Red alert, and false alarm

I got quite concerned by Sunday night as Amanda's left eye started to look like it was swimming in blood. This picture from Sunday bedtime isn't the best perhaps, as it's not as brilliantly red as it seemed to me!

I called Dr. Troia and he asked if the eyeball was bulging at all (no). He said it was probably not a problem but I could bring her in Monday morning to his non- Boys Town office, which was our first visit to that location. Amanda already had remarked that she sees Dr. Troia in lots of different places, I thought it was amusing that we'd add one more office to the list. I took her to Kids Network and worked from home for a couple of hours in the morning, then ran her to the office, where we were put in a room within 5 minutes of arriving, Dr. Troia came in 2 minutes later, looked at her for 2 seconds and said, "Oh, that's nothing." He added, "I'm glad you brought her in though, just to be sure." That made me feel a little better, but I felt dumb about worrying. But, better safe than sorry. If the eye had reddened so drastically the day of, or day after, or day after the day after, her surgery, it wouldn't have freaked me out so much. This started 5 days after surgery, which made me wonder what was up! But, just blood from the surgery. So, good news (altho' I couldn't help but wonder what that 7 minute visit is going to cost me).  Amanda went back to Kids Network, arriving in time to go on the field trip to the Royals' baseball game, and I went to work.

We actually had a very busy weekend, as I did respite ("babysitting") for a foster family's two girls. They came Friday night 7pm and left Sunday night 6:30pm. Cute girls! And so sweet. Sisters, one 5 years old and the other 2 years old. As a major time filler, we went to the zoo Saturday. It was a perfect day - not too hot, somewhat overcast with a breeze. Thank you, God! It's been a horribly hot and humid week, and there's more of it this week. I was so pleased that Saturday was so great. Since these are not "my" girls, I wouldn't post their pics, but I figure it's ok to post if I don't show their faces. How many pictures can you take of three girls facing the other way? Answer: 3  The first is my favorite. I actually said, "Hey, girls, look over there at the building!" and quickly snapped the picture!   =)

We had a great day. They were all really good girls. I had a stroller for the 2-yr-old, and lunch, snacks and water bottles to see us through the day, as well as lots of old bread which I'd been storing in the freezer for the occasion. A favorite thing of ours is to feed all the goldfish from the bridge by the spider monkeys (I think they're spider monkeys). They all had a blast throwing bread to the fish and swans. Amanda leaned over to watch the swan go under the bridge, and almost ended up joining the fish! She grabbed the railing, and I grabbed her shirt while still holding the 2-yr-old, and we looked at each other in great alarm! Then she started to cry since she had scared herself! Not good, let's not take a dive, ok? Here are the other no-look pictures, which I didn't have to choreograph - the jeep in the "bug building" and the water globe. They didn't even end up that wet after being by the water globe, which was nice.

I was ready for them to go home Sunday night. The 2-yr-old blew out her diaper with diarrhea (sorry, too much info?) and I ended up cleaning the carpet where she'd been sitting. Amanda ran downstairs to tell me, "Lily has cat poop on her!" I doubted that, and as I got up to her, I told Amanda, "That's not cat poop, that's Lily poop!" Amanda's reaction: "Ewwwwww!!!!!" That was actually my reaction, too, but I kept that to myself. "Lily poop" - made me think of Gulliver's travels and the Lilliputians, but I couldn't string anything together to make a good joke.

I had to sing at church both services, and the older two girls sat with Sue & Lois, our church friends, while Lily stayed with me. They did well, although the 5-yr-old didn't like Sunday school and started crying, so they found me and I took her to the nursery to stay with Lily. Jessica, the nursery attendant, is a sweetheart and they did fine in there during SS and the late service, when Amanda joined them. I wonder if she had trouble with SS because one of the teachers is male - I was told they have a great fear of men. Lily didn't feed herself independently much, either, which I thought was strange for a 2-yr-old.  Sad to wonder what is due to neglect and abuse when kids end up in foster care. Such sweet, beautiful girls, too. We will have to remember them in our prayers.

Friday, Amanda had her follow-up appointment with Dr. Troia, and he was at the main Boys Town location by downtown. After we received his "Everything looks great, she sure is a personality, you are both so blessed to have each other, you know that, don't you?" pronouncement (he really seems to get a kick out of her), I realized we were by her former preschool, during a school day. I'd taken the day off - had planned to take Tues/Wed/Thurs off, but since she was doing so well, and the doctor wanted the follow-up for Friday, I worked Thurs and took Friday off. She often says she wants to visit her old school and see her teacher Ms. Boidee, so she was VERY EXCITED when I told her we could visit! It was a great visit. Everyone called out to Amanda, saying hi, getting hugs, and saying how big she'd gotten. We sat with Ms. Boidee and had snacks while her kids had outside water play. I'm so glad I thought of stopping by! It was great.

