Wretched basement woes

Found following in article from local station news from April when the new regs were passed into law:

Previously, houses with basements were less likely to be approved,
which often ruled out good parents. New regulations now ease up on the type of
home an approved parent can share. "The homes that we weren't able to license,
we're going to be able to back and see if they meet the standard's now and
then could potentially open up the number of homes we have for kids.

I didn't know that homes with basements were less likely to be approved. I understand, they don't want kids living in crawl spaces (neither do I - there are spiders and mildew and creepy crawly things in those places!), but I think this regulation seems extreme. And it frightens me that a basement would prevent me from doing something that I feel so compelled to do right now, would prevent me from helping a child in need.

Um, HELLO!!!!, this is KANSAS!!! home of Dorothy. I think homes WITHOUT basements should be banned. Can anyone at the state say T.O.R.N.A.D.O.???

But then I read this in the actual regulations:

"Living space" means the rooms in a family foster home that are used for
family activities, including the living room, dining room, family room, game or
television room, and sleeping rooms. This term shall not include bathrooms,
laundry rooms, and garages.

And I think to myself....if I take out all the actual furniture in our downstairs family room and office, then all that leaves in the finished portion is DH's bathroom and the laundry room. So, maybe we can get around this by moving our office upstairs to one of our other spare bedrooms and selling the hideous sectional and t.v. with the green "bruise" in the upper left hand corner of the screen. I would gladly give up that, and it would cost me nothing except the argument that will certainly occur if DH and I attempt to move furniture, together, up the stairs, again.

I think I will wait for the home visit instead of freaking out. I may have just found myself a loop hole....

It's Sunday morning. We made a family decision to skip church, and I fell back to sleep. I think its allergies. Adult onset allergies. As if IF wasn't enough!

DH brings me Starbucks (which I will rant about below) and a bagel, so I wedge myself up on pillows, catch up on my daily NCLM quota and watch some tivo'd 20/20. DH goes outside to mow.

Mysteriously, we can't get our act together. When I'm goal-oriented, he's spacey. And when he's fired up, I'm taking a nap. But I digress...

Innocently self-medicating with blogs, I hear the unmistakable sound of a chainsaw firing up.

I first think to myself, How can he do this? I need to be ready to take him to the emergency room in a situation like this and I'm not even wearing a bra! And then I think I bet he's not even wearing safety glasses. But then finally settled on I'd better get my camera. This could be good!

All the episodes of Ax Men I've endured have paid off in education, I guess. Because he did not hurt himself or the house. The limb was 'felled' (I am pleased and dismayed that my vocabulary has been expanded in this way. Thank you, History Channel). And we can now set up the badminton net for the BC Underground Athletic Society.

Warning! Prepare youself to be blinded by the whiteness of my husband's legs. We don't call him Powder for nothin!

And now. I believe you were promised a rant about Starbucks:

You may recall the press Starbucks got when it shut down every single store for a couple of hours one night back in February. Unfortunately, this extra training given to all employees so that they could all brew the perfect cup of joe was wasted time for the folks at MY Starbucks. Exhibit A: This morning's hazelnut latte contained zero hazelnut. Fortunately, we keep some syrup on hand for our own espresso machine, but seriously?! the little syrup box was clearly marked with an H. Exhibit B: when I was allergy-sleepy earlier in the week I stopped at the same Starbucks for an iced raspberry no whip mocha which arrived pinker than normal, which could be attributed to the fact that it had no mocha, making it in fact, a latte. I was able to overcome this obstacle by some leftover Hershey's syrup found in the back of the fridge at work, but I dare say I was endangering my own life by putting anything found in that cess pool near my mouth! Now, for $4 a pop, you would think they could at least include all of the ingredients. Grrrrrr to Starbucks. These are the last few drops of caffeine I will be enjoying before my IVF cycle, my last few weeks of that sweet sickly taste that allows me to drag my arse out of bed, and they are ruining it!!!!

***

For those of you on pins and needles wondering about my to do list from yesterday, that also was ruined, but not by Starbucks, that I know of. No, they were ruined by the fear that our home may not be up to foster care code.

See, I was purusing the state regulations for foster care, because being the over-achiever that I am, I would like to have everything done in advance of the home visit, so there would be no to-do list. And I am now fearful our home will not qualify because the new regulations (established in March) make it mandatory that any floor with living space (kitchen, bath, living room, office, etc.) have two exits directly to the outside. Our basement has zero.

Sure, our basement has a staircase that leads to the first floor. And two 'daylight' windows, but exits need to be only 44" from the floor. Ours are about 6 feet from the floor.

So, I am maybe over-reacting, but I'm worried our house won't qualify and we will have to either a) install escape windows which will cost us thousands, or b) move to a home that has exit windows in the basement. I like our house, make that love our house. We have just recently got it to where we love it, after years of updates and improvements. To buy a home of similar quality would break us, or at least make us 'house poor'. So, I'm afraid of this, and so did nothing on my list for fear that it would all be for naught.

Lest I appear like a stalker, I am resisting calling the agency tomorrow for details. But I probably will, because this is killing me. DH says we should wait until the home visit, but I am not famous for my patience, and so will probably call. I'm bummed about this potential setback, and hoping for the best, like some grant from some generous agency to make our house meet the regs, or that I'm a doofus and missed some clause that fabulous people like us are exempt.

Other possible solutions: promise never to take the child downstairs? 'unfinish' the finished portion of our basement thus rendering our resale value toilet worthy?

