At this festive family-centred time of year we are even more aware of Peter and Belle's families than usual, as well as the families of previous foster children we've cared for.
Peter's parents and siblings are spending their second Christmas without him. We recently took Peter to an informal contact session where we met up with all of his siblings and the various relatives and carers they live with, plus a smattering of other family members and their partners and children, saw Father Christmas and swapped presents. His siblings have started to ask why they can't all live together, and we know that Peter will be in their minds on Christmas Day, as they will be in ours.
Belle's parents are not only spending their daughter's first Christmas without her, but they have recently found out that the decision has been made for Belle to be adopted. We've never met them but regularly send and receive notes when Belle goes to contact sessions, and of course speak about them often with Belle's social worker. As the months go by and we learn more about their own stories, we start feeling like we know them a little. I can't imagine how they must be feeling now.
I've been thinking about Belle's forever family too and wondering who they are and what they're doing. They don't know it yet, and won't do for several months, but they will be spending their last Christmas without Belle in their family! They haven't even seen a photograph of her, but their tree next year will be decorated with adorable little hand and footprint crafts, they'll be hanging up a stocking with Belle's name on and getting excited about watching her open her presents on Christmas morning.
We're not in touch with Jack-Jack or Andy's forever families but we do think about them regularly, chat about how old they are now and wonder what they look like. Whether or not Belle's parents decide to keep in touch, and whoever we have in our family by that point, we'll definitely be thinking about her next Christmas too and wishing her well.
We've come to realise that fostering families just keep getting bigger!
Showing posts with label holiday. Show all posts
Showing posts with label holiday. Show all posts
Friday, 12 December 2014
Thursday, 7 August 2014
Sibling contact
Peter's having a fantastic Summer holiday! He relaxed into the swing of things about one week in, and we've had some really lovely days out as a family. We even went camping together near the seaside, and Peter enjoyed the whole tent experience, paddling in the sea and watching the boats.
We had Peter's first sibling contact this week at a local soft play centre. Peter has several siblings - some in other foster placements, and some placed with relatives. The children were removed from their parents getting on for 18 months ago, they haven't seen each other for around a year, and it was fascinating to see them all instantly drop back into the roles they had when they were at home. The oldest child became "the parent", the youngest child became "the baby", and they all treated Peter as though he'd made no progress at all since they last saw him although they clearly adore him and have missed him. Two sets of their grandparents had also travelled to be there, and it was a strange and wonderful experience chatting to all the people present, and realising that they are now all part of our extended family because Peter is part of our family. Sibling contact will be arranged at least four times a year, and it will be lovely to watch the other children grow up and see them progress, just as it will be lovely for them to know Peter as he gets older.
One bizarre consequence of having a large, loving, extended family who don't communicate or see each other regularly seems to be duplicate presents! It's no secret that looked-after children tend to have a lot of "stuff" (although we've tried to stem the tide a bit by saving towards more expensive items that meet a sensory need rather than endless toys), but as an example Peter has received no less than three remote control cars from various members of his family for his birthday! Not that he is complaining at all, although he hasn't got the coordination to work them yet so they've been put away for now.
We've noticed that Peter seems to go through phases of rapid progression and then plateaus for a while to process everything before starting again. He's in a rapid progression phase at the moment, especially with his speech and understanding, which has been fantastic as it's reduced his overall frustration and anxiety. He's putting several concepts together now to ask questions and tell us what he wants in more detail - still no grammar, just lists of words such as "come on come on watering can paddling pool Peter blue slide tummy" to tell me I'm not filling up the watering can with the paddling pool water fast enough, he wants to slide down the blue slide on his tummy whilst I spray him!
He also now understands how a calendar works, and accepts if we tell him something fun is happening "on Friday", rather than having a meltdown because he didn't understand that the fun thing would ever happen if it wasn't happening now. We use a visual calendar with symbols for activities we're doing during the week, and he regularly checks it to remind himself what's going on. It will be a very different child going back to school in September!
