Friday, April 28, 2006

The Antichrist

I have met her. There is no doubt in my mind. She was disguised as an advocate at an IEP meeting I attended on Wedsnesday. Had to be the nastiest, ugliest, meanest woman that I have ever encountered in my life.

Now don't get me wrong, I have nothing against advocates in the IEP process. Matter of fact, I actually believe that any parent who has a child in special education should have one. And they shouldn't have to pay out of their own pockets for them. The special education maze can sometimes be enough to send me over the edge and I have had training and experience in it. I can't even begin to imagine what it does to the parent that has no prior experience with it and no prior knowledge of how things work with it.

That being said....this woman should NOT be allowed to be an advocate. It is one thing to come into a meeting to advocate (hence their titles) for what is best for the child at hand. It is completely another to do nothing but badmouth, bitch and moan, and complain about the staff working with this child. For the most part, the team is doing what they know to do for the kid. Yes there could be improvements, but there always could. And coming in ranting and raving like a lunatic as opposed to asking for x,y, and z will get you nowhere with this team.

At one point, she was actually questioning what qualifications and training the resource teacher had. Now correct me if I am wrong, but having been hired by the school district 2 years ago, she was already checked to make sure that she met the district's standards. The fact that she didn't meet the standards of this advocate is what was amazing to me.

At one point, she actually accused the resource teacher and reading specialist of falsifying the results on the most recent testing they had conducted on this child. They were convinced that there was no way he could have made as much progress as he did. Now correct me if I am wrong, but isn't that the whole fucking purpose of the supports that are in place for him??? To make these amazing gains??? And they accused the team of having their expectations set too low, yet they are the ones questioning how he was able to make that much progress. Doesn't sound to me like their expectations are all that high either.

One of the most ironic things that I saw during the meeting was that when I spoke to mom on the phone in the weeks prior after completing my own evaluation, she was pleasant and responsive to me. Yes she had some concerns and frustrations, but what parent doesn't? However, this advocate opened her mouth and all these atrocities and accusations started flying about, and all it took was that little fire under mom's ass and she became a crazed lunatic as well.

The saddest part of the meeting....the fact that over 2 hours into it, NOTHING was resolved. Nothing in this child's programming had changed (and I'm not so sure that it really needed to), none of their concerns were met with resolution. The only thing that came out of it, was that now the entire team is scrambling to make sure that this kid has anything and everything available to him. Most of which he doesn't even need. But of course, the district is so terrified of due process that they will do anything to avoid it, no matter the costs.

It's days like this that I really hate my job. Most of the time, I really enjoy what I do. For the most part, I have it pretty easy when it comes to my job. Then you run into the devil incarnate and she makes you doubt what you do! Damn woman...she is evil and needs to be destroyed!

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Housekeeping

I have neglected to respond to any of my comments that I have gotten....even when they were posed as questions. So here goes.

Shawnee wanted to know where I got the Hello Kitty Bedding from. Target of course ;) And yes, it most certainly looks like the walls have been covered in Pepto Bismol. I take absolutely no offense to that at all.

The dog was not trying to hump Caitlyn. He was jumping up on her with his paws on her chest to lick her face. If he had tried to hump my child, I might have gone just a little ape shit over it. Shawnee, I told my mom want you said to do about me calling the house and just keep saying my name over and over again. And well she had a few choice words for you, and also added that would be willing to hunt you down and harm you if she had to listen to this dog barking all day long.
But on a scarier note...I was looking at my little traffic report the other day. And because of this very post, someone who searched "woman fucking her dog" actually came across my blog. And the fact that they hung out and read a few pages gives me the willies to be perfectly honest. So not that I posted about a woman fucking her dog, but because those 4 words, in that specific order, were in the post about the humping dog, they found me. And now, after this paragraph, I can only imagine the visits I will get since technically I am talking about a woman fucking her dog.

The scissors ... well I am really waiting for the day that she cuts her hair. I know it will be coming soon. Matter of fact, she has already tried to cut MY hair with the stupid things. So it really is only a matter of time now.

The Easter Bunny's travel route is nowhere to be found on the internet. I was able to find where Santa was over Christmas, but the Easter Bunny....well he's obviously nowhere near as popular as the fat guy in the red suit.

