The thick plottens!

So it turns out the Dum-Dum incident is being taken seriously, and a staff meeting has been scheduled for here at our place March 3rd. Apparently, what's most serious about it is that the Case Aide is saying it didn't happen-- yet I have the freaking pix of it. Un-be-weave-able! See, I had bought a disposable camera for the family visits so I could make a photo album for Baby Grrl with pix of her mom and sisters, hoping that would help their faces seem more familiar to her. I was just trying to do something for Tomorrow and for her mom who wishes she could see the baby more often. So they took photos over two visits, half of them from the second of those two visits, which was on the Monday before Valentine's Day, and before the bio mom & I had The Lollipop Discussion. So what does she do? Gives the baby lollipops and takes photos of it! It's so America's Dumbest Criminals. I mean really. And the expressions on bio mom and Unknown Female Family Member's faces in the pix say, 'Nanny nanny boo boo, we're givin' her lollipops anyway!' I'm not making it up.

What irks me is that the Case Aide is denying it occurred. I happen to have a photo of *her* sitting off to the side in the visit, apparently knitting or something and clearly not paying much attention to the chaos of eight females swirling around her.

This is not at all what I signed up for. At the risk of causing friction in our so far very cordial relationship, I really want to tell Bio Mom to sign up for a parenting class already, and for the Case Aide to make sure *someone* at the visit is certified in CPR. As I tell Tomorrow every day, "Save the drama for your mama!"

The following pix are of Tomorrow's first taste of solid food: home-made sweet potato. Because you are what you eat and I can make my own baby food. :>D I had boiled and pureed some sweet potatoes for a batch of Deliciously Deceptive macaroni and cheese so I thought I'd give her the spatula to taste. She licked it all off and then wanted some more! And as it turned out, the spatula made a great teether.

Letting Off Steam

After visits, we all do it. Tomorrow looks at us and smiles her crooked I'm-only-smiling-because-I- know-it's-the-socially-acceptable-thing-to-do-right-now smile while simultaneously looking as if she is about to cry, then usually laughs and then cries. She is verrry clingy-- and those of you who know me well, and how much I love babies, know that I normally would not use the word clingy to describe babies who simply want to be held. Clingy = I cannot put her down, in a desperate way. Not just that she would rather be held or worn, but as if she is screaming DO NOT LET ME GO. It feels like fear. It looks like fear. It sounds like fear. Of course, we just hold her. We kiss her. We tell her we missed her. We let her sleep on us (she will normally sleep in her crib for the first three hour nap of the night but not after visits).

Yesternight her bio mom gave Tomorrow some hair cream that contains hormones (mink oil, anyone?), a hat and mittens in size 2-4T (the T is for toddler), size 4-6 socks (she is a size 2), size 1 moccasins (?), a pair of red and pink Nikes (!), a Tweety Bird (for ages 3+) that dances and sings I Want Candy, and a Dum Dum (lollipop) "FOR HER TO TEETHE ON".

My knee-jerk reaction was to call her Case Worker, but I decided I was over-reacting. The woman apparently has no clue what is developmentally appropriate or nutritionally sound, and doesn't even know what size Tomorrow is wearing. Notes to self.