We had Peter's first sibling contact this week at a local soft play centre. Peter has several siblings - some in other foster placements, and some placed with relatives. The children were removed from their parents getting on for 18 months ago, they haven't seen each other for around a year, and it was fascinating to see them all instantly drop back into the roles they had when they were at home. The oldest child became "the parent", the youngest child became "the baby", and they all treated Peter as though he'd made no progress at all since they last saw him although they clearly adore him and have missed him. Two sets of their grandparents had also travelled to be there, and it was a strange and wonderful experience chatting to all the people present, and realising that they are now all part of our extended family because Peter is part of our family. Sibling contact will be arranged at least four times a year, and it will be lovely to watch the other children grow up and see them progress, just as it will be lovely for them to know Peter as he gets older.
One bizarre consequence of having a large, loving, extended family who don't communicate or see each other regularly seems to be duplicate presents! It's no secret that looked-after children tend to have a lot of "stuff" (although we've tried to stem the tide a bit by saving towards more expensive items that meet a sensory need rather than endless toys), but as an example Peter has received no less than three remote control cars from various members of his family for his birthday! Not that he is complaining at all, although he hasn't got the coordination to work them yet so they've been put away for now.
We've noticed that Peter seems to go through phases of rapid progression and then plateaus for a while to process everything before starting again. He's in a rapid progression phase at the moment, especially with his speech and understanding, which has been fantastic as it's reduced his overall frustration and anxiety. He's putting several concepts together now to ask questions and tell us what he wants in more detail - still no grammar, just lists of words such as "come on come on watering can paddling pool Peter blue slide tummy" to tell me I'm not filling up the watering can with the paddling pool water fast enough, he wants to slide down the blue slide on his tummy whilst I spray him!
He also now understands how a calendar works, and accepts if we tell him something fun is happening "on Friday", rather than having a meltdown because he didn't understand that the fun thing would ever happen if it wasn't happening now. We use a visual calendar with symbols for activities we're doing during the week, and he regularly checks it to remind himself what's going on. It will be a very different child going back to school in September!
Thursday, 24 July 2014
Summer update
Amazing to think that we're nearly at the end of the first week of the Summer holidays already! Peter had a wonderful Frozen themed birthday at home playing with our friends and their children. We were impressed that he held it together all day and had great fun, although it did mean that there were a couple of days' fall out afterwards, and we ended up taking all his birthday presents away and drip-feeding them back over the next few weeks as he couldn't cope with all the change at once.
Peter found the last couple of weeks of school hard due to the changes in routine and the constant reminders of transition - saying goodbye to the leavers, having his "moving up" day with his new teacher and classmates for next year, talking about the holidays etc. and his anxiety has been coming out at home in regressed behaviours which haven't yet calmed down.
The holidays are also hard for Peter in different ways. We have lots of lovely fun activities planned as well as down time at home, but we also have high expectations of him in terms of his behaviour, tidying up, finishing tasks and learning to do things for himself. It's nothing he's not capable of, but it's extremely tiring and frustrating for him to listen, focus and stay on task so he's been trying every trick in the book to get out of doing whatever we've asked him to do!
Peter's just started Occupational Therapy and we're learning tips to help him improve his fine motor skills at home. We've come to suspect that school are not placing any demands on Peter or trying to teach him much at all as yet, which is such a shame. He's keen to learn, he just needs someone with him to help him focus. He's made huge progress with his language, but at the end of Reception year he didn't know which end of a Pritt stick was which, no one has attempted to correct his "whole fist" pencil grip, and we've eyed most of the art folder that came home with some suspicion as it looked more like the work of a TA!
Even with all the anxiety and regression, Peter is still doing fantastically. We started very casually potty training at the start of the holidays and he loves all the praise and chocolate buttons although isn't yet able to tell us before he needs to go. It will come. He can get dressed pretty much independently now and is working on being able to put his own shoes on. He's mastered opening and closing screw-top lids and is completing 50 piece puzzles. We're excited to see how much progress he makes by the time school starts again in September!
