The Owenland Park Expansion

My youngest sister Devon, is having a pretty rough time right now. In order to help her out, we have taken in her 4 daughters until the end of the school year. This is what Owenland Park looks like these days with Jessa (13), Abbie (8), Connie (5), Jack (3 1/2), Devlynn (3) and Wyatt (19 months). Wyatt refused to sit on the steps. The second step from the bottom is "The Naughty Step", where kids sit in time out. Ma thinks that is Wy wouldn't sit there - because he is usually in trouble when he has to sit there.

The 3 older girls came down from St. Joe on Sunday. Monday was a whirling dervish of a day with getting them registered for school, picking up uniforms, the things one needs to accommodate 4 young ladies, extra groceries etc. Tuesday was their first day of school and my first day of getting 3 more people up and out of the house by 7:15. I knew Tuesday went too well to be true. Don't get me wrong, there have been no serious morning issues this week, but where Tuesday morning went so smoothly, the rest of the mornings have been like herding cats.

Devlynn joined us at the homestead on Tuesday evening. I was very nervous about bedtime with a three year old whose mommy isn't here. She has surprised me. Yes, they have all been sad but there haven't been any histrionics - at least none that I have heard about. (I am currently in rehearsals for Our Town and so I have not been home until all (or almost all) 6 kids are asleep.

Ma picked up a bunk bed Tuesday afternoon and Daddy stayed home Wednesday so he could pull the guest bed out and put in a twin for Jessa and the bunk bed for the other girls. As soon as Jack & Devlynn saw Dad with Jess' box springs they were all over him: "What'r you doin?" and "What's that?" Dad explained what he was doing and those two kids immediately offered to help! Dad pulled while Jack & Devlynn MUSCLED that bed up 3 flights of stairs! You didn't think I helped did you? I admit it, I didn't help. I ran for the camera! I knew you would want to see these kids shouldering their share of the work as it were!

I spent Thursday morning sorting through all kinds of things. The bigger kids were at school so I had Jack, Devlynn & Wyatt. We were all in the girls' room and I was trying to put things away and organize. Every time I turned around Wy was half way up the bunk bed ladder. Twice I put him in time out for getting up on that thing. I needed to mop their floor so I took Wy to the bathroom thinking he would be distracted by brushing his teeth. In the time it took me to grab the mop and mop bucket Wy climbed the steps and the ladder and was sitting in the top bunk all by himself happy as he could be.

After I finished cleaning up their room, I sat down on the bottom bunk and saw a cigarette butt under Jessa's bed. I haven't even had a chance to talk to the other adults about this let alone Jess. She has also started up a facebook account under a slightly false name. Now we have to figure out rules for and parental controls on the computer.

Abbie has refused to wear her uniform jumper all week. Currently she has one pair of pants that fit (but need to be seriously hemmed), a pair that has to be exchanged and a jumper. With the staunch refusal of wearing a jumper, that leaves us with her wearing the same pair of pants every day. I talked to her this morning and told her we will get more pants, but at the moment she simply cannot wear the same pair of pants every day - even if we wash them. Her response was less than enthusiastic so I asked her if she was ever going to wear her jumper. She gave me an adamant "NO." I told her that even grown ups have things they don't like and do NOT want to do, but that we have to do them anyway. Then I told her I would strike a bargain with her. If she wore the jumper, I would fix her a fancy breakfast. She wasn't quite sold so I started listing off options I thought I could handle. I offered up French Toast. She said she had never had it but it sounded good. She got into her jumper, she helped me fix the toast and has asked if we can have it again!

From what the folks and John have told me it is Connie who is having the most trouble at bed time. She needs a little bit more tender care until she falls asleep. Monday was my day off so I was home to help get everyone off to dreamland. Abbie said she would imagine her whole family floating on a soft cloud "even Great." Connie said she couldn't sleep on a cloud. She was going to imagine she was in Kansas and she was riding her bike and she was going to ride her bike to sleep while I drew circles on her back...

Devlynn and Jack have made great friends. They share, they argue, they play together and apart. They remind each other to share. OK, they really snap at each other "YOU HAS TO SHARE!" or "IS MY TURN NOW!!!" But at least they are getting the picture! You can see here they are sharing 2 necklaces. They both wanted the purple and I told them they would have to take turns. Together they decided they could both wear both necklaces at the same time and they were happy till something else was fun. As I was wrangling kids out to the car this morning she hopped over to me in her little footy pajamas and held up "I love you" fingers and gave me a big hug. It was really sweet.

Jack has really handled all of this change & chaos pretty well. There was one morning this week though when he just curled up in a ball and laid on the floor softly whispering "Jax is so sad. Jax is sooo sad..." I cuddled him up for a while but he retained his ball like position. It is not so easy to cuddle a kid who is curled up like a rolly polly - but I did my best. We wound up having chocolate milk and watching Finding Nemo in order to pull him out of the doldrums. Once the bunk bed was put in, he and Devlynn have found a new hobby: climbing into/out of the top bunk, pretending to sleep, insisting they are monkeys and trying to swing on any bunk bed bar before mommy/aunt Amy barks "YOU GET DOWN FROM THERE!" They are upstairs right now chattering on about something. And he has recently taken to answering questions with "Wehhhhhl" and then something random.

Wy's vocabulary has continued to explode. All morning long he has been saying something to me and I finally figured out "HEHWO" is hello. I am really that brain dead at the moment! I'm not sure if all this commotion has had an effect on Super Wy. He hasn't acted any differently. He plays with the other kids when he wants and he simply ignores them when he isn't interested - which is pretty much Wy in a nutshell. I am walking a fine line of making sure my kids get some special mom time - but making sure everyone has some special time or something sweet done for/said to them every day. I can't imagine how hard it is for the girls to make this adjustment, but they have really been good about everything. I think once we get over the hump/initial shock of transition we will get into a routine. Not that I think this is going to be easy, I just think we are going to find our own rhythms and our own sense of normalcy.

Ok friends, we might be a bit longer than usual for a while, and maybe a bit short on just the boys - but the girls are a part of Owenland Park so you'll get to hear about everybody!

Until next week - love and many blessings to each of you. Amy.