Court rejects request to keep sect mothers with children

AND THE MEN ARE IN CUSTODY? NO?

NO!


An infant, left in car seat, and female members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, depart by chartered bus from the San Angelo Coliseum where they had been temporarily housed in San Angelo, Texas Thursday, April 24, 2008. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez)


SAN ANGELO, Texas (AP) -- More than half the teen girls taken from a polygamist compound in west Texas have children or are pregnant, state officials said Monday.

A total of 53 girls between the ages of 14 and 17 are in state custody after a raid 3½ weeks ago at the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado.

Of those girls, 31 either have children or are pregnant, said Child Protective Services spokesman Darrell Azar. Two of those are pregnant now, he said; it was unclear whether either of those two already have children.

"It shows you a pretty distinct pattern, that it was pretty pervasive," he said.

************

And the men are in custody, right? What? No?

the article goes on to say no one has been charged.

Guess they can't arrest ALL of the men, right?

But they can take ALL of the children - even the nursing infants and boys.

*************

On Monday, CPS also revised its total count of children in state custody to 463, up one from Friday. Azar said the change resulted from finally getting the children out of the San Angelo Coliseum and into foster facilities around the state, where they were able to get a more accurate count.

Of those 463 children, 250 are girls and 213 are boys.

********** So of the 250 girls, 31 are between 14 - 17, supposedly. So the other 219 girls are newborns, infants, toddlers, preschoolers, etc., etc. etc. ********



And the latest news today:

Mother gives birth to boy

By MICHELLE ROBERTS, Associated Press Writer
SAN MARCOS, Texas (Associated Press) -- One of the hundreds of young polygamist-sect members taken into state custody gave birth Tuesday to a healthy boy while child welfare officials, state troopers and fellow sect members stood watch outside the maternity ward.

The mother is "younger than 18," Crimmins said, and will remain with her new son in a nearby foster-care facility until a formal custody hearing will determine the pair's fate sometime before June 5. Crimmins declined to give any other details about the girl or where she and the baby would stay.

*************

So they are probably going to separate her from her child.

Further in the article....

************

CPS spokesman Darrell Azar said he was unaware that an FLDS teen had gone into labor, but added that typically, a child born to a ward of the state becomes a ward of the state also.

***********

In other words, this mother has NO SAY in them taking her child from her.


I am not proud to be in a country where the government can steal a child from the mother's arms but let the men who are the impregnators walk freely. It's still a man's world, ladies. And it seems more so in Texas.

Everything is bigger in Texas except the authorities brains.

Mini Me Pose

Looks like we need those Texas Authorities again!

Pitcher Roger Clemens, already battling allegations he used steroids and lied to a congressional panel, reportedly carried on a decade-long affair with country music star Mindy McCready that started when she was just 15 years old.

The New York Daily News reported Monday that Clemens began the affair when he was a 28-year-old star of the Boston Red Sox, and that details of their relationship could surface during a defamation lawsuit Clemens filed against his former trainer, Brian McNamee.

Clemens' lawyer, Rusty Hardin, reportedly confirmed that the star pitcher had a long relationship with McCready, but denied it involved sex.

"He flatly denies having had any kind of an inappropriate relationship with her," Hardin told the Daily News.

**********

Yeah, so did Clinton.

NEW YORK — It's nothing to LOL about: Despite best efforts to keep school writing assignments formal, two-thirds of teens admit in a survey that emoticons and other informal styles have crept in.

The Pew Internet and American Life Project, in a study released Thursday, also found that teens who keep blogs or use social-networking sites like Facebook or News Corp.'s MySpace have a greater tendency to slip nonstandard elements into assignments.

The results may give parents, teachers and others a big :( — a frown to the rest of us — though the study's authors see hope.

"It's a teachable moment," said Amanda Lenhart, senior research specialist at Pew. "If you find that in a child's or student's writing, that's an opportunity to address the differences between formal and informal writing. They learn to make the distinction ... just as they learn not to use slang terms in formal writing."

