Bullets

*He hadn't actually scored the test yet, but the reading specialist said that James made huge progress in reading since January. I am so proud of him. We have worked on it, but not a ton and very carefully so as not to cause him to put up walls.

*The reading specialist told me they are going to offer Missy two extra weeks of school in June and a few extra weeks in August. I couldn't be happier :-) It took him awhile to get the funding in place to offer summer school, but he finally got it. His efforts are well appreciated.

*Missy arrived at school only about 10 minutes late. She was not crabby and mean. This is a  greater success than arriving almost on time. We decided she didn't sleep the night before. Why else would a kid roll over in bed and scream, "I hate you!" when Christina was trying to get her out of bed?  She does have a problem with sleep. Some nights we wonder if she has slept at all. She talks and plays and rolls around. She gets into a lot of  trouble, too. Anyway, to see if it was true I had her lay down after lunch on the couch with a blanket. She was asleep in 5 minutes.

*We went to a wonderful fund raising dinner and auction for orphans in Belize last night. It was a success. The girls were servers and Vanessa played her harp. I gave a hand where I could. Namely upping the bids :-) and sweeping the floor after. I lost the bid on a gorgeous flower pot that I thought would look great on my new porch.... and then the gal who won the bid gave it to me in exchange for the girls doing special music in her church. Awesome.

*At 11PM Steve was out in the dark fixing the water system in my market garden. I was freaking out about the wind. Such a gale!! There are some casualties amongst the tomatoes,  but I am afraid to look and see how many. The wind blew warm and hard all night long.

*I admitted defeat and hired the neighbor boy to mow and weed whack until the girls get out of school. His brother lasted 10 minutes, but he stuck with it for an hour and half and finished one whole section. I expect to see him this morning.

* I requested more consistency in drivers for transport to visits.... and so we are getting a new gal. This is number 8. She will be doing ALL the visits including the all day one a few hours away from here. There are some nasty things about foster care that cannot be helped. He must see his mother, but she must be in this other town getting the help she needs.

*I'm getting tired of being told by all but two friends so far that they could not do foster care because they could not give the child up. What? Does that make me some heartless witch because I feel I can? Can't helping put families back together be a ministry, too? It's not about us.

*Waiting to hear if I pick up the little one today.

*James had a problem. I asked him to take out the compost ... and then I saw him climbing the mountain with the bucket. As I guessed, he was trying to avoid meeting the goose. Now, mating season is over. The goose is calm and cool. The kid not so much. I had him come back down the hill and told him to go through the orchard, which is far enough away from the barn yard that the goose wouldn't do anything, even if he saw him. He freaked out and started insisting that he is NOT afraid of the goose.  We went around and around on this. Him refusing to go, but not admitting the reason. Finally, I took him to the barn and we confronted the goose. The kid was screeching in total panic but still screeching that he was NOT afraid of the goose. The goose didn't appreciate the behavior and started biting at his jeans and flapping his wings. Hilarious, really. I was the one getting the beating from the goose because I really didn't want to make the fears worse, but I wanted him to confront his fears and acknowledge them. We have found that with him, it's the only way then can he figure out a way to solve it. He has to face it. Well, the goose got good and riled up and I got bit enough and I picked him up by the neck and threw him in the cage and locked it. After he calmed we brought him back out and James fed him and walked beside him. We let the goose be with us all day as we worked around and things are a bit better for James. And wouldn't you know it, now Missy acting afraid.