknowledge my problems." What these problems were they no longer said, and if they had it would have contradicted the shrink who has previously shown no compunction for tearing them apart in court. My husband's copy had two statements next to each other that contradicted each other, one praising him for being good at something and the next saying he was bad at it. That faux pas pissed him off quite a bit. It also lists one party as being Anna Warren, not Anna Brock, and doesn't say if she's a supervisor or not. But nowhere on their was Natasha Ivory's signature. Our lawyer got on to her, and says she's signed it since then and the case is officially closed.
Choctaw County DHS promised us copies of the pictures they that were in our file, then changed their mind and said they wanted nothing whatsoever to do with our case.
That is supposedly the end of the legal harassment. There are still some loose ends hanging, but I'll talk more about them later.
As I said in my last post, we went back to the old house to retrieve some things. There were plenty of signs that people had been on the property, including human feces by the back door, but no one bothered us while we were there
We're past the initial move, but not fully moved in. The house still needs the kitchen, the den, one bathroom, and a lot of external work finished. It is minimally furnished while we build the kitchen cabinets (on site from scratch, not prefabs, the room isn't square enough) and scrounge up a panel truck to move some more of our stuff.
I guess it should feel like victory. Instead it feels like a tornado has uprooted us and set us down elsewhere, doing major damage in the process. We've been running on adrenaline for months while our emotions were on hold. Now the feelings are starting to catch up with us, and it's not fun. We want to just scream and cry, but we don't want to upset the children. At least we've got things to build and cook and clean to take it out on.
And we still don't know what was really behind this whole mess, so we don't know if it's really over or if it's just this round that's over.
Anyway, it's time to get back to my Regularly Scheduled Life (TM). I'm putting a tag on these posts ("harassment") if anyone wants to just subscribe to those, and posting about other things again. Thanks to everyone who provided advice and moral support through all this. The ideas y'all had about the video camera and the lawyer did the trick. I don't want to think about what we would have done without you.
Sorry to be late. We've been busy getting moved.
After we met with Choctaw County DHS on Wednesday, December 15 we prepared to move into the new house. Unfortunately the sellers had "issues" that we were still dealing with (Good grief, the post I'll write on them when I get the time!), one of those issues being a pack of huge, vicious attack dogs even they couldn't handle anymore that they were trying to leave behind for us to deal with. Long story short, we were almost another week getting moved in. During that time something or someone killed our chickens and ducks where they were being temporarily held. So out of around 30 animals we had when this mess started, we were down to one dog.
Also during that week we got revised forms from Chickasaw County DHS (not Choctaw County DHS). I'd quote from our copies of them but they got misplaced during the move so I'll have to paraphrase off the top of my head. The only parts that were changed were the descriptions of us. Post-psychological evaluation, everything negative had been stripped from my copy, but they had added in that I "refused to acknowledge my problems." What these problems were they no longer said, and if they had it would have contradicted the shrink who has previously shown no compunction for tearing them apart in court. My husband's copy had two statements next to each other that contradicted each other, one praising him for being good at something and the next saying he was bad at it. That faux pas pissed him off quite a bit. It also lists one party as being Anna Warren, not Anna Brock, and doesn't say if she's a supervisor or not. But nowhere on their was Natasha Ivory's signature. Our lawyer got on to her, and says she's signed it since then and the case is officially closed.
Choctaw County DHS promised us copies of the pictures they that were in our file, then changed their mind and said they wanted nothing whatsoever to do with our case.
That is supposedly the end of the legal harassment. There are still some loose ends hanging, but I'll talk more about them later.
As I said in my last post, we went back to the old house to retrieve some things. There were plenty of signs that people had been on the property, including human feces by the back door, but no one bothered us while we were there
We're past the initial move, but not fully moved in. The house still needs the kitchen, the den, one bathroom, and a lot of external work finished. It is minimally furnished while we build the kitchen cabinets (on site from scratch, not prefabs, the room isn't square enough) and scrounge up a panel truck to move some more of our stuff.
I guess it should feel like victory. Instead it feels like a tornado has uprooted us and set us down elsewhere, doing major damage in the process. We've been running on adrenaline for months while our emotions were on hold. Now the feelings are starting to catch up with us, and it's not fun. We want to just scream and cry, but we don't want to upset the children. At least we've got things to build and cook and clean to take it out on.
And we still don't know what was really behind this whole mess, so we don't know if it's really over or if it's just this round that's over.
Anyway, it's time to get back to my Regularly Scheduled Life (TM). I'm putting a tag on these posts ("harassment") if anyone wants to just subscribe to those, and posting about other things again. Thanks to everyone who provided advice and moral support through all this. The ideas y'all had about the video camera and the lawyer did the trick. I don't want to think about what we would have done without you.
Monday, January 17, 2011
When Hell Came to Our Home Update January 17
Master Post
We've been really busy getting moved into the new house, but I'm back at the old house today. Some unkind soul turned off our outdoor water faucet so it burst in the freeze. We dealt with it, added more locks to the house, and for the first time since October spent the night.
It was Psychologically Necessary In the Long Term (TM), but I hated every minute of it. And I hated that I hated sleeping in my own house. And -- you get the picture.
There's a little more that's happened with DHS, but I'm not really in any shape to blog about it today. Another month should not slide by before I post again.
We've been really busy getting moved into the new house, but I'm back at the old house today. Some unkind soul turned off our outdoor water faucet so it burst in the freeze. We dealt with it, added more locks to the house, and for the first time since October spent the night.
It was Psychologically Necessary In the Long Term (TM), but I hated every minute of it. And I hated that I hated sleeping in my own house. And -- you get the picture.
There's a little more that's happened with DHS, but I'm not really in any shape to blog about it today. Another month should not slide by before I post again.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update December 18
Master Post
We're back at the Okolona house with the children for the first time since our house was broken into, doing a last email download before changing over the phone. If you've emailed me recently, please be patient. It's going to take me a while to go through that mess.
Friday December 10 -- We met with the new lawyer and went over the case. She was thrilled that we were buying a house. She showed us the official notice from the psychologist that I was Certified Sane and Not a Danger to Children *TM* (And don't y'all forget it! :P) The only remaining issues we all could find were my middle child's dental records and verification that we weren't living in Chickasaw county anymore. We'd filed a change of address to Choctaw county, where we were staying with a relative, and both lawyers had informed Chickasaw county DHS of that, but when we'd stopped by Choctaw county DHS they'd never heard of the case.
Our lawyer had no idea if we were going to be in Youth Court Friday December 17. She said Chickasaw County DHS didn't bother sending out summons to anyone! All she had was Natasha Ivory asking her, "Are you doing anything Friday?"
Lawyer: "Is there something I need to do Thursday?"
Natasha Ivory: *silence*
Personally I think that's grounds for a lawsuit right there, but first thing's first.
Sunday December 12 -- The seller finally agrees to sell the house for the appraised value (instead of the ridiculously high figure they were holding out for, but that's a story for later.) The bank needs two days to process the last remaining paperwork, and we agree to meet on the morning of Wednesday December 15, the last day all the requisite lawyers and officials can be rounded up before sometime in January (which would do us out of a year's worth of Homestead Exemption.) We're hoping this clears before Friday's Youth Court deadline, which we still have no confirmation about.
Tuesday December 14 -- While we're out buying kitchen wares for the new house, the manager of Choctaw County DHS visit's our relative's house. She says she'll be back to check on us tomorrow morning -- at the exact time we need to be at the bank buying the house over an hour and a half's drive away! But we've got to have this confirmation tomorrow to avoid Friday's Youth Court hearing! We put her off until the afternoon, which is when we're already scheduled to meet with both sets of subcontractors to discuss the renovations. Nobody sleeps well that night.
Wednesday December 15 -- We get up early, go to the bank, sign the papers and take possession of the house, then fly back to Choctaw County to meet the manager of Choctaw County DHS.
2:30 she arrives. I'll have to look up the spelling of her name as I can't remember it offhand. She was nice and professional, and had trouble reconciling DHS Standard Operating Procedure with what has happened in our case.
"What have you worked on in your Family Team Meetings?"
"What's that? We've only heard that term once before."
"What do you want to work on in your Family Team Meetings?"
************** "We want the case closed."
She did note that we'd met all the points that had been presented. She kept wanting to see our updated Individual Service Plan, the one with the vaccination information on it. We showed her the only ISP we had (which doesn't mention vaccinations), and told her that Chickasaw County had refused our repeated requests to clarify and update the original ISP. Apparently there is an updated one we haven't seen, though, because she appeared to have seen one that does mention vaccinations. Interesting.
(We have a family history of allergic reactions to vaccinations, and are delaying the children's vaccinations until they turn 12 so they'll be big enough to handle an adverse reaction should one occur.)
She kept asking when the pictures were taken of our house for the DHS.
"We never allowed pictures to be taken of our house for the DHS. If there are any pictures they were obtained illegally."
She shut up about the pictures. So apparently there are pictures which were taken during a break-in in our DHS file. Interesting.
She took pictures of our relative's house (which pleased our relative none at all), and then my husband had to fly our to meet the subcontractors. She tried to talk to our daughters privately, but they refused to talk. Finally she told them, "We're going to get this resolved so you can get back to being kids. No kid should have to go through this."
She asked very politely if, after all this was over with, I would delete the video of her from my camera as she hated being videoed.
Before she left I asked her to verify our Youth Court appearance. She called and told me we were scheduled to appear in Chickasaw County Youth Court at the Courthouse Friday December 17 at 9:30 am.
9:30 am! Shit!
Wait a minute. Chickasaw is a spit county (has two county seats half an hour's drive apart for historical and geographic reasons). Did she mean the Houston Courthouse or the Okolona Courthouse?
She called back. It was the Okolona Courthouse.
*deep breath* Okay. I thanked her gratefully for clarifying that, said goodbye to her, and set about figuring out what to do next.
A few minutes later I was told that she was back. She said that she'd been called back and that it was really the Houston Courthouse.
Houston, Okolona, which was it? If we guessed wrong we'd automatically be in contempt of court!
"Anna's assistant said Houston. I'll called Anna back to verify."
"Wait, who's Anna?"
"Anna Brook is the manager of Chickasaw County DHS," she said absently while dialing her cellphone.
"Oh thank you!" I said, so thrilled I was ready to jump up and down (also so cold, as I'd come out without my coat.) "We've been trying for months to find out who the supervisor is! Not even our lawyers could find that out!"
"She stared at me, then asked for verification. She said Chickasaw County was supposed to call her right back with the information.
We waited for 10 minutes while she glared at the phone and I shivered. Then she told he that she would find out the exact location and type it up on a Choctaw County DHS letterhead and leave it at her office for us to pick up in the morning. I said goodbye to her again, not expecting to see her anytime soon.
At 6:30 that night she showed back up at our door, handed me a piece of paper, and said, "This should take care of things. Remember our agreement." Then she left.
I opened the paper. It was a letter from her stated that after consulting with Anna Brook, manager of Chickasaw County DHS, we had met all their points and our case was closed. There were no scheduled court appearances for us anywhere. I'll post the letter later.
Everyone is thrilled!
Still, my husband and I are waiting for the next shoe to drop.
Lest anyone reading this wonder how any county could be so corrupt, here's last week's headline: Chickasaw jailer arrested for selling drugs to inmates.
We're back at the Okolona house with the children for the first time since our house was broken into, doing a last email download before changing over the phone. If you've emailed me recently, please be patient. It's going to take me a while to go through that mess.
Friday December 10 -- We met with the new lawyer and went over the case. She was thrilled that we were buying a house. She showed us the official notice from the psychologist that I was Certified Sane and Not a Danger to Children *TM* (And don't y'all forget it! :P) The only remaining issues we all could find were my middle child's dental records and verification that we weren't living in Chickasaw county anymore. We'd filed a change of address to Choctaw county, where we were staying with a relative, and both lawyers had informed Chickasaw county DHS of that, but when we'd stopped by Choctaw county DHS they'd never heard of the case.
Our lawyer had no idea if we were going to be in Youth Court Friday December 17. She said Chickasaw County DHS didn't bother sending out summons to anyone! All she had was Natasha Ivory asking her, "Are you doing anything Friday?"
Lawyer: "Is there something I need to do Thursday?"
Natasha Ivory: *silence*
Personally I think that's grounds for a lawsuit right there, but first thing's first.
Sunday December 12 -- The seller finally agrees to sell the house for the appraised value (instead of the ridiculously high figure they were holding out for, but that's a story for later.) The bank needs two days to process the last remaining paperwork, and we agree to meet on the morning of Wednesday December 15, the last day all the requisite lawyers and officials can be rounded up before sometime in January (which would do us out of a year's worth of Homestead Exemption.) We're hoping this clears before Friday's Youth Court deadline, which we still have no confirmation about.
Tuesday December 14 -- While we're out buying kitchen wares for the new house, the manager of Choctaw County DHS visit's our relative's house. She says she'll be back to check on us tomorrow morning -- at the exact time we need to be at the bank buying the house over an hour and a half's drive away! But we've got to have this confirmation tomorrow to avoid Friday's Youth Court hearing! We put her off until the afternoon, which is when we're already scheduled to meet with both sets of subcontractors to discuss the renovations. Nobody sleeps well that night.
Wednesday December 15 -- We get up early, go to the bank, sign the papers and take possession of the house, then fly back to Choctaw County to meet the manager of Choctaw County DHS.
2:30 she arrives. I'll have to look up the spelling of her name as I can't remember it offhand. She was nice and professional, and had trouble reconciling DHS Standard Operating Procedure with what has happened in our case.
"What have you worked on in your Family Team Meetings?"
"What's that? We've only heard that term once before."
"What do you want to work on in your Family Team Meetings?"
************** "We want the case closed."
She did note that we'd met all the points that had been presented. She kept wanting to see our updated Individual Service Plan, the one with the vaccination information on it. We showed her the only ISP we had (which doesn't mention vaccinations), and told her that Chickasaw County had refused our repeated requests to clarify and update the original ISP. Apparently there is an updated one we haven't seen, though, because she appeared to have seen one that does mention vaccinations. Interesting.
(We have a family history of allergic reactions to vaccinations, and are delaying the children's vaccinations until they turn 12 so they'll be big enough to handle an adverse reaction should one occur.)
She kept asking when the pictures were taken of our house for the DHS.
"We never allowed pictures to be taken of our house for the DHS. If there are any pictures they were obtained illegally."
She shut up about the pictures. So apparently there are pictures which were taken during a break-in in our DHS file. Interesting.
She took pictures of our relative's house (which pleased our relative none at all), and then my husband had to fly our to meet the subcontractors. She tried to talk to our daughters privately, but they refused to talk. Finally she told them, "We're going to get this resolved so you can get back to being kids. No kid should have to go through this."
She asked very politely if, after all this was over with, I would delete the video of her from my camera as she hated being videoed.
Before she left I asked her to verify our Youth Court appearance. She called and told me we were scheduled to appear in Chickasaw County Youth Court at the Courthouse Friday December 17 at 9:30 am.
9:30 am! Shit!
Wait a minute. Chickasaw is a spit county (has two county seats half an hour's drive apart for historical and geographic reasons). Did she mean the Houston Courthouse or the Okolona Courthouse?
