We're moving!... Again!

Although, we're not moving very far...we found out last week that we will be moving to one of the other cottages on campus.  It is a very big blessing for us.  We have really come to love the house we live in here, but we are a little cramped on space.  We are making some changes to the way we house kids and are going to offer a new program.  Because of that, if we stayed in our current house we would have to give up one of our three rooms.  That would make all four of us sharing two bedrooms and a bathroom.  It would be even more cramped!

We were very happy when we were told that we'd be swapping with the cottage next door.  We will get to move into a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom, 1 living area apartment on one side of the cottage.  We will then have 4 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms, 1 living area, kitchen and dining room on the communal side of the house for us and the boys to share.

We are super excited, but I have to say, packing is hard work!  Doing this with a 1 and 4 year old is even harder!  Luckily, we got rid of TONS of stuff when we moved here so there isn't nearly as much to move as there once was.  My biggest issue now is that every time I get some boxes packed and move on to another area, my kids decide they need to dig out half of what was packed!  Every time I turn around there is more stuff scattered throughout the house (and keep in mind this is a 6 bedroom, 5 bathroom, 2 living areas, etc house....that is a lot of space to keep hunting stuff down!).  I'm really not complaining, it's just rather humourous.  Very similar to the pinterest picture "Cleaning your house with kids is like brushing your teeth while eating oreos."  Just swap out cleaning for packing!  Thankfully my mom is coming tomorrow to take the kids on for a while.  That should greatly speed up the process!

We are headed to Colorado this week to spend the week with Greg's parents.  I'm looking forward to a little vacation and some cooler weather!

Who goes to children's homes?

Are the children here just the throw away kids that no one could take care of? Unequivocally no.  I feel extremely passionate about this.  The majority (as in I can't think of any that aren't, but maybe I'm forgetting) are kids who were dealt lots in life they didn't deserve.  Most are suffering the sins of their parents.  There are SO many hurting children in this world...and quite a few just down the road from you.  While I think international adoption is a great thing and something necessary as well, I hope people don't forget that there are so many hurting children just a few miles from you.

Some of our children are up for adoption, some are not.  Some of our children are state placed, some are privately placed.  They come from all races, all economic classes, divorced homes and married homes and various locations.  Everyone is hurting in some way.  I'm not talking the "my mom said I couldn't wear this shirt and hurt my feelings."  No, this is more the "my mom decided I wasn't important enough and instead of taking care of my most basic needs went and bought drugs instead."  We have kids who have endured abuse and neglect.  But you know what, they're still kids.  They're kids who have dreams about going to college, becoming dentists, becoming engineers...and mostly finding people who just want to love them.  Again, these are NOT throw away kids.  I hope you find some motivation to support the kids here or somewhere else there's a need.  As Christians we need to be the ones showing these kids there are people in this world who are willing to love them, encourage them, pray for them, hug them...

"Normal" Day

Okay, so life here is fun.  Crazy...fun.  At the beginning I kept thinking, okay once we just get into a rhythm and have a "normal" day then I'll feel like I have this under control.  It didn't take long to realize that there is a new standard for "normal."  Normal day here = crazy all the time.

This week we have our house of 7 boys aged 3-18.  Let me just tell you, the personalities in this house are very very different.  Here is a run down of the "day in the life" of a houseparent.  It starts at 6:00 waking up boys that have to be at school at 6:30 for before school tutoring.  That means Greg gets up those that have to go, and then I get up to hang out while he runs them up to school.

When he gets home he gets the coffee going and gets the rest of the school aged boys up.  If the 3 year old is up, I get up too, if not I go back to bed for a little bit. :-)  Greg pulls them out of bed...some are better than others about getting up.  For the record, the boys have already been threatened that if they miss the bus and Greg has to drive them, they have to pay for the gas money!

Once the big ones are off to school we have devo with the rest of the staff in the library.  Then, Greg heads to work, usually weed eating and stuff for the morning.  While he's gone I usually walk the little ones around, sometimes to the park or other times to the "pantry" to get supplies for the day.  Note: The pantry is our food storage building where I go get our groceries from.