Half of the teens surveyed say they sometimes fail to use proper capitalization and punctuation in assignments, while 38 percent have carried over the shortcuts typical in instant messaging or e-mail messages, such as "LOL" for "laughing out loud."

A quarter of teens have used :) and other emoticons.

Overall, 64 percent have used at least one of the informal elements in school.

Teens who consider electronic communications with friends as "writing" are more likely to carry the informal elements into school assignments than those who distinguish the two.

The study was co-sponsored by the National Commission on Writing at the College Board, the nonprofit group that administers the SAT and other placement tests.

The chairman of the commission's advisory board, Richard Sterling, said the rules could possibly change completely within a generation or two: Perhaps the start of sentences would no longer need capitalization, the way the use of commas has decreased over the past few decades.

"Language changes," Sterling said.

Defying conventional wisdom, the study also found that the generation born digital is shunning computer use for most assignments.

About two-thirds of teens say they typically do their school writing by hand. And for personal writing outside school, longhand is even more popular — the preferred form for nearly three-quarters of teens.

That could be because the majority of writing is short — school assignments are on average a paragraph to a page in length, Lenhart said.

Among other findings:

— Teens who keep blogs are more likely to engage in personal writing. They also tend to believe that writing will prove crucial to their eventual success in life.

**********************

I have to agree that kids who are blogging and writing on myspace, etc. are at least WRITING! and you can't help but celebrate that.

I have had 5th graders put shortcuts from texting habits into papers and I always explain the difference between formal and informal writing, so yes, a very teachable moment! It made me smile to actually see the "text slang" in the paper. At least I know they are writing outside the classroom, too!

On another note, there is always that communication gap to be aware of. I had a student once come to me in tears with his paper.

He asked me why I "put that" (points to paper) on his work.

I looked at the paper and thought, geesh, kid... you got 101 points, what more do you want? The highest he could have gotten was 105!

But all I said was, because that is the grade you earned.

His little eyebrows wrinkled up as if to say, what are you talking about old lady?!

Suddenly a lightning bolt hit me!

Me: OHHH!!! You think I wrote lol (laugh out loud) but that is actually 101 (one hundred and one) points!!!

He thought I was making fun of his paper!

He was sooo relieved and we both, well,

LOL

Restored Faith in Humanity...

Wow, I've been getting lots of hits from people who are also curious about my question in my previous post. Here is one:

search words: why weren't flds men arrested?

those were the search words from someone in Tennessee.

Good to know I am not the only one who is asking this question!

FLDS and RICE SCARE - A RANT

This whole FLDS thing is so strange. Why have they not found the 16 year old who made the phone call? More importantly, why were the children rounded up and removed from their homes? Why didn't the authorities round up all the men in the compound instead? The children did nothing wrong yet they are the ones to suffer.

Here is part of an article I read in the news today...

"We recognize it's critical that these children not be exposed to mainstream culture too quickly or other things that would hinder their success," agency spokeswoman Shari Pulliam said. "We just want to protect them from abuse and neglect. We're not trying to change them.""

Neglect? These children were NOT neglected. I've seen neglected children. I've taught neglected children. These children are NOT neglected. Stop adding adjectives to support your reasons for separating them from their mothers.

If you truly feel these children are in danger, and I agree that marrying off children against their will is wrong, then why weren't the MEN WHO WERE FORCING the marriages and MARRYING the children, and IMPREGNATING THE CHILDREN carted off? Why are the men allowed to continue to live as they always do while little children are crying at night for their mothers?

I don't fully know about the situation there, I understand that. I do know that we have teenagers all of our country that are pregnant and UNDER the age of 18 and many of them were impregnated by men over 18 so I don't understand why I don't read more news about these men being arrested and the pregnant teens being taken away from their parents. Why aren't those moms being carted off for not knowing where their teenage daughter was when she was off with a man who was breaking the law by sleeping with her?!? It's really no different. If it's against the law to marry and impregnate girls under the age of 18, then it's against the law, period and every pregnant teen that slept with a man over 18 should be held to the same accountability. Jamie Lynn Spears is 16 and pregnant right now!!! Why hasn't the government stepped and and taken her away to protect her from "neglect and abuse"???

