sastyk

Four years ago we were foster parents to two wonderful children whose family was broken up by deportation. The parents had overstayed their visas (ie, they entered the US legally), in part because their children were both born (while in the US, ie the children were citizens) with kidney disease and…

These are two of my sons, Judah and Zion. Adorable, no? Yeah, I think so too. And they are so sweet. Zion loves animals, he wants to know everything about them. And anything that begins with the letter Z 'My yetter!" Judah is one of the sweetest natured kids on the earth - if someone tries to take…

As I mentioned some months ago, we are planning on selling our farm in Knox, NY (The farm is in the town of Knox, but the address is 43 Crow Hill Road, Delanson, NY - for reasons obscure to us even after a decade and a half, the mail goes two towns away) and moving to urban Schenectady. Well,"The…

More soon, but I can finally show you pictures of my whole family. We celebrated the adoption of Deniece, Rimonah, Judah, Malkiah and Hezekiah yesterday, to our incredible joy! I have professional pictures coming, and will do good ones of each individual child, but here's the best one of the…

We came back from the developmental pediatrician yesterday in a jubilant mood. Two of my sons came to us with significant developmental delays. Both of them have made wonderful progress, so last night was an occasion for celebration. A lot of parents have children who are delayed in some ways.…

In one of my last posts, I argued that White children need to read Black children's books as much or more than Black children, and more importantly, need to read lots of good children's books with Black language, culture and heroes. They also need to read about other non-White cultures, but given…

Since Zion's arrival as a newborn in 2013, this blog has been quite quiet. First I wanted to give Zion the same time and resources that my other babies had. Then just as we started to get back on our feet, the flood of adding four kids to our home, including three under three (plus Zion who was…

I don't know a single person on any end of the political spectrum who doesn't want to see an end to police shootings of black folk. I don't know a single person who doesn't want to make sure that shootings like the Charleston one never happen again. But most ordinary white people also don't have…

But just in case you were wondering, there is basically no chance whatsoever that Climate Change could be happening without human intervention. I realize that we'll be hearing about this point 0.01 possibility until we all die, but just so we all know.

Are you new to this parenting gig? About to give birth or adopt or take on a foster placement? Or maybe you've had one easy kid, and are about to go to two and sense that things are about to change radically. Or maybe you have them, but you feel like you are missing something in the "how to stay…

My children made me try a chocolate-covered gummy bear the other day. Now a chocolate gummy bear is not a local, sustainable or home-grown food, and frankly, I don't like gummy bears (the only good use I ever had for them was in college, where nothing would keep posters on cinder-block walls…

Fourteen years ago, on a cold February weekend, Eric, our 10 month old son, Eli and I went driving around rural upstate New York, looking for a place to settle. We had actually wanted to stay in Massachusetts, but a combination of high land and real estate prices and Eric's grandparents' (who…

If you've thought about foster parenting at all, even for a couple of minutes, you probably grasp that someone has to do it. Because the truth is that kids whose parents can't care for them has been a global problem for all of human history. It is a problem that could get better or worse with…

Take five little pieces of paper, and write down the five things that matter most to you in your life, whatever they are. Your parents. Your partner. Your kids, Your community. Your grand passion - art or the Red Sox, guitar or hunting or knitting. Your home. Your favorite chair. Your dreams for…

Writing books and essays about food, I hear a lot of stories about what people ate growing up. Because cooking was mostly women's work, those stories are almost always about mothers and grandmothers, and how the food made them feel - and how the memories of that food still do make them feel.…

I should have known, but did not, that being read aloud to was a learned skill. It never occurred to me to think about it from my privileged place in the world of literacy. I was, for a time, though a teacher of writing, a fish who swam in words without thinking of the water. Like a lot of book-…

We adopted him on Wednesday, with 30+ family and friends in attendance. It was fabulous. The judge did a wonderful job of including ALL my children in what was a special day for our family, and then we partied. The funniest moment was that the lawyer had spelled his middle name incorrectly (…

(Some of my kids watching sheep mothering their babies) Over the last decade a whole lot of babies have been born on my farm or brought home to it. We have had calves, chicks, kids (goat), kids (human), ducklings, goslings, kits and lambs. One of the most fascinating revelations of this is just…

p>There are a number of possible answers to that question, but my current summer favorite is chicken-tortilla soup.  You can do this with bones, bones and meat, a whole chicken, stock and some breasts, whatever you have, but since we have some smaller whole chickens available from some roosters…

Exactly a year ago at the end of a crazy, long week (Eric's final grades due Tues, thought we were getting three kids Wed., annual "hey, let us look under your beds and in your closets" foster care recertification, which annually gives me PTSD because my limited cleaning skills get close scrutiny…

The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption has done more to get kids in care adopted than just about anyone else - their facebook page and websites have done a lot to draw attention to the needs of kids for families.  The biggest new face of foster adoption comes from an adoptive family that put up an…

We had a fence crisis this summer, and for two days had no good containment for our bucks.  As is entirely predictable, we also then had a spate of baby goats beginning New Years Day. Now there is a good reason why most people in the Northeast do not plan goat births for January unless they have…

<I wrote this several years ago as a joke piece for a foster parent group I was on, and I've decided to publish it in case any of you enjoy it.  One of the harsher realities of having 9 kids is that it does cut into your private time, but even more, the psychological heft of foster parenting…

Yesterday morning Isaiah (10) asked me with a grin on his face: "Which one of us is your FAVORITE child?" My answer "None of you. I like Rubeus best. He's quiet, and soft, never talks to me,  and takes care of almost all his own needs." D. (11) "But he's not a kid, he's a cat." Me: "Shhh...you'll…

...on a sticky, sweaty afternoon in July, I received a call from the head of homefinding from my local county social services agency.  These are the folks whose job it is to find homes for kids who come into foster care.  A two-day old newborn boy was being removed from the hospital, because of…

In the last few years, a number of political leaders have tried to live on a food stamps budget.  Among others Newark Mayor and political heir-apparent Cory Booker and current and former governors of Colorado and Oregon.  Some have done so to draw attention to the limitations of food stamps, others…

My family looks pretty different, and it gets a lot of attention.  The vast majority is positive, and most of the rest is just curious or wondering - but every now and then someone says something REALLY stupid, unkind or offensive.  A lot of the time, if the kids don't hear it, I let it go.  If…

It is only on really stressful days when I refer to them as my unholy army of the night.   The rest of the time, at least at meals, it is just "my army" and we really do go through a stunning amount of food.                   For example, in late August, right around the time this photo was taken…

A reader sends me a letter and gives me permission to reprint it here, because I suspect he's not the only one with this question: "I think what you are doing with your family is great, but I feel like you've moved away from peak oil and climate change to write about foster care, and I don't see a…

The fall cool-down has come here, and it is time for soup.  My kids' current favorite is Portugese style Chick-pea, Garlic, Potato and Sausage, although they liked the vegetarian lentil version I made yesterday when we were out of chicken broth, chick peas and sausage ;-). It is a simple soup - I'…