Tag Archives: family

February 12, 2013 · 3:41 pm

Justice Needed For a Loving Family . . .

When someone has already been cleared of child abuse charges by their state’s child protection agency (here in NM, that would be CYFD, or Children, Youth & Family Department), and all of the criminal charges dropped, I believe it is an abuse of power to do what the Prosecuting attorney in a specific case here is doing.

A journalist for the ABQ Journal has now written and published two columns about this family and this case . . . the links to both columns are below.

http://www.abqjournal.com/main/2013/01/07/opinion/difficult-questions-over-child-discipline.html

http://www.abqjournal.com/main/2013/01/21/upfront/rio-rancho-family-run-through-wringer-again.html

Here is the Kuckartz family . . .

Do these children look unhappy or abused?

It is my opinion that when given the facts that CYFD has closed the case, returned the children, and from what I understand, some of the CYFD workers involved in the case have even apologized to the family for what they have put them through, the judge ruled the children should return to the family, and both the judge and CYFD have ruled that the child’s injury was accidental, that this should be over and done with. Further, as Ms. Krueger points out in her second column, all criminal charges were dropped.

I believe that it is absolutely prosecutorial vindictiveness for District Attorney Lemuel Martinez to take the cases before a Sandoval County grand jury within the next month to seek indictments on these parents — again, as Ms. Krueger has stated in her second column.

These parents have done every single thing required of them by CYFD. Their children have been returned to them, quite some time ago.

I believe, as has been stated on the following website:

http://www.seekingjusticenow.org/

that what this prosecutor is doing is not seeking justice for children. No, I believe what he is doing is trying to make a name for himself on the backs of this family.

It’s time to stop. It’s time to stop holding this family hostage. It’s time to stop terrorizing these children with the threat of taking their parents away and destroying their family. They have been financially and emotionally devastated by all of this, and now are being stalked and threatened by complete strangers to the point that it is difficult to even go out grocery shopping with the children, as they then are recognized, followed and threatened. It’s time to stop.

Whatever your beliefs are regarding corporal punishment, or (as in the case of some people I know) any form of punishment at all, the facts are that these parents have been legally cleared of child abuse. It is wrong for the prosecutor to do what he is doing. It is time to stop, and leave this family alone. I would even go so far as to say it is time for the prosecutor to apologize to this entire family, especially the children, for what has been done to them even after they’ve fully complied with everything required of them by CYFD, and after the children have been returned and all the criminal charges have been dropped. It is time for this to end.

I ask you to pray for all who are involved in this case, this family, in which the children are so loved and cared for, the grand jury, that they will see this for what it is, and the prosecutor, to just stop, and leave them alone. This is a good, loving family.
It’s time for this to stop.
Now.

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February 11, 2013 · 7:00 pm

A Day in the Life…

Today, we had brunch instead of breakfast, which thrilled my family to no end. I’m not big on cooking breakfast, LOL! however, my cousin, Kathy Kollar, owns a WONDERFUL B & B in Ashland Ohio called College House B&B, which you can learn more about by going to

http://www.collegehousebb.com

During her last visit here, she gave me a copy of her little B&B Cookbook, which she sells at the B&B. I used one of the recipes from it called Make Ahead Scrambled Eggs, which was a huge hit with my family. I also heated tortillas for those who wanted to make it into breakfast burritos, and toasted bagels and English muffins. I very much recommend College House B&B! It is family friendly, Kathy and her twin sons live there, and are homeschoolers. The rooms are luxurious and reasonable, and the food is awesome, Kathy is a WONDERFUL cook.

After brunch, my stepson did his math, using a product we are reviewing for the Schoolhouse Review Crew, then the twins and my eldest son did some worksheets in the writing program that we are reviewing. After that, all four kids and myself finished a chapter in e Spanish program we are evaluating, and then the twins did the pages in THEIR math program. Now, we’ve just finished reading a book as a read aloud that we are reviewing. Everyone has had a snack, and in a little while we will be playing a card game that teaches about money.

In between these activities, I’ve been doing laundry, and thawing out meat to cook for supper. We have leftovers of homemade au gratin potatoes, and leftovers of slowcooker rosemary/garlic potatoes and carrots to go with it, plus a salad.

All and all, I think it’s been a productive day!