I am not saying the FLDS are right or wrong. I am not debating their beliefs or lifestyle. I am questioning why the men, who are the ones who were breaking the law, are not the ones in custody?!

And do we really need to know there is a marriage bed in the temple? I am not Mormon and I am not pro or con Mormon but I do know that the media loves to take the most intimate detail and post it all over the news so that freaks in the world can obsess over that one piece of news.

It's like the news this morning about the RICE! LIMIT! Oh! My! God! RUSH! to COSTCO! and BUY! RICE! Before! WE! RUN! OUT! Argghhhhh!

Do any of you still have duct tape left over??!

Back to my point: I want the media to report on the law. What laws where broken and WHO WAS BREAKING THEM.

I want the MEN of the compound rounded up and arrested if they are the ones who illegally married and impregnated the girls. How can the government take away a 22 year old mother's 3 year old child?! How does that even make sense?!?

I have to stop now. I'm starting to run low on duct tape and Saran Wrap. I think I'll pick up some rice while I am at Sam's Club.

Bi-Polar Baby

Earth Day Inspiration

How sweetly lies old Ireland
Emerald green beyond the foam,
awakening sweet memories,
calling the heart back home.




Photograph by William Manning/CORBIS

Andrew Sums Up Mondays...

WEEKEND UPDATE

The weekend began with some Pennsylvania LOVE: Herr's Chips for moi and burnt chips for Sparky. We are in salty snack heaven. THANK YOU to our dear family, Mick and Linda in Reading, Pa. !!!!!! You have no idea how awesome this is to us!!!!

Impromptu birthday party: What's a girl to do when she has a baby and can't get to the store? She gets out all of her past holiday stuff and throws a graduation/It's A Boy!/Merry Christmas/Happy New Year! Birthday Party! Sweet Pea gets extra credit points since I realized about an hour into the ride to Phx. that I had not gotten a cake for Little L. I didn't even have to call Sweet Pea - she was on the ball and baked one already! And the multi-themed celebration was a complete Moron Family moment! THANK YOU , SWEET PEA!!!!




To redeem myself to the three people who read my blog, I AM taking Little L to Disney in two weeks. And I DROVE to McD's on my lunch time to bring back lunch for her AND I bought her dessert after work at Dairy Queen, and bought her HAIRSPRAY (movie) so I am not completely a bad mother! :-)

My baby Roo!!!! He is filling out SOOOO well and I needed to grab those chunky thighs and squeeze them every chance I got! He was soooo skinny when he was born and for a few weeks after so it's awesome to see him filling out so nicely!

We had fun on Saturday visiting with Baby Roo and the minute we drive away from the house, my heart aches for him. He is just the cutest thing on this planet. His Pop Pop (Sparky) spent a LOT of quality time with his grandson.




We stopped at Az. Mills to eat at The Rain Forest Cafe, another small birthday treat for Little L. It was way yummy and filled us up so that we didn't need to cook dinner tonight. We stopped at the store and bought groceries for the week and now we are relaxing. Life is good.

The Last of the Teens...

Today is Little L's 19th birthday!!!!

She loves to draw and it quite good at it. She does a lot of animation and manga so I asked her to try to draw a picture of Baby Roo and she did a great job! I love her work and she is so creative and talented!

We are going to Phx. to celebrate. I suppose I'll have to share Baby Roo with her since it IS her birthday. We will celebrate more in a few weeks with a trip to, where else, Disneyland. :-)

Happy Birthday, Little L! I hope it's as special as you are!!!!

Love,
Mama
xoxoxoxo

Baby Love...

Loose vs. Lose # 345

Another person who cannot tell the difference:

Kanye West blogged:


"I absolutely lost my mind (in a good way) on the new Glow in the Dark tour. The constant hours of creating helped me 2 keep from loosing my mind in a bad way."

Argh....

Teen For sale FREE!!!

Changing. Blogspot.Password. Now.

Little L.... you crack me up.... and by the way... what is a VEEP???

FOX NEWS:
WASHINGTON — The Virgin Mary on a grilled cheese and the Illinois-shaped corn flake appear to have new competition for webbies' fascination: Dick Cheney's mysterious sunglasses.