When we get back Bethany goes down for a nap, the boys that are here find something to do...play, draw, etc.  I try and get something going for supper and we hang out until Greg gets home at lunch.  We do lunch, tidy, and send the littles off for an afternoon nap/quiet time.  Things start getting really crazy around 3:00 as people start trickling home.  Then it seems like everyone has something they have to do.  Homework, sports practice, projects, studying, chores, therapy, dr appts, banquets, etc.  It's a matter shuttling everyone where they need to be and helping people who need help all the while trying to keep the house in order and get supper on the table.

After supper, the boys finish chores, play in the backyard, finish homework, etc.  The littles go to bed around 8:00 and the big ones stay up until around 10:00.  Finally at 10:00 boys have to be in their rooms, doors closed.  Greg and I head to our room and get ready to start the whole thing over again the next day!

Like I said...fun...crazy fun!

Day 1 = Success

Well we survived Day One!  Actually we did more than survive, we had a great time.  Our boys are cool kids, I'm not going to lie.

This is our week with four boys grades 8-12.  I made some poppy seed chicken (minus poppy seeds since they didn't have any in the food area) and corn/green bean casserole.  The boys made all the appropriate "oohs and ahhs" and made me feel like I had cooked them a gourmet meal!

We're all hanging out in the living room watching some TV.  Everyone's smiling and we're having a good time!  Loving my life tonight.

New Car Smell

This post is all about keeping it real.  The new car smell has worn off a little, everything's not covered in rainbows and no one's ridden up on their unicorn lately.  I'm feeling disconnected from my old home and not fully connected to my new one yet.  I'm living in a little limbo right now.

Truly, I think I'm ready to get this show on the road.  Let's have some big loud boys in our house!  We have this nice big house and it's very very quiet.  Well, as quiet as it can be with a 3 year old that never (seriously, NEVER) stops talking.  We drove to Austin today, we walked around Ikea for awhile, then we went to HEB to get coffee and then we came home and played outside for awhile.

As I sat reflecting on our day...unintentional reflection....our Hulu wouldn't connect to the internet so we had to wait for Grey's Anatomy....yes, my first world problems! :-)  Anyway, reflection, I began thinking about how its going to take some readjustment to be content in the quietness.  We lived a very filled (not full) life.  There was something going on pretty much every night of the week. I was craving quiet, peace, change.  It's here.  Now, remembering to pay attention to these blessings is on my to do list.

Smart As Allison

Since I haven't always posted my blog on Facebook and now there are people reading it who didn't read it before, I thought a little explanation was in order.

I started this blog when I found out I was pregnant with Bruce....allllll the way back in 2007.  At that time, creating blogs was all the rage.  I have used this blog (intermittently at times) to document our lives.  Currently it's documenting/explaining what our new roles here in Cherokee look like.

When all my friends created their blogs they had cutesy titles and such...there's not a whole lot of cutesy that goes well with our last name...not to mention the fact that in your top 100 words used to describe me, cutesy would likely not make the cut.  So, Smart As Allison was born.  Because 1) I am a know it all (you know, that whole oldest child problem), and 2) well, to be frank (or Allison...hardy har) I also have some Smart As* tendencies! :-)

Small towns...

Raise your hand if you've ever lived in a small Texas town.  I thought I had...I mean, I lived in Abilene for five years...that's a small Texas town, right?  Um, it's not.  If your town has a fast food restaurant in it, you are not a small Texas town.

Want to know what we have here in Cherokee?  Let me tell you.  We have: 3 churches, 1 school campus (elementary, middle, and high school), a feed store, a very old gas station (um, no pay at the pump here!), a post office, a roadside BBQ "restaurant" (and by restaurant I mean two picnic tables outside a tiny building...), Sue's General Store that also serves lunch (and is VERY good!), and the creme de la creme...a single flashing yellow light.

It's cute. It's quaint.  And if you need something you can drive 15 miles and hit up the big city of Llano or San Saba (population of about 3,000).  I'm not going to lie...we have already driven to Llano for Chicken Express (multiple times).

To describe it as Greg described it: "I have more Facebook friends than there are people who live in Cherokee, TX."

First day...ish...