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November 8, 2012 · 10:29 pm

Homeschool park days, in November! :-)

Yet another very cool thing about having moved from MI to NM, Here in Albuquerque, we are still doing homeschool park days, in November, in summer clothes! Today was our weekly park day with the ABQ homeschoolers group,the kids were having a great time, and so was I! I was very included in the conversations with the other moms, and so caught up in the enjoyment, it was 4:00 before I even realized it! We usually leave park days by around 3:00 – 3:30, and do at least one errand on the way home, leaving time for me to get supper going so we can eat shortly after my husband gets home. Fortunately, today I made use of my slow cooker, because even without an on the way home errand, we got home about 15 minutes before my husband did. It was a fun afternoon! Now, if I can just find the time to get to the MVD and get my driver’s license changed to a NM license, then we’ll be able to get library cards, and it will help if any of the museums have lower prices for local residents.

One cool thong we’ve done since moving here is to go to the International Hot Air Balloon Fiesta. Tons of fun, and educational, too! There was a Nasa tent, where we watched a good demonstration of why one would have to have a space suit in space. The demonstration was done using peeps, which was kind of fun. 🙂 There was a hot air balloon simulator that all four kids got to go in and “fly” the balloon, seeing on a big screen everything that was happening. We got to meet some of the balloon pilots, and watch all the balloons being inflated and set up for the balloon glow. After that, there was an awesome fireworks show, better than any we’d ever seen, anywhere. Next year, we plan to try to go to both a morning session, when they do the mass ascension of all the balloons, and an evening session, to see the glows and fireworks again. It was an awesome evening, and I highly recommend that if you ever get to Albuquerque during the fiesta, you should make it a point to go. My kids liked it so much, we purchased from amazon.com two books about the first hot air balloon flight and plan to do a lapbook about it.

They’ve also asked to do a unit study about Route 66, because it runs right through our city(Albuquerque), and because the original Cars movie was based on Route 66, so now that we’re getting settled in here, I will find the unit study I had saved on the computer, and they can do it. I’m saving some of thos stuff, though, so that if I can find someone to sit with the kids next month when my husband has surgery (I will need to be at the hospital all day with him), they’ll have something to do. I don’t know any unschoolers who might be willing to keep them that day, so if I find anyone, it will likely be regular homeschoolers, who will have their own kids doing school, so mine will need something schooly to do, too, even though we generally are relaxed/homeschoolers. Lst resort will be having to bring them to the hospital for the day with me, which would NOT be my first, or the best choice.

Another educational thing they want to do is learn about New Mexico, along with each state we drove through on our way here to NM, so we’ll do that before continuing on with our study of all 50 states. My two youngest, for about the past year off and on, on their own, have been making notebooks in which they draw and color each state flag, then label it with the name of the state, the number (1st, 2nd, etc…) of state, and the year it became a state. They are enjoying that, probably because it was their own idea. My stepson has for some time been writing stories for the Fossil Fighters DS game, and drawing pictures to go with them. He’s keeping them in a notebook. Our oldest is most interested in playing baseball on DS, sorting his sports cards, and reading.

I have been considering getting the Write an Adventure Novel in a year curriculum and doing it myself! I had made a goal to learn to knit this year, but then we found out my husband was being transferred to NM, so my time became cosumed with packing and getting us moved. Now it’s November, so if I’m going to meet my goal I will need to find the DVD set I purchased from a homeschool catalog and get going on it, hadn’t I? But first, I need to complete a baby gift I’ve been working on for a new grand niece.

We have my cousin and her teo boys from Ohio coming the first part of next week for a short visit on their trip out west, so the kids and I will be getting the house in order as best as we can (we aren’t completely unpacked as yet) tomorrow and Monday, and while I run errands tomorrow, they’ll be doing their Saturday chores under their dad’s supervision. I think I will call my cousin tomorrow and ask her if she will teach me how to make omelets while she’s here. That way I can buy what I need for them on Saturday while grocery shopping.

Next on my list is getting desks for the computer room, so I can have back the tables I need for cardmaking/stamping/scrapbooking workshops. I’m a consultant for Close to My Heart http://lorimoffit.ctmh.com and am really trying to get my business off the ground now that we are finally here. If any of my readers enjoy scrapbooking, stamping and/or card making, please consider me for your papercrafting needs, and go to my website. I have a current party going, so if you go to the site and scroll down, you’ll see a link for hurricane sandy aid gathering. Click on that to begin shopping. In November, everyone who gets the stamp of the month set can also choose another stamp set for 50% off, plus, with every stamp of the month set, Close to My Heart will donate $1.00 to the American Red Cross for hurricane relief. Get a great deal, and help others at the same time! You can also order when there is o current party, but I do try to have one up each month. If you are interested in having your own party, you can email me at lorimoffit@gmail.com and I’ll set you up with an EZ invite so that you can have your own online gathering, earning free and half price product for yourself. I will also be happy to mail you catalogs to show to your local friends, and your non-local friends can order from your personalized link on my website. Their online order will be sent directly to them, and you still get the credit! 🙂

Well, I think that’s all for today!