Peter found the last couple of weeks of school hard due to the changes in routine and the constant reminders of transition - saying goodbye to the leavers, having his "moving up" day with his new teacher and classmates for next year, talking about the holidays etc. and his anxiety has been coming out at home in regressed behaviours which haven't yet calmed down.
The holidays are also hard for Peter in different ways. We have lots of lovely fun activities planned as well as down time at home, but we also have high expectations of him in terms of his behaviour, tidying up, finishing tasks and learning to do things for himself. It's nothing he's not capable of, but it's extremely tiring and frustrating for him to listen, focus and stay on task so he's been trying every trick in the book to get out of doing whatever we've asked him to do!
Peter's just started Occupational Therapy and we're learning tips to help him improve his fine motor skills at home. We've come to suspect that school are not placing any demands on Peter or trying to teach him much at all as yet, which is such a shame. He's keen to learn, he just needs someone with him to help him focus. He's made huge progress with his language, but at the end of Reception year he didn't know which end of a Pritt stick was which, no one has attempted to correct his "whole fist" pencil grip, and we've eyed most of the art folder that came home with some suspicion as it looked more like the work of a TA!
Even with all the anxiety and regression, Peter is still doing fantastically. We started very casually potty training at the start of the holidays and he loves all the praise and chocolate buttons although isn't yet able to tell us before he needs to go. It will come. He can get dressed pretty much independently now and is working on being able to put his own shoes on. He's mastered opening and closing screw-top lids and is completing 50 piece puzzles. We're excited to see how much progress he makes by the time school starts again in September!
Tuesday, 29 April 2014
Easter holidays
We had a fantastic break. We'd planned in an activity for each day of the first week, and then went on a trip away for five days on the coast. Peter loved the beach and paddling in the waves, and even had his first ice cream in a cone! He threw himself into every opportunity that came his way, and it was amazing to see his independence and confidence grow over the fortnight.
He has so much energy and enthusiasm that it's easy to forget that although physically he's nearly five, mentally and emotionally he's about half that. By the Friday before school was due to start again we realised that it was all getting too much for Peter. We reigned it all back in and spent some quality quiet time at home, reading stories, laughing together, doing jigsaws and singing, without any distractions or stimuli like the TV, iPad or visitors. Peter really responded well to the new relaxed routine and we've had a peaceful and easy start to the Summer term.
With all this in mind, we've decided to calm things down around here for the time being. Fewer planned activities, less screen time, going out at when it's less busy, and a focus on family time at home. We've even cut down on Peter's hours in school as we saw how much better he did in the holidays when he was able to nap every day and the effect that had on both keeping his moods regulated and the quality of his night time sleep. We'll be picking him up after lunch and will evaluate how he's doing at half term to see whether we'll continue.
In the spirit of Easter, it's been a wonderful rejuvenating time, and feels like a fresh start for all of us.
He has so much energy and enthusiasm that it's easy to forget that although physically he's nearly five, mentally and emotionally he's about half that. By the Friday before school was due to start again we realised that it was all getting too much for Peter. We reigned it all back in and spent some quality quiet time at home, reading stories, laughing together, doing jigsaws and singing, without any distractions or stimuli like the TV, iPad or visitors. Peter really responded well to the new relaxed routine and we've had a peaceful and easy start to the Summer term.
With all this in mind, we've decided to calm things down around here for the time being. Fewer planned activities, less screen time, going out at when it's less busy, and a focus on family time at home. We've even cut down on Peter's hours in school as we saw how much better he did in the holidays when he was able to nap every day and the effect that had on both keeping his moods regulated and the quality of his night time sleep. We'll be picking him up after lunch and will evaluate how he's doing at half term to see whether we'll continue.
In the spirit of Easter, it's been a wonderful rejuvenating time, and feels like a fresh start for all of us.
Sunday, 5 January 2014
Back to school
Peter starts his new school on Tuesday and whilst we're excited about the new opportunities and experiences he'll have, we both feel a bit sad that the holidays are over as we've had such a lovely time together.