Yes, Shawnee, I do love me a Cadbury Egg, but only one a year and around Easter. I didn't get one this year :(

And thanks for giving me warm and fuzzies about my child not wanting to be at home anymore. I do know that it's only because of Kelly and the other kids on the block. Add that to the fact that my mother gives her any damn thing that she wants, and it's a pretty good place to be. Kari I would love to come and have a sleepover with you :) But I can't promise an all out hissy fit....but if there are margaritas involved, I am sure that there is a pretty good chance of it LOL.

The Pizza Guy has gotten some reprieve from my child's vulgarities. If you ask her to say it, she won't. If you ask her what she used to say to him, she won't. Now when she hears someone say the F word, she very quickly brings it to their attention that they have spoken a bad word....

Person: "Get the fuck out!"

Caitlyn: "Mommy, fuck is a bad word right?"

So although we are not there just yet, it is progress in my eyes.

Friday, April 21, 2006

She doesn't want to live here anymore

She hasn't come right out and said it. But the girl has been at my mom's house 5 out of the 7 last nights. What is wrong with that picture? I suppose I could say yeeeeehaw that Matt and I are getting as much alone time as we are, nto to mention the fact that I have watched some TV shows uninterrupted. But it's getting a little crazy now when I say we are going home and she cries and cries that she wants yet another sleepover.

I am thinking it has something to do with the fact that Kelly lives there now and they spend all day outside playing together in the beautiful weather that we are having. When you weigh that against coming to her own house where the closest person to her age is her parents, it doesn't seem so strange.

Where can I go and have a sleepover and cry when it comes to coming home?

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Only in my world

Yesterday I went shopping for all of the goodies for the Easter Basket for the girl and the cousins. I also picked up the little box of Paas tablets to color the eggs. That event was scheduled for tonight. At 8 o'clock to be exact.

I was right on schedule. House cleaned, dinner eaten, ready to color eggs.

Matt opens the box.....the sealed box.....it's fucking empty. Nothing in it! Not one single little tablet.

Off to the store he went to get a new one, and of course he comes home with one that is far more complicated involving stickers and springs, suction cups and hats for the eggs. I will post pics of them at some point, cute, but a pain in the ass none the less.

Here's some Caitlyese for the day...

Before bed she asked me,

"Mommy can you get on the computer to find the Easter Bunny's schedule to see if he is heading to my house right now."

Love this immediate gratification generation. We had no idea when the damn bunny or santa was showing up when we were kids. Our parents probably put our asses to bed at 6:30 because they told us these characters wouldn't come until we were fast asleep. And there was no way for us to check up on that, we just had to believe them.

Saturday, April 08, 2006

The Jelly Bean Contest

We've all seen them. The huge jars filled with jelly beans and you have to guess how many jelly beans are actually in the jar. Now I have never been able to guess how many stupid beans are in the thing. I have never even come close.

They had a jar of jelly beans at Caitlyn's school. All of the kids were encouraged to make a guess. The prize would be a Cadbury Egg (completely worth the guess in my book) and a gift certificate for a local pizza place. So quite a few kids from the school made their guesses. Kids in ages ranging from pre kindergarten (Caitlyn's class) up through 8th grade.

Well, she and Matt are now on spring break, so they were home on Friday. Matt gets a call from her teacher. Guess what??? She won the freakin jelly bean contest.

Now the funny thing is, Caitlyn has no conceptualization of any number over 100. I don't really think that she even knows that numbers that high exist. So when they asked her for her guess, she said to them "60 70." The teacher wrote down 6,070. Another student behind her heard her guess and said 60 80. Again, the teacher write down 6,080. So out of all those kids, two 4 year olds won the prizes :P

Want to know how many jelly beans were in there????

6,049

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Child Proof my ASS!!!

Caitlyn loves using scissors. She will cut just about anything that she can get her little fingers on. So we have had the discussion on more than one ocassion about what she is allowed to cut.....paper only. And we haven't had this conversation because she doesn't abide by this rule. It is only because I want to make sure that it is always fresh in her memory when she picks the things up.

Last night, she took her scissors up to her room. And came back down with her doll....her now almost bald doll. So I didn't ream her out, because really where is the harm in a little hair cutting ....hair of the doll that is.

She goes back up with the scissors. A few minutes later I hear her crying. I run up there, and she is screaming that she cut herself with her scissors. I assume it's Caitlyn being the drama queen that we all know that she can be. She shows me her hand and sure as shit, she really did cut herself. Right between her thumb and index finger, you know, that little floppy piece of skin.

So beware, those little scissors with the rounded egdes...not so child proof in my book.