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September 18, 2012 · 3:25 pm

Celebrating Womanhood, & what being a woman has meant to me…

When my friend Amanda let me know about this blog hop, at first I just thought it would be something I’d want to read, but I’ve come to realize that perhaps I might have something to contribute to the conversation as well… 

When I was young, I decided I was going to be a famous author. I used to write stories all the time, and I majored in journalism when I went to college. I lost my idealism for journalism though, when I realized that professional journalists are not objective at all, the way we were being taught that they were supposed to be.   I still occasionally wrote stories, but never really went any further than that with creative writing.

I worked for General Motors for several years, first at Buick, in Flint, MI, then a transfer to Pontiac Motors, in Pontiac, MI, until I became ill and began having black outs with no warning, that not one doctor over several years was ever able to diagnose. By the time it was dignosed as a serious thyroid problem, necessitating major surgery, the assembly plant I worked in had been closed during a time of severe downsizing, and I no longer had a job at General Motors.

In the meantime, I had gotten married, at age 32. So, now I was no longer having blackouts, was healthier, etc., and I knew that what I wanted most of all was to be a full time wife, homemaker, and mother. The problem was that we just could not conceive a child. We did realize eventually that the most important thing for us was that we become parents, not necessarily that we conceive, and I give birth, and so our adoption journey began… we quickly discovered that private, newborn infant adoption was not going to be for us. It’s quite costly, at least it was then, and it just didn’t feel right, either, to us. We found out we could adopt a waiting child in foster care, but I knew I couldn’t be a foster parent. I couldn’t handle having to give the kids back over and over while waiting for a child to be available for adoption. Later, though, we found out that we didn’t have to be foster parents in order to adopt, and our first son came to us when he was just under the age of two. He has special needs, fetal alcohol syndrome, mild mental retardation, and is on the autism spectrum. And he is a joy to our lives (most of the time!) 🙂 After his kindergarten year in public school, my life took another turn, and I became a homeschooling mom, something I never thought I would do, ever. I began with straight Abeka, a curriculum for homeschool in a box, with teacher manuals to tell me day by day what to do, which worked well for the first couple of years. After that, we drifted into more relaxed homeschooling, with me putting it together from many different sources, rather than a curriculum in a box. We still use things from many different sources, but we are very relaxed about it, halfway between relaxed homeschooling and unschooling, and my kids are learning so much more now than they did before! 

When my stepson finished kindergarten, he came to stay with us for the summer, and he’s still here at age 15! He loves the way he is able to be educated, learning according to his own passions, not according to what a specific curriculum says he must learn at a specific age. So do his brothers. His older brother, our first child, is now age 19, and still learning, so much more than he would have if he’d been left in a school. His younger brothers, our 11 year old twins who were adopted at age 8, have also learned so much more than they were learning in school while they were still in foster care. Homeschooling has turned out to be one of my best life choices.

My life, like everyone’s life, has been a series of journeys, and choices. I made the choice, with my husband, that I’d be a full time homemaker, then later added being a full time at home mom, then a full time homeschooling mom. I’ve had times when it was not an easy road by any means, for a number of reasons, but honestly, I wouldn’t be anything else. it’s the best feeling in the world to know that I am the person who taught my kids how to read, how to write, how to do so many things. 🙂 

And maybe, just maybe, one day I’ll try writing again, and maybe I WILL be a famous author! Or, maybe I’ll just write, no matter what comes of it, no matter if nobody ever reads it except for me…

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April 29, 2010 · 9:55 pm

Another day in Detroit…

I was just too tired to do this last night when we got home, instead, I put my feet up and fell asleep! So, here’s what we did yesterday.

We got up WAY earlier than usual, the alarm was set for 5:30 am.  Mike (my husband) got up to have the first shower, then got all the kids up and downstairs for breakfast, and to get dressed in the clothes I’d had them put downstairs Tuesday night before bed. When they headed downstairs, I was able to go get my shower and get dressed, then downstairs to check my blood (159, best morning reading in a LONG time) and have my breakfast.