She called back. It was the Okolona Courthouse.
*deep breath* Okay. I thanked her gratefully for clarifying that, said goodbye to her, and set about figuring out what to do next.
A few minutes later I was told that she was back. She said that she'd been called back and that it was really the Houston Courthouse.
Houston, Okolona, which was it? If we guessed wrong we'd automatically be in contempt of court!
"Anna's assistant said Houston. I'll called Anna back to verify."
"Wait, who's Anna?"
"Anna Brook is the manager of Chickasaw County DHS," she said absently while dialing her cellphone.
"Oh thank you!" I said, so thrilled I was ready to jump up and down (also so cold, as I'd come out without my coat.) "We've been trying for months to find out who the supervisor is! Not even our lawyers could find that out!"
"She stared at me, then asked for verification. She said Chickasaw County was supposed to call her right back with the information.
We waited for 10 minutes while she glared at the phone and I shivered. Then she told he that she would find out the exact location and type it up on a Choctaw County DHS letterhead and leave it at her office for us to pick up in the morning. I said goodbye to her again, not expecting to see her anytime soon.
At 6:30 that night she showed back up at our door, handed me a piece of paper, and said, "This should take care of things. Remember our agreement." Then she left.
I opened the paper. It was a letter from her stated that after consulting with Anna Brook, manager of Chickasaw County DHS, we had met all their points and our case was closed. There were no scheduled court appearances for us anywhere. I'll post the letter later.
Everyone is thrilled!
Still, my husband and I are waiting for the next shoe to drop.
Lest anyone reading this wonder how any county could be so corrupt, here's last week's headline: Chickasaw jailer arrested for selling drugs to inmates.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update December 16
Master Post
Bought the house. Renovations begin Monday. Current move-in date is in two weeks.
DHS case may be resolved. More details Saturday.
Bought the house. Renovations begin Monday. Current move-in date is in two weeks.
DHS case may be resolved. More details Saturday.
Thursday, December 09, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home, Update December 9
Master Post
Both our lawyers have informed DHS of our official change of address.
Natasha Ivory has said that we'll be summoned to appear before Youth Court on December 17 (it meets once a month), but we haven't been given an official summons yet. I'll quote from the lawyer's email as to the reason:
She indicated that you have not signed the service agreements or the rights and responsiblities. Ms. Ivory indicated that your service agreement has not changed. She indicated that Gene asked them to provide additional information regarding the agreement but did not inform them of specific questions. The service agreement must be signed. It is indicating that you understand and agree to work with DHS to achieve your goals/objectives.
Those of you who've seen the video know that we repeatedly asked for specific additional information which we never recieved, and which they promised ON TAPE to provide us in writing.
Our psychologist has finished my sanity assessment and faxed it in. The children have been medically examined and gotten clean bills of health; a letter to that effect should be ready Monday.
The preliminary paperwork is finished on our buying a house, and the final negotiations are about to begin. It'll need about a week's worth of renovations after the purchase is finalized. (There's isn't a "move-in ready" house in five counties. We looked.)
That's what passes for good news.
We've been talking with the Mississippi Bureau of Investigations. After stalling us for weeks, they finally said that due to budgetary constraints all property cases without a "smoking gun" piece of evidence attached to them when they come in the door are being given low priority. This was in spite of the fact that the number of property cases had gone through the roof during the recession. Everyone who voted to cut government spending, thanks for nothing.
Tomorrow we have a meeting with our lawyer to discuss matters.
Both our lawyers have informed DHS of our official change of address.
Natasha Ivory has said that we'll be summoned to appear before Youth Court on December 17 (it meets once a month), but we haven't been given an official summons yet. I'll quote from the lawyer's email as to the reason:
She indicated that you have not signed the service agreements or the rights and responsiblities. Ms. Ivory indicated that your service agreement has not changed. She indicated that Gene asked them to provide additional information regarding the agreement but did not inform them of specific questions. The service agreement must be signed. It is indicating that you understand and agree to work with DHS to achieve your goals/objectives.
Those of you who've seen the video know that we repeatedly asked for specific additional information which we never recieved, and which they promised ON TAPE to provide us in writing.
Our psychologist has finished my sanity assessment and faxed it in. The children have been medically examined and gotten clean bills of health; a letter to that effect should be ready Monday.
The preliminary paperwork is finished on our buying a house, and the final negotiations are about to begin. It'll need about a week's worth of renovations after the purchase is finalized. (There's isn't a "move-in ready" house in five counties. We looked.)
That's what passes for good news.
We've been talking with the Mississippi Bureau of Investigations. After stalling us for weeks, they finally said that due to budgetary constraints all property cases without a "smoking gun" piece of evidence attached to them when they come in the door are being given low priority. This was in spite of the fact that the number of property cases had gone through the roof during the recession. Everyone who voted to cut government spending, thanks for nothing.
Tomorrow we have a meeting with our lawyer to discuss matters.
When Hell Came to Our Home Update December 4
Master Post
We have new mailing addresses. We're staying with a relative in Choctaw county and using her address for our personal mail, and we've got a PO Box for our business mail.
DHS refused to believe that our new lawyer was our new lawyer without paperwork, which they delayed mailing to us at our new address so we could sign. We hand-delivered it yesterday. They didn't like seeing it back.
The new lawyer informed DHS that according to Mississippi law, NO agency has the right to monitor homeschoolers. They didn't like hearing that either.
The next part gets really weird. Our old lawyer was emailing us every day insisting that we tell him where we were staying every single day and night, apparently at the behest of DHS who wanted a continuous update on our E911 address. We refused. Our new lawyer is perplexed by our old lawyer's behavior, since even convicted felons don't have to report in that often. Then they insisted we give them a mailing address. We gave them our new PO address, but they refused to accept it. We gave them our relative's address in Choctaw County, but they refused to accept that either, insisting that we were still living in our house in Chickasaw County.
West Chickasaw County DHS insisted that we take the children by Chocktaw County DHS at the beginning of the month so they could see them. We went Thursday, but Choctaw county DHS had never heard of us and couldn't wrap their brain around why West Chickaway County DHS would insist that children who weren't even living in Chickasaw county report back to Chickasaw county once a month. When they called West Chickasaw County DHS, they were told to tell us to bring the children up to Okolona on Friday.
Friday we drove the children 90 miles both ways just so West Chickasaw County DHS could see them, but when we got there they ignored the kids and focused on me. Their only question was had I gotten the mental assessment done?
Then they announced that they were taking us to Youth Court on December17 for not providing them with a mailing address. When we told them they had our new address, they refused to believe it was valid. We don't understand this, and neither does our lawyer.
There's been this weird dichotomy since the beginning. At first they were urging us to go on and move out of the county, so they "wouldn't have to take us before the judge". Now they're threatening to take us before the judge for moving out of the county. Nobody we've talked to understands this.
Here's the Election Day video on youtube.
Part 1
Part 2
It's 19 minutes broken into two parts. I apologize if it's crude, but we did the best we could at the moment. It gets hard to see and hear when they speak to our children (for their privacy) but it gets really interesting after that.
We have new mailing addresses. We're staying with a relative in Choctaw county and using her address for our personal mail, and we've got a PO Box for our business mail.
DHS refused to believe that our new lawyer was our new lawyer without paperwork, which they delayed mailing to us at our new address so we could sign. We hand-delivered it yesterday. They didn't like seeing it back.
The new lawyer informed DHS that according to Mississippi law, NO agency has the right to monitor homeschoolers. They didn't like hearing that either.
The next part gets really weird. Our old lawyer was emailing us every day insisting that we tell him where we were staying every single day and night, apparently at the behest of DHS who wanted a continuous update on our E911 address. We refused. Our new lawyer is perplexed by our old lawyer's behavior, since even convicted felons don't have to report in that often. Then they insisted we give them a mailing address. We gave them our new PO address, but they refused to accept it. We gave them our relative's address in Choctaw County, but they refused to accept that either, insisting that we were still living in our house in Chickasaw County.
West Chickasaw County DHS insisted that we take the children by Chocktaw County DHS at the beginning of the month so they could see them. We went Thursday, but Choctaw county DHS had never heard of us and couldn't wrap their brain around why West Chickaway County DHS would insist that children who weren't even living in Chickasaw county report back to Chickasaw county once a month. When they called West Chickasaw County DHS, they were told to tell us to bring the children up to Okolona on Friday.
Friday we drove the children 90 miles both ways just so West Chickasaw County DHS could see them, but when we got there they ignored the kids and focused on me. Their only question was had I gotten the mental assessment done?
Then they announced that they were taking us to Youth Court on December17 for not providing them with a mailing address. When we told them they had our new address, they refused to believe it was valid. We don't understand this, and neither does our lawyer.
There's been this weird dichotomy since the beginning. At first they were urging us to go on and move out of the county, so they "wouldn't have to take us before the judge". Now they're threatening to take us before the judge for moving out of the county. Nobody we've talked to understands this.
Here's the Election Day video on youtube.
Part 1
Part 2
It's 19 minutes broken into two parts. I apologize if it's crude, but we did the best we could at the moment. It gets hard to see and hear when they speak to our children (for their privacy) but it gets really interesting after that.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update November 28
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Thanksgiving has come and gone, and we made do okay.
I filled out two more personal assessments for the psychologist and a Maternal Discipline short-answer test. ("Your child has broken a lamp and lied to you about it. What do you do?" "I don't have any lamps. Everything breakable is in storage. This is why.")
The new lawyer sent a certified letter to East Chickasaw DHS, and hasn't heard back from them. I'm told that from a legal standpoint this is a Good Thing for some reason, but it doesn't feel that way.
We've taken steps toward changing our legal address and buying a house.
Our dogs escaped from our friend's house, and we had to go find them. We found our older daughter's Australian Silky Terrier, but our younger daughter's Lhasa Apso has vanished. I so wanted to scoop them up and take them back with us, but we can't. And there's no way we can explain to them why the humans that love them aren't there to take care of them anymore, and won't be for weeks at least.
ETA: DHS wants to see the children at the first of every month. Since we're not living up there now I expect to here from them next week that I've gone insane and murdered the kids -- again. They've used that same excuse twice before to see them.
Thanksgiving has come and gone, and we made do okay.
I filled out two more personal assessments for the psychologist and a Maternal Discipline short-answer test. ("Your child has broken a lamp and lied to you about it. What do you do?" "I don't have any lamps. Everything breakable is in storage. This is why.")
The new lawyer sent a certified letter to East Chickasaw DHS, and hasn't heard back from them. I'm told that from a legal standpoint this is a Good Thing for some reason, but it doesn't feel that way.
We've taken steps toward changing our legal address and buying a house.
Our dogs escaped from our friend's house, and we had to go find them. We found our older daughter's Australian Silky Terrier, but our younger daughter's Lhasa Apso has vanished. I so wanted to scoop them up and take them back with us, but we can't. And there's no way we can explain to them why the humans that love them aren't there to take care of them anymore, and won't be for weeks at least.
ETA: DHS wants to see the children at the first of every month. Since we're not living up there now I expect to here from them next week that I've gone insane and murdered the kids -- again. They've used that same excuse twice before to see them.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update November 23
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Making a flying visit to the house for food and warm clothes -- the weather is starting to turn nippy. Got an MMPA(?) I think the "M-something Multi-Phasic Assessment" today so I can be Certified Sane(TM). Took care of some details concerning buying and moving into the new house. My husband says Bozo just got back so I don't have time to post details. Gotta leave in five minutes.
Found an email at this address from our lawyer saying that the DHS workers we saw in the video on Election Night called him up and complained that we "talked to fast". Oh boo hoo!
Oh, thanks to those of you who offered to donate money, but we haven't needed it. As I mentioned in my homeschooling blog intro post, we've been tigthwads for over 20 years and debt free most of that time. This "adventure" has been exhausting and infuriating, but not financially catastrophic. What we need are advice, moral support, and contacts for lawyers and media who might be interested in our case. Thanks to those of you who've given us that. I don't know what we'd do without you!
ETA1 - Our animal-minder quit, so we moved the dogs, chickens, and ducks to a friend's house. At least they're not up here anymore.
ETA2 - A poster here offered to edit the video and post it on Youtube. Check back for more details.
Making a flying visit to the house for food and warm clothes -- the weather is starting to turn nippy. Got an MMPA(?) I think the "M-something Multi-Phasic Assessment" today so I can be Certified Sane(TM). Took care of some details concerning buying and moving into the new house. My husband says Bozo just got back so I don't have time to post details. Gotta leave in five minutes.
Found an email at this address from our lawyer saying that the DHS workers we saw in the video on Election Night called him up and complained that we "talked to fast". Oh boo hoo!
Oh, thanks to those of you who offered to donate money, but we haven't needed it. As I mentioned in my homeschooling blog intro post, we've been tigthwads for over 20 years and debt free most of that time. This "adventure" has been exhausting and infuriating, but not financially catastrophic. What we need are advice, moral support, and contacts for lawyers and media who might be interested in our case. Thanks to those of you who've given us that. I don't know what we'd do without you!
ETA1 - Our animal-minder quit, so we moved the dogs, chickens, and ducks to a friend's house. At least they're not up here anymore.
ETA2 - A poster here offered to edit the video and post it on Youtube. Check back for more details.
Friday, November 19, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home November 19 Update
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I'm a bit behind on my updates here.
November 13
Sorry to be away so long. I haven't had access to a computer since my last post.
Got a new lawyer who has experience with DHS. Got a respected psychologist who says I'm not crazy -- one of DHS's claims is that I'm too nuts to look after the kids, even though there's no evidence to support that. (According to the shrink we're totally outside the DHS's usual client base, and they don't know what to do with us.) Other counselors have looked over the document, say it's totally out of line, and offered suggestions.
East Chickasaw DHS has continued to act like idiots, including another claim that I ax murdered my children in our house when we weren't even in the county -- that was the Tuesday after my husband and I went back to the house. (It's awfully tiring to teleport everyone in, scream and murder the kids, resurrect them, clean up the mess, and teleport out every month.) On Election Day they were waiting for us when we drove back to our old county to vote and harassed us again, but this time we made a video. Excuse me while I go learn uploading. I've never had to upload more than a jpeg before.
The entire video file is at http://www.megaupload.com/?d=TFQVWUMR
Okay, here's the crazy "Service Plan" that DHS came up with for us, which looks nothing like any "Service Plan" any other expert has ever seen before: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=NIOO2ML8 Note the total lack of anything specific complaints or remedies.
The video is over 15 minutes in length and doesn't fit on youtube. How do we chop it in half?
When we went back to our home to vote on Election Day we found DHS waiting for us in our driveway. Here Patti Young and Natasha Ivory try to make us sign a document saying that we agree to abide by another document that they don't have with them and which they say they've changed, BUT they won't say what the changes are and they refuse our point blank requests for specifics. Oh yeah, and all this happens IN THE DARK. It's blurry where they talk to our children but clears up after that when the "good" bits happen.
November 19
Not much happened this week. The new lawyer was unable to find out who at East Chickasaw DHS was supposed to be overseeing our case, and finally just sent a letter to their office. We gathered up the girls' homeschool registration forms for her (the only paperwork required by homeschoolers in Mississippi. The rest of the stuff they asked for is not required.)