Esmeralda took the whole school holiday off work, and 2.5 weeks of having two adults completely focussed on him have been fantastic for Peter. We did a count up recently - since he moved in with us 11 weeks ago he's gone from using about 10 single words to 200 words and phrases, and 50 of these have been during the Christmas holidays! His language and communication are really blossoming, it's amazing to see. He's confidently eating several crunchy foods now, and we're sure that this has helped his speech as his muscles are getting a better workout.
His behaviour is completely different now, you'd barely know he was the same child. He had a period of regression after a contact session recently, and it really served to remind us how far he's come.
Peter has met quite a few friends and members of our extended family over Christmas which has been really good for him to develop his social skills and coping strategies. He's walking for longer periods outside holding hands without needing to use the buggy (today was for almost an hour) and we're working on his awareness of danger and road safety. He even managed a family meal out in a restaurant on Boxing Day! We'd had it booked for months, and even though we pre-booked our food and phoned ahead of time to make the waiting staff aware, we thought he'd last about 10 minutes and we'd then take it in turns to walk around outside with him. He surprised us all by sitting beautifully in a dining chair playing on the iPad after he finished his food, and we stayed for the whole three course meal!
We couldn't be more proud of Peter and his progress, and are looking forward to the Easter holidays already!
Esmeralda took the whole school holiday off work, and 2.5 weeks of having two adults completely focussed on him have been fantastic for Peter. We did a count up recently - since he moved in with us 11 weeks ago he's gone from using about 10 single words to 200 words and phrases, and 50 of these have been during the Christmas holidays! His language and communication are really blossoming, it's amazing to see. He's confidently eating several crunchy foods now, and we're sure that this has helped his speech as his muscles are getting a better workout.
His behaviour is completely different now, you'd barely know he was the same child. He had a period of regression after a contact session recently, and it really served to remind us how far he's come.
Peter has met quite a few friends and members of our extended family over Christmas which has been really good for him to develop his social skills and coping strategies. He's walking for longer periods outside holding hands without needing to use the buggy (today was for almost an hour) and we're working on his awareness of danger and road safety. He even managed a family meal out in a restaurant on Boxing Day! We'd had it booked for months, and even though we pre-booked our food and phoned ahead of time to make the waiting staff aware, we thought he'd last about 10 minutes and we'd then take it in turns to walk around outside with him. He surprised us all by sitting beautifully in a dining chair playing on the iPad after he finished his food, and we stayed for the whole three course meal!
We couldn't be more proud of Peter and his progress, and are looking forward to the Easter holidays already!
Tuesday, 13 August 2013
Summer
Summer is a very busy time in the fostering world. We've had a huge number of calls about placements in comparison to the average we've had since we started fostering. Summer is when most families arrange to go on holiday and foster families are no different - about half of the calls we've had have been for respite whilst the child/ren's foster carers are away. We're encouraged to take the children we foster away with us on family holidays as they're part of the family, but in some cases that's just not possible - perhaps there are issues getting a passport in time, perhaps an older child doesn't want to go, perhaps there are issues with missing contact, or perhaps the holiday was booked long before the child was placed and they can't be added in.
Summer can also be a stressful time for birth families as they are not used to having their children at home 24/7 which can exacerbate issues. We've had several calls to place school-aged children at short notice over the last few weeks.
As this busy period coincides with carers going away, the matching process for placements gets much trickier for the duty team, and we've had quite a few calls for children outside our preferred age range of 0-8 (we're approved for 0-18), or even outside our approval category of 2 unrelated children. I'm sure we'll take teenagers at some point in the future, but at the moment we don't feel ready. We've only been parenting for about 8 months, whereas a birth parent gets 13 years to prepare for those interesting teenage years!