We left the house at about 7:40 to go drop the kids off with wonderful friends who have been helping with child care when I have appointments, and got to their house just on time for the kids to help collect the morning eggs from their chickens!  Then, we got going to Detroit for my first appointment for the day, the initial consult with my surgeon, Dr. Carlin. Commuter rush traffic is SOOOO fun!

My appointment with Dr. Carlin (this was the appointment that I was required to bring my husband to) was for 10:30, I actually signed in a little before 10:00, I think, and actually was able to have my appointment begin a little early as a result. I had to go with a nurse to be weight, blood pressure checked, height checked, and answer questions. Then I was taken to an exam room and saw Dr. Carlin’s P.A., who asked many questions, measured me, checked to make sure I’d brought and handed in to the nurse my lab reports, my letter of intent, and my 11 page questionnaire.

I Finally saw Dr. Carlin after that. We talked about the surgery and the hospital stay, and he gave me my weight loss goal that must be met before the surgery, which is 15 – 20 pounds.  The reason for this is that it will shrink the liver, making it easier to do laproscopic surgery, as opposed to open.

After Dr. Carlin, Wanda (the nurse who is the coordinator for the bariatric progam at HFH) came and took us to her office for scheduling.

Wanda & Me

The surgeons have very busy schedules this time of year. My medical clearance appointment will be June 1, and my appointment to schedule surgery is August 13, unless there’s a cancellation before then. This will be a four hour appointment, because I have to be seen by three or four different people.

Once we were done with this appointment, we went to the hospital cafeteria for lunch, then on to my other appointment, the mandatory class with the exercise people.  We had a one hour presentation, then on to exercise machines. I was able to do 15 minutes on treadmill set to 1 mile per hour, I did a quarter of a mile. The treadmill is very hard on my back.

Then I did 15 minutes on a recumbant bike, which is more of a workout than I would have guessed! I did two miles in that 15 minutes. 

After that, the specialist spoke with me about what I should do to build up strength and ability to exercise.  To begin, I’ll walk the length of my block, because that way if I get out of breath or hurt, I can stop at my porch to sit long enough to drink some water. I’ll do that until I can walk long enough without a break that I won’t need to have something close by for a sit down.  I want to get to where I can go down the street and walk the track at the high school. I’m also going to dust off the wii fit and get back to using it, especially when the weather doesn’t permit outdoor exercise.

When we left there, it was time for commuter rush traffic again, so we decided to go have dinner before coming home. We went to Big Boy, knowing I’d be working hard on changes starting today, and I had things I probably won’t have again, some for a long time, some forever. I had chicken parmesan with salad bar, and an ice cream sundae for dessert. No pop, I quit pop already. I had water.

Then we got on the freeway in time for just the tail end of the rush traffic, went back to Port Huron, and went and got our kids, picking them up about a quarter to nine. I was in bed by 11:30, which is early for me, because I’m generally up until at least 1:00 or 2:00 am.

Today, I had a breakfast hotpocket and some strawberries for breakfast, a cracker, ham & cheese lunchable for lunch (Thursday is the day my kids have their home-school gym & swim program at the YMCA, I do a lunchable or the asian chicken salad from Wendy’s), 2 slices of swiss cheese for snack,  a small piece of boneless pork chop roasted with garlic and rosemary seasoning and a serving of mashed potatoes with margarine for supper. I will probably have a small amount of deli sliced ham and cheese for a snack later.

While dinner was cooking, I went out and walked. I walked the length of my block 6 times.  I need to find out how long it actually is so that I know how far I actually walk.

I washed the dishes, folded some laundry to be put away, and did my piano practice.

I’ve decided that since I’m going on a journey to a healthy me, I may as well take care of all the things my doctors have been nagging me about, so a couple weeks ago I had my mammogram, which came back normal, then this past Monday I went to the gynocologist for my yearly (it’s been two years sice the last one, and I’m supposed to see her every six months because of having had cancer), and set up my appointment for the “you’re over 50” colonoscopy, which will be on May 11. So, I am truly working on a healthier me.

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April 20, 2010 · 12:15 am

Loving friends & family……..

When I went to the 6 hour orientation, and also when I read the book we were required to purchase and read, the question of how to handle those who would say I am taking the easy way out was addressed.  I admit, this is something I did fret about, having had people comment that they had their children “the hard way”, as if adoption was the “easy way out”.  I’m so happy that this has not happened so far.  I’ve told just about everyone who is important to me, and received wonderful support from each one so far. You never know how good your friends are, or your family either, until you need to count on them for support ad non-judgement.  I’m luckier than I realized.

Just a little discouraged though, which I’ll address in another post……..

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