I'm supposed to have a psych evaluation next week that should satisfy any legitimate concerns they have on that regard. Isn't that the cherry on top of a mountain of stress?
And on top of all that we're still househunting, which ordinarily would be a job all by itself. There's a lot more I can post about that (yeesh!) but my time is limited. More after we get something nailed down. Plenty of running around thanks to that next week.
I have no video editing capablilities right now. Is there somewhere I can post a thirty minute video for viewing? Youtube cuts off at 15 minutes.
We're going to be spending Thanksgiving living out of suitcases. Oh, joy. I only hope something gets resolved before Christmas.
To those who think I'm doing this for attention, I'm really not that kind of person. Given a choice, I'd really rather be sitting back, chatting about fandom, and reading fanfic as opposed to dealing with all this. You have no idea how much I wish I could even care about fandom right now.
I'm a bit behind on my updates here.
November 13
Sorry to be away so long. I haven't had access to a computer since my last post.
Got a new lawyer who has experience with DHS. Got a respected psychologist who says I'm not crazy -- one of DHS's claims is that I'm too nuts to look after the kids, even though there's no evidence to support that. (According to the shrink we're totally outside the DHS's usual client base, and they don't know what to do with us.) Other counselors have looked over the document, say it's totally out of line, and offered suggestions.
East Chickasaw DHS has continued to act like idiots, including another claim that I ax murdered my children in our house when we weren't even in the county -- that was the Tuesday after my husband and I went back to the house. (It's awfully tiring to teleport everyone in, scream and murder the kids, resurrect them, clean up the mess, and teleport out every month.) On Election Day they were waiting for us when we drove back to our old county to vote and harassed us again, but this time we made a video. Excuse me while I go learn uploading. I've never had to upload more than a jpeg before.
The entire video file is at http://www.megaupload.com/?d=TFQVWUMR
Okay, here's the crazy "Service Plan" that DHS came up with for us, which looks nothing like any "Service Plan" any other expert has ever seen before: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=NIOO2ML8 Note the total lack of anything specific complaints or remedies.
The video is over 15 minutes in length and doesn't fit on youtube. How do we chop it in half?
When we went back to our home to vote on Election Day we found DHS waiting for us in our driveway. Here Patti Young and Natasha Ivory try to make us sign a document saying that we agree to abide by another document that they don't have with them and which they say they've changed, BUT they won't say what the changes are and they refuse our point blank requests for specifics. Oh yeah, and all this happens IN THE DARK. It's blurry where they talk to our children but clears up after that when the "good" bits happen.
November 19
Not much happened this week. The new lawyer was unable to find out who at East Chickasaw DHS was supposed to be overseeing our case, and finally just sent a letter to their office. We gathered up the girls' homeschool registration forms for her (the only paperwork required by homeschoolers in Mississippi. The rest of the stuff they asked for is not required.)
I'm supposed to have a psych evaluation next week that should satisfy any legitimate concerns they have on that regard. Isn't that the cherry on top of a mountain of stress?
And on top of all that we're still househunting, which ordinarily would be a job all by itself. There's a lot more I can post about that (yeesh!) but my time is limited. More after we get something nailed down. Plenty of running around thanks to that next week.
I have no video editing capablilities right now. Is there somewhere I can post a thirty minute video for viewing? Youtube cuts off at 15 minutes.
We're going to be spending Thanksgiving living out of suitcases. Oh, joy. I only hope something gets resolved before Christmas.
To those who think I'm doing this for attention, I'm really not that kind of person. Given a choice, I'd really rather be sitting back, chatting about fandom, and reading fanfic as opposed to dealing with all this. You have no idea how much I wish I could even care about fandom right now.
Friday, October 22, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update October 22
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I'm making a flying visit to our house for the first time in 11 days. There's private papers scattered all over the floor and other evidence of another break-in.
But we finally talked to someone who was willing to put us on the trail of the more specialized lawyers. And we got a video camera with a good audio pickup.
I'll update when I can. Internet access is problematic when I'm away from the house.
I'm making a flying visit to our house for the first time in 11 days. There's private papers scattered all over the floor and other evidence of another break-in.
But we finally talked to someone who was willing to put us on the trail of the more specialized lawyers. And we got a video camera with a good audio pickup.
I'll update when I can. Internet access is problematic when I'm away from the house.
When Hell Came to Our Home Update October 21
Master Post
Still out here. Progress is being made on various fronts, but it's slow going.
Can anyone recommend a video camera with a good audio pickup?
The children are starting to get fretful, being away from home for so long and moving so much. This nonsense is hard on them.
What's the contact infor for the Huffington Post?
I must commend the DHS for their efforts to "treat" my depression. Right now I'm too darn angry about what they have done to be depressed.
Still out here. Progress is being made on various fronts, but it's slow going.
Can anyone recommend a video camera with a good audio pickup?
The children are starting to get fretful, being away from home for so long and moving so much. This nonsense is hard on them.
What's the contact infor for the Huffington Post?
I must commend the DHS for their efforts to "treat" my depression. Right now I'm too darn angry about what they have done to be depressed.
Monday, October 18, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update October 18
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After many hours of wrangling our lawyer got a copy of the DHS's "Individual Service Plan" for myself and my husband. It's a hoot. Counselors we've shown this to have hit the roof. It only has one signature attached to it, and that isn't anyone I've seen or talked to. Each section has a different date, and a different due date. Everything is out of compliance with the official state practices. Some of it is against state law, other parts of itare against official insurance practices. Some of it isn't even worded in complete sentences.
Part 1 says:
"...will correct her home deficiencies to corrrect but arenot(sp) limited to replaceing the dead bolt lock"
This is:
1) ungrammatical,
2) incorrectly spelled, and
3) the deadbolt lock they want me to remove is next to a front door window that's already been broken into before. The insurance people would hit the roof over that!
Part 2 wants the children's medical/dental records BUT doesn't offer to pay for them. I learned today that's not kosher.
Part 3 says:
"...will provide proof/confirmation that the children's educational needs are being met."
That's ILLEGAL in Mississippi.
Part 4:
"the dead bolt will be replaced with a safer type of lock..."
DHS, meet insurance people. Insurance people, meet DHS.
There's no "client" signature. There's no "social worker" signature. There is an "ASWS" signature -- but no date. I was told that the ASWS is the social worker supervisor. BUT the person who signed in the "ASWS signature" slot is not a social worker supervisor. She's not even a social worker. Melody Hamilton, who has the only signature on the entire document that they faxed our lawyer, is a student intern working in their office.
How many ways can you say FAIL!
After many hours of wrangling our lawyer got a copy of the DHS's "Individual Service Plan" for myself and my husband. It's a hoot. Counselors we've shown this to have hit the roof. It only has one signature attached to it, and that isn't anyone I've seen or talked to. Each section has a different date, and a different due date. Everything is out of compliance with the official state practices. Some of it is against state law, other parts of itare against official insurance practices. Some of it isn't even worded in complete sentences.
Part 1 says:
"...will correct her home deficiencies to corrrect but arenot(sp) limited to replaceing the dead bolt lock"
This is:
1) ungrammatical,
2) incorrectly spelled, and
3) the deadbolt lock they want me to remove is next to a front door window that's already been broken into before. The insurance people would hit the roof over that!
Part 2 wants the children's medical/dental records BUT doesn't offer to pay for them. I learned today that's not kosher.
Part 3 says:
"...will provide proof/confirmation that the children's educational needs are being met."
That's ILLEGAL in Mississippi.
Part 4:
"the dead bolt will be replaced with a safer type of lock..."
DHS, meet insurance people. Insurance people, meet DHS.
There's no "client" signature. There's no "social worker" signature. There is an "ASWS" signature -- but no date. I was told that the ASWS is the social worker supervisor. BUT the person who signed in the "ASWS signature" slot is not a social worker supervisor. She's not even a social worker. Melody Hamilton, who has the only signature on the entire document that they faxed our lawyer, is a student intern working in their office.
How many ways can you say FAIL!
Thursday, October 14, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home October 14 Update
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We emailed the FBI and some support and media outlets today. Please suggest anyone you can think of.
ETA: I'm Debbie Byrd Shinn. The women who contacted me who said they were from DHS named themselves Patti Young, Natasha Ivory, and Joyce Cook. None of those names are in the MS Employee registery: http://dsitspe01.its.ms.gov/its/webphone.nsf/Home?OpenForm
Ever since the activity started at the trailer next door, dh smelled a lot of ammonia and organic solvents in the evening. He originally put it down to remodeling. He also remembers being asked if he could show somebody how to "cook something" last year. "Cook what?" he asked puzzled.
Here is a letter my husband prepared for the FBI. Please forward it to any parties who might be interested:
Over the last several weeks my wife has been the subject of an harassment campaign.
She has blogged this at crabby-lioness.livejournal.com
Most of this happens when I am not at home.
This began with a daylight breaking and entry, and what was suggested by the county attorney to be an attemptedkidnapping of our son. And the telephone went dead 1 hour before all this. (No reply from PSC.)
Deputy Jimmy Rappe,in no uniform, but acting as such still, refused to look at the door, but told my wife DHS would respond; he was interested only in the child being out of the house, and told her not to lock the door.
The sheriff’s dept. knows about the evidence of the break-in, but have never picked it up from the Okolona police.
DHS blames my wife for letting the baby out of the house, as if this break-in never happened. The county attourney even suggested this was an attempted kidnapping; we have asked him as well to have this investigated.
One day after that when my family was with relatives in another county, Chris Ware Chickasaw SD, called me at work,that there was an emergency at my house, that some of my family were inside injured, and no one would come to thedoor. I told him no one was at home. He and DHS said they did not believe me. I said if anyone was in my house, they had broken in, and asked Ware to investigate the windows and doors – he refused. Okolona police recommended we get a civil rights attorney at this point, but none up here will take our case.
More items of harassment came in a steady trickle as we tried to find a way to move.
Saturday, Oct. 9, 2010, our home was entered shortly after we left. About 45 minutes after we left, 3:27 pm,someone called my telephone, and a stranger inside picked up. They discussed and viewed my wife’s medical records,which we found by the telephone. Our attorney did not want us to report this, and it does seem a little pointless since an Okolona policeman thinks one of the voices is Jimmy Rappe, of the Chickasaw SD.
His mother lives next door (see the trailer story following) and has made threatening statements before.
Please read her further descriptions and help us end this harassment.
I suspect something is going on over at the trailer near us; it was almost abandoned until about 2 months ago.
I have smelled ammonia and strong organic solvents (I have a degree in chemistry) from that direction since.
One night, several people came down, turned off the outside light, carried boxes into the pitch-black interior, then emerged with even more boxes, coming down steps and loading these into vehicles in total darkness. Something is going on.
We have removed from the house, as we deem it no longer safe.
Please, please, read her further descriptions and help us end this harassment.
Thank you,
Robert Shinn, Ph.D.
We emailed the FBI and some support and media outlets today. Please suggest anyone you can think of.
ETA: I'm Debbie Byrd Shinn. The women who contacted me who said they were from DHS named themselves Patti Young, Natasha Ivory, and Joyce Cook. None of those names are in the MS Employee registery: http://dsitspe01.its.ms.gov/its/webphone.nsf/Home?OpenForm
Ever since the activity started at the trailer next door, dh smelled a lot of ammonia and organic solvents in the evening. He originally put it down to remodeling. He also remembers being asked if he could show somebody how to "cook something" last year. "Cook what?" he asked puzzled.
Here is a letter my husband prepared for the FBI. Please forward it to any parties who might be interested:
Over the last several weeks my wife has been the subject of an harassment campaign.
She has blogged this at crabby-lioness.livejournal.com
Most of this happens when I am not at home.
This began with a daylight breaking and entry, and what was suggested by the county attorney to be an attemptedkidnapping of our son. And the telephone went dead 1 hour before all this. (No reply from PSC.)
Deputy Jimmy Rappe,in no uniform, but acting as such still, refused to look at the door, but told my wife DHS would respond; he was interested only in the child being out of the house, and told her not to lock the door.
The sheriff’s dept. knows about the evidence of the break-in, but have never picked it up from the Okolona police.
DHS blames my wife for letting the baby out of the house, as if this break-in never happened. The county attourney even suggested this was an attempted kidnapping; we have asked him as well to have this investigated.
One day after that when my family was with relatives in another county, Chris Ware Chickasaw SD, called me at work,that there was an emergency at my house, that some of my family were inside injured, and no one would come to thedoor. I told him no one was at home. He and DHS said they did not believe me. I said if anyone was in my house, they had broken in, and asked Ware to investigate the windows and doors – he refused. Okolona police recommended we get a civil rights attorney at this point, but none up here will take our case.
More items of harassment came in a steady trickle as we tried to find a way to move.
Saturday, Oct. 9, 2010, our home was entered shortly after we left. About 45 minutes after we left, 3:27 pm,someone called my telephone, and a stranger inside picked up. They discussed and viewed my wife’s medical records,which we found by the telephone. Our attorney did not want us to report this, and it does seem a little pointless since an Okolona policeman thinks one of the voices is Jimmy Rappe, of the Chickasaw SD.
His mother lives next door (see the trailer story following) and has made threatening statements before.
Please read her further descriptions and help us end this harassment.
I suspect something is going on over at the trailer near us; it was almost abandoned until about 2 months ago.
I have smelled ammonia and strong organic solvents (I have a degree in chemistry) from that direction since.
One night, several people came down, turned off the outside light, carried boxes into the pitch-black interior, then emerged with even more boxes, coming down steps and loading these into vehicles in total darkness. Something is going on.
We have removed from the house, as we deem it no longer safe.
Please, please, read her further descriptions and help us end this harassment.
Thank you,
Robert Shinn, Ph.D.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home October 13 Update
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Hi folks. Thanks for the info and the kind messages. I've been out of pocket recently. So far so good.
First up -- here is the link for a copy the message I found on my answering machine Saturday night:
http://filebucket.info/?1oo0r81rh
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=EDBCGQXQ
And a big THANK YOU to the cybergeeks who did that for me. If you want to help and have the ability, please mirror that for me. I'll add your links in later.
If you would, please someone make a slideshow using the audio and the transcript I posted earlier and post it to youtube. Please mirror that as well, and forward to anyone who might be interested in civil rights. Thank you.
Second -- DHS
According to the lawyer we hired to handle the DHS end, he spent three hours badgering them before they would even admit to having my name in their files. Then they wanted a release form. Then they spent even more hours giving him the runaround -- wrong person, wrong office, wrong directions et al. Then when he asked them to write down the complaint, they said a bunch of hooey but have so far refused to put anything in writing. ('m not surprised, because they never gave us anythign in writing either.) Some of the hooey isn't even legal in Mississippi.
They complained --
the house isn't clean enough, even though we cleaned it to their earlier (verbal) specs and got their (verbal) approval;
the floor isn't fixed, even though we repaired it to their earlier (verbal) specs and got their (verbal) approval;
(There was a background sense that we weren't acting "White enough", that we weren't living the way people of our socio-economic standing should live. That instead of buying a trailer and some land in the country, and building extensions as we went along, we should have "properly" bought a pre-made house in the suburbs and tied ourselves down with a huge mortgage. That we should buy all-new furniture instead of taking care of the old stuff we have. Apparently one can't be frugal and be a "good" person.