An undated photo of the vice president on the White House Web site has caused a stir on the Internet, causing some people to wonder if he's in eyeshot of an unclad female.

The White House says it's just someone holding an innocuous fishing rod (the veep -- allegedly -- is fly fishing in Idaho).

I am assuming VEEP is vice president? Why don't I know this? Why is Fox news using internet talk?

Oh hai mom! I jacked yer blog!

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My Mum Mum is too wordy...

Here's the story of my mommy going to the hospital...





Mommy was hurting....



We are going where?!




Mum Mum had to get me IN and OUT of the car seat.




I'm fine... really, it wasn't that bad.

Dear World,

Adventures with Infant Car Seats

SO I've not been blogging because I've been... living?

I thought I would tell the story of Sweet Pea's post birth gallbladder surgery. Because you've all been sitting around thinking I wonder when she is going to write a post about Sweet Pea's post gallbladder surgery? Right?

Well, it was a dark and stormy night. Actually it was dark, not stormy. And I am not sure you can call it "night" because it was techinically early morning. But anyway... it was 3:30 am.

I had been at Sweet Pea's for just under a week straight. I enjoyed every single minute. I got to hold Andrew early in the morning and let Sweet Pea take a nap. I helped with cooking, cleaning, dishes, shopping, etc. But the best, hands down, was having Andrew curl up like a little lima bean right under my chin and sleep for hours at a time.

One Thursday evening, I made dinner and we did our normal stay awake till past midnight and attempt to go to bed. I was having a hard time falling asleep each night without Sparky. This was the longest we had ever been away from each other. I was restless but finally managed to fall asleep just after 1 am. Around 3:30, I heard Sweet Pea crying softly. I heard some little gurgles from Andrew but I felt something was wrong. As I was coming out of my sleep, my first thought was wondering if Sharon was overwhelmed from lack of sleep and maybe Andrew had not settled down yet. Perhaps she just needed her mama to reassure her that all is well. I planned to rock the baby and soothe her and give her a little break. But as I sat up in bed, trying to wipe the sleep from my eyes, I saw her shadow in the hall, headed towards my guest room.

She came and sat on the edge of the bed, her breathing hard and gasping for air. She tried to speak between gasps...

"I'm..... having.... pain.....

I sat up straighter.

"where is it?"

I was alarmed. I am horrible in emergencies. At school we were given an inventory and asked to list all of the things we could do in case there was an emergency such as cook, perform CPR, call parents, etc. I wrote down that I could panic. I am really good at panicking.

But moms don't panic.

When Sharon called me a week earlier to ask if she might be in labor, I could tell from the minute she told her Daddy to put me on the phone that she was in labor. But I remained calm. As I hurried around to dress and gather our suitcases at 12:30 am, I was calm and collected. I talked to her and gently suggested she go ahead and go to the hospital to be checked. She couldn't see me with my bug eyed self running after my grandma bag and looking for my jeans and sweater in the closet. I spoke soothingly, reassuring her that the hospital would simply send her home if she were not in labor - all the while motioning with my hands like a mad woman at Bob to grab the sock! with rice! to heat! when Sweet Pea is in labor!

"It ...ss...starts in....my back.... and goes... to... the ... front...."

Classic gallbladder pain.

Or a gas bubble.

One of the other.

Except that she was really hurting. I grabbed the baby and asked her what she thought it was.

She knew. When she had taken a small fall in front of the house 2 weeks earlier, she had an ultrasound that revealed, for the first time, shadows of stones in her gallbladder.

"I... think it's... my gallbladder."

My mind raced. Mr. Sweet Pea was at work. I could call and ambulance or... I could try to load her and the baby in the car. We decided to not call an ambulance. The hospital wasn't that far. But Andrew was NOT going into the ER. That germ - infested place is NOT the ideal setting for a baby who was just in the hospital fighting some kind of unidentified infection already.

I grabbed the car seat. After trying for about 3 minutes to jiggle and click the 18 point harness system on these new fangled car seats, I moved aside and let Sweet Pea finish the job. I instantly thought he would be stuck in there for the next 5 days as I would have no idea how to release him once we got back home.