This should all die down a bit towards the end of the summer as everyone returns from their holidays, children on respite return to their regular carers, and everyone prepares for the start of a new school year, but unfortunately it will probably get busier again shortly afterwards. Many of the referrals to social services are made by schools, so the start of the new school year is an opportunity for teachers and school nurses to keep an eye on their pupils again - perhaps a child's presentation has declined since they last saw them in July, perhaps their personality has changed significantly, or perhaps a child confides in a teacher about something worrying that happened over the summer holiday.
We've turned down a couple of open-ended school-aged placements recently as we think it wouldn't be fair on Jack-Jack for his last few weeks with us, being ferried around to activities that would interest older children, and their new school year would start around the time we need to be focussing on the introductions between Jack-Jack and his new family. We are open to taking a toddler or baby placement in the mean time though, so we'll see what happens. Around this time next month, our lives could look completely different and we might be joining the ranks of frazzled parents and carers trying to get everyone organised by 8am for the school run!
Summer can also be a stressful time for birth families as they are not used to having their children at home 24/7 which can exacerbate issues. We've had several calls to place school-aged children at short notice over the last few weeks.
As this busy period coincides with carers going away, the matching process for placements gets much trickier for the duty team, and we've had quite a few calls for children outside our preferred age range of 0-8 (we're approved for 0-18), or even outside our approval category of 2 unrelated children. I'm sure we'll take teenagers at some point in the future, but at the moment we don't feel ready. We've only been parenting for about 8 months, whereas a birth parent gets 13 years to prepare for those interesting teenage years!
This should all die down a bit towards the end of the summer as everyone returns from their holidays, children on respite return to their regular carers, and everyone prepares for the start of a new school year, but unfortunately it will probably get busier again shortly afterwards. Many of the referrals to social services are made by schools, so the start of the new school year is an opportunity for teachers and school nurses to keep an eye on their pupils again - perhaps a child's presentation has declined since they last saw them in July, perhaps their personality has changed significantly, or perhaps a child confides in a teacher about something worrying that happened over the summer holiday.
We've turned down a couple of open-ended school-aged placements recently as we think it wouldn't be fair on Jack-Jack for his last few weeks with us, being ferried around to activities that would interest older children, and their new school year would start around the time we need to be focussing on the introductions between Jack-Jack and his new family. We are open to taking a toddler or baby placement in the mean time though, so we'll see what happens. Around this time next month, our lives could look completely different and we might be joining the ranks of frazzled parents and carers trying to get everyone organised by 8am for the school run!
Tuesday, 30 July 2013
You can't choose your family
So, we all know the phrase "you can choose your friends but you can't choose your family". We were thinking about this over the weekend as we took Andy and Jack-Jack to see the "In the Night Garden" live show. Due to the distance we had to stay overnight the night before, and chose to stay in an apartment rather than a hotel so that we could put the babies down to sleep in the bedroom and still enjoy our evening without disturbing them. After we'd arrived and had some dinner it was past their bedtime so we gave them a bath and settled them down in their travel cots.
The giggling and jumping up and down started the second we pulled the door to as the boys realised that being in the same room together was officially the best and funniest thing ever. Andy got over this pretty quickly but Jack-Jack soon bounced and giggled himself into a hyperactive frenzy, even managing to rock the cot from side to side with loud thumps. Each time I went in to resettle them I saw poor old Andy laying in his cot good as gold, looking more and more exhausted, resigned to the fact that there was a baby-shaped tornado gradually inching his cot closer and closer with each jump. After an hour or so of this Andy fell asleep, but it was another hour before Jack-Jack finally gave in. There was nothing else to do in that situation as we had nowhere we could separate them, and both boys really were too tired (despite appearances!) to get up and try again later.
These boys aren't related by blood, they're not step-siblings or siblings by adoption, they're just living together temporarily in the same foster family. It hardly seems fair when we think about how much they impact on each other.
This is something we think about quite often as we know that we want to carry on fostering once we've started our own family, whether by birth or adoption. We believe that our children will benefit from growing up in a fostering family, and whilst we're sure there'll be highs and lows as different children move in and out of our home, we hope that they'll grow up to be non-judgemental, caring individuals able to connect to and relate to people in all sorts of situations, who will want to grow up to make a positive difference to the world.