Some of the property is old, but it's all in good shape. The additions were built at above US Navy standards.);
that our homeschooled children needed to be tested to see if they were learning enough. THIS IS ILLEGAL IN MISSISSIPPI. Homeschooled children in Mississippi have to meet no testing requirements whatsoever: http://www.hslda.org/laws/analysis/Mississippi.pdf In fact:
"It is not the intention of this section to impair the primary right and the obligation of the parent ... to choose the proper education and training" for their children, and nothing in this section shall be construed to grant the State of Mississippi "authority to control, manage or supervise" the private education of children. "And this section shall never be construed so as to grant, by implication or otherwise, any right or authority to any state agency or other entity to control, manage, supervise, provide for or affect the operation, management, program, curriculum, admissions policy or discipline of any such school or home instruction program." Miss. Code Ann. § 37-13-91(9).
(The funny part of this is that when they asked to see the girls' schoolwork and I showed them their Singapore Math notebooks, Patti Young, aka DHS-1, couldn't even read the problems correctly out of my 9yo's workbook, and declared the 11yo's workbook was above her head.);
that our children need to be given a medical exam and vaccinated. Okay, we were holding off to see how the mercury content in modern vaccines was being handled, but the kids are old enough they may be safe. (I had an extremely bad reaction to an MMR shot once, and I was 21 at the time.) Still THIS IS ILLEGAL IN MISSISSIPPI. Only children entering the school system have to be vaccinated. http://www.msdh.state.ms.us/msdhsite/_static/14,0,71.html
(Also there was an issue with the age of the vaccines. I was at the County Health Clinic one day when a batch of "fresh" vaccines arrived and was left sitting on the reception counter. They were already out of date and had been culled from another medical center, with all the proper markers for rejects. This sort of thing does not inspire confidence.);
that I am "too depressed" to "properly watch my children" or to "properly homeschool". THIS IS ILLEGAL IN MISSISSIPPI. There's no requirements for homeschool teachers in our state;
that I should send them a copy of any lease I sign anywhere else so they can check out my new home and so they can transfer my case instead of closing it.
They said (but didn't put in writing) that if I moved they would drop the case. That doesn't jive with the above statement.
The lawyer wants to comply with all this. I suspect much of it will actually evaporate when they have to put it in writing.
Third -- the matter of the break-ins and the Sherrif's Department's actions. We're still working on this end. Everyone who hears about it is horrified, but most don't want to get involved.
Gotta go. Please pass this story along to any homeschool advocates, including Mississippi homeschool advocates, the Mississippi state senator who chairs the education committee, and anyone else who may be interested. Thanks.
Hi folks. Thanks for the info and the kind messages. I've been out of pocket recently. So far so good.
First up -- here is the link for a copy the message I found on my answering machine Saturday night:
http://filebucket.info/?1oo0r81rh
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=EDBCGQXQ
And a big THANK YOU to the cybergeeks who did that for me. If you want to help and have the ability, please mirror that for me. I'll add your links in later.
If you would, please someone make a slideshow using the audio and the transcript I posted earlier and post it to youtube. Please mirror that as well, and forward to anyone who might be interested in civil rights. Thank you.
Second -- DHS
According to the lawyer we hired to handle the DHS end, he spent three hours badgering them before they would even admit to having my name in their files. Then they wanted a release form. Then they spent even more hours giving him the runaround -- wrong person, wrong office, wrong directions et al. Then when he asked them to write down the complaint, they said a bunch of hooey but have so far refused to put anything in writing. ('m not surprised, because they never gave us anythign in writing either.) Some of the hooey isn't even legal in Mississippi.
They complained --
the house isn't clean enough, even though we cleaned it to their earlier (verbal) specs and got their (verbal) approval;
the floor isn't fixed, even though we repaired it to their earlier (verbal) specs and got their (verbal) approval;
(There was a background sense that we weren't acting "White enough", that we weren't living the way people of our socio-economic standing should live. That instead of buying a trailer and some land in the country, and building extensions as we went along, we should have "properly" bought a pre-made house in the suburbs and tied ourselves down with a huge mortgage. That we should buy all-new furniture instead of taking care of the old stuff we have. Apparently one can't be frugal and be a "good" person.
Some of the property is old, but it's all in good shape. The additions were built at above US Navy standards.);
that our homeschooled children needed to be tested to see if they were learning enough. THIS IS ILLEGAL IN MISSISSIPPI. Homeschooled children in Mississippi have to meet no testing requirements whatsoever: http://www.hslda.org/laws/analysis/Mississippi.pdf In fact:
"It is not the intention of this section to impair the primary right and the obligation of the parent ... to choose the proper education and training" for their children, and nothing in this section shall be construed to grant the State of Mississippi "authority to control, manage or supervise" the private education of children. "And this section shall never be construed so as to grant, by implication or otherwise, any right or authority to any state agency or other entity to control, manage, supervise, provide for or affect the operation, management, program, curriculum, admissions policy or discipline of any such school or home instruction program." Miss. Code Ann. § 37-13-91(9).
(The funny part of this is that when they asked to see the girls' schoolwork and I showed them their Singapore Math notebooks, Patti Young, aka DHS-1, couldn't even read the problems correctly out of my 9yo's workbook, and declared the 11yo's workbook was above her head.);
that our children need to be given a medical exam and vaccinated. Okay, we were holding off to see how the mercury content in modern vaccines was being handled, but the kids are old enough they may be safe. (I had an extremely bad reaction to an MMR shot once, and I was 21 at the time.) Still THIS IS ILLEGAL IN MISSISSIPPI. Only children entering the school system have to be vaccinated. http://www.msdh.state.ms.us/msdhsite/_static/14,0,71.html
(Also there was an issue with the age of the vaccines. I was at the County Health Clinic one day when a batch of "fresh" vaccines arrived and was left sitting on the reception counter. They were already out of date and had been culled from another medical center, with all the proper markers for rejects. This sort of thing does not inspire confidence.);
that I am "too depressed" to "properly watch my children" or to "properly homeschool". THIS IS ILLEGAL IN MISSISSIPPI. There's no requirements for homeschool teachers in our state;
that I should send them a copy of any lease I sign anywhere else so they can check out my new home and so they can transfer my case instead of closing it.
They said (but didn't put in writing) that if I moved they would drop the case. That doesn't jive with the above statement.
The lawyer wants to comply with all this. I suspect much of it will actually evaporate when they have to put it in writing.
Third -- the matter of the break-ins and the Sherrif's Department's actions. We're still working on this end. Everyone who hears about it is horrified, but most don't want to get involved.
Gotta go. Please pass this story along to any homeschool advocates, including Mississippi homeschool advocates, the Mississippi state senator who chairs the education committee, and anyone else who may be interested. Thanks.
Monday, October 11, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Update October 11
Master Post
I currently live at
591 Hwy 41 E
Okolona, MS 38860
Catherine Young's old trailer is next door.
Someone probably thinks i saw something or someone over there I should not have. Having me committed would discredit me as a witness. Please circulate this post.
I currently live at
591 Hwy 41 E
Okolona, MS 38860
Catherine Young's old trailer is next door.
Someone probably thinks i saw something or someone over there I should not have. Having me committed would discredit me as a witness. Please circulate this post.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
When Hell Came to Our Home Part 2A
Master Post
I haven't talked much about the trailer next door. Normally I don't think much about it, but with all this trouble coming from that direction I'm reminded that things have been odd over there lately.
It's been abandoned for years, but the week before school starts there's a lot of activity going on over there. Lots of people in and out, lots of banging and remodeling noises going on, so much that I didn't notice anything odd about the banging noises the day our door was broken open.
Then there's the people, who gathered together to talk at the back door instead of the front door, the back door that can only be seen from our back yard. At least they did until the day the baby watched them, three days before this mess started. They watched me take him in. They haven't gathered at either door since then.
Then there's the inside lights, which are never on over there anymore, even though they seemed to be working fine the last time anybody lived there.
Then there's the night a whole bunch of people came over with a whole bunch of boxes. They turned off the outside lights, took a lot of boxes in, then took even more boxes out. Funny thing was they did it in complete darkness, with neither the inside or outside lights on, even though that meant negotiating stairs and uneven terrain in the dark.
Then there's the morning Bozo, the guy who lives there, cut across his front yard like he was coming to our front door. He saw me in the window, stopped, turned and glared at the street, then got in his truck and left. We'd been having a rash of damaged doorknobs about then.
Odd stuff.
I haven't talked much about the trailer next door. Normally I don't think much about it, but with all this trouble coming from that direction I'm reminded that things have been odd over there lately.
It's been abandoned for years, but the week before school starts there's a lot of activity going on over there. Lots of people in and out, lots of banging and remodeling noises going on, so much that I didn't notice anything odd about the banging noises the day our door was broken open.
Then there's the people, who gathered together to talk at the back door instead of the front door, the back door that can only be seen from our back yard. At least they did until the day the baby watched them, three days before this mess started. They watched me take him in. They haven't gathered at either door since then.
Then there's the inside lights, which are never on over there anymore, even though they seemed to be working fine the last time anybody lived there.
Then there's the night a whole bunch of people came over with a whole bunch of boxes. They turned off the outside lights, took a lot of boxes in, then took even more boxes out. Funny thing was they did it in complete darkness, with neither the inside or outside lights on, even though that meant negotiating stairs and uneven terrain in the dark.
Then there's the morning Bozo, the guy who lives there, cut across his front yard like he was coming to our front door. He saw me in the window, stopped, turned and glared at the street, then got in his truck and left. We'd been having a rash of damaged doorknobs about then.
Odd stuff.
When Hell Came to Our Home Part 4
Master Post
We went to see a lawyer we've had dealings with before today. Usually when he calls us up on Sunday he asks us to come over in the late morning. This time he wants to see us first at 6, then at 6:30.
When we reach his office, there's a campaign sign in the front yard for the County Attorney who won't return our calls.
We tell him about yesterday's break-in and the rest of the story while he texts. He doesn't want to get a subpoena to find out who called our house. He says the answering machine tape isn't the sort of evidence that will stand up in court. Only DNA evidence or pictures will.
(That's funny because when we were robbed two years ago the burglar cut himself on the glass of the window getting in and bled all over the floor. The Sheriff's Department refused to take a blood sample when we asked them to.)
He offers to help us deal with DHS. We take him up on it.
When we get home we find out that he was right. The answering machine won't stand up in court. Because while we were at his office someone broke into our front door and erased our answering machine, including the copy of the message that was on it.
Good thing there's more copies.
We went to see a lawyer we've had dealings with before today. Usually when he calls us up on Sunday he asks us to come over in the late morning. This time he wants to see us first at 6, then at 6:30.
When we reach his office, there's a campaign sign in the front yard for the County Attorney who won't return our calls.
We tell him about yesterday's break-in and the rest of the story while he texts. He doesn't want to get a subpoena to find out who called our house. He says the answering machine tape isn't the sort of evidence that will stand up in court. Only DNA evidence or pictures will.
(That's funny because when we were robbed two years ago the burglar cut himself on the glass of the window getting in and bled all over the floor. The Sheriff's Department refused to take a blood sample when we asked them to.)
He offers to help us deal with DHS. We take him up on it.
When we get home we find out that he was right. The answering machine won't stand up in court. Because while we were at his office someone broke into our front door and erased our answering machine, including the copy of the message that was on it.
Good thing there's more copies.
When Hell Came to Our Home Mega Post
Please repost this story far and wide. One forum already refused it as being too "troublesome", but I am terrified as to what will happen to my children and myself if no one knows.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 2A
October 11 update
October 13 update
October 14 Update
October 18 Update
October 21
October 22
November 19
November 23
November 28
December 4
December 9
December 16
December 18
January 17
February 26
Six Months Later
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 2A
October 11 update
October 13 update
October 14 Update
October 18 Update
October 21
October 22
November 19
November 23
November 28
December 4
December 9
December 16
December 18
January 17
February 26
Six Months Later
When Hell Came to Our Home Part 3
Master Post
There's some middle details, but we'll skip to the juicy bits. I'll fill them in later if I have the time.
Friday October 8
2:00
DHS-2 comes to our house. We've had problems with finding both the front and back door locks hanging half out of the door over the past few weeks (as well as both damage and cigarette butts in the backyard) so I've taken to locking the double-locked deadbolt all the time. Friday it's cranky from everything the door's been through and won't unlock for me. I go out the back door and come round the front to talk to DHS-2.
I tell her we're looking at houses nearer to where dh works, but they all need alterations. (We have two dozen poultry and henhouses are no longer standard issue.) The best looking one turned out to have problems on closer inspection, and may take months of repairs to get into shape, so we might not be able to move until spring.
DHS-2 expresses the hope that we would have already moved "So we won't have to involve the judge." She won't explain what she meant by that.
Previously she had brought boxes from the dollar store's leftovers to help me pack. I ask for more. She's surprised I've actually used the ones she brought. (Well duh, I have to pack for five people!) She says she'll be over with more boxes Tuesday or Wednesday.
Saturday October 9
2:45 we leave on a picnic and to do our monthly canned goods run. When we get home there's a strange message on our answering machine. According to *69, the call came at 3:27 yesterday afternoon and was from "662(local area code)/000-0000".
I'll try to upload the message later, but here's what we've been able to make out.
Male 1-Let me know cause I'm saying all you can commit -- if you bring a petula(?) it's going to be, "Hey you." Because she can't go out and commit the people but she can write them up. And you know, everybody should be told to bring somebody. So you know, you're paying for it.
Male 2-So you want me to tell her that, that I talked to you about it already right?
1-Uh-huh
2-Who?
1-I don't have nothing.
2-Who?
2-Oh, okay
1- I told her that.
2-Okay.
Female-Not Medicaid.
Male 3-Man I know a beep came on, that's all I heard.
1-Might be a blue card.
3-I guess.
Coincidentally(!) a medical record from the baby's birth was laying out of its folder on the counter about two feet from the phone with my husband's state-run Blue Cross health insurance number on it. We haven't had that folder open in over a year.
According to one source who wishes to remain anonymous who's heard the message, the male voices sound like members of the Sheriff's Department and the County Attorney's office.
We've talked to lawyers. We haven't found one who wants to touch this case. They say you take cases against the Sheriff's Department to the Attorney General. They also say the Attorney General's office won't do anything.
I don't know what will happen next.
There's some middle details, but we'll skip to the juicy bits. I'll fill them in later if I have the time.
Friday October 8
2:00
DHS-2 comes to our house. We've had problems with finding both the front and back door locks hanging half out of the door over the past few weeks (as well as both damage and cigarette butts in the backyard) so I've taken to locking the double-locked deadbolt all the time. Friday it's cranky from everything the door's been through and won't unlock for me. I go out the back door and come round the front to talk to DHS-2.
I tell her we're looking at houses nearer to where dh works, but they all need alterations. (We have two dozen poultry and henhouses are no longer standard issue.) The best looking one turned out to have problems on closer inspection, and may take months of repairs to get into shape, so we might not be able to move until spring.
DHS-2 expresses the hope that we would have already moved "So we won't have to involve the judge." She won't explain what she meant by that.
