Archives for June 2013

6 Tips for Children With Parents In Prison

One in 28 children in the United States has a parent that is currently incarcerated (1).

Sadly, a number of these children wind up in foster care. A quarter of the foster children that have been in my care had a parent that was incarcerated at the time of placement. To some children, going to jail is a regular event that just means you need to go bail them out. And other children feel shame and even guilt when a parent goes to prison.

6 tips for when a child has a parent in prison:

1. Help the child feel secure in his surroundings with reliable people and activities.

Surround the child with people and places that he knows. Don’t overwhelm the child with new places and people at first.

2. Have a predictable schedule and let him know what will happen during the day.

Children do best when they know what to expect. “Dad will be taking you to school, then I will pick you up from school for a doctor appointment. After that we will stop by the grocery store before going home for dinner.”

3. Encourage your child to talk about his feelings.

Ask “How are you feeling?” I love this touching Sesame Street video when Muppet Murray talks to child Nylo about his mom’s incarceration. Grab a Kleenex…

4. Let the child know that it’s okay to have big feelings.

I had a family member with an incarcerated parent, and when this child got in trouble, the words were heartbreaking: “I’m bad, just like my dad!”

Shame, guilt, sadness, and anger are such big emotions for a child to handle. Let them know that it’s okay to feel that way, but that feelings change: “I know that you’re having some really big feelings right now, and that’s okay…feelings never last forever. They always change. So even though right now, your big, big feelings are making you {sad}, they won’t last forever. I promise.” (2)

5. Talk honestly with the child about his parent’s incarceration.

Honesty builds trust which is what a child needs during this time. “Daddy is in jail because he broke a grown-up rule called a law.”

6. Let the child know that the incarceration is not his fault.

Some children from hard places take the world on their shoulders and are full of worry and guilt about things they have no control. Let them know that it’s not their fault that their parent was the one that made a bad choice.

Sesame Street has released a new initiative for children with parents in prison. For more tips, activities and videos, check out Sesame Street’s Little Children, Big Challenges: Incarceration.

What has been your experience with children whose parents are incarcerated?

8:41 am by Penelope

How Can You Live Up to the Impossible Standard?

Are you on Pinterest?

Pinterest can be so much more than recipes, beauty tips, and crafts I will never do! My sister and I have decided that Pinterest gives mothers this impossible standard of having a perfectly decorated home…while eating delectable foods… while wearing fun fashionable outfits… and being SKINNY! Are you kidding me?

Foster2Forever Pinterest

My goal as a foster mom raising traumatized children is to get through each day without too many meltdowns!!! However, through Pinterest I have found numerous informative articles on being a foster/adoptive mom.

Are you following my Pinterest board on Foster Parenting?

I also have an Adoption board on Pinterest!

Are you on Pinterest? Leave your link below so we can follow each other!!!

3:32 pm by Penelope

Proud to Be a Stay At Home Mom

I’m a Stay At Home Mom!!!

Beginning at 4 months old, my sweet baby boy, Lil Bit, had grown up in daycare. I was incredibly blessed by motherhood, and more and more, I began dreading leaving my 3-year-old each morning. The daycare had grown as quickly as he did and was becoming more chaotic with the revolving door of daycare workers. This school year, each morning, my heart hurt as I dropped him off with him wailing, “I don’t wanna go to school. I wanna go witchoo.”

I was already feeling guilty for leaving my severely-neglected JD in daycare as an infant. His diagnosis of Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD) piled on even more “mommy guilt.” Would staying at home have helped my adopted child in his attachment as an infant? Taking FMLA (family leave) made a world of difference for my son after he got kicked out of his third daycare. (This year of all-day Kindergarten was incredibly successful with only minor rule infractions and not one meltdown at school!!!)

But could I really go back to being a stay-at-home mom as I had been when my husband and I first married? (See this YouTube video about homeschooling my stepson)

It turns out that YES I CAN!!! And I’m loving being a stay-at-home mom!! But I am busier than I thought possible after saying yes to a sibling foster placement of a school-age child and infant sibling.

Our finances are tighter, but with me staying at home, we are saving over $800 a month from daycare costs, eating out much less, lower gasoline costs, no office wardrobe, no maid service, etc.

And we, as a family, are less stressed – minus the stress that two additional children add.

Are you a stay-at-home mom? If you work outside the home, have you thought of how you could stay at home with your children?

2:30 pm by Penelope

Travel Tips We Learned on Our Family Cruise

We needed a vacation! And then something magical happened! Disney Cruise Lines announced cruises out of Galveston! We quickly booked a week-long Caribbean cruise with Mickey, Minnie, Donald and the rest of the Disney gang. I highly recommend Disney Cruise Lines! It was the best!!!

