Monday’s Fostering Blog
The three girls all start back to school this week. Alice our foster daughter is going into year 4 tomorrow, Lauren starts year 7 at a new school and Annie is going to year 9 and they both start back on Wednesday. I am usually very organised at getting everything ready for the new school term but for some unknown reason this year I seem to have dropped a few balls. I focussed so much on Lauren at the beginning of the holidays, mainly because she needed an entire new uniform for her new school. Somehow Annie has gone under the radar and I have only just realised that she has grown out of a number of things. Their school is fairly strict on uniform – which means there are only two shops in town that you can go to for the regulation items like skirts, blazers and PE kits. Not only that you have to pay extra to have their initials embroidered on to each item of their PE Kit. Annie and Lauren are very different builds so we rarely get hand me downs passed to Lauren.
Anyway after a bit of a panic we get the uniform that Annie needs. I took a very deep breath and paid the bill. Now to school shoes – why I left it to till this week I will never know. I think in the back of my head, I was thinking I don’t want to buy at the beginning of the summer holidays just in case they grow before term starts! How much their feet actually grow in the 6 weeks holiday is probably minimal but nevertheless I have left it until now. So we are at the shoe shops in town with what seems like the world and his wife, trying to get shoes to fit. Easier said than done though as both girls wear orthotics in their shoes. After what seemed like an age and many tears, we get Lauren sorted. Annie however has opted to wear her old shoes for the first few days of term until the shop can order the shoe she likes in the size to fit her. Just hoping now their uniforms and school shoes last out the school year.
Because Alice is such a poor eater, she grows really slowly. In fact at age 8, she is still the size of a four year old. This is not usually a good thing, but on the school uniform front, it does mean that she doesn’t actually need anything new as everything still fits her. She doesn’t even need shoes as she gets boots from the Orthotic Department at the hospital to fit her splints! I make a promise to myself that next year will be more organised. Somehow I doubt that it will be different and I expect Alice will have grown by next year and will need a new uniform!
A Less Ordinary Family Foster Care Blog