Previously she had brought boxes from the dollar store's leftovers to help me pack. I ask for more. She's surprised I've actually used the ones she brought. (Well duh, I have to pack for five people!) She says she'll be over with more boxes Tuesday or Wednesday.
Saturday October 9
2:45 we leave on a picnic and to do our monthly canned goods run. When we get home there's a strange message on our answering machine. According to *69, the call came at 3:27 yesterday afternoon and was from "662(local area code)/000-0000".
I'll try to upload the message later, but here's what we've been able to make out.
Male 1-Let me know cause I'm saying all you can commit -- if you bring a petula(?) it's going to be, "Hey you." Because she can't go out and commit the people but she can write them up. And you know, everybody should be told to bring somebody. So you know, you're paying for it.
Male 2-So you want me to tell her that, that I talked to you about it already right?
1-Uh-huh
2-Who?
1-I don't have nothing.
2-Who?
2-Oh, okay
1- I told her that.
2-Okay.
Female-Not Medicaid.
Male 3-Man I know a beep came on, that's all I heard.
1-Might be a blue card.
3-I guess.
Coincidentally(!) a medical record from the baby's birth was laying out of its folder on the counter about two feet from the phone with my husband's state-run Blue Cross health insurance number on it. We haven't had that folder open in over a year.
According to one source who wishes to remain anonymous who's heard the message, the male voices sound like members of the Sheriff's Department and the County Attorney's office.
We've talked to lawyers. We haven't found one who wants to touch this case. They say you take cases against the Sheriff's Department to the Attorney General. They also say the Attorney General's office won't do anything.
I don't know what will happen next.
When Hell Came to Our Home Part 2
Master Post
Sunday August 22
The three children and I arrive at a relative's house.
Monday August 23
Dh calls from Good Buddy's house. He says the Sheriff's Department won't return his calls. The police are asking questions at the telephone relay station.
Tuesday August 24.
Dh calls from Good Buddy's house. The Sheriff's Department still won't return his calls, and won't return calls from the police about the incident. The police tell them to come pick up the doorknob for evidence. They refuse. The telephone relay station refuses to talk to the police about our phone.
Wednesday August 25.
Dh calls from a cellphone. Good Buddy's phone has gone dead in the same way ours did. Good Buddy is a certified electrician. He traces the problem back to the phone being switched off at the relay station.
The Sheriff's Department won't return our calls. The relay station won't answer the cops' questions. Dh calls the County Attorney. He refuses to discuss the case. The cops call the Sheriff's Department. All they'll talk about is DHS-1 giving us 30 (not 25) days to clean the house. They refuse to discuss the doorknob or come get it.
Thursday August 26.
Morning
We don't actually find out what happened in the morning until days later. Mean Sister called the Sheriff's Department. She reported hearing me yelling at the children inside the house we hadn't been in since Sunday morning. She said the children screamed, she heard thumps, then silence.
What we heard was that the Sheriff's Deputy-2 (not Bozo), DHS-1, and DHS-3 come out to our house. Of course the house is locked and they can't get in. DHS-1 later said that DHS-3 said she saw a face at the window that looked like my younger daughter. They don't break in to investigate.
They call dh at work and demand he come home and open the door for them. "Home" is 90 minutes away. Dh calls and tells us what he knows. He gets home, tracks down Sheriff's Deputy-2, and unlocks the door and demands the Deputy search the house for the intruder the Deputy said was there earlier. The Deputy complies with a sick grin. Of course there's no one there.
DHS-1 demands that the children be seen by a Sheriff. Our relative calls the Sheriff of the county we're in at the time. He's a proper Sheriff (not like Bozo and company) and immediately comes out to investigate. I tell him this story and show him the baby's unburned feet, as well as the girls. He says he'll call.
Friday Morning.
The Proper Sheriff calls back to tell us DHS-1 is on her way. Seems she forgot to interview the girls. She says "of course" our safety has to come first. (That's the first -- and last -- time this idea is expressed.) She interviews the girls. According to our older daughter she asks about what TV shows they like (they hardly watch any) and their favorite movie. (DD-1 is annoyed she doesn't ask about favorite books.) Then she asked how we punished the girls and what their homeschool day was like. She leaves.
Friday afternoon we go home.
Then there's a frenzy of house-cleaning and home repairs. We fix everything they told us to fix. DHS doesn't acknowledge this fact. For the next two weeks their questions revolve around when we can move out of the house, the girls' homeschooling, and my mental health. They want me to give them my records and be evaluated by their counselor. I demur.
Then three weeks of silence.
Then last Friday things kick up again bigtime.
Sunday August 22
The three children and I arrive at a relative's house.
Monday August 23
Dh calls from Good Buddy's house. He says the Sheriff's Department won't return his calls. The police are asking questions at the telephone relay station.
Tuesday August 24.
Dh calls from Good Buddy's house. The Sheriff's Department still won't return his calls, and won't return calls from the police about the incident. The police tell them to come pick up the doorknob for evidence. They refuse. The telephone relay station refuses to talk to the police about our phone.
Wednesday August 25.
Dh calls from a cellphone. Good Buddy's phone has gone dead in the same way ours did. Good Buddy is a certified electrician. He traces the problem back to the phone being switched off at the relay station.
The Sheriff's Department won't return our calls. The relay station won't answer the cops' questions. Dh calls the County Attorney. He refuses to discuss the case. The cops call the Sheriff's Department. All they'll talk about is DHS-1 giving us 30 (not 25) days to clean the house. They refuse to discuss the doorknob or come get it.
Thursday August 26.
Morning
We don't actually find out what happened in the morning until days later. Mean Sister called the Sheriff's Department. She reported hearing me yelling at the children inside the house we hadn't been in since Sunday morning. She said the children screamed, she heard thumps, then silence.
What we heard was that the Sheriff's Deputy-2 (not Bozo), DHS-1, and DHS-3 come out to our house. Of course the house is locked and they can't get in. DHS-1 later said that DHS-3 said she saw a face at the window that looked like my younger daughter. They don't break in to investigate.
They call dh at work and demand he come home and open the door for them. "Home" is 90 minutes away. Dh calls and tells us what he knows. He gets home, tracks down Sheriff's Deputy-2, and unlocks the door and demands the Deputy search the house for the intruder the Deputy said was there earlier. The Deputy complies with a sick grin. Of course there's no one there.
DHS-1 demands that the children be seen by a Sheriff. Our relative calls the Sheriff of the county we're in at the time. He's a proper Sheriff (not like Bozo and company) and immediately comes out to investigate. I tell him this story and show him the baby's unburned feet, as well as the girls. He says he'll call.
Friday Morning.
The Proper Sheriff calls back to tell us DHS-1 is on her way. Seems she forgot to interview the girls. She says "of course" our safety has to come first. (That's the first -- and last -- time this idea is expressed.) She interviews the girls. According to our older daughter she asks about what TV shows they like (they hardly watch any) and their favorite movie. (DD-1 is annoyed she doesn't ask about favorite books.) Then she asked how we punished the girls and what their homeschool day was like. She leaves.
Friday afternoon we go home.
Then there's a frenzy of house-cleaning and home repairs. We fix everything they told us to fix. DHS doesn't acknowledge this fact. For the next two weeks their questions revolve around when we can move out of the house, the girls' homeschooling, and my mental health. They want me to give them my records and be evaluated by their counselor. I demur.
Then three weeks of silence.
Then last Friday things kick up again bigtime.
When Hell Came to Our Home Part 1
Master Post
Hi folks. We've had a pretty horrible school year so far. DHS showed up at our door, in a story that gets scarier and more bizarre the further along it goes. Here's how it started:
Introduction
14 years ago we moved to where we live now. Dh started teaching high school, and I started having babies. It's just outside town limits, and there's not many neighbors. At that time we had one good neighbor on one side of us. She was an older woman caring for her elderly mother who lived in the trailer between us, a "Granny cottage" to use the Australian term. We got along well, and I had many pleasant visits to her house -- except for one visit. Her grown nephew came over while I was there. I greeted him politely, and was abruptly told that as a female I was unworthy to be breathing the same air as he was, let alone talking to him -- only in shorter and ruder terms. I chose not to embarrass my Good Neighbor by asking about Bozo after he left.
Years pass, my Good Neighbor's mother dies, and my Good Neighbor moves to another town leaving the two houses beside me to her Mean Sister, who is Bozo's mother. Mean Sister is dogmatic and close-minded. She can't stand any woman who doesn't work and put her children in day care, or anyone who disagrees with her own far-right conservative views. My children and I are no longer welcome at her house. Still, we stay on amiable terms by never exchanging more than a dozen words
at a time.
Over the years the trailer between us that was her mother's retirement home gets used as a crash pad by various relatives down on their luck until they either find another place to live or simply can't stand Mean Sister any longer. We're used to having people pull up to it, stay for a while, and leave.
Last year the public high school where my husband works has a meltdown and gets taken over by the state. He scrambles and finds a job at a community college 90 minutes away. All this is widely talked about in the town where we live, as he's a popular teacher and the parents didn't want to see him leave. It's a very stressful time for us. Maybe people expected us to pack up and leave immediately, but we were too busy to even start looking for a place to move.
The school year starts. I'm busier than ever, what with two dogs, four ducks, two dozen chickens, two homeschooled children, a toddler, and getting dh off every morning. I sorta notice people moving in and out of the trailer next door, but I don't think much of it -- except to notice that when they gather together to talk at the door, as people are inclined to do before leaving, they don't gather at the front door. They gather at the back door, which can only be seen from our fenced-in back yard. One Thursday evening shortly after school starts the toddler comes with me when I go out to water the birds. He stands at the fence and stares at the group gathered round the back door. I scoop him up when I go back inside, but otherwise pay them no attention. I'm more concerned about the fact that they've taken out the old refrigerator and left it behind the trailer with the door standing open, and glad our children stay inside our fence.
The next Saturday all hell breaks loose.
Day 1: Saturday August 21, 2010
9:00 - The Natchez Trace Visitor's Center hosts a nature photography program in the morning. My husband and the girls go to see it and do some shopping afterward, leaving the toddler and I behind to catch up on our rest. We're in the middle of a heat wave, with the temperature over 100F every day, and the photographers hope the program doesn't get cut short due to the heat. It's going to be another scorcher.
12:00 - I check email. After a few moments, the (land-based) internet connection goes down. I think nothing of it, as this has happened before.
1:15 - I finish the scarf I'm knitting for one daughter and take it up front with the toddler following me. I go to the back of the house for the yarn for my other daughter's scarf. The toddler doesn't follow me. Perhaps he got distracted looking out the front window to see if the car is back yet. He does that a lot.
I hear a strange man's voice in my house.
The doors and windows are locked. How is there a strange man in my house? And more important -- where's my baby?
The man says that my toddler was found playing outside, in spite of the fact that the doors and windows are locked and the baby can't open them. I run out the open door and there's my baby in Mean Sister's arms. She yells at me that the baby was found playing in the road, she's called DHS, and I'm in "a world of trouble young woman!" There's something wrong with that statement but I can't put my finger on it at the moment.
I take my child and say that I'm going home to deadbolt my door. Mean Sister yells, "Don't deadbolt the door! Get another lock, but don't deadbolt it!" Weird.
I take the baby home and look him over. He's fine. That's weird for some reason too, but I'm more concerned about the door right then.
Obviously the regular lock failed. Because the door has a window in it that can't be secured, we have a double-sided deadbolt in it. Otherwise a thief would reach through the window and throw the lock. I get my keys to lock it.
While I'm trying to find the right key (I'd forgotten dh had borrowed it a while back) who should come up to my door but Mean Sister's son Bozo, whom I haven't spoken to in years. He says he's a Sheriff's Deputy now, although he's not in uniform and he shows me no ID. (I later found out he was hired on when the regular Deputies were shipped off to Iraq with their Reserve units.) He tells me that DHS is coming, but I tell him I'm more concerned about getting the door locked. I
notice that the regular doorknob has been pulled almost completely out of the door frame, the door frame is cracked even with the regular lock, the bottom of the door is kicked inward, and the frame of the door window has been yanked almost apart. I point all this out to him. He yells, "Don't lock the deadbolt!"
1:45 Dh and the older children come home, wet, muddy, and grinning from their nature photography walk. I tell dh what happened. He drops the groceries he's carrying on the floor and goes to check the baby.
1:55 A woman who identifies herself as DHS arrives (henceforth to be known as DHS-1), although she shows no identification. Coincidentally, her last name is the same as Mean Sister's mother who used to live in that trailer. It's not a common last name in our area.
DHS-1 says she heard the baby was playing in the middle of the road on the yellow line and wants to see the baby. That's when it hits me -- it's over 100F outside (102F we later learn.) My tender-footed baby is barefoot, as he usually is at home. There are no burns on his feet. There are no marks of any kind on his feet. How could he have made it to the middle of an asphalt highway?
I point this out to DHS-1. She ignores it. I point out the door being damaged. She ignores that as well.
Meanwhile, dh has taken the doorknob off the door and replaced it. The knob shows clear signs of tampering. He shows it around. The Sheriff's Deputy isn't interested. DHS-1 isn't interested. Since we live right outside the city limits, he calls the cops. The phone isn't working. He leaves to show it to the cops.
DHS-1 complains that there are canned goods in the floor from the groceries my husband brought in, that the girls are dirty from their nature walk, that not all the power outlets have baby blockers on them, and that there are a couple of soft spots in the floor. She wants to take pictures. I refuse.
DHS-1 wants to know if I have ever been treated for depression. Yes. She wants the records. I refuse.
Dh returns. The police are concerned about the doorknob. DHS-1 still is not. DHS-1 leaves, telling us we have 25 days to get the house cleaned and the floor fixed.
What with all the upset, it's nightfall before I get around to mentioning to dh that the internet went down right before this started. Dh teaches computer building and maintenance classes. He gets out his kit and checks the line. He reports back that there's 1/10th volt on the line, and the only thing that could have caused that would be if it were deliberately switched off at the relay station.
Dh goes over to Good Buddy's house to make phone calls. He calls the cops. They say, "Get out. Get out now. It's not safe." He calls a relative in another county for shelter.
Sunday Morning.
We throw everything in the car and leave for the relative's house.
Then things start getting scary.
To be continued.
Hi folks. We've had a pretty horrible school year so far. DHS showed up at our door, in a story that gets scarier and more bizarre the further along it goes. Here's how it started:
Introduction
14 years ago we moved to where we live now. Dh started teaching high school, and I started having babies. It's just outside town limits, and there's not many neighbors. At that time we had one good neighbor on one side of us. She was an older woman caring for her elderly mother who lived in the trailer between us, a "Granny cottage" to use the Australian term. We got along well, and I had many pleasant visits to her house -- except for one visit. Her grown nephew came over while I was there. I greeted him politely, and was abruptly told that as a female I was unworthy to be breathing the same air as he was, let alone talking to him -- only in shorter and ruder terms. I chose not to embarrass my Good Neighbor by asking about Bozo after he left.
Years pass, my Good Neighbor's mother dies, and my Good Neighbor moves to another town leaving the two houses beside me to her Mean Sister, who is Bozo's mother. Mean Sister is dogmatic and close-minded. She can't stand any woman who doesn't work and put her children in day care, or anyone who disagrees with her own far-right conservative views. My children and I are no longer welcome at her house. Still, we stay on amiable terms by never exchanging more than a dozen words
at a time.