We got in the car and headed to the hospital. It was as if Sweet Pea was in labor all over again. Breathing hard, she managed to spit out directions... turn here... right... left... merge... pull in here.

I dropped her off out front, as if she were headed to a big sale at the mall and I would find a good parking space.

I sat there for a few minutes, unable to pull away. I just had such a hard time dropping her off, knowing how much pain she was in. But.. it was the ER. It also happened to be the ER she works in so I knew they would take good care of her.

I reluctantly pulled away. Andrew never made a sound. He was so sweet and wide eyed. Just enjoying a little middle of the night joy ride with his mum mum.

We arrived back home. Thankfully, I remembered the garage door opener. I pulled into the garage. I closed the garage behind me. I slipped out of the front seat, closed the door and pulled on the handle of the back door. It wouldn't open. I tried to use the button to open it. No luck. I opened the front door and tried to jiggle the handle of the back door to open it. No deal.

There was no way that car was winning. If I had to crawl into the back seat and figure out how to release Andrew from his harness, I would have. As I was doing that, something clicked in my brain and I managed to open the car door. Sigh.

I reached in. I didn't know how to unlock the car seat from the base. I spent another 5 minutes pushing and pulling on various parts until I finally found the magic red bar at the top of the seat. Big sigh.

We get inside the house. It is now just after 4 am. He's ready to eat. Just one problem. I cannot figure out how to unlock the seatbelts that are holding him IN the carseat. Bigger sigh. Again, after clicking more than Dorothy every clicked her ruby red heels, I found the magic code and got him out! Free, free, free at last! Thank God Almighty, he was free at last!

In the meantime, poor Sweet Pea is admitted to the hospital, tests are run, and surgery is scheduled. My poor baby had to have surgery 12 hours after coming into me to say she was having pain. She was so tired, so run down. I left the baby with his Uncle at the house and came to soothe her. She is so strong! I just cannot get over how hard she fought to keep her spirits up. She knew it would be hard to breastfeed. She knew it would impossible to lift the baby. She knew she was going to need some more help and asked me to stay another week. I was MORE than happy to do that! I enjoyed a bonus week with her and it was perfect timing as I had time off of work (2 weeks) for our spring break!

She was discharged that night at 10:30 pm. Here's a photo of my baby girl and my baby grandson... resting and recovering from their ordeals.

Are you smarter than a 5th grader?

The attached picture is a new article on the pages from FOXNEWS.com.

I read the artcile several times to see if the ARIZONA man just happened to be in NEW MEXICO when he was charged in Santa Fe... but no... the HEADLINE screams ARIZONA man but the very first line in the article states a Santa Fe man.

So... I think the reporter thinks that Santa Fe is in Arizona whereas it is really in New Mexico.

And by the way, FoxNews and AOL news...

If I see this mistake one more time I am going to scream.

lose vs. loose.

Hire me... I'll help you to edit your articles.

Happy Monday.

~ “Old as she was, she still missed her daddy sometimes.”
Gloria Naylor quotes (African-American novelist and educator, 1950)

I don't want to talk about it...

I haven't blogged because I forgot my email and password to log on.

Can you say

dementia?


But I will say this: I got to go to Phx. this weekend and see my sweet grandson and oh my lord have mercy on my soul I love that little boy. I just get the sweetest vibes from him - I think he is gonna be a good one! :-) What a doll baby. Anyway, we played and ate and slept and fought over who could hold him. When I got to work on Monday I spoke to a teacher/friend about a pain I was having. I mentioned that it starts in my shoulder and is strong in my upper arm but does extend down the arm to my wrist. I mentioned also that it began about a month ago.

She smiled and said - "You have grandmom arm!"

How funny is that?! She is sooo right!! It is very pronounced after visiting Baby Roo. Too, too funny.

Ok, I have to upload the more recent photos and then I will post them. In the meantime, here's a funny one of Andrew from when he was still in the hospital. Mr. Sweet Pea gets credit for this hilarious photo!