Yikes...6 weeks since I was on here. I did think about it a lot. I believe I was depressed for a while. Depressed over the direction our grandson Caleb was heading. He'd already been 'asked to leave' his daycare. Was going weeks at a time without having a bowel movement. Was so full of anger all the time that it was just getting scary. A friend mentioned encopresis as a possible diagnosis re his bowel problems. I checked out this website and lightbulbs started popping all over the place...just like last year when we realized his adenoids were causing him so many problems. As stated on that site, the first round of treatment consists of heavy duty laxatives every night for a week. I knew his mom wasn't up to that in any way, shape or form so I offered to keep him fulltime and tackle the problem. After thinking he couldn't or wouldn't go in the toilet all this time, once he started having real urges to go he never once had an accident in his pants. It was really quite phenomenal. I'll spare you all the details, but I couldn't be more pleased with how that aspect of Caleb is shaping up. Well, within a day or two of being here fulltime, he'd ask me five times a day, "I can stay here with you, Grandma?" I'm sorry to say it was the first time in his wee life that he had a routine schedule and felt like a priority. He was obviously in need and incredibly responsive to what we were giving him here. And let me tell you; it's tv-test-pattern B*O*R*I*N*G in my opinion, but he seems to crave a schedule so that's what we're doing. The diet went from pizza, chicken nuggets and mac-n-cheese to shredded wheat, PB on whole wheat, lots of fruit, brown pasta and chicken. Amazingly no complaints there, either. He's been with us two weeks as of tomorrow. My life is no longer my own. Hard to believe I used to get to go hang out at the office all day every day making art, or doing whatever I darned well felt like doing. But I know in my heart this is more important than anything I've ever done. When he first came here I moved from depressed to all out overwhelmed. 24/7 I was on that boy...basically breaking him back down to square one and starting over behaviorally. Today I am feeling very hopeful. We can actually go in the grocery store (albeit briefly) and not have to put him in a cart and not have to chase him and not worry about big screaming fits. He's got a ways to go, but I truly am hopeful that society is going to be happy to have him be a part of it. I have no idea where this all will go re his mother. I know that when she takes him for a few hours on her days off he'll ask her for reassurance "I go back to Grandma's house?" and that must hurt terribly. Thank God she loves him enough to want him to get what he needs, and smart enough to realize that right now anyway, she's not capable of giving it to him. So, that's pretty much us in a nutshell as of today.
On another note, John and I joined Weight Watchers four weeks ago. We weighed in today; I've lost almost 8 and John's lost 14! I'm so proud of him. His belly's the smallest I've seen in the 10 years I've known him. We're going for it!!! Caleb's not up to a half hour meeting, so we go in separate cars and Caleb leaves with Papa so I can stay and attend the meeting. Last week I was standing at the counter waiting for my turn to pay. Caleb's tugging on my arm and says, "Grandma. Grandma. I not tell that lady she has a big butt!" Like I was supposed to reward him for it. yikes. I was kind of scared to take him back today, but since then (thanks to advice from my mom), we've had the talk about how some people are big and some are little and wouldn't the world be a boring place if everyone were the same. :-)
You make a sandwich of two pieces of fabric with quilt batting in the middle. Sew an 'X' from corner to corner. Then sew all the squares together. Then snip all the seams every 1/4 to 1/2 inch. Honestly, the sewing takes less time than all that snipping, but don't you just love how they get all fuzzy like that? Looks so cuddly to me. You have to take it to the laundromat for the first wash and dry due to all the lint and fabric that comes out. I've washed and dried it twice more here at home, and now it's ready to wrap. The diaper cake is 3 tiers of diapers wrapped around and around each other and held with a ribbon(this one used about 70 newborn size). 
I may have gone overboard on the doos and dads I clipped on for decoration, but felt the diapers looked kind of ugly and wanted to cover them up as much as I could. Be prepared to spend some $$ on these. I think I've got about $75 in this one all told. Hey; two of John's ex's will be there (that I know of). I have to look good, right? ;-)