Over the years the trailer between us that was her mother's retirement home gets used as a crash pad by various relatives down on their luck until they either find another place to live or simply can't stand Mean Sister any longer. We're used to having people pull up to it, stay for a while, and leave.
Last year the public high school where my husband works has a meltdown and gets taken over by the state. He scrambles and finds a job at a community college 90 minutes away. All this is widely talked about in the town where we live, as he's a popular teacher and the parents didn't want to see him leave. It's a very stressful time for us. Maybe people expected us to pack up and leave immediately, but we were too busy to even start looking for a place to move.
The school year starts. I'm busier than ever, what with two dogs, four ducks, two dozen chickens, two homeschooled children, a toddler, and getting dh off every morning. I sorta notice people moving in and out of the trailer next door, but I don't think much of it -- except to notice that when they gather together to talk at the door, as people are inclined to do before leaving, they don't gather at the front door. They gather at the back door, which can only be seen from our fenced-in back yard. One Thursday evening shortly after school starts the toddler comes with me when I go out to water the birds. He stands at the fence and stares at the group gathered round the back door. I scoop him up when I go back inside, but otherwise pay them no attention. I'm more concerned about the fact that they've taken out the old refrigerator and left it behind the trailer with the door standing open, and glad our children stay inside our fence.
The next Saturday all hell breaks loose.
Day 1: Saturday August 21, 2010
9:00 - The Natchez Trace Visitor's Center hosts a nature photography program in the morning. My husband and the girls go to see it and do some shopping afterward, leaving the toddler and I behind to catch up on our rest. We're in the middle of a heat wave, with the temperature over 100F every day, and the photographers hope the program doesn't get cut short due to the heat. It's going to be another scorcher.
12:00 - I check email. After a few moments, the (land-based) internet connection goes down. I think nothing of it, as this has happened before.
1:15 - I finish the scarf I'm knitting for one daughter and take it up front with the toddler following me. I go to the back of the house for the yarn for my other daughter's scarf. The toddler doesn't follow me. Perhaps he got distracted looking out the front window to see if the car is back yet. He does that a lot.
I hear a strange man's voice in my house.
The doors and windows are locked. How is there a strange man in my house? And more important -- where's my baby?
The man says that my toddler was found playing outside, in spite of the fact that the doors and windows are locked and the baby can't open them. I run out the open door and there's my baby in Mean Sister's arms. She yells at me that the baby was found playing in the road, she's called DHS, and I'm in "a world of trouble young woman!" There's something wrong with that statement but I can't put my finger on it at the moment.
I take my child and say that I'm going home to deadbolt my door. Mean Sister yells, "Don't deadbolt the door! Get another lock, but don't deadbolt it!" Weird.
I take the baby home and look him over. He's fine. That's weird for some reason too, but I'm more concerned about the door right then.
Obviously the regular lock failed. Because the door has a window in it that can't be secured, we have a double-sided deadbolt in it. Otherwise a thief would reach through the window and throw the lock. I get my keys to lock it.
While I'm trying to find the right key (I'd forgotten dh had borrowed it a while back) who should come up to my door but Mean Sister's son Bozo, whom I haven't spoken to in years. He says he's a Sheriff's Deputy now, although he's not in uniform and he shows me no ID. (I later found out he was hired on when the regular Deputies were shipped off to Iraq with their Reserve units.) He tells me that DHS is coming, but I tell him I'm more concerned about getting the door locked. I
notice that the regular doorknob has been pulled almost completely out of the door frame, the door frame is cracked even with the regular lock, the bottom of the door is kicked inward, and the frame of the door window has been yanked almost apart. I point all this out to him. He yells, "Don't lock the deadbolt!"
1:45 Dh and the older children come home, wet, muddy, and grinning from their nature photography walk. I tell dh what happened. He drops the groceries he's carrying on the floor and goes to check the baby.
1:55 A woman who identifies herself as DHS arrives (henceforth to be known as DHS-1), although she shows no identification. Coincidentally, her last name is the same as Mean Sister's mother who used to live in that trailer. It's not a common last name in our area.
DHS-1 says she heard the baby was playing in the middle of the road on the yellow line and wants to see the baby. That's when it hits me -- it's over 100F outside (102F we later learn.) My tender-footed baby is barefoot, as he usually is at home. There are no burns on his feet. There are no marks of any kind on his feet. How could he have made it to the middle of an asphalt highway?
I point this out to DHS-1. She ignores it. I point out the door being damaged. She ignores that as well.
Meanwhile, dh has taken the doorknob off the door and replaced it. The knob shows clear signs of tampering. He shows it around. The Sheriff's Deputy isn't interested. DHS-1 isn't interested. Since we live right outside the city limits, he calls the cops. The phone isn't working. He leaves to show it to the cops.
DHS-1 complains that there are canned goods in the floor from the groceries my husband brought in, that the girls are dirty from their nature walk, that not all the power outlets have baby blockers on them, and that there are a couple of soft spots in the floor. She wants to take pictures. I refuse.
DHS-1 wants to know if I have ever been treated for depression. Yes. She wants the records. I refuse.
Dh returns. The police are concerned about the doorknob. DHS-1 still is not. DHS-1 leaves, telling us we have 25 days to get the house cleaned and the floor fixed.
What with all the upset, it's nightfall before I get around to mentioning to dh that the internet went down right before this started. Dh teaches computer building and maintenance classes. He gets out his kit and checks the line. He reports back that there's 1/10th volt on the line, and the only thing that could have caused that would be if it were deliberately switched off at the relay station.
Dh goes over to Good Buddy's house to make phone calls. He calls the cops. They say, "Get out. Get out now. It's not safe." He calls a relative in another county for shelter.
Sunday Morning.
We throw everything in the car and leave for the relative's house.
Then things start getting scary.
To be continued.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Hi, sorry I've been away. In the past year my baby became a hyperactive toddler, my mother died and left her affairs in an emotional and legal mess, we got chickens and ducks and have been on a chicken-and-duck-related building spree, and my husband's workplace became unworkable and he got a new job 90 minutes away. I think that qualifies as "busy".
Details later.
Details later.
Saturday, July 04, 2009
Happy Fourth of July
233 years ago our Founding Fathers defied the Authority that had created their Colonies to declare these United States of America an independent nation with Liberty and Justice for all.
3 hours ago an American Fundamentalist Christian told me with a straight face that the definition of "sin" was "to defy the Authority that created you." I know, weird huh?
30 minutes ago we celebrated our country's birthday with Bison burgers, fireworks, and the Annual Sparkler Dance with Barking Terrier.
Happy Independence Day!
3 hours ago an American Fundamentalist Christian told me with a straight face that the definition of "sin" was "to defy the Authority that created you." I know, weird huh?
30 minutes ago we celebrated our country's birthday with Bison burgers, fireworks, and the Annual Sparkler Dance with Barking Terrier.
Happy Independence Day!
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Got flue?
We have since Christmas. We're not just talking the at-least-one-day-down-for-one-day-up kind. We're talking about the kind where phlegm comes out your tear ducts - yuck! But aside from exhaustion and sore throats no one's really suffering, so I'm grateful for that.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Friday, December 12, 2008
Friday, November 28, 2008
Special Needs Mother Leads the Heroes in New TV Show
I don't know when it's coming to America, but there's an interesting show on the BBC right now. It's Survivors, a six-part story about what happens to the survivors of a devastating plague that wipes out 99% of the population. The show is a remake of a 1970s series by Terry Nation, the Classic Doctor Who writer who created the Daleks, and the cast is chock full of New Doctor Who/Torchwood alumni. A groups of survivors bands together under the leadership of Abby Grant. Her qualification? Years of mothering a son with leukemia has left her practical, compassionate, and very self-disciplined. It's a heartening endorsement of what we all know but society usually doesn't acknowledge. Here's the website http://www.bbc.co.uk/survivors/
Friday, November 14, 2008
Benchmarks
This week Owl lay on his tummy, lifted his head, and kicked his feet up for the first time.
This week Sunshine made a 100 on a spelling test for the first time.
This week Brighteyes followed a recipe for the first time. She made biscuit dough for chicken and dumplings.
Today Owl made the "g" sound for the first time
Today Sunshine discovered that silent movies could be wonderful and not at all boring for the first time. (Thank you, Buster Keaton.)
Today Brighteyes laughed at herself for the first time.
Today I learned all over again that I can be completely exhausted and still be an okay Mom.
Not a bad week.
This week Sunshine made a 100 on a spelling test for the first time.
This week Brighteyes followed a recipe for the first time. She made biscuit dough for chicken and dumplings.
Today Owl made the "g" sound for the first time
Today Sunshine discovered that silent movies could be wonderful and not at all boring for the first time. (Thank you, Buster Keaton.)
Today Brighteyes laughed at herself for the first time.
Today I learned all over again that I can be completely exhausted and still be an okay Mom.
Not a bad week.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Election Day 2008
I'm always proud to be an American, but some days I'm prouder than others. Election Day 2008 was one of those days.
We've all been down with bad colds but I'll try to post soon. Owl was 13.5 pounds at his 7-week exam and is over 15 pounds at 11 weeks. He's gaining over an ounce a day, and it's all coming out of me.
We've all been down with bad colds but I'll try to post soon. Owl was 13.5 pounds at his 7-week exam and is over 15 pounds at 11 weeks. He's gaining over an ounce a day, and it's all coming out of me.
Monday, September 01, 2008
Jackpot
Sorry to take so long posting, but there's a new man in my life. We made contact a few months ago, but we didn't actually meet until last Tuesday. Since then, the greedy boy has demanded my attention for hours at a time. :)
Owl was born Tuesday afternoon at the midwifery center in Summertown, Tennessee. He's about 10 minutes old in the picture. He was 9 pounds and 21 inches at birth, and came after an hour and ten minutes of labor -- my longest yet.
We came home to north Mississippi Saturday, just in time for his first hurricane. (Don't worry, we're way above the evacuation zone.) I'll post his birth story in a few days.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Puttering Around
Okay. After three speedy labors my body has gotten tired with it's old pattern and decided to try something new. Now it's trying the "start and stop" pattern. "Let's try an hour or two of contractions every two or three days! And just as soon as Crabby is sure we're finally getting down to business (at 1:30 at night, mind you) let's stop!"
*Deep sigh* My midwife informs me this is a common pattern with third or fourth babies. She and her colleagues are convinced the best thing for me to do is lots of walking. Walk, walk, walk the baby out. There's some evidence for this, since the baby has been moving lower every time I move around and bounces back up when I lay down.
The problem is that I am so not a pleasure or sport walker. It's an efficient way to get from Point A to Point B but I overused walking for stress relief between grade school and high school (you can probably guess that story), and I've never really enjoyed it since. And that's without the 100F weather we're having.
No, I'd rather dance than walk. But it's been over a year since I took the time to practice, and I didn't bring any tunes. Where am I going to find Middle Eastern dance tracks in rural Tennessee?
But wait. The Farm hosts alternative music concerts. Surely the bands leave CDs at the store to sell. I search the bins and -- score! Amidst the folk songs and such I find a Tribal Bazaar and a Barracka Mundi. I am now in business.
(I love "folk songs and such" but this is edging out of pleasure and into neccessity.)
The dancing does help with the stress relief, even if all the "dancing" I'm up to at the moment is just walking around the room swinging my hips. My slow progress has been discouraging to me. I try to remind myself it's actually very good for the baby, but I don't handle frustration well. It's easy for it to set off my chronic depression, and that's the last thing I need.
So that's where things stand now. My husband is doing a fair amount of writing. The girls are alternating between working on their art and being bored out of their skulls. The library visits when are type these up are helping, but my husband thinks they'll be tired of them after today. We'll see how things go.
Me? I'm puttering around.
My actual due date isn't until Friday. I just gotta remember that.
*Deep sigh* My midwife informs me this is a common pattern with third or fourth babies. She and her colleagues are convinced the best thing for me to do is lots of walking. Walk, walk, walk the baby out. There's some evidence for this, since the baby has been moving lower every time I move around and bounces back up when I lay down.
The problem is that I am so not a pleasure or sport walker. It's an efficient way to get from Point A to Point B but I overused walking for stress relief between grade school and high school (you can probably guess that story), and I've never really enjoyed it since. And that's without the 100F weather we're having.
No, I'd rather dance than walk. But it's been over a year since I took the time to practice, and I didn't bring any tunes. Where am I going to find Middle Eastern dance tracks in rural Tennessee?
But wait. The Farm hosts alternative music concerts. Surely the bands leave CDs at the store to sell. I search the bins and -- score! Amidst the folk songs and such I find a Tribal Bazaar and a Barracka Mundi. I am now in business.
(I love "folk songs and such" but this is edging out of pleasure and into neccessity.)
The dancing does help with the stress relief, even if all the "dancing" I'm up to at the moment is just walking around the room swinging my hips. My slow progress has been discouraging to me. I try to remind myself it's actually very good for the baby, but I don't handle frustration well. It's easy for it to set off my chronic depression, and that's the last thing I need.
So that's where things stand now. My husband is doing a fair amount of writing. The girls are alternating between working on their art and being bored out of their skulls. The library visits when are type these up are helping, but my husband thinks they'll be tired of them after today. We'll see how things go.
Me? I'm puttering around.
My actual due date isn't until Friday. I just gotta remember that.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Still here, Still Pregnant....
Two weeks later...
We left back for Tennessee the next day. It's been all quiet on the home front, with no more break-ins. It's been pretty quiet on the Farm too. We moved back into a different cabin, one across the road from our midwife's house.
I guess I should explain about the Farm Midwifery Center. It's the US's oldest freestanding (not directly attached to a hospital) birthing center. The Farm was established in Tennessee in 1970 as a hippie commune by a group of alternative lifestyle advocates from San Francisco. 38 years later it's still going as sort of a combination gated rural community/alternative lifestyle tourist attraction. It's biggest draw is the Midwifery Center.
The Center both takes care of pregnant women and trains midwives. The provide home births for local women, including the local Amish community. But they also have cabins available for women who come in from outside the area. Currently my neighbors include pregnant women from California, New York, and Illinois. We're the only ones who didn't fly in.
So basically, right now we're in a cabin in 40 year-old woods in the foothills of the Appalachias. The deer come up to the back windows. The midwife lives across the road, with more midwives down the street. There's a clinic within walking distance, a spectacular earthen swimming pool with a rock face diving cliff that's like something out of one of the more expensive hotels at Disneyworld just out of walking distance, good restaurants with cheap lunchtime buffets in driving distance, and a tourist town with a friendly obstetrical department that works with the clinic just down the road. I've had nothing to do but eat, sleep, swim and play tourist for two weeks. It's been incredibly relaxing.
It's been so blasted relaxing the baby hasn't wanted to come.
I've had three premature labors in a row. Since they were all eight and nine pound preemies, nobody was sure what the cause was. Now it looks like the premature labors might have been stress-related. This is the first time I've had a labor go full term. That's good. I keep telling myself that's good. The problem is I don't know how to cope with a full term labor.