We can't choose our family (and our children can't choose their siblings) but we can choose our family values, and we hope that every child of any age who leaves us takes a little bit of these with them in how they've developed, learned and grown whilst they've been with us.
The giggling and jumping up and down started the second we pulled the door to as the boys realised that being in the same room together was officially the best and funniest thing ever. Andy got over this pretty quickly but Jack-Jack soon bounced and giggled himself into a hyperactive frenzy, even managing to rock the cot from side to side with loud thumps. Each time I went in to resettle them I saw poor old Andy laying in his cot good as gold, looking more and more exhausted, resigned to the fact that there was a baby-shaped tornado gradually inching his cot closer and closer with each jump. After an hour or so of this Andy fell asleep, but it was another hour before Jack-Jack finally gave in. There was nothing else to do in that situation as we had nowhere we could separate them, and both boys really were too tired (despite appearances!) to get up and try again later.
These boys aren't related by blood, they're not step-siblings or siblings by adoption, they're just living together temporarily in the same foster family. It hardly seems fair when we think about how much they impact on each other.
This is something we think about quite often as we know that we want to carry on fostering once we've started our own family, whether by birth or adoption. We believe that our children will benefit from growing up in a fostering family, and whilst we're sure there'll be highs and lows as different children move in and out of our home, we hope that they'll grow up to be non-judgemental, caring individuals able to connect to and relate to people in all sorts of situations, who will want to grow up to make a positive difference to the world.
We can't choose our family (and our children can't choose their siblings) but we can choose our family values, and we hope that every child of any age who leaves us takes a little bit of these with them in how they've developed, learned and grown whilst they've been with us.
Saturday, 8 June 2013
Summer
I'm not normally a sun-lover. I'm the sort of person who says, on a warmish spring or autumn day that it's perfect because "it's not too hot" or "there's a lovely breeze." I have spent many a beautiful summer's day inside reading a book, with the curtains drawn slightly to stop the glare. I also suffer from hayfever so summer has been synonymous with itchy, red eyes and a streaming, puffy nose. Not fun.
This year I'm already loving the summer! A warm sunny day now means an hour or two in the park, not having to wrestle Jack-Jack into hundreds of layers of clothing (so getting ready to leave the house is much quicker), ice lollies, the paddling pool, bare feet, playing outside in the garden, no mud to clean up when we walk the dog, laundry hanging out on the line, eating meals outdoors, smelling neighbours' barbecues and hearing snatches of conversation and laughter in the evenings, picnics... the list goes on.
I was even eyeing up buckets and spades in the toy shop the other day. Anyone who knows me will be shocked at this announcement, given my past dislike of sun, sand and sea, but living with a small child seems to turn everything on it's head and I'm already planning a trip to the seaside!
Thankfully Jack-Jack doesn't mind having his sunscreen applied and can be persuaded to keep a sun hat on, or perhaps these hot summer days wouldn't be quite as much fun!
This year I'm already loving the summer! A warm sunny day now means an hour or two in the park, not having to wrestle Jack-Jack into hundreds of layers of clothing (so getting ready to leave the house is much quicker), ice lollies, the paddling pool, bare feet, playing outside in the garden, no mud to clean up when we walk the dog, laundry hanging out on the line, eating meals outdoors, smelling neighbours' barbecues and hearing snatches of conversation and laughter in the evenings, picnics... the list goes on.
I was even eyeing up buckets and spades in the toy shop the other day. Anyone who knows me will be shocked at this announcement, given my past dislike of sun, sand and sea, but living with a small child seems to turn everything on it's head and I'm already planning a trip to the seaside!
Thankfully Jack-Jack doesn't mind having his sunscreen applied and can be persuaded to keep a sun hat on, or perhaps these hot summer days wouldn't be quite as much fun!