Bet you're all wondering how our first day with kids went...well it didn't. :-)  We still had some de-escalation training to finish up and had to have our TB test finished so they postponed our first day with kids until next week.

So in place of the "first day of school" post, I'll try to give you a better understanding of what life is/will be like here.  We have a big house.  It has 3 rooms and 2 bathrooms for us. We have chosen to put both kids in the same room so we can use the 3rd bedroom as a personal living room/craft room for us.  The rooms are actually quite big so it's not a problem.  When we finish getting everything unpacked, I'll post pictures.  We have a communal living room, kitchen, dining room, and office area.  Finally, there are three boy's bedrooms all with their own bathrooms.  "Our" rooms are all separate from the rest of the house and can be locked to keep our section private.  We have a private entrance through our room as well.

There are a total of six cottages all next door to each other.  Three boys cottages and 3 girls cottages.  We live in Cottage 2.  We will only be houseparenting boys.  We are the "relief parents."  All houseparents work three weeks on, one week off.  When the houseparents from Cottage 1 have their off week, their boys come live in our house. The next week, when the houseparents from Cottage 3 have their off week, their boys come live with us.  The 3rd week, we work as backup parents...basically help with doctor's appointments, help shuttle kids around, etc.  And then, we are off for the fourth week.

At capacity, each cottage can have up to 8 kids.  Currently, one cottage has 6 boys and one has 4.  The boys range in age from 3-19.  Once they graduate high school, the kids are assisted in finding a college to attend or another place to live.  All the kids go to school "in town" (2 miles down the road).  They get breakfast and lunch at school.  As housemom, I'm responsible for feeding them afternoon snacks, dinner, and an evening snack...and all meals on the weekends.  We treat them as part of our family.  If we run errands, they run errands.  When we go to church, they go to church.  We all eat dinner around a large table (think Duggar's). 

We are really happy here.  I'm not so naive as to think that life with lots of boys of varied pasts won't be difficult at times.  Still, we are thankful for this opportunity.  We have peace about our decision to be here and truly feel God's presence in this decision.

P.S.  Any questions that you all have?  Anything you're curious about?  If you know me at all, you know nothing's off limits!  Ask away!

The country

The picture doesn't do it justice...the air is clear, the grass is green, the sky is blue, it smells like the perfect mixture of dirt and grass, there are stars at night, big hills, beautiful sunsets, God bless Texas! :-)

It's really happening

The house is all moved...all that's left in our house now are things that are staying for the new tenants. Our new house is all set up minus a few odds and ends. Looks like we're really doing this.

Today was our last Sunday at Northside as members. Not forever, we will be back...just felt weird. I felt sad today as we got rid of the rest of our things and our house was completely empty. we brought both kids home from the hospital to that house...it's been very good to us. But, in the end, it is just a house.

We head out to Cherokee bright and early tomorrow morning. We have boys in our home starting Wednesday. Again, we are really doing this. Catch you all on the flip side!

Last day of work

Today was my last day working as a process engineer...at least for now.  Who knows if I'll ever go back, but for today I'm done.  It felt really weird walking out.  There have been a lot of weird feelings lately.  Feeling nervous and excited, feeling ready to go and wanting to stay, insecurity, hurt feelings, apprehension, delite, and many others.  It's been a crazy few weeks.

At this point, I'm ready to get there, have my house set up, and see what my new life looks like.  It's been a long day.  We did get most everything moved in this weekend.  Greg's mom is here and with her motivation we got pretty much every box unpacked.  Things are coming together!  We do our first aid/CPR training Thursday, and then we head up there with the last of our stuff.  Greg's mom flies out Sunday morning so we'll be dropping her off, heading to church, then heading back to Cherokee to start our time there.

Our new changes

I posted on Facebook, but thought I'd go ahead and give a few more details about what's coming up in our lives.