BFF S. says there is no way this will disqualify us. How many homes would meet this clause? No one in a home older than the late 1990's in our part of the country anyway. Any home with any portion finished would need to have two windows / fire exits or a walk out basement. And how sad is it that a TRAILER could be licensed, and my beloved home could not?

***

Instead spent yesterday afternoon laying on a float-y with BFF S at mutual friend L's home while she is on vacation. It's a tough job checking the chemicals and watering her plants, but someone had to do it. Enjoyed adult bevies (accurately mixed by moi - perhaps I should train those losers at Starbucks!). Read People and other high-quality publications. Dished on everything. Felt like we were on vacation!!!

***

P.S. Dear Blogger, Just because I added some pics to this post does not mean I want you to forget everything you know about formatting. I did indeed want those extra spaces between paragraphs. We are SO in a fight!

P.P.S. Sorry for the snarky post. I'm really not in a bad mood, but sometimes its fun to rant.

Foster Care Information

So, T and I attended a Foster Care Informational Meeting on Tuesday night. There were 7 other people there. I'll just go around the tables:

Persons 1 & 2) a couple about our age and apparent socio-economic status, who have been TTC for 2 years unsuccessfully and are now expanding their definition of family. I was kind of hoping we could make friends with them. I pictured us going out for coffee after the class and bonding together, but although they were sweet looking, I was too shy to even give the girl my card.

Person 3) a 20-year old girl who was legal custodian for her cousin who is now turning 18 and leaving the home. The 20-year old thought she would find another young person to live with her, because she was doing okay on her home and thought her house would be quiet if she was all alone.

Persons 4 & 5) two older ladies from the same church who were switching agencies. They didn't say much. And ...

Persons 6 & 7) scummy couple about whom you will now hear.

I am not a snob. Well, okay, I am kind of a snob. But its only because I'm so darn competitive and I strive to be better than everyone else. So, please don't hate me for being super judgemental and critical about these two. I just wouldn't want my child to have to live with them if I died.

I noticed right away that this couple appeared to be below the povery level themselves - they were adorned in cut off jeans and faded, hole-y tees, but I tried to assume the best of them. I was a bit concerned when they mentioned that they already had 6 children living in their home. I looked past the blue tooth in the woman's right ear during the whole meeting (which is not a sign of poverty, just poor manners). I pretended that her dye job was professional, or at least recent. I ignored her obvious prison tattoo. But I will admit that I began to question whether or not I thought they would be accepted as foster parents (please God, say it a'int so!!!) when they got into a heated argument during the meeting. She literally hit him at one point during their discussion.

Lest I appear completely un-Christian, I was blown away, I mean totally and completely inspired by the 20-year old who was there. When I was her age, I was more concerned with where I would be getting my alcohol that night or gathering enough tips to cover the 'minimum payment' on my credit cards. And here she is, taking care of other peoples' families. Truly amazing. And I was honored just to have been in the same room with her. Wow.

***

The next day, I had the opportunity to go on a road trip with my friend from work who has just completed his foster care classes. He is always a riot, and it was a good day of work. We got to talking about his classes, and my experience the night before, and he tells us (there were others in the car) about one of his classes when they were being prepared for unusual behavior:

Teacher: What would you think if you came home and saw your foster child riffling through your mail?

Friend: (says to self, but not out loud so as not to get in trouble from his wife) I'd think the little bastard was trying to rob me, find my credit card numbers or something.

Teacher: Whatever you're thinking, you'd be wrong. Children may sometimes rifle through the mail looking for utility bills to be sure you've paid them. They're so used to their power being turned off, and having to move, that they live in constant fear of the utilities being shut off.

Can we all pause for a moment to let this sink in? Because we in the car were awe-struck.

He went on to tell us about how the simple act of lighting a candle can frighten some foster children, because that can be taken as a sign of the power being off. Candles?!

I am sure I will hear many many more gut-wrenching stories like this in the coming weeks as we begin our classes. And I may even witness these behaviors in the children who will come to share our home. But it was very sobering to hear this story and to have my world realigned like this.

Overall, I am so very happy that T and I are going to do this. I feel so empowered by my confidence in this decision. And I feel strong. Like I can do this, like we are right for this, like it was meant to be. I have no doubts. And it feels so amazing to be doing something that feels absolutely spot on.

At the same time, it feels good to be able to work toward a goal. So many times in our TTC journey, we haven't had any control. It's been hurry up and wait, over and over and over again. But now, its fill out this form. Buy this thing. Go to this class. I can do this. I can control this. And it feels good to be headed toward a goal and to feel like there's something I can do that will impact the outcome. We obviously don't have that in the IF world.

***

So, this weekend, I hope to begin some foster care preparations around the house, in advance of our first, unofficial home visit from our chosen agency. They are small things, but good to get them started, since I can't tackle the spare bedroom until after the garage sale. I hope that by writing them down, I will kind of commit to them and force myself to at least get started. There is a lot to do. So, here goes:

1. Install smoke detectors in all bedrooms on the first floor. Currently, we only have one in the hallway and I have N.E.V.E.R. once checked the battery. Yes, I'm lucky I haven't been killed. We have lived here almost 6 years. Yikes!
2. Install CO2 detector in hallway on first floor.
3. Purchase hand rail for basement staircase. If needed, stain to match rest of woodwork in home.
4. Purchase and install plugs for wall outlets throughout home. This, of course, is step B, after the all important step A: count wall outlets throughout home.
5. Purchase and install baby gate for top of basement stairs.

***

In IVF news, there is no news! Another day, another BCP. Should probably call RE's office on Monday to update them on leftover drug inventory and schedule blood work for communicable diseases check.