I Must Be Insane...

[Juniper]

Well, my hubby's sister is in kind of a bind right now. She lives in an awful school district, so for the past 11 years she's been sending her kids to school in her babysitter's school district, claiming that's where they live. Shady, eh? Well now her sitter is moving, so she's got a problem.

She's also recently divorced, and her ex isn't very helpful. So she's been working two jobs and still hasn't got any money. The logical thing to do would be to sell her house and move to a better school district, but she's good at finding reasons why this or that won't work.

Her solution now is to enroll them in school where my father-in-law lives, saying that they now live with him. It's a very good district; we used to send our kids there till we moved where we are now. But grandpa isn't much into grandparenting, at least in the hands-on sense. He's got his own life and likes it that way. So I cannot see him waiting at the bus stop for these kids and then keeping them till she gets off work, no sir-ee.

SO we did the only logical thing and offered OUR help. Unfortunately we live very far away from her - about an hour's drive, maybe more in busy traffic. If we were to send them to school here, it would require them to live with us during the week. Which is the only right thing to do anyway, if we're going to claim they live here for school purposes.

We're talking about an 8 year old boy and 11 year old girl, both with issues - the boy is learning disabled (slightly, and my SIL is in denial about it, but he's in 2nd grade and can't read, and most people can't understand his speech. Including me.) and the girl has ADHD, lies, steals, etc.

We have the room, and I'm sure my SIL would send us money to help pay for food, etc. It would be SO good for these kids to live here, where we can give them a stable family environment in a healthy area and very, very good schools. We have a 12 year old girl and 10 year old boy, so they'd have companionship. But Oh My God what an additional pile of work on me.

I think there's a very good possibility that if they were to come live with us, I would have to give up college. I can't see it any other way, except maybe cutting back to part time, maybe two classes a quarter. This place is already a madhouse with me gone all day and having to catch up.

But I love the kids and want what is best for them. They're really all the family I've got now.

So if you would just say a little prayer for whatever is best.

Thanks.