We are headed on a new adventure.  We're going to go work for Cherokee Home for Children as relief parents.  It's totally a fluke thing (AKA God thing)...we had not been thinking about doing this in any way.  Two days before Christmas my mom asked if I'd take her and my kids to Cherokee to see my grandmother who was visiting my uncle.  My uncle is the director for CHFC.  While there he was talking about this Public Relations position that was open.  I started thinking, "hmmm, I'd be really good at that!"  So, we talked more, he showed my mom and I around the home and everything and I texted Greg, "think you could live in Cherokee?"  There were a few problems with that already: 1) the position really needed to be a male since the other part of the job was to fund raise (sometimes in very conservative churches, hence why it needed to be a male) and 2) I'm the director's niece.  Not to mention the fact that I wasn't completely convinced Greg and I even wanted to move to Cherokee at this point.

We figured, what the heck...so, Greg and I submitted our resumes along with a proposal to split the position into two with Greg and I splitting the workload.  We were met with a phone call saying it just wouldn't work.  The position reported directly to my uncle and being that I'm his niece it just wasn't the right thing for the home.  We totally got it.  We were VERY disappointed.  I didn't realize how much I really wanted it to happen until my heart totally sank during that call.

A few days later we got another call with another opportunity.  My uncle asked if we would consider being house parents.  We really weren't sure...house parents are a whole different ball game.  We have small children, I have a great job, we live a very comfortable lifestyle, we live down the street from my parents, we'd have other people's kids in our house, could we be good examples, do we have what it takes, how would our children adapt...these and so much more started going through our heads.  Filled with questions we asked my uncle at least 20 different things.  We prayed, and talked, and prayed, and talked, and decided this is something God put on our hearts and in our lives.

To give more history: Greg is adopted.  He was adopted at age 2.  He lived with a foster family for over a year before his parents got him.  He (and I) have always felt strongly that without places like Cherokee and other similar resources there are far too many ways for kids to fall through the cracks.  By giving homes/families to children who need them, we are fulfilling something Greg has always felt passionately about.

We had one more hurdle...convince the board that we should be able to be hired despite my relationship with the director.  We prayed and prayed the entire board meeting.  We finally got the call late that night and were officially offered the position!  Wow.  We were really doing this!  After waiting for some loose ends (AKA my bonus) at work, I gave two weeks notice and we're heading that way soon.

We move next weekend and officially have kids in our home starting March 7th.  I still feel a little shocked and honestly ridiculously overwhelmed.  Packing up our house, deciding what to keep and what to get rid of, figuring out how to do a birthday party for Beth (who turns one this week), and still working everyday up until the day we move has totally maxed out my stress threshold.  So, prayers for my peace level are much appreciated.  I will hopefully continue to include you all on our adventures!

Exciting changes heading our way...

There are exciting changes heading our direction.  Don't really want them all on the internet quite yet, but I do hope that as things change around here that I will also be a little more motivated to keep my blog up to date! (and we are NOT pregnant...that seems to be where everyone's mind goes first!)

Other things going on in our lives: Bethany is turning ONE this month.  Crazy.  We've had some drama lately with her weight.  She was not gaining weight like she was supposed to.  I ended up deciding to wean her...that was a very difficult decision for me.  After having nursed Bruce for 18 months I was feeling a lot of guilt about weaning her, but in the end it was the right decision.  She just wasn't gaining weight.  She has been dropping percentiles and at her 9 month appointment she had dropped to the 5th percentile for weight (still in the 95th for length).  Our pediatrician was concerned so we started supplementing all her bottles, but she still nursed for most of her feedings.  When we went back for a check up at 10 months she had dropped to the 3rd percentile.  Red flags and alarms were going off.  I started crying that the drs office, asking if I had to stop nursing.  He said no, but that I had to record every ounce she ate so I'd need to pump exclusively.  Um, no.  So, we used up what was left in the freezer and supplemented with formula.  All of her bottles were double strength...

When we went back for her 11 month checkup she was up TWO WHOLE POUNDS!  Yay!  That shot her back up to around the 45th percentile.  The dr was thrilled and I was so relieved!  That being said, we're still watching her calorie intake very closely, but are hopeful that she'll maintain this weight gain.

Other news, Bruce is growing like a weed and seriously funny.  He says so many silly things and likes to talk about his brother "Rica".  Not sure about that, but supposedly imaginary friends are good things.  He loves preschool and comes home every day telling me that he had fun!

'Til next time...hopefully not 6 months from now...but I make no promises!