I'm not used to the baby dropping and staying dropped. I'm not used to contractions that come and go, letting you get back to sleep. It's all starting to get a teensy bit annoying.
Meanwhile, we're not running short of days. My husband has been saving his leave days for this moment for seven years. He's enjoying the delicious feel of it being August and him not being in the classroom teaching a new class, although he has been asked to guest lecture at the Farm's alternative school.
Sunshine is taking it incredibly well. Brighteyes has had some trouble with the break in her routine. Not a day has gone by without her throwing a temper tantrum over something that she felt was out of place in some way. It's probably aggravated by her loose tooth -- she's always fussy when she's got a tooth coming out. Still, in the last few days we've made it clear that her fusses aren't helping the baby. She was shocked to realize the baby could hear her even though it hasn't been born yet. She's trying harder to keep it together. Now that she isn't spending so much energy on fusses, she's become an extremely prolific artist, doing two or three sketches a day. Her father is working his way through the exercises in How to Draw What You See and experimenting with some pastels I found on sale at a local Hobby Lobby. It's occurred to Brighteyes that she can invent her own art exercises, and she has been making detailed notes on how to draw hands.
Sunshine is drawing more as well, and is getting better at drawing individual objects. She's also working her way through a dinosaur coloring book.
I brought their math and spelling workbooks along as well. These were very helpful in the first week. Whenever they started to feel anxious and get fussy over the lack of a familiar routine, I would pull them out and they would calm down. By the second week they preferred to spend their time drawing.
And that's basically it. We've hit all the local tourist attractions and eaten at almost all the recommended restaurants. I found a consignment shop that sells new name brand children's clothing overruns for $1.50 to $5.99 and got a start on the fall clothes buying. I've almost finished the Torchwood audiobooks I never had the time to listen to at home. Tomorrow is our 20th wedding anniversary, and the day after that is the adjusted official due date.
I'm really, really ready for the baby to be born now. Okay baby?
We left back for Tennessee the next day. It's been all quiet on the home front, with no more break-ins. It's been pretty quiet on the Farm too. We moved back into a different cabin, one across the road from our midwife's house.
I guess I should explain about the Farm Midwifery Center. It's the US's oldest freestanding (not directly attached to a hospital) birthing center. The Farm was established in Tennessee in 1970 as a hippie commune by a group of alternative lifestyle advocates from San Francisco. 38 years later it's still going as sort of a combination gated rural community/alternative lifestyle tourist attraction. It's biggest draw is the Midwifery Center.
The Center both takes care of pregnant women and trains midwives. The provide home births for local women, including the local Amish community. But they also have cabins available for women who come in from outside the area. Currently my neighbors include pregnant women from California, New York, and Illinois. We're the only ones who didn't fly in.
So basically, right now we're in a cabin in 40 year-old woods in the foothills of the Appalachias. The deer come up to the back windows. The midwife lives across the road, with more midwives down the street. There's a clinic within walking distance, a spectacular earthen swimming pool with a rock face diving cliff that's like something out of one of the more expensive hotels at Disneyworld just out of walking distance, good restaurants with cheap lunchtime buffets in driving distance, and a tourist town with a friendly obstetrical department that works with the clinic just down the road. I've had nothing to do but eat, sleep, swim and play tourist for two weeks. It's been incredibly relaxing.
It's been so blasted relaxing the baby hasn't wanted to come.
I've had three premature labors in a row. Since they were all eight and nine pound preemies, nobody was sure what the cause was. Now it looks like the premature labors might have been stress-related. This is the first time I've had a labor go full term. That's good. I keep telling myself that's good. The problem is I don't know how to cope with a full term labor.
I'm not used to the baby dropping and staying dropped. I'm not used to contractions that come and go, letting you get back to sleep. It's all starting to get a teensy bit annoying.
Meanwhile, we're not running short of days. My husband has been saving his leave days for this moment for seven years. He's enjoying the delicious feel of it being August and him not being in the classroom teaching a new class, although he has been asked to guest lecture at the Farm's alternative school.
Sunshine is taking it incredibly well. Brighteyes has had some trouble with the break in her routine. Not a day has gone by without her throwing a temper tantrum over something that she felt was out of place in some way. It's probably aggravated by her loose tooth -- she's always fussy when she's got a tooth coming out. Still, in the last few days we've made it clear that her fusses aren't helping the baby. She was shocked to realize the baby could hear her even though it hasn't been born yet. She's trying harder to keep it together. Now that she isn't spending so much energy on fusses, she's become an extremely prolific artist, doing two or three sketches a day. Her father is working his way through the exercises in How to Draw What You See and experimenting with some pastels I found on sale at a local Hobby Lobby. It's occurred to Brighteyes that she can invent her own art exercises, and she has been making detailed notes on how to draw hands.
Sunshine is drawing more as well, and is getting better at drawing individual objects. She's also working her way through a dinosaur coloring book.
I brought their math and spelling workbooks along as well. These were very helpful in the first week. Whenever they started to feel anxious and get fussy over the lack of a familiar routine, I would pull them out and they would calm down. By the second week they preferred to spend their time drawing.
And that's basically it. We've hit all the local tourist attractions and eaten at almost all the recommended restaurants. I found a consignment shop that sells new name brand children's clothing overruns for $1.50 to $5.99 and got a start on the fall clothes buying. I've almost finished the Torchwood audiobooks I never had the time to listen to at home. Tomorrow is our 20th wedding anniversary, and the day after that is the adjusted official due date.
I'm really, really ready for the baby to be born now. Okay baby?
Monday, August 04, 2008
A Really Awful Week
I left home to be closer to the midwives for the birth last week. I came home two days ago. No baby yet, but it's been one hell of a week.
Tuesday I ran around trying to finish the packing and get the house settled for our first vacation in 17 years. I was so busy I didn't conciously notice the heat index of 116F. Which isn't to say I didn't unsconciously notice it, as it sent me into precipitous labor around midnight.
All of my births have been precipitous. Once started, labor doesn't stop until late morning, when the baby is born. So, after a few frantic midnight calls to the midwives, we all agreed it would be best if I came on up.
Problem: the Sunshine and Brighteyes are sound asleep. This means an early-morning call to SIL to ask if she can come over and babysit. At 1 am. That she actually shows up is testament to her good character (a fact I sometimes have to remind myself of when -- but that's another story). So we get underway at a 2:45 am.
Did I mention the midwifery center is three and a half hours away? In the daylight? We get there at 6:45 am, find our cabin, and I get examined and immediately ordered to bed. My husband and I eat a cheese pizza we picked up on the way. I manage to convince myself it's really cheese toast with a fruit on the side in a slightly different format. Alas, my husband lacks my skill at self-delusion and had a harder time with it. We get a call from SIL to see if we made it, then crash for three hours.
SIL is supposed to call back at 11. No call. At 11:30 my husband leaves to pick up the girls. I try to talk him out of it, but he logically points out he has to pick up his paycheck today anyway, and he doesn't trust those jokers not to lose it on him. So he made the trip twice more while I got another checkup and slept the rest of the day.
With all the sleep I actually managed to stop the labor for the first time in four pregnancies. Maybe that wild yam extract the midwife insisted I take is actually doing some good. The family gets in around 10, and we finally get everyone fed, settled, and in bed around midnight.
We spent all day Thursday and Friday morning exploring, shopping for stuff that got behind left in the mad dash, and relaxing. We were feeling pretty good by lunchtime Friday when we got a call from SIL that our house now had busted-out windows.
My husband spent the afternoon and night on the phone getting damage reports while I packed everything back up. According to the searchers, the thief had broken through the window in the front door, found it unopenable, then broke a back window, made a mess, stole some change, and left without taking any large items. They couldn't tell what small items were missing and what were lost in the mess. I finally got my husband off the phone at 11pm so we could sleep.
Saturday morning I had an exam, was okayed with a stern warning to avoid stress, and we left. It was another over 100F day. The car, which had been doing fine, had it's air conditioner die once and it died twice on the way back.
The house was in a bigger mess than we'd been told about. On the other hand, it was in a mess when we left, so the searchers probably didn't realize what was us and what was the thief. On the third hand, the thief apparently found it hard to deal with. He checked a few stereotypical places, then stopped instead of doing the whole place.
Note to future thieves: even I'm not dumb enough to hide anything valuable in my panty drawer. We don't have a lot of pawnable swag. A fortune spent on books, DVDs, homeschool materials, and arts & crafts supplies isn't worth much at Leroy's Pawn Shop. It's called "investing in education". You may have heard of it?
Anyway, don't bother looking for the top pawn shop items here. I don't own any gold jewelry. I'm a silversmith, dude. That means everything I own is silver, and almost all of it is non-commercial and so distinctive tracing it would be a snap. Leroy wouldn't know what to do with it.
As for the electronics, the TV is 13 years old. The buttons have worn off the set and it has to be worked with a remote. The computer was assembled out of mostly second-hand parts put together from junked machines people brought my husband to work on. We're not worth breaking into.
Bah. It looks like the thief got a graphing calculator, around $100 worth of change inside two coin banks (one containing dd1's allowance for the past year!), a pearl necklace, some heavy commercial silver chains, a handmade silver and garnet chain, some carved wood and crystal boxes from my collection, a handful of Christmas candy(?), and some forty-watt light bulbs(?) he stuffed into a toy bucket and dropped in the backyard.
This paucity was not for lack of trying, mind you. He backed his car up to our front door with the intention of loading it up, but in the end he didn't find it worth the effort. We didn't design our house to be easy to steal from.
The next thief will have an even harder time. The broken panes have been replaced with a shatter-proof material, and the windows are being fitted with custom locks made by my husband. Never challenge a genius who has his own machine shop.
And the new front window is elegantly engraved with our family name, our business name, and a pair of dragons.
But the sherriff's department and our own searchers missed the Clues. The thief left his homemade club outside the window and left his bloodstains on the curtain and on the floor after cutting his hand opening the window. Pity we can't interest the sherriff's department enough to come collect them or even take our statement. We called and were told the officer in charge "had called this afternoon but no one picked up the phone". (Lie. Neither we nor the answering machine got any such call.) and wouldn't be available until Monday.
By Saturday night my (not) Good (definitely) Old PTSD was wearing off and I felt a bit -- frazzled. On top of all this I'm still almost 9 months pregnant and still under orders to avoid stress. And did I mention easily exhausted? It took me over 24 hours to type up this post, and I to stop once for contractions, which fortunately stopped with rest and plenty of water. I so don't need this right now.
And on top of everything else, it's probably guaranteed it'll be another 17 years before I get another vacation!
Tuesday I ran around trying to finish the packing and get the house settled for our first vacation in 17 years. I was so busy I didn't conciously notice the heat index of 116F. Which isn't to say I didn't unsconciously notice it, as it sent me into precipitous labor around midnight.
All of my births have been precipitous. Once started, labor doesn't stop until late morning, when the baby is born. So, after a few frantic midnight calls to the midwives, we all agreed it would be best if I came on up.
Problem: the Sunshine and Brighteyes are sound asleep. This means an early-morning call to SIL to ask if she can come over and babysit. At 1 am. That she actually shows up is testament to her good character (a fact I sometimes have to remind myself of when -- but that's another story). So we get underway at a 2:45 am.
Did I mention the midwifery center is three and a half hours away? In the daylight? We get there at 6:45 am, find our cabin, and I get examined and immediately ordered to bed. My husband and I eat a cheese pizza we picked up on the way. I manage to convince myself it's really cheese toast with a fruit on the side in a slightly different format. Alas, my husband lacks my skill at self-delusion and had a harder time with it. We get a call from SIL to see if we made it, then crash for three hours.
SIL is supposed to call back at 11. No call. At 11:30 my husband leaves to pick up the girls. I try to talk him out of it, but he logically points out he has to pick up his paycheck today anyway, and he doesn't trust those jokers not to lose it on him. So he made the trip twice more while I got another checkup and slept the rest of the day.
With all the sleep I actually managed to stop the labor for the first time in four pregnancies. Maybe that wild yam extract the midwife insisted I take is actually doing some good. The family gets in around 10, and we finally get everyone fed, settled, and in bed around midnight.
We spent all day Thursday and Friday morning exploring, shopping for stuff that got behind left in the mad dash, and relaxing. We were feeling pretty good by lunchtime Friday when we got a call from SIL that our house now had busted-out windows.
My husband spent the afternoon and night on the phone getting damage reports while I packed everything back up. According to the searchers, the thief had broken through the window in the front door, found it unopenable, then broke a back window, made a mess, stole some change, and left without taking any large items. They couldn't tell what small items were missing and what were lost in the mess. I finally got my husband off the phone at 11pm so we could sleep.
Saturday morning I had an exam, was okayed with a stern warning to avoid stress, and we left. It was another over 100F day. The car, which had been doing fine, had it's air conditioner die once and it died twice on the way back.
The house was in a bigger mess than we'd been told about. On the other hand, it was in a mess when we left, so the searchers probably didn't realize what was us and what was the thief. On the third hand, the thief apparently found it hard to deal with. He checked a few stereotypical places, then stopped instead of doing the whole place.
Note to future thieves: even I'm not dumb enough to hide anything valuable in my panty drawer. We don't have a lot of pawnable swag. A fortune spent on books, DVDs, homeschool materials, and arts & crafts supplies isn't worth much at Leroy's Pawn Shop. It's called "investing in education". You may have heard of it?
Anyway, don't bother looking for the top pawn shop items here. I don't own any gold jewelry. I'm a silversmith, dude. That means everything I own is silver, and almost all of it is non-commercial and so distinctive tracing it would be a snap. Leroy wouldn't know what to do with it.
As for the electronics, the TV is 13 years old. The buttons have worn off the set and it has to be worked with a remote. The computer was assembled out of mostly second-hand parts put together from junked machines people brought my husband to work on. We're not worth breaking into.
Bah. It looks like the thief got a graphing calculator, around $100 worth of change inside two coin banks (one containing dd1's allowance for the past year!), a pearl necklace, some heavy commercial silver chains, a handmade silver and garnet chain, some carved wood and crystal boxes from my collection, a handful of Christmas candy(?), and some forty-watt light bulbs(?) he stuffed into a toy bucket and dropped in the backyard.
This paucity was not for lack of trying, mind you. He backed his car up to our front door with the intention of loading it up, but in the end he didn't find it worth the effort. We didn't design our house to be easy to steal from.
The next thief will have an even harder time. The broken panes have been replaced with a shatter-proof material, and the windows are being fitted with custom locks made by my husband. Never challenge a genius who has his own machine shop.
And the new front window is elegantly engraved with our family name, our business name, and a pair of dragons.
But the sherriff's department and our own searchers missed the Clues. The thief left his homemade club outside the window and left his bloodstains on the curtain and on the floor after cutting his hand opening the window. Pity we can't interest the sherriff's department enough to come collect them or even take our statement. We called and were told the officer in charge "had called this afternoon but no one picked up the phone". (Lie. Neither we nor the answering machine got any such call.) and wouldn't be available until Monday.
By Saturday night my (not) Good (definitely) Old PTSD was wearing off and I felt a bit -- frazzled. On top of all this I'm still almost 9 months pregnant and still under orders to avoid stress. And did I mention easily exhausted? It took me over 24 hours to type up this post, and I to stop once for contractions, which fortunately stopped with rest and plenty of water. I so don't need this right now.
