It may appear that I am obsessed with parenting and adoption, and while it is my priority, I am nearly as emotionally involved in food production.

For some reason, this endeavor has always made me deliriously happy. That’s a good thing as I take my role as food provider for 39 children seriously. I want to teach, model and enable good nutrition and there’s no better way than in growing one’s food organically.

Children coming from backgrounds of lack and deprivation such as my kids, all adopted from the foster care system, are always amazed... more

How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.

Anne Frank, Diary of a Young Girl, 1952, German Jewish diarist (1929 - 1945)

It’s already 9:30 in the morning and I’m still sitting here in front of the computer. I did get about 20 kids out the door to school, I’ve washed a load of clothes and hung them outside but breakfast bowls are in the sink, I’ve neither washed my face nor brushed my teeth, I’m still in... more

I told someone recently that I feel as if we live in an alternative universe. What’s normal for others is rarely so for us, not simply because we’re a large family but because of all the issues, diagnoses, challenges and behaviors that we present each day.

While one family was at the high school homecoming, I was babysitting for my friend whose son was sent to a psychiatric unit. I’d picked up two of her other children to bring to my house which is also their version of normal, knowing my kids would distract and entertain her kids while she tended to a difficult situation.

A... more

The boys were put into a foster home where they proved to be unmanageable — defecating throughout the house, destroying furniture and scratching the ivory off the piano keys…”

Please go read the entire article of a severely troubled child. These are the children we parent. I know from your comments and emails, from other blogs and stories that when we adopt older children, especially from the foster care system but also increasingly from foreign countries as FAS and FAE are rampantly coursing through our children, that we are inviting a word of challenges into... more

I can say that my daughters are gorgeous without it looking like I’m claiming credit since 17 of them were adopted. I also think my birth daughter, 34 this month, is beautiful as well and I compliment them all often. My pre-teens, fortunately only two at the moment, now 12 and nearly 14, plus my 12 year old granddaughter are caught up in the Hannah Montana mentality, this decade’s version of Valley Girls I suppose, where shopping at the mall is a teen’s main goal... more

I've had a particularly tough month, likely not much different from many other adoptive parents. Looking back at some of my October posts regarding gratitude, love and supporting my children, plus reminiscing about how tough last October was when I faced abdominal surgery with a potentially scary outcome, I figured this October would be a walk in the park in comparison.

I was wrong.

Having my laptop stolen by a family member, a son with sticky fingers nearly did me in. I lost so much important information; it contained all the financial nerdy spreadsheets... more

When one adopts older children, one takes on their sad past. There’s no way around it. Children come with memories, good and bad, real or imagined, usually projected into impossibilities; fantasies if you will, devoid of facts that were documented, scars that are visible, and diagnoses that clearly exist. You can’t have a dozen well-trained doctors say one thing, yet have one uneducated person say another that flies in the face of facts.

I remember my three Honduran daughters describing their imaginary life before they joined our family. In a moment in which... more

After I wrote the post regarding destruction of beds and bedding, I received quite a few interesting comments and I’ve really been thinking about the sensory affect on children. I need to research it further but in the meantime one of my grown daughters, adopted at age 11 with her two younger brothers, now 22 and 24, told me her version or explanation.

“Maybe part of the problem is that the kids have a hard time with whole, intact things (i.e. nice jewelry, matching bedspreads)... more

I’m as perplexed as anyone over the willful mistreatment of items, furniture and clothes. To have come from a background of severe deprivation and lack, one might think that an older child would now appreciate a fairly middle class existence.

I’ve found that to not be so.

For 20 years I’ve fought the most unusual battles that seem to run through each set of siblings that I have adopted.

They fundamentally despise sheet sets. Forget a flat sheet, top sheet and matching pillowcases. Preferring a bare mattress which appalls me, twisting... more

With four soccer teams going, we’re in the midst of some serious playing time. Four or five nights a week we’re on the rec field. Sometimes we have game conflicts, but not often and there are enough family members to spread out and form a large cheering section. I am loud and positive during each game, affirming and encouraging every single attempt they make.

Older adopted children neither come with instruction manuals, nor good manners, and no on ever covered many of the socially polite bases that one might reasonably expect an 11 or 12 year old to understand.

Tonight... more