River and Meadow moved away last week. I haven't blogged about it, but the Amanda-Meadow friendship fell on rocky ground. Amanda hadn't learned to ride her bike without training wheels, and she couldn't keep up on her scooter. Whenever there were other kids around, Meadow would be off with them with Amanda trailing, crying for her to wait. The first day I remember it happening, the small group of kids was going down to the church parking lot to ride bikes, and Amanda trailed them. I told her to just get going, she'd catch up. Then I don't know what happened, but the next thing I knew, Meadow's older sister Nadia (age 17?) asked if Amanda could go to the mall with her for a quick trip. I think the other kids left her in the dust, Nadia saw it happen, and felt bad for Amanda. I said sure, and Amanda had a blast. Meadow came up just as they were leaving and asked where they were going, and Nadia said, "Don't you worry about it." She was my new hero. One night, I was going to mow and Amanda went over to see if she could play with Meadow. She came back about 45 minutes later, but told me Meadow wasn't home and she'd been hanging out with Nadia the whole time! Nadia had done her nails and let her play with some of her makeup. What a cool teenager! Anyway, it didn't get better with Meadow. She was fine when it was one-on-one, but most of the time she was running off to play with someone else. One night Amanda came in to ask if she could go swimming in a backyard pool with them, and I said sure! She changed, went outside, and came in a minute later, crying and saying that they said she couldn't go. I went out to see what had happened, and River said she wasn't invited in the first place, it was at Ivy's house and they couldn't invite anyone Ivy didn't know. I said, Ivy knows Amanda. Then the story was that Ivy's parents don't know Amanda. Then it was that they weren't supposed to invite other people, but right after he said that, Ashley came to report to River that she'd asked her brother Austin, like River had asked her to, and he could swim. I looked at River to ask what his next story was. I took Amanda inside and just hugged her. We avoided them for awhile. One day Amanda & I went outside to pull some weeds, and River & Meadow were outside their house, and Amanda kept shouting, "Hi Meadow!" across the street, and they didn't hear or didn't react, and so Amanda shouted again, and then Meadow turned around and said, "What?!" in a not very nice tone. I couldn't help it, I said, "What?! She's trying to say hi, and you say 'What?!'? Forget it!" and I told Amanda to stop talking to them. A couple weeks later, River & Meadow rolled over on their bikes and told me that their house had sold. I said that was great, etc. Amanda was happy we were all communicating again and asked if she could go with them (up & down the sidewalk) on her scooter. I said sure. But then they were going up the hill, and Amanda was calling after Meadow. At the top of the hill, Meadow turned her head, said, "I can't hear you", and continued speeding away from Amanda. I called Amanda back and just told her - no more. Meadow is NOT being a good friend, and Amanda should stop trying to play with her.  

I probably over-reacted in both situations, but it just took me back to being a kid and trying to get other kids to like me. I don't want that for Amanda. She's fabulous (but yes, bossy too) and I don't want her to think she has to chase after people who aren't nice to her. But I struggle with that - I don't want her to tamp down her wonderful love and exuberance for others, not to mention that God commands us to love our enemies, and love our neighbors as ourselves, so I wonder how to balance that with trying to teach your child to make good relationship decisions. Am I wrong about this, especially since she's still so little? Thoughts, please?

Anyway, one day there was a moving van in their driveway. After supper, we went over to say goodbye. Ashley and her brother were just walking over for the same purpose. We all talked with them for awhile, and said goodbye, and as we walked away, River said, "Meadow wants to give Amanda a hug," so Amanda went back and the two girls shared a big hug. *sigh*  Confusing, sad, I don't know. I think the "new people" are a couple with no kids - probably a good thing.

Ashley, who is a pretty nice girl who is couple years older than Amanda (and a big overweight - she seems to get made fun of a lot by other kids, from what she says, even River when they were in school together), has been coming to our house and playing with Amanda, and vice versa. Ashley's parents are Christians, so we seem to be in sync with our views and values. Ashley has an older brother and younger brother and sister (3 yrs & 18 mo). The girls' friendship seems to be going well. Ashley knows that if Amanda is not being nice, she can go home, and probably should go home. Most of the time, Amanda does pretty well, and it's nice for both of them to have a playmate.

Sorry for the long brain dump!