And on top of everything else, it's probably guaranteed it'll be another 17 years before I get another vacation!
Friday, June 20, 2008
"I Got Sunshine on a Cloudy Daaayyyy"
Sunshine has hit a cognitive bump in her learning. Basically her short-term memory is shot to hell. You tell a story, she'll ask you to repeat it. She works a math problem, and two minutes later can't remember the answer and has to work it again. She looks at a word to copy it down and can't spell it correctly. She loses her pencil and her eraser half a dozen times each during every lesson. She turns over a card in Concentration (card game) and can't remember what it was.
Otherwise, she's smart as a whip. She knows how to spell most words, and her math reasoning skills, handwriting, and drawing are improving in leaps and bounds. She can often out-think her big sister when it comes to making connections and engaging her long-term memory.
That said, I'm about to tear my hair out in frustration. My husband reminds me that Bright Eyes hit a similar cognitive bump as well at 5 years old. True, but Sunshine is 7 years old, and it's harder to keep my patience sometimes. Still, it should clear up in time, when enough brain cells grow enough synapses for her memory to fully work. Not everyone's brain matures in the same manner or at the same rate. Until then it's just a waiting game.
At least she isn't in the school system. One of my husband's former students showed up the other day looking for help for his son. The boy had had a similar problem in his early grades and been labeled "special ed". The problem cleared up over time, but the label stuck. Now 10, he hasn't been challenged to learn anything and his father is starting to panic. At least with Sunshine I can repeat the material as long as it takes for her to master it.
Otherwise, she's smart as a whip. She knows how to spell most words, and her math reasoning skills, handwriting, and drawing are improving in leaps and bounds. She can often out-think her big sister when it comes to making connections and engaging her long-term memory.
That said, I'm about to tear my hair out in frustration. My husband reminds me that Bright Eyes hit a similar cognitive bump as well at 5 years old. True, but Sunshine is 7 years old, and it's harder to keep my patience sometimes. Still, it should clear up in time, when enough brain cells grow enough synapses for her memory to fully work. Not everyone's brain matures in the same manner or at the same rate. Until then it's just a waiting game.
At least she isn't in the school system. One of my husband's former students showed up the other day looking for help for his son. The boy had had a similar problem in his early grades and been labeled "special ed". The problem cleared up over time, but the label stuck. Now 10, he hasn't been challenged to learn anything and his father is starting to panic. At least with Sunshine I can repeat the material as long as it takes for her to master it.
Aaaand back again!
Our recurring problem with the telephone and internet connections being down during working hours tends to clear up within hours after complaining to the state utilities regulatory board. Three cheers for regulation!
Thursday, June 05, 2008
Same Song, Second Verse.....
Once again, our phone and internet lines are completely down except for a few hours at night. Once again, I'm not a happy camper. I've been working on new posts. This development really throws a spanner in those works..
Thursday, May 22, 2008
With the political campaign heating up, attention is beginning to fall on Bush's No Child Left Behind program for public schools. The program has drawn loads of scathing criticism for its top-down approach to solving problems and the inept way that it has been implemented in many schools, including the snarky No Child Left Behind -- Football Version
It would be a great analogy if it kept things in proportion. NCLB is not, as the blog claims, supposed to prepare children to win the championship. It's supposed to prepare children to qualify for the team. Way-big difference. Currently too many schools are not bothering to prepare children to qualify for the team.
The other day a young woman came over to our house for some math tutoring. She had graduated with good grades from the local "good" high school and is probably gifted, but she had never been taught the fundamental concepts she was supposed to learn. She couldn't subtract 0.5 from 6. While this distressed the adults in the room, it totally amazed my home-schooled eight year-old, who could do all the problems on the woman's college homework assignment in her head. I finally had to distract the child with cartoons before the poor woman died of embarrassment.
While NCLB is a step in the wrong direction, it only got passed because public schools weren't doing their job in the first place. To quote from today's AP article
All teams must make the state playoffs and all MUST win the championship. If a team does not win the championship, they will be on probation until they are champions, and coaches will be held accountable. If after two years they have not won the championship, their footballs and equipment will be taken away until they do win the championship.
It would be a great analogy if it kept things in proportion. NCLB is not, as the blog claims, supposed to prepare children to win the championship. It's supposed to prepare children to qualify for the team. Way-big difference. Currently too many schools are not bothering to prepare children to qualify for the team.
The other day a young woman came over to our house for some math tutoring. She had graduated with good grades from the local "good" high school and is probably gifted, but she had never been taught the fundamental concepts she was supposed to learn. She couldn't subtract 0.5 from 6. While this distressed the adults in the room, it totally amazed my home-schooled eight year-old, who could do all the problems on the woman's college homework assignment in her head. I finally had to distract the child with cartoons before the poor woman died of embarrassment.
While NCLB is a step in the wrong direction, it only got passed because public schools weren't doing their job in the first place. To quote from today's AP article
Educators look at that goal and say, 'These people must be kidding,'" Petrilli said.
Even if educators have that view, parents don't, says Kerri Briggs, the Education Department's assistant secretary for elementary and secondary education.
"They would like their kids to be on grade level now and not 50 years from now, not 20 years from now, but this year," Briggs said.
Let's not even try to kid anybody. The only reason NCLB passed in the first place was because the public schools were broke and had refused to do anything substantive to fix their problems for decades. Desperation was the cause for NCLB, not malevolence. Yes, there are a few loonies around who want to end public education, because a working public education system (as opposed to the mess we got now) is essential to a working democracy. But NCLB was not passed because of a few loonies. It was passed because a substantial number of parents in this country are fed up with their schools not working.
Want to end government interference in the school system? Fix the blooming schools without government interference. If the schools are not willing to fix their problems on their own, they can't blame their customers, the parents, for trying to fix the problems for them.
Monday, May 19, 2008
I Ought to Frame This
"Dear Taxpayer,
"You are entitled to an economic stimulus payment of $xxx as provided by the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008. You can expect your payment by 5/23/08."
Honestly, how often do you get a note from the Federal Government saying, "Your check is in the mail"?
"You are entitled to an economic stimulus payment of $xxx as provided by the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008. You can expect your payment by 5/23/08."
Honestly, how often do you get a note from the Federal Government saying, "Your check is in the mail"?
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Mississippi's First Big Budget Election
My family just survived our first big-budget political election. In previous years Mississippi has been too inconsequential for the Big Guys to bombard us with a propaganda saturation campaign. Not so this year unfortunately, as the race for the House of Representatives seat MS-01 seemed suddenly worthy of big-money mass callings, media, and mailings praising the virtues of the Conservative Republican candidate while accusing Democratic candidate Travis Childers of closing churches, not paying his own taxes, increasing taxes on others, and everything else short of eating babies for breakfast. Most of the attack ads turned out to be lies and all of them carefully avoided talking about the real issues, like the war and the economy.
I'm pleased as punch to report that the big-money ad campaign failed completely. Glenn McCullough, the Fundamentalist Christian Conservative Republican candidate who snowed in our mailboxes and whose flunkies called our phone 6-12 times a day with pre-recorded messages was about the first person knocked out of the race. Then we were blitzed with a fistful of anti-Childers mailings every day. My husband especially loved the one that linked Childers to Obama; he thought it was the best endorsement anyone could possibly offer Childers. The net result of all that garbage was that Democrat Travis Childers carried our county easily and won the race.
Hopefully the big-money people will have learned their lesson and we won't get a similar blanket of glossy over-sized postcards and annoying phone calls next election. Hopefully.
As for us, we voted for Green Party candidate John Wages until he was knocked out of the race. Wages was the only candidate running in favor of pulling out of the war. Then we switched to Childers for the runoff. Childers seems tolerable, but I could not in good conscious vote for someone who would, among other things, deny the sanctity of marriage to all single adults who seek it's blessings while a better candidate was on the ballot.
While looking for tonight's election reports I found a nice-looking blog for Mississipi Democrats called CottonMouth. It's good to see another Mississippi blogger who isn't a staunch Conservative; sometimes I feel a bit lonely.
I'm pleased as punch to report that the big-money ad campaign failed completely. Glenn McCullough, the Fundamentalist Christian Conservative Republican candidate who snowed in our mailboxes and whose flunkies called our phone 6-12 times a day with pre-recorded messages was about the first person knocked out of the race. Then we were blitzed with a fistful of anti-Childers mailings every day. My husband especially loved the one that linked Childers to Obama; he thought it was the best endorsement anyone could possibly offer Childers. The net result of all that garbage was that Democrat Travis Childers carried our county easily and won the race.
Hopefully the big-money people will have learned their lesson and we won't get a similar blanket of glossy over-sized postcards and annoying phone calls next election. Hopefully.
As for us, we voted for Green Party candidate John Wages until he was knocked out of the race. Wages was the only candidate running in favor of pulling out of the war. Then we switched to Childers for the runoff. Childers seems tolerable, but I could not in good conscious vote for someone who would, among other things, deny the sanctity of marriage to all single adults who seek it's blessings while a better candidate was on the ballot.
While looking for tonight's election reports I found a nice-looking blog for Mississipi Democrats called CottonMouth. It's good to see another Mississippi blogger who isn't a staunch Conservative; sometimes I feel a bit lonely.
Monday, May 12, 2008
The Coming Collapse of the Middle Class
Harvard Law Scholar Elizabeth Warren gave a lecture on what has gone wrong with the American Economic Dream. It's up on youtube here. Watch it. The sad but entirely predictable thing is that I heard all these statements 20 years ago in publications on the "radical liberal fringe". I did what I could to protect my family then, staying away from credit cards and debt. I figured, rightly it turned out, by the time the mainstream media picked up on the story it would be too late. Still, it's nice to see the government's figures backing everything up.
Keep in mind that what Elizabeth Warren talks about isn't news. It's history. She isn't talking about what is happening right now, but what has already happened while America has slept.
Keep in mind that what Elizabeth Warren talks about isn't news. It's history. She isn't talking about what is happening right now, but what has already happened while America has slept.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Blasted At&T
Thanks to our wonderful phone company and internet provider, we now have no phone or DSL during business hours and only intermittent service at night. AND they give me the run-around when I try to get it serviced. I am so not a happy camper.
Monday, March 03, 2008
March 2008 Update On the Girls.
Latin
We're starting over again on Minimus. It's a refresher for Brighteyes, but Sunshine needs it more. I had hoped both girls would precede at the same pace, but that's not to be.
Math
Brighteyes is working through Singapore 3 without any real problems. Sunshine is having trouble adding and subtracting above 10. She doesn't want to give up her fingers yet, even though she knows how to use the abacus. I'm printing her out worksheets from http://www.kidzone.ws/ for extra practice.
Spelling, Handwriting, Grammar
All going fine. Sunshine is through with her handwriting book and currently practices with Draw, Write, Now at the end of lessons. While Brighteyes inherited her father's command of the pencil, Sunshine has inherited my lack of command of the pencil. She's coming along with her handwriting with practice. I hope we'll show the same improvement with art eventually.
Brighteyes is working in First Language Lessons Volume 3. I really like the way these lessons integrate sentence diagramming into the lessons, teaching the parts of a sentence by teaching their place on the diagram. That makes so much more sense than the way my husband and I were taught grammar in grade school.
The importance of these skills really sank in to us this year. My husband is teaching a remedial test prep class at the high school. He began by spending two weeks teaching the parts of speach and sentance diagramming. The students had never been taught either skill before. They hated every minute of it! Why wasn't he teaching them math, which was on the test, instead of this garbage which wasn't on the test? They tried to sneak out at every opportunity, and he constantly had to round them up. But when they were tested after the first two weeks, every one of them had jumped a letter grade higher. It turned out grammar was on the test after all in every problem. Those poor kids had literally not been taught enough grammar to properly understand the questions they were supposed to answer.
History
Back at it.
Literature, Science, Art
Not back at it. I have hopes for it as soon as Sunshine stops throwing a tantrum at the start of every lesson. Brighteyes went through the same stage at that age. I hope Sunshine will also leave it behind when she turns 7.
Reading
Sunshine is working through her beloved Doggie Sticker Book and happily reads aloud the description of each dog.
Logic
Brighteyes has started on Mind Benders. At 8 1/2 she seems a bit young to me, but she is eating them up, completing 3 or 4 3-square logic problems a day. So, I'm ordering her the beginning set and the first Cranium Crackers book. That ought to keep her busy for a while. Sunshine is chomping at the bit to begin the Mind Benders Warmup, but I told her she had to finish first grade math before that.
Format
Right now we're splitting lessons. We work in the mornings until lunch, then resume after a 4pm snack. It's working for now.
We're starting over again on Minimus. It's a refresher for Brighteyes, but Sunshine needs it more. I had hoped both girls would precede at the same pace, but that's not to be.
Math
Brighteyes is working through Singapore 3 without any real problems. Sunshine is having trouble adding and subtracting above 10. She doesn't want to give up her fingers yet, even though she knows how to use the abacus. I'm printing her out worksheets from http://www.kidzone.ws/ for extra practice.
Spelling, Handwriting, Grammar
All going fine. Sunshine is through with her handwriting book and currently practices with Draw, Write, Now at the end of lessons. While Brighteyes inherited her father's command of the pencil, Sunshine has inherited my lack of command of the pencil. She's coming along with her handwriting with practice. I hope we'll show the same improvement with art eventually.
Brighteyes is working in First Language Lessons Volume 3. I really like the way these lessons integrate sentence diagramming into the lessons, teaching the parts of a sentence by teaching their place on the diagram. That makes so much more sense than the way my husband and I were taught grammar in grade school.
The importance of these skills really sank in to us this year. My husband is teaching a remedial test prep class at the high school. He began by spending two weeks teaching the parts of speach and sentance diagramming. The students had never been taught either skill before. They hated every minute of it! Why wasn't he teaching them math, which was on the test, instead of this garbage which wasn't on the test? They tried to sneak out at every opportunity, and he constantly had to round them up. But when they were tested after the first two weeks, every one of them had jumped a letter grade higher. It turned out grammar was on the test after all in every problem. Those poor kids had literally not been taught enough grammar to properly understand the questions they were supposed to answer.
History
Back at it.
Literature, Science, Art
Not back at it. I have hopes for it as soon as Sunshine stops throwing a tantrum at the start of every lesson. Brighteyes went through the same stage at that age. I hope Sunshine will also leave it behind when she turns 7.
Reading
Sunshine is working through her beloved Doggie Sticker Book and happily reads aloud the description of each dog.
Logic
Brighteyes has started on Mind Benders. At 8 1/2 she seems a bit young to me, but she is eating them up, completing 3 or 4 3-square logic problems a day. So, I'm ordering her the beginning set and the first Cranium Crackers book. That ought to keep her busy for a while. Sunshine is chomping at the bit to begin the Mind Benders Warmup, but I told her she had to finish first grade math before that.
Format
Right now we're splitting lessons. We work in the mornings until lunch, then resume after a 4pm snack. It's working for now.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
One More Round!
I'm pregnant again, for the fourth time. It lacks the thrill of my first time, but it also lacks the stark terror of #2 and #3 after the death of my first child. I can live with that. More details to follow.
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