Saturday, 6 April 2013
Nature
Jack-Jack really loves being outside in nature. Nothing calms him down quite like a walk along the canal, or through the park, and he quite often drops off to sleep out in the fresh air as long as we're on the move. We're at Center Parcs this weekend, and it's been lovely going on long walks together with Jack-Jack in the carrier, pointing out the various birds and other wildlife, and watching him gazing up into the trees. He's mesmerised by water too and can spend ages staring at anything where the water is fast flowing, like a canal lock, weir or waterfall.
The sun came out today, so we thought that this afternoon would be a perfect opportunity to let Jack-Jack experience nature close-up - we plopped him on the grass behind our villa, stopped worrying about what he might put in his mouth and just let him crawl around as he pleased. He soon learned that pine cones, pine needles, twigs and stones aren't that tasty, and focussed on chasing after some passing ducks. When he got bored with that, he sat down and thoughtfully pulled up clump after clump of grass, feeling it between his fingers, tasting the obligatory handful or two, and letting it blow away on the wind. The sun was getting lower in the sky, there was a sparkle on the water of the nearby brook and it was magical to watch Jack-Jack taking it all in.
Esmeralda and I spent this evening working on our CWDC workbook. It's something that every foster carer has to complete within the first 12 months, and aims to provide evidence of competency and understanding of the skills, standards, legislation, knowledge etc. involved in fostering. It's interesting, but is quite a long piece of work, especially alongside caring for a baby 24/7 and doing the daily recordings! We have a support worker helping us to complete it, and she came round on Thursday to see how we were getting on and check that we're on the right track. She answered all our questions and is coming back in 3 weeks, so we thought we'd use the down time this weekend to make some headway. Our social worker would be proud!
The sun came out today, so we thought that this afternoon would be a perfect opportunity to let Jack-Jack experience nature close-up - we plopped him on the grass behind our villa, stopped worrying about what he might put in his mouth and just let him crawl around as he pleased. He soon learned that pine cones, pine needles, twigs and stones aren't that tasty, and focussed on chasing after some passing ducks. When he got bored with that, he sat down and thoughtfully pulled up clump after clump of grass, feeling it between his fingers, tasting the obligatory handful or two, and letting it blow away on the wind. The sun was getting lower in the sky, there was a sparkle on the water of the nearby brook and it was magical to watch Jack-Jack taking it all in.
Esmeralda and I spent this evening working on our CWDC workbook. It's something that every foster carer has to complete within the first 12 months, and aims to provide evidence of competency and understanding of the skills, standards, legislation, knowledge etc. involved in fostering. It's interesting, but is quite a long piece of work, especially alongside caring for a baby 24/7 and doing the daily recordings! We have a support worker helping us to complete it, and she came round on Thursday to see how we were getting on and check that we're on the right track. She answered all our questions and is coming back in 3 weeks, so we thought we'd use the down time this weekend to make some headway. Our social worker would be proud!
Friday, 29 March 2013
Holiday time
So, we haven't had a chance to speak to our social worker Jane about our decision to be open to another placement as she's been on annual leave, but Jack-Jack's move into his own room has gone very smoothly. The only slight negative is that it does take us slightly longer to respond to him in the night - I think having someone scream half a meter away from your ear wakes you up far more effectively than sounds through a baby monitor, but the positives far outweigh this! The purchase of a blackout Gro blind for the window has helped even more now the evenings and early mornings are getting lighter, and last night he slept nearly 11 hours before waking for milk! We're not kidding ourselves that this will happen every night, but the odd unbroken 5 or 6 hours of sleep is doing wonders for Esmeralda and me.
We've just booked our first trip away as foster carers - we're going to Center Parcs for a weekend! Jack-Jack will enjoy going for walks, watching the wildlife and going swimming, and we've booked him into a session of soft play for crawlers. There isn't much specifically for the under-1s, but we were really impressed with the list of activities (although gulped a bit at the prices...) for slightly older toddlers upwards - I can see us going back regularly in the future with whatever children we have with us at the time!
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