Why I Number My Children

Hi Snooki Toes!!

So it's come to my attention that calling my children by numbers could be perceived as offensive. In all fairness, The numbers thing is only for the blog since all kids in care have the right to confidentiality. It's not like I'm ever saying it out loud to them.

Either way, when I was deciding how I would address the children for the blog, I looked to other foster bloggers for ideas. Most of the blogs I read use cute made up nicknames for each child and a few use names that the foster parents have chosen for the children either just for the blog or to be made official upon adoption. My problem with either of those methods is that (1) it takes a lot of creativity that I just don't have to nickname children and (2) I was afraid that I would slip up and accidentally post the child's real name. Having numbers makes it obvious to me that I've slipped up and typed the child's name so I can replace it with a number before posting. (3)I thought about calling them by their first initial, but that is stepping pretty close to TMI and we have multiple children with the same first initial. (4) Typing "4" is faster than typing "snooki toes" or whatever name I could come up with.

Further, numbering my kids helps a reader who's jumping into the middle of my story to figure out who's who pretty easily. If I have 2 kids living with me right now, my kids are numbered 1-5, and I'm talking about baby 3- he has probably already returned home. As opposed to snooki toes, tootsie roll, glitter angel, paint-y face, and... see? I can't even make up 5 fake made-up names! Anyway, the nicknames give no clues about who is who and when they came or left.

Considering the length of time and amount of children I plan on fostering, numbers made sense. So sorry if it sounds cold. If you can get past my metric system of labeling children and read my content, you'd know that cold is not an accurate word to describe me or how I feel about my children.

Just to clarify- Hats off to the foster bloggers who can pull off the nickname thing with out slipping up or ending up with names like "sausage elbow" like I eventually would. I don't think everyone should go around numbering their kids, but it works for me.

Thank you and goodnight.