Here are a list of tips we learned when cruising with our children:

Buy Travel Insurance

You never know when your child may get sick, break an arm, etc.

Upgrade Your Room at Check-In

You can get steep discounts on available rooms. We could have upgraded from an interior room to a larger room with a port hole for $200; however, being the budget travelers that we are, we chose to spend that money elsewhere, since we spent so little time in our room.

Cash Is Not Accepted at Shops On-Board

We made the mistake of bringing cash to spend on the ship for souvenirs; however, the ship’s gift shop only took our room key or credit cards for purchases.

Bring a Carry-On Bag When You Board

Think of what activities you or your kids might want to do the afternoon of boarding. If your kids are waterbugs, like mine, bring swimsuits and pool paraphernalia in a carry-on so you don’t have to listen to your kids whine all afternoon because they want to get in the pool.

Decorate Your Stateroom Door

Since stateroom doors are made of metal, use magnets to decorate the door to your stateroom so your kids can find your room easily among the sea of doors that are identical.

Have a Plan for Sea Sickness

I cannot even read a map in the car without feeling woozy. Although, I did get “the patch” for the cruise, if you would like a more natural (and less expensive) alternative, consider taking Ginger Root capsules. I used it considerably when my former job had me flying in a helicopter with a former Vietnam chopper pilot.

Enroll Your Children in the Ship’s Kids Club

My kids begged to spend time in the Oceaneers Club for kids. In fact, one evening, our Kindergartner didn’t asked to be picked up until nearly midnight!!

Plan for Naptime

Our 3-year-old needs an afternoon nap! But the last thing we wanted to do was spend two hours in our interior cabin watching our child sleep. We had an ingenious idea and took the kids to an afternoon movie at the ship’s on-board theater. In the dark, cool theater, our exhausted preschooler fell asleep rather quickly, regardless of the theater’s surround sound system. We enjoyed watching DisneyNature’s Chimpanzee. (you must see this movie about adoption in the wild)

10:47 am by Penelope

How Can You Say NO to Foster Kids?

Our two rambunctious preschool boys are a handful! The older, JD, being strong-willed and defiant, is not the best role model for our easy-going 3-year-old, Lil Bit.

Having our hands full with these two boys, my husband feels overwhelmed by infants and toddlers. Last summer, the placement of 3 more little ones in our home had us running ragged with FIVE kids aged 5 and under — (ages 5, 4, 3, almost 2, nearly 1). I was flabbergasted when a encountered my own Chick-Fil-A controversy when a {single} man lectured me for having too many children. After surviving that chaos, we changed the age limit of our foster home to ages 5 through 17. “No more babies” became my husband’s mantra. We have had no new placements since.

Early in May, we finally did receive a foster care placement call.

“I know your home is closed to infants; however, we have an 8-year-old little girl that needs a home. She has a 6-month-old baby brother.”

I was excited about the possibility of this foster care placement. Our 5-year-old, JD, could have an older sister to play with! However, after having 5 kids last summer, I knew my husband had to “bless” another foster care placement that included an infant.

“Hold on – let me get my husband on the other line,” I quickly responded.

To my surprise, my husband said yes.

We would have FOUR children to parent. The kids will outnumber us 2 to 1!!!

That evening, I asked my husband about his change of heart: “I could hear the desperation since there are no foster homes in our area that accept infants. I just felt called to be their foster parents.”

So we are now a family of SIX!!! I am so blessed to now be a stay-at-home mom! I honestly do not know how we could care for all these children if I were still working.

Now, my work is non-stop! Laundry, feedings, spit-up, diapers, referee…repeat. I am exhausted! And school hasn’t let out for summer yet!!!

The bickering between JD and his new sister, KK, is nonstop. (They are not allowed to play Wii together or it starts World War Wii!) Since I have been a mom to boys, I didn’t realize how difficult it would be to deal with “little girl drama.” (my friends with daughters had warned me) I honestly believe dealing with “little boy energy” is easier.

The baby, Doodlebug, is a joy, but I had forgotten how tough infanthood is. And this baby spits up non-stop! He is the fifth infant I’ve cared for and I’ve never seen this much spit-up before. Even the incredible Dr. Brown’s Natural Flow bottles and Similac Spit-Up formula are not helping.

Another difficulty was that, at first, this baby would not go to sleep without a bottle in his mouth – and he would not take a pacifier – so frustrating, given his spit-up problem. I finally weaned him from this unhealthy habit which was torture for both of us. However, this sleeptime bottle weaning process has created an incredible bond between the two of us.

We don’t know what the future holds for our foster children, but we do know that we were called to be their foster parents, if only for a short time.

When have you said no to foster care placements?

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links to Amazon.