Sorry

I'm sorry I never got to blogging, but I was also in a pretty sorry state yesterday, exhausted to the point of tears. I have been trying to decide what to write in a letter that I need to send to John about whether or not we are going to allow him to return home after he gets out of jail. There are so many reasons not to and it has been so freeing not to have to live with the stress of having him here, though it was balanced with the joy of having Isaac with us. SO that has been weighing heavily on me.


However, we do have some good news here at the Fletchers. Rand starts his orientation today! He will be working at Lowe's through the vocational rehab program. Even though it took over 3 months to get him this job through them, he will now have support and hopefully won't mysteriously lose this job because there will be others involved that can help to resolve any conflicts that arise. With his FASD (undiagnosed, but there just the same) he has been able to have a few jobs, but he was let go and never was able to explain why (and we are never really sure if he even knew why).

Salinda has a job starting next week as well and Sadie has told me that she is getting an apartment. We received copies of her county assistance paperwork here and while that was never the hope for us to have any of our kids on welfare, I know her dream has been to have her own place forever, so at least in her mind she is achieving a sense of independence and success, which should help her feel better about herself. I'm proud of her that she never asks us for anything now that she is out on her own. I think she realizes that her choices have made that an inappropriate road to go down (something that a couple of her older brothers have never been able to figure out).

Sadie has a second interview today at Pizza Ranch and we are hoping she will ahve that job. Leon and Sadie will find out this weekend about the job at my favorite coffee shop that they applied for and interviewed for last week. I know that they will both feel better about having some extra spending money and something productive to do with their time.

SO things are hopping along. Even though we do get continuously frustrated with some of the choices of our kids, as we listen to the stories of others we seem to have been blessed in many ways. The children who are living here never make me feel honest fear that I'm going to get hurt -- something that I live under constantly when a couple of the kids who aren't here are living with us. So having 8 kids at home who, while not excelling by the definition of anyone else in society, are functioning fairly well, not raging very often, and putting nobody in danger, that's huge for us and for most families like ours.

Today I'm off to my office to prepare for a two day training that starts tomorrow. I always enjoy going through pre-adopt training with new families. Their enthusiasm is always motivating to me and I enjoy the interaction. Sixteen hours is a long time to listen to any one person, so keeping their interest is tricky, but I think I'm a bit more entertaining than at least some of the others in the world who give the training. And I'll tell you this much... I'd much rather be giving than receiving 16 hours of training!

Hope all is well in your worlds...